Spring Flowers '11 desktop wallpaper

It’s finally happening.

After such a brutal winter, Spring finally seems like it’s here. Of course, I’m ignoring the fact that it snowed last week, but that’s neither here nor there.

To commemorate the return of sun, outdoor activities, and a decrease in depression levels, I’ve created my yearly Spring Flowers desktop wallpapers and posted them over at mybestdesktops. Bring a little sunshine to your computer by downloading these today. Or if you like, download some spring flowers from 2010, spring flowers from 2009, or spring flowers from 2008.

I should remember to get outside!

The Orchid Show: Cuba in Flower

Last week, the woman and I rode up to the Bronx to check out the New York Botanical Gardens’ The Orchid Show: Cuba in Flower. It was cold and there was still snow on the ground, but, for the most part, the ride was pleasant. After paying our $12 to park the motorcycle and $20 each to get in, we quickly found ourselves transported to (generally) warmer, lusher, more Caribbean climes. For the most part, the walk through the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory (incidentally, the nation’s largest Victorian-era glasshouse) was quite pleasant and the orchids on display delicately mesmerizing.

I should remember to make orchid hunting yet another reason to get to Cuba sooner rather than later. I’ll just keep this orchid desktop wallpaper up to remind me!

Oh yeah…

After Martinique, I spent the holidays freezing and damp high in the Peruvian Andes. This trek was organized through Adventure Life. For the most part, it was great. Some time in Cusco acclimatizing ourselves to the altitude, then off to the Ausangate region for 6 days climbing over 17,000 foot passes, meeting Andean people, watching baby alpacas being sheered and sometimes born, visiting the markets, sampling local cuisine like guinea pig and strawberry beer… and basically taking in the gorgeousness of the often brutal landscape. (There’s a desktop or two available over at mybestdesktops.com)

After the trekking, we took the easy train route to Machu Picchu… Truly breathtaking ruins, but I wouldn’t recommend taking the train all the way there and the town of Aguas Calientes was a bit too touristy. Finally we spent the New Year in Lima drinking Pisco Sours and exploring.

Although there were many memorable experiences along the way, it was hard to compete with a month in the Atlas Mountains of Morocco. Additionally, there were some hiccups with Adventure Life… I should remember to think twice before using them again.

Immediately upon retuning to New York I had a single day to relax before heading down to Savannah, Georgia for a work shoot. The fruits of that labor should be launching soon. I should remember to chat about it then.

Then it’s been heads down working.

I should remember not to work so much… and travel more.

Yes, that’s an oversimplification and the law isn’t quite so cut and dry unless the work is registered with the government (still not 100%), but that would have been all the information needed to cover the uses outlined in that post.

When I wrote that first post, there were plenty of funny examples of my works finding their way into company’s and people’s commercial uses. I wasn’t trying to be mean spirited about the whole thing, it was more of a humorous take on unauthorized appropriation for small commercial endeavors… but what happens when it’s not a small or humorous commercial endeavor?

That was just the case when I woke up this past Sunday morning and during my normal morning routine, watched a heart wrenching video about Tainted Meat on the New York Times website. At the very beginning of the piece was this photo:

I immediately recognized it. I’d taken that photo of a garden gnome in an old lady’s front yard while in California last year… but I honestly couldn’t believe that the Times could have overlooked getting authorization of this photo I’d made available for personal use on mybestdesktops.com.

I so couldn’t believe it, that I didn’t even double-check the photo until the following day when I overlaid the Times crop over my original.

There was no question. That was my photograph in a New York Times video piece! I immediately, checked with my photographer, photo editor, illustrator friends and a copyright lawyer on the best course of action. Some were more official or threatening than others… but I thought the best thing would be to call the producer of the piece… this must have been an unfortunate oversight.

To make a long story short, dealing with the folks at the Times was a pleasure and action was taken swiftly to correct the problem. I have nothing but the utmost respect for the work they do and can completely understand how this sort of error could occur.

In the end, I got credited just below Pulitzer prize winning photographer Damon Winter… and the story has really gotten a big response that could turn into positive change in the meat industry.

I should remember to keep shooting… this could be going somewhere.

Yellow Scooter desktop wallpaper

So, posting a couple yellow desktop wallpapers at MyBestDesktops on the subject. The first one is the yellow scooter you see above (and previously saw in my first post on yellow). The next will be something even more yellow! That one should be available on Monday.

Enjoy.

Crazy clouds over Manhattan

Last Friday, while having some dinner at Mexican Radio (after missing a Michael Jackson tribute in Times Square), I and 8 million or so New Yorkers were treated to some amazing cloud formations and lighting as the sun set on a crazy week in general.

Luckily, I had my camera with me and was able to grab a few decent shots to remember just how weird everything looked. I’ve posted them on my Flickr account and Gothamist even posted one in their gallery about the mammatus clouds.

And additionally, you could download the Crazy Clouds Over Manhattan image as a desktop wallpaper over at MyBestDesktops.com.

I should remember to carry my camera with me as much as I can.

Update: In a roundabout way one of the photos I took of the clouds made its way onto CNN via a video report that featured  Gothamist which had a thumbnail of the shot. It’s tiny and only there for a second, but it’s there:

Basically, what TinEye does is take any image you submit to it and try to find wherever it’s being used online. The easiest way to use the service is by installing the Firefox extension.

So, with that out of the way, let’s check out some of the thieves using my imagery without permission:

MintProperty.com used my Empire State Building desktop for a party flyer:

Before

After

My Dark Sky desktop wallpaper is getting used quite a lot. Here are a couple examples:

Before

After

After...

After Again!

My High Voltage desktop from Hong Kong used for the Zap Stick 800,000 Volts Pink Stun Gun:

Before

After

And my Manhattan Bridge desktop used also for a party flyer (extra funny because I’m in the lower left of the image):

Before

After

These are just a few of the ways unscrupulous folks online have been ripping off some of my images. Not a ton that can be done about it, but at least with TinEye.com, I can stay up to date with some of the offenders.

I should remember to visit that site often…

Last April, I posted some Spring Flower desktop wallpapers to MyBestDesktops.com and they’ve become the most popular designs on the site. In the past few weeks their traffic and downloads have increased dramatically, so it seems like there’s a demand for some nice, flowery, desktop designs for Spring.

To help, I’ll be posting 5 new Spring desktop wallpapers over the course of the next 2 weeks. Hopefully, people will download them and the world will be a better place. Of course, the RSS feed would be the best way to stay up to date.

I need to remember to enjoy Spring as much as possible.

I should remember to upload more desktops.

I need to remember to keep uploading stuff!