Sizes

My eldest nephew is getting married next weekend (the "May two-four weekend", to use the vernacular). He's asked me to be the official photographer (whatever that means; something tells me I won't be getting a press pass). I'm happy to do it, but being something of a Man Of Expensive Hobbies, I just won't feel right unless I get some ridiculously expensive gewgaw that I'll be able to blame when and if the photos don't come out perfect.

So began the hunt for the perfect flash diffuser. I have one already that I don't like much; it's a pain to put on and take off, and the results have never been all that great. I went online to see what the pros and semi-pros are using these days. Opinions seem pretty evenly divided on two different bits of gear, both (mercifully) relatively inexpensive. So I trundled off to the local expensive camera store to try them out. The first one is dead simple and gives good results in most basic situations; "solid but not spectacular" as I like to say. As for the other one, I put it on the store's flash on the store's camera and started taking test shots.

Oh. My. God. Beautiful soft light, no harsh shadows, simple to use... I fell, and fell hard. I was in love. I handed over my Interac card and walked out of the store, visions of gorgeous wedding pics dancing before my eyes.

It wasn't until I got home that reality reared its ugly head. I discovered that my swishy new flash diffuser actually comes in different sizes. The flash I tried the diffuser on in the store was a slightly newer model than the one I have, so of course the diffuser didn't fit. Who would ever have thought that a big ol' camera manufacturer like Canon would actually change the dimensions of a flash head from one year to the next? I mean really... Jeans and shoes come in sizes. Pizza comes in sizes. But flash heads?

*sigh*

I guess planned obsolescence is still alive and well in the photo world.

But no problem, right? I still had my receipt; it would be a simple matter of trundling back to said expensive camera store and exchanging the offending diffuser with the proper one. But noooooo... to paraphrase Yogi Berra, my flash is so popular that no one uses it any more. I called all the pro shops in Toronto, then all the pro shops in Calgary (where the aforementioned wedding is taking place). Finding the right size of swishy new flash diffuser seems like it will be quite a production number. All I can do for the moment is return the one I bought for a refund, use the simpler, cheaper, not-so-in-freaking-credibly-nice diffuser and grumble a lot.

I remain undeterred, although my chances of getting this thing in time for the wedding are starting to look slim. But someday, trust me: my photos will have that just-kissed-by-God look to them. In the meantime, there's always Photoshop.

Let the madness begin...

I'm a late bloomer when it comes to the blogosphere. I didn't even start reading them until last summer, when the CBC lockout created a flurry of blogs all spouting righteous indignation. Talk about cool!

Over the years I've gone through phases of journal-writing. I've even had jags of letter-writing that might have been worthy of an epistolary novel - if anything interesting happened, that is. The simple fact is that I've spent a great deal of my life actually writing things for a living. And now I'm going to do it for fun? What am I, nuts?

I think this blog is really about catharsis. I'm going to be curmudgeonly, I'm going to vituperate (as you'll soon learn, I love parenthetical comments almost as much as I love using big words) and I think I'm going to have a damn fine time doing it.

Why did I pick Voltaire2006 as a nom de plume? Simple. I think that if François Marie Arouet were alive today, he would be - holy crap - 311 years old. Wait a minute; what I *meant* to say was that if he were alive today, he and I would probably get along just fine. He'd still be 311 years old, though, so I could probably take him in a fair fight. Voltaire had a bit of a problem with authority figures (although he was apparently a great schmoozer), and hated bigotry, pedantry and, above all, intolerance. I think I could advance a strong argument that he may well have been the first curmudgeon. And who doesn't have a big ol' soft spot for the curmudgeons of this world?

I have no idea what the future holds for this blog. I might get tired of it in a week, or it may become a valuable therapeutic tool. Who knows? Someone out there in the blogosphere might even read this. I look forward to your comments.