Back to old habits

I have been having a dilemma lately with my blog.  I have been blogging on jeremywilburn.wordpress.com since last year and have really gotten away from the original intention for starting to blog.  I began blogging as a student/staff blogger representing the University of Illinois at Springfield.  So to remedy the situation, I have decided that I will start another blog, and here it is!  This blog will focus more on the personal aspects of my life and the things I do for fun with friends and family.  I will post photos and videos much more often and want this blog to be fun!

And now, I officially present to you jwilburn.wordpress.com!  Leave me some feedback and I hope you will enjoy the journey!

Using Pixish for Higher Ed

This has been a crazy busy week with like a million of projects, all back to back…finally I get to blog…my apologies.

So I ran across a website the other day called Pixish. That same day, Brad Ward from SquaredPeg blogged about it’s uses in higher ed. I met with some creative students yesterday and talked to them about how they would feel about submitting photos in exchange for photo credits for use on some of our webpages (Student Life, Student Page?, Media Quad, etc.). It was unanimous, and everyone said they would be happy to submit photos. We currently do not have a campus photographer (he retired 6 months ago) other than myself, and I am do not consider myself a professional photographer; I can just take pretty good photos. So I thought, why not open this up and see what kind of response we get. I will be monitoring the site for quality of shots and to ensure they will help add to our goals. I will not just take any shot of students, certainly not something point and shoot, but actual really excellent shots of students having fun. FJ Gaylor blogged about how to capture life after 5 p.m. This is definitely something we have always struggled with, and really do now since I have moved from the Student photographer position I held here last year to full time marketing. No one has filled that void yet, I’ve got my eyes on a young woman I met at a preview day, so hopefully she comes to UIS next year! Anywho…chime in on how you feel about this and whether or not you think students will really take advantage of this.

Weekend Re-Cap

Superbowl Weekend! Not gonna lie, I was really getting sick and tired of all the “perfect” talk accompanying the Patriots. I am a hardcore Patriots (and Jets) hater! And that can only mean one thing: I am a Dolphin’s fan. Flame me for their horrible season last year, but the Tuna’s in charge and has revamped practically the entire coaching staff. Anyway, something else the superbowl brings is usually awesome and memorable advertisements. While I have always enjoyed watching the commercials, I found myself not only viewing them, but really looking for the next big idea in any one of them. But more on that later! I’ve got to tell you about the events that led up to Sunday first.

Thursday night, we were predicted to get a TON of snow. I really don’t like snow that much. Sure it’s pretty, but it makes such a mess of things. Classes got canceled for the evening in preparation for the worst. Come 5:30 a.m. friday morning, word came down that the campus was closed! Woohoo, three day weekend! I look outside and this is what I saw.

That’s right…A TON of SNOW! 10 inches to be exact…19+ from drifting…

And here’s my poor car…Look at the snow on the mirror. I had to dig out the bottom of my door so that I could get it open.

My buddy T and I spent some time digging our own cars out as well as a couple of our friends, and even some people we didn’t even know. We even pushed one girl out of a snow pile she drove into, later admitting that she’d never seen snow like this before…crazy.

The next day, I came down with something awful…I mean, I have been out of commission for the last three days…I don’t usually get sick, but when I do, it’s bad news…I’m feeling better today, but I wouldn’t have minded another day off to relax.

On Superbowl Sunday, my friend Chad held a get together at his place so we could watch the game on his 52″ plasma (thanks to me and SD). Let me just revisit what I said earlier about me really not liking the Patriots. I just wanted to make sure that was fresh in your mind. The game was full of a bunch of great plays on both sides, but one play stands out above all…This scramble by Manning and ensuing catch by Tyree…INCREDIBLE!

