Back in 2005 a group of developers made a strong push to open up a casino near the city of Gettysburg Pennsylvania. After a tough fight from many historical preservation groups this plan was defeated. Well the same developers are proposing to build a casino again. This time even closer to the historical battlefield sites in Gettysburg. Click on map to view proposed casino site.

This proposed casino site is opposed by many historical preservation groups: Civil War Preservation Trust (CWPT), National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA), National Trust for Historic Preservation (NTHP), Preservation Pennsylvania. They recently drafted a letter in opposition to this proposed casino plan.

Preservation Groups Declare Opposition to New Gettysburg Casino Proposal
Proposal poses direct threat to National Park and America's most famous small town

(Gettysburg, Pa.) - In a letter dated January 26, 2010, a coalition of state and national preservation groups conveyed to Adams County, Pa., businessman David LeVan their decision to oppose his effort to open a casino a half-mile to the south of Gettysburg National Military Park.  In the letter, the Civil War Preservation Trust, National Parks Conservation Association, National Trust for Historic Preservation and Preservation Pennsylvania cited the location's proximity to the battlefield as a direct threat, noting that the potential development and traffic impacts place the National Park at further risk. [read more]

If the casino plan comes to pass years from now Gettysburg could end up just like Charlestown West Virginia. I have driven through Charlestown several times in the past couple of years and the only remarkable thing about this city is the amount of signage and billboards dedicated to lure people into the race track and gambling. All of the historical significance of this city has been forgotten other than a footnote on Wikipedia.  They also have the most obnoxious radio ads promoting Charlestown Races and Slots. I would hate to see this happen to historical site and city like Gettysburg.

If you oppose the construction of a casino near one of our most famous Civil War heritage sites. Please sign the petition.

Additional information can be found at the following links:

• No Casino Gettysburg
• Civil War Preservation Trust
• No Casino Gettysburg Facebook Group
  

Recently I saw a post on The New Modern about a documentary of Sally Mann's process to photograph Civil War battlefields using a Civil War era photographic processes. Introduced in 1851, the wet-plate collodion process is a method of making photographic negatives on glass plates that have been coated with light-sensitive chemicals. The plate is then coated with a silver nitrate solution, loaded in a plate holder into the camera, and then exposed while still wet and sticky. The photographer has only about five minutes to make the picture before the solution dries.

This process is alluring and the results have a distinctive look that I find attractive. There is a growing number of practitioners  returning to these alternative photographic processes. As I spend more time researching my Civil War photography project I'm finding that many of these practitioners are also actively working on projects as well. I don't see myself switching to alternative processes at this time, but it certainly interesting and maybe something I could explore later.




For those interested in the history of photography I highly recommend Jeff Curto's History of Photography podcast. He records his lessons from his History of Photography class at the College of DuPage. I have listened to a couple of semesters worth of classes and have found them both interesting and valuable in my photographic research.

Here are some additional links to people that are actively exploring and using the wet plate process for their photography
Tintypes, Ambrotypes - Wet Plate Photography
Photography Contrastique - My Alternative Photographic Processes Diary
Civil War Photography - R.J. Szabo

One of the key lessons I learned in my college economic classes was the concept of opportunity costs. In a nutshell given a set of scarce resources and multiple needs, when you apply that resource to one of the needs you are giving up on the others. Those unmet needs are the opportunity costs.

One of my goals for this year is to focus my time, money, and attention (all scarce resources) on just a few goals and projects. This requires me to postpone or give up other projects I had running simultaneously in the background so I can use my scarce resources towards the goals I want to accomplish.

A recent example was presented to me last week. For the past couple of years I have been asked to photograph the talent show at my daughters old elementary school. In the past I saw this as a way to give back to the school and to potentially  build up a portfolio and client base for a future photography business. Last week I was asked once again to photograph the event this year. I was not able to photograph it due to a scheduling conflict but I took this opportunity to explore my options as if I was available.

Talking Heads - Burning Down the House

Watch out you might get what you're after Cool baby strange but not a stranger I'm an ordinary guy Burning down the house Hold tight wait 'til the party's over Hold tight we're in for nasty weather There has got to be a way Burning down the house

This weekend I helped Emma with her 8th grade science investigation project. She was able to pick any project she wanted and decided that burning down houses would make a fun project.

Her study was to compare black and silver heat resistant paint against a control of no paint. She built 9 different popsicle stick houses, painted them, and then we burned them to see which one would last the longest.

She also needed photos for her project board and with fire involved I was very happy to give her a hand.

In the photo above you can see the glue bubbling on the corner of the house.

For those that are curious, the silver heat resistant paint lasted the longest by almost a minute. The black heat resistant paint didn't do much better than the unpainted houses.

The project made for some interesting photos and I can potentially see myself doing some more controlled burns of stuff in the future to get some abstract photos using my 180mm macro lens.

The start of a new year gives me time to reflect about the coming year and also about the year past. What went well and what didn't. The last year was a tough one for the family and I. This time last year I had a single goal, to find a new job. I accomplished that goal in the middle of July and I'm happy to be fully employed again, unlike many people in the current economy.

My creative photographic output also suffered for the first half of the year. I guess Maslow knew what he was talking about. While I was unemployed I took consulting jobs to help pay the bills and I also toyed with the idea of taking some paid photographic jobs. I shot several events and portraits last year with the idea to build up my photographic portfolio. This portfolio could be used to help launch a photo business. During these small odd jobs I quickly confirmed something that I already knew, I don't want to make a business out of my photography. I like having my photography as a hobby and creative outlet. Turning it into a business and becoming a professional photographer is just not for me. I'm happy and proud to call myself an amateur rather than an aspiring professional.

Back to my goals for this year, I have found that the goals that have the highest likelihood of being accomplished are the goals that are written down. So with that thought in mind here are my goals for Twenty 10.

One of the reasons I had for converting this website from a photography portfolio website to a blog was to give me a central location where I can post my thoughts and writing. At one point I was maintaining 3 different written blogs, a photoblog (which I'm still running at mydrive) and a static photography website. One of my goals for this year is to write more and a having a centralized location will help me to fulfill that goal.

During my day job I program and manage several websites. That provides a great deal of information that I can write about on a regular basis. So I recently created a Technology category that will I will use to record my thoughts about technology, software, hardware, and the like. Here is an ideal example lesson learned (or maybe re-learned.)

During the month of December the 2010 Smithsonian National Zoo calendar was shipped to all of the Friends of the National Zoo (FONZ) members. I'm happy to report that one of my images was selected for a page in the calendar that was set aside to promote the FONZ Photoclub. For this page they took a selection of photos from our photoclub members for display on the calendar.

The FONZ photoclub meets on the first Tuesday of every month in a relaxed and inviting environment to share and learn about photography. The club also raises money to support the Zoo by selling member's photographic work at special events. Club members also help out with photographic services at various zoo special events.

Earlier this week we had our January meeting and there were several new faces in attendance. They all mentioned they learned about the photoclub from the calendar. So this little promotion seems to have done the trick.

Shown below is one of my images they selected to be shown on the page.

As we enter a new year and a new decade everyone starts to think about changes... changes to habits... changes to goals...  and in my case changes to websites.

I have been wanting to update the structure of my website for sometime and a new release of the Movable Type content management system gave me a good excuse to make some updates. With this change I decided to merge my 30seasons.com blog into my main manderson.com domain. This website will be my primary home for all my photography, writing, and links to my social media presences on the internet.

The first round of updates have been completed and I plan on additional changes over the coming weeks, so stay tuned.