Thomas Hawk Digital Connection

My good friend Marc Evans, Clearlight1971 on Flickr, is participating in a new group photography show at the Silence Gallery in the Pomona Arts Colony that Opens this Saturday night from 6pm – 10pm. This is a cool new gallery that is working with more and more photographers to get the work up and out there. Check it out if you are in SoCal and can make it.

Click through on the image above for more details!

Data Robotics today announced the release of two new Drobo models, a new consumer type Drobo (the Drobo S at an $800 price point) and a new enterprise type Drobo (the Drobo Elite at $3,500).

The main difference between the Drobo S and the previous Drobo is that the device now contains 5 hard drive bays instead of 4. Also, in addition to USB 2.0 and Firewire 800 capability, the new Drobo now supports eSata connection as well. With this new unit Drobo now claims that it offers not only single drive redundancy but dual drive redundancy, meaning that if two drives were to fail at once your data could likely still be recovered. To get all of the hardcore technical details on the new units check out the reviews on Engadget and Gizmodo.

I’ve personally been a big fan of the Drobo and use Drobos for the primary storage of all of my digital data. Remember hard drive failure is not a question of if, but when. I’ve got four Drobos at present with about 12 terabytes of storage and am buying a 5th one today myself as I’m running out of storage again. While a Drobo should not be considered a replacement for offsite backups (remember theft/fire), protecting against hard drive failure (probably the number one way people lose data) makes a lot of sense.

I don’t think that I’m going to pay up $800 just yet for the new Drobo, but it looks like the previous model (which has FireWire 800) has dropped in price and is now offering a $30 rebate. At $319.95, after rebate, this is the cheapest I’ve seen this model yet. If you’ve been thinking about picking up a Drobo, now might be the time to do it.

“Nothing is original. Steal from anywhere that resonates with inspiration or fuels your imagination. Devour old films, new films, music, books, paintings photographs, poems, dreams, random conversations, architecture, bridges, street signs, trees, clouds, bodies of water, light and shadows. Select only things to steal from that speak directly to your soul. If you do this, your (and theft) will be authentic. Authenticity is invaluable; originality is non-existent. And don’t bother concealing your thievery-celebrate it if you feel like it. In any case, always remember what Jean-Luc Godard said: “It’s not where you take things from-it’s where you take them to.”

-Jim Jarmusch

There’s a big debate going on today regarding the latest music video by Director Keith Schofield (above), Charlotte Gainsbourg’s “Heaven Can Wait” (featuring Beck). The video would seem to clearly rip off and steal ideas from amateur photographers including Flickr user William Hundley. The video above, for instance, features a skateboard sitting on four cheeseburgers, looking almost identical to a similar popular photograph which had been published previously by Hundley on Flickr.

Hundley’s posted about this apparent rip off in his flickrstream in a post entitled Someone is using my ideas… Hundley was tipped off to this rip off by Merkely who also tipped me off to it.

I’m not a lawyer and personally don’t know enough about copyright law to know if Schofield has any legal liability over this theft or not. The image is not the same, clearly, but it would be inconceivable to me that Schofield could have thought up the idea without first viewing Hundley’s original photograph. But is idea appropriation an actual crime? Is there technically any liability? I have no idea, but it’s an interesting debate and maybe someone who knows the law better than I do could chime in.

If you are in the market for a compact digital camera check out this review by Flickr user Andertho. He highly recommends the Olympus E-P1.

Retro beauty, modern function. This is the sweetest, nicest, awesomest, prettiest digital camera I have ever seen. The form factor is amazing. The build quality is just superb. The fit and finish are masterfully done. The camera has a satisfying heft even given its small size. The shutter makes a nice, quiet ka-chunk noise that is just satisfying as well. This thing looks like something Henri Cartier-Bresson would have carried around 60 years ago, yet it is an amazingly capable modern camera. This is a camera you just want to pick up and hold and play with. I find excuses to take this thing with me and use it. I love my D-300 for what it can DO. I love this camera for what it IS.

Read the entire review here.

Phillip Toledano has a powerful and touching photo essay about the death of his 98 year old father. It’s an honest photographic examination of family, life, and death. It shows how much more powerful photographs can be when you put yourself into them emotionally. Spend a few minutes going through this one. Read the words that go with the images. You won’t regret it. More of Toledano’s work here.

Thanks to Ryan MacLean for the heads up.

From Adobe:

Adobe today announced the Photoshop Camera Raw 5.6, Lightroom 2.6 and DNG Converter 5.6 Release Candidates, available for immediate download on Adobe Labs. The term ‘release candidate’ means this update is well tested but would benefit from additional community testing to provide the highest quality experience for customers working on a variety of hardware and software configurations.

The Lightroom 2.6 Release Candidate is available as a free download for existing Lightroom 2 customers, and the Photoshop Camera Raw 5.6 Release Candidate is available as a free download for existing customers of Photoshop CS4. The DNG Converter 5.6 Release Candidate is also available as a free download for all customers. Click here for more information and to test out the updates.