I am sorry for jumping around so much, my mind is still recovering from the medicine…back to business. So of the commercials that were played, there were a couple that stuck out in my mind. Some in a good way, and others in a bad way. First: Winner for the night…The Tide talking stain commercial. Congrats to their marketing team for that video. They did it all right…entertaining, made me remember their product, and drew me back in with an interactive website at the end mytalkingstain.com

Other winners for the night included Budwiser/Bud Light, Bridgestone (maybe a surprise?), Coca-Cola, Diet Pepsi Max, and Sobe. You can view them all on MySpace’s Superbowl ad site.  Line of the year:  “Suck One.”  Wait for the T-Shirts!

I am getting the bug back!

So as I sit here, bitterly enjoying my Subway sub and looking at lenses for my camera, I am thinking to myself: “I really miss taking photos.” Over the course of the past week or so, I have been able to take a lot of photos of a variety of different things. I’ve been able to hang out with some friends and shoot photos with them, and more importantly, some of my girlfriend! As I thought about it over lunch, I realized the reason I quit enjoying photography was because I was shooting too many things that I wasn’t passionate about. Not only that, but it was usually on a last minute notice thing and more often than not, after hours. And while I enjoy attending events, I wish I had something to show for it. I talked with our creative director the other day, and ever since I started here I’ve been trying to get some new camera equipment. I’ve been begging for a good telephoto to replace the 28-200 G lens that I have now. Performance wise, the lens takes nice photos outdoors. Inside shots with low light, and autofocusing though are awful. I don’t think I’ve ever used a lens that focuses as slow as this one does, and is also not that accurate. Also, the zoom is not very tight (and is backwards from every other Nikon lens I’ve ever used…) and slides out while moving around. Aside from all that, it does take nice photos when the lighting is right. Unfortunately for me, I take a lot of photos in very poorly lit places and in places you’re not supposed to use a flash. In these situations I resort to my trusty 50mm f1.8. Like these photos here, the left one being pretty much my trademark shot:

Now, my friend Joe, of FJ Gaylor told me yesterday that he had a lens he might be able to sell me which would be amazing! Hook me up! Another reason I have been excited about photography is because the FJ Gaylor was updated to include all their fall 07 shots. Let me just say that they have their act together! If you need photographs of your college, I would highly recommend them! And I’m not the only one.

 

Moving on, last night at the library (I briefly mentioned this earlier) I was helping Jordan find some things. I came across a book titled “Memoirs of Mary and Martha Washington.”

 

Then I looked at the copyright date in the center on the bottom of the page….1852.

Isn’t that amazing?!?  It’s crazy to think that book is actually in my universities library.

It’s hard to read, but this book was given as a gift on Christmas in 1853.  These photos were taken with my iPhone.  It does a decent job for a camera phone in low lighting.  But so anyway, I was really amazed and I think the artistic aspect of that book really made me enjoy photographing them (even just with my phone).

 

Alright…last thing…I mentioned bitterly enjoying my sandwich.  Last time I got a tuna sub from Subway I got a six inch.  They put three scoops of tuna on my six inches.  Today I was starving and decided to get a foot long.  I watch as he applies the tuna and see him put only four scoops on my sandwich.  Now…it’s been a while since I’ve taken a math course, but if there are three scoops on a six inch, shouldn’t there be six scoops on a twelve inch sub?  The tuna was spread so thin on my sandwich, I would have gotten all bread and veggies.  So I asked him to put another scoop on my sandwich and he said it would be .50 a scoop.  Then I started thinking, I’m paying more for a 12 inch sub with an extra scoop of tuna than I would for two individual six inch subs.  $7.10 later, I leave with my sub and drink (drink was free for being a student!) and return to my office.  I usually spend $3.27 for lunch on a six inch sub.  It probably wouldn’t bother me so much except for the fact that 4 out of the last 5 times and 7 out of 10 times I have gotten “fast food” whether it be from Subway, Taco Bell, or Wendy’s, they have gotten my order incorrect.  I guess they think that when I ask for a hamburger I really want a cheeseburger instead.  Customer service has really gone down hill…