Pod Design, Ho Ho’s, and digital camera woes
We’ve been blessed with great partners in developing Daily Grommet. You saw Eric Marthinsen (of Agile Commerce) in the launch video. Equally key has been Pod Design, who did our front end design and guided us on video strategy.
Their great work, professionalism, and partnership approach has been delightful. But I was really touched when the two principals, Steve and Lizzie Curran dropped by this basket of flowers, to mark our first official day of operating the business.
If you look closely you’ll see some unexpected white adornments in the beautiful flower arrangement. Those would be…HoHo’s. There’s a little story there. You see, we were meeting late one night when my husband dropped off a dinner for me (how great is that?). It was sushi and Yodels. Pretty much sums up the breadth of my food habits. But with that box of Yodels on the table, I discovered that Lizzie, of Pod, was not immune to the occasional packaged cake treat, so we trade stashes of such here and there. And thus the Ho Ho’s.
So onto the camera woes. Being ignorant is so frustrating. My new digital camera controls throw me into that boat, every time I use it. I should explain that I am a pretty active photographer, and have been on a film camera since I was about 10 years old. My all-time favorite camera was a totally manual Olympus OM-1. I used that ever since design school, until son #2 inadvertently poured lemonade all over it. (He was only a baby…) So getting used to this Canon EOS Digital–in among the many more pressing things I need to learn–has been hard. Son #1 has helped me. Husband wrote up an “even-Jules-can-follow-this” quick settings guide.
Yet I go to snap a simple flower arrangement shot and I am stymied. I have no patience for gadgets. But here is the funny part. No matter how I tried, I could not get the camera to focus for this flower shot. Now focussing is pretty basic. Even I can do that. But there was this big blurry center spot in every shot. Depth of field problems? No. ISO off base? No. I ran through my limited repertoire of check points until I noticed…. a big fat Ho Ho frosting smudge right on the center of the lens. Guilty as charged. I have the blurry photographic evidence–to destroy right after I write this post.
Anyone want to come and lend a hand in the photography department at Daily Grommet? Seriously. Need a product photographer hobbyist to take this camera out of my hands. The pay is ridiculous but we are nice people to work with, and we have plenty of Drake’s Cakes on hand.
Jules Pieri 
2 Responses to “Pod Design, Ho Ho’s, and digital camera woes”
Thanks Jules. We are big fans (of Daily Grommet, not just junk food) and know you guys are on your way to great things.
[…] 9, 2008 by julespieri Two weeks ago I whined about how bad I was at taking the photos of Grommet products. (And also whined about how that was the last thing I should be doing with my time.) A couple […]