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Archives for 2003

Birthday Party for Aunt Pat and Mrs. Chang

We had the extended family over to celebrate Aunt Pat and Mrs. Chang’s birthdays. We had 13 people over for dinner: Agnes Chang; Amy and Kevin Olbright; Dave, Trina, and Will Fiala; Art and Pat Fiala; Bill and Dottie Bush; and Christine, Katherine and I. We roasted 4 chickens and ended up only serving 3. We plan to use the extra chicken meat to stock our freezer full of Chicken Noodle soup.

We got a late start with dinner as we spent too much time at a cool children’s bookstore in Issaquah. Everyone arrived around by 6P and we sat down to a chicken dinner. By this time, Katherine was completely exhausted. She had a long day, being entertained by Grandma and Grandma Bush and wandering around Issaquah. She didn’t get in her full nap schedule. By the time dinner arrived she was so worn out she couldn’t fall asleep. Christine and I took shifts trying to get Katherine to sleep but there was just too much going on. Katherine wanted to be social and hang out but she needed her sleep. Christine and I need to manage her sleep schedule better when guests are in town so this doesn’t happen again.

This was the first family gathering that Will and Kevin played with each other. They used to play with each other’s toys but this was the first time they actually played with each other as playmates. It was fun to watch though it increased the decibels in the house a couple of notches.

After dinner, Christine took her mom to the airport for her red-eye flight back to Dulles. Mrs. Chang was an invaluable help and we thank her for helping us take care of Katherine while we went to work.

Tong Family Visit

Ken and May Tong (Rich’s parents) are long time friends with Christine’s mom, Agnes. Mr. and Mrs. Tong came over today to spend some quality time with Mrs. Chang and to see Katherine. The Tongs chatted with Mrs. Chang in Mandarin Chinese for the benefit of Katherine. Christine and I asked Mrs. Chang to speak Chinese to Katherine so Katherine would learn the sounds of the Chinese language.

Mrs. Chang and the Tongs spent the afternoon together catching up and seeing the Tongs new house. Mrs. Chang returned just in time for the family gathering where we celebrated her and Aunt Pat’s birthdays.

Family Gathering

Christine’s mom has been staying with us since Monday. She’s been helping us take care of Katherine while our nanny Patty is on vacation. She’s been doing a great job and has really enjoyed spending some quality time with her granddaughter Katherine.

On Friday, my parents arrived in town. Christine’s mom leaves Saturday night and my mom will be taking care of Katherine until Patty returns on Wednesday. My dad is spending the weekend and flying back Sunday night. It’s great to have the extended family around. Katherine is the center of attention and the house is bustling with activity. There is no shortage for helping hands to hold Katherine while Christine and I catch up on chores.

Friday night, Kevin and Amy joined my parents and Christine’s mom for dinner. Steve threw together some hamburgers and we sat around the kitchen table for dinner. Earlier in the week, Steve broke one of the kitchen chairs and was paranoid that Mrs. Chang despite being light as a feather would re-break it and fall back through the glass door taking Katherine along for the ride. A quick chair change solved this problem.

After dinner, we all gave Katherine a bath. Katherine loves taking a bath, kicking her rubber duckies with her tiny feet. We showed everyone all of the bath entertainment devices we have: purple octopus, 4 yellow duckies, foam letters, and the highlight: bubbles. Christine whipped out the Gymboree bubbles and proceeded to fill the bathroom full of bubbles. Kevin and Katherine had the time of their lives. Kevin was impressed with the number of bubbles and that they stayed in the air for so long. Popping the bubbles turned out to be just as fun as watching them float around.

After Katherine’s bath, we all went up to the entertainment room to hang out. Steve blew up the Aero bed for Mrs. Chang to sleep on and Kevin proceeded to jump on it as a trampoline. Kevin had a great time jumping on the Aero bed and he demonstrated an uncanny coordination. There were several instances that we thought he was going to go careening off the bed into the couch or wall but he recovered his balance in the nick of time. Kevin also liked doing somersaults on the bed with the help of Amy and Steve to push him over the top.

Bisco has been itching himself due to a skin irritation. We put a cone on his head so he couldn’t continue to itch himself and irritate his skin some more. Everyone felt so sorry for Bisco, especially Kevin. Kevin called Bisco “cone head”. Kevin would stick his head in front of Bisco and pet his nose. Every time Kevin pet Bisco’s nose, Bisco would lick Kevin’s hand. Kevin started to imitate Bisco by sticking his tongue out too.

