wherein Liz works with MS Paint and MS Photos
Things I have done this week:
1. The endless saga of photo editing continues. *flops disconsolately over desk* The problem with photo edits is that they are horribly, mind-numbingly tedious, and yet I can't just automate them by saying, "Kick up the light by 30, kick up the color by 50, increase clarity by 15" and so on, because every photo has a slightly (or strongly) different color balance and light-dark balance and so on. Also some of them are cockeyed. So I have to pay attention to every single one, but it's all fiddling with sliders and squinting doubtfully at my monitor in an attempt to determine whether changing the red-green balance or reducing highlights or whatever other alteration actually helps anything.
2. I continued prodding Mr. Geniality into recording voiceovers for the video tours we shot while his voice was gone. We have six left, plus one that I need to record myself because it was the second video I shot without him and the timing is deeply fucked up, so I figure that I will suffer through trying to narrate something useful. Also we recorded three more intro clips (one of us stands outside an apartment door and does a little "Welcome to such-and-such building, located [fill in place]. Brief description of building. Today we're going to see Apartment XXX, which is a [style of apartment] on the YYY floor. Let's head on in!") because while I kept a record of intro clips for apartments where Mr. Geniality did the tour, I neglected to keep track of apartments that needed intro clips where I narrated the tour. Whoops! But that is fixed now.
3. Last week I pinned a bunch of architectural blueprints to the wall in Mr. All Hat's unused apartment. (Insofar as I am aware, Mr. All Hat's company position is "brown-noser to Company Owner." As part of that, he gets a complimentary studio. We started using it for storage last year because fuck him, and after I cleaned up his mess (ewww) we also use it as a sample unit for tours.) I then took good digital photos of the blueprints -- both each floor as a whole, and every individual apartment -- and I have been using those to create nice clean floor plans for all the apartments that did not have extant floor plans, what the hell were they even DOING before I moved to the downtown office??? *headdesk* I can do about two a day, which I think is not bad considering my only graphics program is MS Paint. *double headdesk*
The thing is, I can't just clean up the blueprints, because they are not always up-to-date! So I need to check them against photos of the apartments to see what, if anything, has been changed, which direction doors actually open, and so on. If things have changed, I then have to draw new walls, move doors, delete closets, and otherwise rearrange things as needed, so there's a creative element as well as the general "turn a grainy, grayish drawing with occasional wobbly bits into a clean, readable, sharp-edged black and white diagram." It's more satisfying than photo edits, but equally tedious.
4. Prepping for a special board meeting on Wednesday, to discuss ministerial options and things we need to make sure get addressed in our meeting with a UUA representative next Saturday morning. The UUA rep was originally planning to come to Ithaca for the weekend and give our Sunday sermon, but given the Covid-19 situation, the UUA has imposed a travel ban on national staff. So our Saturday meeting will be on Zoom, and the sermon will be pre-recorded and inserted virtually into the service in whatever fashion makes most sense to the Celebrations committee.
5. Mom's birthday was Thursday! I sang her Happy Birthday over the phone. She has safely arrived in Minnesota and is staying with Nick. :)
6. Cat's birthday was Friday! I texted her Happy Birthday, and she said she had a great day. :) Hopefully the card I sent arrived today. (I should have mailed it at the same time I mailed Mom's card, but I was distracted and didn't remember until a few days later, oops.)
7. Mr. Geniality has decided to get back into a fitness routine as his New Year's resolution. I have never had a fitness routine, per se, and since I have had regular possession of a car, I don't walk nearly as much, which was previously my default exercise. Driving is really convenient so I don't think I'm magically going to start walking a lot again, but I do want to do some kind of activity.
What I really need is a gym buddy, but I have no idea where to find one. :/
And now I think I will go websurf a bit, because my brain is kind of fried from editing photos and floor plans all day. *wry* If you want to comment on this post, you can do so over here on Dreamwidth, where there are currently (
comments)
1. The endless saga of photo editing continues. *flops disconsolately over desk* The problem with photo edits is that they are horribly, mind-numbingly tedious, and yet I can't just automate them by saying, "Kick up the light by 30, kick up the color by 50, increase clarity by 15" and so on, because every photo has a slightly (or strongly) different color balance and light-dark balance and so on. Also some of them are cockeyed. So I have to pay attention to every single one, but it's all fiddling with sliders and squinting doubtfully at my monitor in an attempt to determine whether changing the red-green balance or reducing highlights or whatever other alteration actually helps anything.
2. I continued prodding Mr. Geniality into recording voiceovers for the video tours we shot while his voice was gone. We have six left, plus one that I need to record myself because it was the second video I shot without him and the timing is deeply fucked up, so I figure that I will suffer through trying to narrate something useful. Also we recorded three more intro clips (one of us stands outside an apartment door and does a little "Welcome to such-and-such building, located [fill in place]. Brief description of building. Today we're going to see Apartment XXX, which is a [style of apartment] on the YYY floor. Let's head on in!") because while I kept a record of intro clips for apartments where Mr. Geniality did the tour, I neglected to keep track of apartments that needed intro clips where I narrated the tour. Whoops! But that is fixed now.
3. Last week I pinned a bunch of architectural blueprints to the wall in Mr. All Hat's unused apartment. (Insofar as I am aware, Mr. All Hat's company position is "brown-noser to Company Owner." As part of that, he gets a complimentary studio. We started using it for storage last year because fuck him, and after I cleaned up his mess (ewww) we also use it as a sample unit for tours.) I then took good digital photos of the blueprints -- both each floor as a whole, and every individual apartment -- and I have been using those to create nice clean floor plans for all the apartments that did not have extant floor plans, what the hell were they even DOING before I moved to the downtown office??? *headdesk* I can do about two a day, which I think is not bad considering my only graphics program is MS Paint. *double headdesk*
The thing is, I can't just clean up the blueprints, because they are not always up-to-date! So I need to check them against photos of the apartments to see what, if anything, has been changed, which direction doors actually open, and so on. If things have changed, I then have to draw new walls, move doors, delete closets, and otherwise rearrange things as needed, so there's a creative element as well as the general "turn a grainy, grayish drawing with occasional wobbly bits into a clean, readable, sharp-edged black and white diagram." It's more satisfying than photo edits, but equally tedious.
4. Prepping for a special board meeting on Wednesday, to discuss ministerial options and things we need to make sure get addressed in our meeting with a UUA representative next Saturday morning. The UUA rep was originally planning to come to Ithaca for the weekend and give our Sunday sermon, but given the Covid-19 situation, the UUA has imposed a travel ban on national staff. So our Saturday meeting will be on Zoom, and the sermon will be pre-recorded and inserted virtually into the service in whatever fashion makes most sense to the Celebrations committee.
5. Mom's birthday was Thursday! I sang her Happy Birthday over the phone. She has safely arrived in Minnesota and is staying with Nick. :)
6. Cat's birthday was Friday! I texted her Happy Birthday, and she said she had a great day. :) Hopefully the card I sent arrived today. (I should have mailed it at the same time I mailed Mom's card, but I was distracted and didn't remember until a few days later, oops.)
7. Mr. Geniality has decided to get back into a fitness routine as his New Year's resolution. I have never had a fitness routine, per se, and since I have had regular possession of a car, I don't walk nearly as much, which was previously my default exercise. Driving is really convenient so I don't think I'm magically going to start walking a lot again, but I do want to do some kind of activity.
What I really need is a gym buddy, but I have no idea where to find one. :/
And now I think I will go websurf a bit, because my brain is kind of fried from editing photos and floor plans all day. *wry* If you want to comment on this post, you can do so over here on Dreamwidth, where there are currently (
comments)