Yesterday was another Athens, GA Strobists meet. Like the previous meets, there was lots of talk about camera capabilities, radio trigger capabilities, working the camera within the flash synchronization speed, etc.
I did stand in for some shots while we waited on actual models to show up. I think I’ll stick to behind the camera.
Caught this one when Katie’s friend, Sara, said something to make Katie laugh.
As this was mostly at night, my Canon wasn’t focusing, so I shot in manual. While the light was right, most were out of focus. Suggestions?
In the Q&A, Stuart Brown, co-author of Play: How It Shapes the Brain, Opens the
Imagination, and Invigorates the Soul, rejects the idea play is a rehersal for adulthood. Stopping an animal from playing doesn’t prevent the animal from being a successful predator. REM sleep provides the rehearsal needed for learning. Play is the next evolutionary step. The video is a little too heavy on repeating the same generic idea over an over with different examples. However, they are amusing examples.
The types of play Brown references usually involves multiple individuals in a social interaction. This play teaches survival skills like socialization, adaptation, flexibility (our selfish genes at work).
The origin of this play research was in identifying the next Charles Whitmore, the University of Texas Tower sniper. In studying mass murderers, he found Charles and others like him consistently grew up in environments where play was not allowed. By not playing these children developed into dysfunctional adults.
I found a particular claim quite interesting. “The opposite of play is not work… It is depression.” That is almost word for word out of his book on page 126, which Google Books has a copy. Later he better explains the part about play and work are not in opposition:
The quality that work and play have in common is creativity. In both we are building our world, creating new relationships, neural connections, objects…. At their best, play and work, when integrated, make sense of our workd and ourselves. (Play, p.127)
I think the opposition to depression involves movement which is exercise. Exercise produces serotonin which is crucial to fighting off depression. So my work, sitting in a cube all day long problem solving is good for dopamine but not a producer of serotonin. However, a good game of tag would produce both dopamine in anticipating tagging a playmate and serotonin from the movement. (Why can’t work be more like tag?)
If Dr. Brown is right, then suppressing the rough and tumble playing children enjoy is the best way to place in society malfunctioning adults who are more likely to be violent. Things like recess (just half an hour) during the day will keep our prisons less full 20 years later. <sarcasm>Maybe the No Child Left Behind meant all the children will end up in prison?</sarcasm> More likely children will fit their play in less supervised situations and get their fill.
This little snake was found in the hallway at work. I thought the commotion was a continuation over the geyser in a sink until GH asked if I brought my pet to work. Went over the see and snagged this before maintenance took it away. Hope he enjoys life on the other side of the road.
I wish I had brought my dSLR. It really would have broought out the details. This okay I guess for automatic fash.
Someone brought a baby. There are lots of strange noises from women making baby speak. The only thing I understood from all of that was, “Do we have a new employee?”
Get ‘em started young, I guess. Teach ‘em to be good employees before they learn to talk back.
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Some of my latest work has been in chasing cheaters or “Vista ate my homework” claims. Some background: I work for a project that hosts online classes for 32 of the 35 universities in our system. We have about 125,000 users who have performed at least 100 actions this term. We have had about 50 million hits this semester (over in a couple weeks). The stories
DBA: Some of you use stage in all lower case, some in all upper case, and some in mixed case. You have to all use one naming convention. The way you have written this, its not going to work. Programmer: That is why I am here. I need you to fix their stuff so it will. DBA: Do you know what a “Catch-22″ is? Programmer: No, but I have a feeling you are going to tell me. DBA: Its when you do it one way which causes this to break. When you do it this other way it causes this other thing to break. Programmer: Right, I just want to do it my way and it to work. DBA: By breaking everyone else’s stuff?