Soon, it was time for Kevin’s bath. Amy used our bath tub to give Kevin a bath so she could put him directly to sleep when they got home. Steve finished cleaning up after dinner and Christine moved downstairs to finish up her OneNote deck. She has an executive presentation next week and this was the best time for her to finish it up so the team could review before the meeting.

Everyone is coming over Saturday night to get together and celebrate the birthdays of Mrs. Chang and Aunt Pat. It should be a full house. We’re off to run some errands and to the grocery store to pick up fixings for Pot Roast.

Color Management on the Epson 2200

The key challenge in viewing and displaying digital photos in color management. Color management is the process by which different digital devices can alter a digital image for display on that device. The CCD in a digital camera converts light into a binary image. This binary image can be RAW (exactly what the senSors see) or compressed into a format like JPEG. Most people output JPEG format from their digital cameras. Not all devices render the binary values in a JPEG as the image as seen through the lens of the digital camera. Different printer papers (glossy, matte, luster, flat) combined with ink produce different variations of color. Color management provides a mapping mechanism between the device and the digital image. On Windows these are called ICC profiles.

I print most of my “keepsake” images using Adobe Photoshop. I use Adobe’s RGB (1998) working space for manipulating my images. Often I have to convert the image’s color space to my “working color space” within Adobe Photoshop. I turn off color management on the printers and use Epson’s ICC profiles for the different papers I’m printing on. I use the “SP2200 Premium Glossy_PK” profile when I’m printing on Epson’s Premium Glossy photo paper. Adobe Photoshop 7.0 has a Print with Preview option that allows me to scale pictures to fit the paper and set the “Print Space” to be the “SP2200 Premium Glossy_PK” profile. When Printing Adobe will map the image from the Adobe RGB 1998 working space to the printer’s ICC profile (“SP2200 Premium Glossy_PK”).

If you have Adobe Photoshop, I recommend downloading the P.I.M. II plug-in from the Epson web site. It automatically installs the Epson 2200 ICC profiles for their most common paper types. The P.I.M. plug-in also supports EXIF image header information. This gives Adobe additional clues as to what image was captured by your digital camera.

Switching to Digital

Switching to Digital

I consider myself a serious 35mm amateur photographer. Christine and I lugged a whole bunch of Nikon gear to Africa and shot nearly 80 roles of slide film. I had always preferred film or slide photography because I could reproduce my favorite photos, frame them or give them to relatives. My early digital camera didn’t have the color saturation and variations in tone that could be produced with the chemical development process used for film.

A couple of months ago, I purchased the Nikon D100 digital camera. This is an SLR camera that basically is a digital version of Nikon’s F100 camera but with a plastic body instead of metal. The D100 takes amazing pictures and I’m very happy with it’s color reproduction for everyday pictures. I will continue to use my Nikon F100 for portraits, special events, and some travel photography. For everything else, I’m switching to digital. It was just too much of a pain to scan in negatives and slides to display them on my web site. By shooting digital, I can post the photos directly to my web site.

I didn’t feel like I could switch primarily to digital until I could find a reasonably priced photo printer that produced near photo lab quality results. I purchased the Epson 2200 photo printer and I’m completely happy with the results. If I print on Epson premium glossy photo paper and look at the print from a distance (framed photo distance) I cannot tell it from a photo lab print. With the Epson 2200, I’m able to make enlargements and copies of my digital photos for framing and for giving to relatives. Each print costs more than a photo lab equivalent but I find that I print only the photos that I want to give away. Most of my digital photos end up hosted on my web site. My web site is now the primary tool for me to communicate and share photos with family and friends.

Epson 2200

The best feature about the Epson 2200 is the roll paper and cutter option. Using the Windows XP printer wizard (I had to configure everything first), Christine can select a digital image from a file share and print a 4×5 photo using the wizard. A roll of 4″ paper is feed through the printer and the printer automatically cuts the photo to size.

The inks and color matching software in the Epson 2200 are much improved. From B&H Photo: “By using Epson’s seven-color UltraChrome inks, the Stylus Photo 2200 is able to print images at fast speeds with a larger color gamut than the previous generation. These unique pigment-based archival inks reproduce the color range, density and saturation of dye-based inks more than ever before, making this printer the best in its class with its photo and color quality, and superior fade-resistance.” When using Epson paper, prints are expected to last 80 years or more.

I’m a happy digital photographer.