Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with pictures

Why doesn't my spouse let me see his/her facebook pictures?

Anonymous — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 08:20:37 -0800

Is this normal? Would you be worried if your spouse blocked you from seeing his/her pictures on facebook? My life partner, let's call him/her LP, blocks me from seeing any pictures on facebook tagged with "LP’s name.” LP has photos, albums posted up on facebook, but has not changed LP's privacy settings to let me see these photos.

I know this because LP and I often spend time together when one of us is on facebook. We'll send each other interesting things we've found when we’re apart, or when we're together, we'll say, "Hey, look at this!" We’ll talk about friends in common, and just generally share our facebook lives like we do our meatspace lives.

We've been partnered up for a long time. LP is, I understand, a private person. And I'm pretty sure that LP is not cheating with someone, or putting up pictures that would be explicit or shocking.

I just don't understand why LP would not allow me to see LP's photos. If LP isn’t having an affair, then this doesn't make sense to me. I've asked LP a number of times why this is the case, and LP has said, "I don't know," or "I'll fix it," or "why does it matter?" This makes me kind of sad, because we both work, and spend many hours each week apart from each other. I think it’s nice and reassuring to be able to pull up a picture of LP in the middle of a typical boring work day.

So this is my question: if your spouse did not let you see your spouse’s photos on facebook, would you think it was weird? Are there any circumstances that would make it seem more or less weird? If you asked your spouse to change this, and your spouse refused, what would you do? I guess it may be obvious that our life partnership is pretty much like most others, with good points and bad points. But that’s probably another question.

So, if you’ve read this far, and if you care, you may feel you need to know more. It’s for you that I’ve set up an email account that you can follow up with me on –
anonymailone-askmefi@yahoo.com.

Is it wrong to masturbate to one's exes when in a relationship?

Anonymous — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 08:30:45 -0800

Autoeroticafilter: Are certain self-pleasuring activities not OK? I have pictures and video of a sexual nature of a couple of my exes. While I would never show them to anyone else and am careful to make sure they remain confidential, I don't plan on getting rid of them.

Since I still find my exes very physically attractive, and I'm not very turned on by most pornography I can find, I tend to make use of these materials for personal satisfaction. I don't think there's anything wrong with this.

What I am wondering about, is whether it is wrong to do this when I'm in a monogamous relationship. I've never had problems being faithful, and I would never date anyone who expected me not to masturbate, or who had a problem with me looking at pornography, but I'm not sure this is the same.

If it makes any difference, one of the exes I don't expect to ever be in contact with again and have no desire to reunite with. Another, I am good friends with and could imagine getting back together if the timing and geography were right, but we're currently platonic and respect those boundaries.

I don't feel that looking at this material changes my feelings towards these people; it just gets me off. But, I could see where if my SO knew, it might be upsetting. Since starting a committed relationship, I haven't been looking at these things because of my uncertainty. I have two basic questions:

Is using these materials for self satisfaction wrong when I'm in a relationship?

Should I talk to my SO about this? I'm not sure I really want to ask permission, since I don't think anyone has a right to tell you how to masturbate, but I really prefer to be open and honest about things. However, I wonder if this is one of those situations where it's better to just keep it to myself.

Help I need pretty food pictures

bookdragoness — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 11:20:12 -0800

Help for the food-imagining-impaired: cookbooks and sources of recipes with pretty pictures? My husband doesn't consider food FOOD until it's cooked, so I generally decide and make what we eat. He wants to start putting together meal plans, so to help I want to surprise him with cookbooks (or other recipe sources) with pretty pictures that make him salivate.

This realization came from the other day where he was looking at canned soups and was easily biased by their food photography. I'd like to help him with his food decision-making abilities, and he has basically no ability to imagine what food tastes like from a recipe, so I thought that getting him some resources with food photographed at its tastiest might help.

I'm rather cookbook retarded - I have the Joy of Cooking, an Italian and two crockpot cookbooks - all of which were gifts. When I think of something to eat, I generally go cruising on the internet and amalgamate several recipes into something tasty.

Bonus for food that is fairly simple to make - while I like to try fancy recipes sometimes, I tend to stick to fairly simple things on weekdays.

Extra bonus for things HE could make - he has a mastery of the microwave, can make pasta (and reheat sauce), chop/slice/peel things, etc.

We have a fairly well-stocked kitchen, including a multitude of spices, blender, mixer, full set of pots/pans, good knives, rice cooker, fondue pot, and a crock pot, if that helps.

I am planning on stopping by a used bookstore on the way home - what should I look for?

3D effect with 2 animated photos

bru — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 11:05:02 -0800

Looking for a site aggregating a series of "2 slightly different pictures of the same subject animated in a loop". I have visited a few weeks ago a site showing examples of "2 slightly different pictures of the same subject animated in a loop", a very simple way of obtaining a 3D effect. I had probably found it in a Twitter link, and I thought it would be easy to find again. Wrong: Twitter search, Google, flickr: nothing.

Help me locate some pictures and their artist.

AAAAAThatsFiveAs — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 08:32:03 -0800

[ArtFilter]: Help me locate some pictures and their artist. A friend is looking to find some pictures she saw a while back on the interwebs. Based on our conversation:

- The art was very detailed, possibly photorealistic?

- Many pictures depict beach scenes. One in particular was a woman in an old-fashioned bathing suit holding an umbrella. A small child was running around her.

- The artist did a series on women. One was a silhouette of a woman against a window. Another was the form of a woman in darkness; she was wearing a skirt (maybe a slip?) that was slit very high up her leg.

- The artist may or may not be well-known, but is likely still alive.

We've tried looking up photorealistic artists on Google, but nothing has been productive so far...

Thanks, Hive!

What can you see in satellite photos?

k. — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 22:33:01 -0800

Satellite photos: what interesting features can be seen or measured in them (or other aerial photos), and where can I get a supply of images? Examples I have already seen, from some crude Google-searching:
Roads
Buildings
Degree of development (urban/suburban/rural)
Oil spills (apparently these are usually hard to see)
Blooms of algae (cyanobacteria) in the Baltic Sea
Damage to buildings from earthquakes

More would be appreciated--the more specific, the better. These will be used in a computer vision system, so I'd especially like to know where I can find a supply of images containing whatever feature I'm looking for (including the above)--easy for buildings or roads, but hard for rare events like oil spills. Natural disasters seem interesting, if there are pictures available.

I would also consider some other kind of non-photographic data as well, if it could be combined with maps or photos. Don't worry whether you think it's suitable; any idea you have will help!

Help me find a magazine

djstig — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 14:23:14 -0800

Help me find a specific magazine. I saw a childrens art magazine a few months ago somewhere, possible on Mefi, and I can't remember what it was called.

It was based in London and had a screenprinted (or screenprint-like) colourful cover. I think it had a one word title as its name, but I may be wrong. There where a number of back issues that could be ordered, about 8 or 9 (again I think)as well as being able to get a subscription. On the website for the magazine I think there where links to a hard backed issue, or other books that the same artists had made.

Just having a quick google now and found Anorak - The Happy Mag For Kids, it isn't that one!

I hope these clues are specific enough as I would like to be able to buy a subscription for my sister and my nephew. Thanks.

Where is a good spot to take pictures of a car in Seattle?

-harlequin- — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 11:00:39 -0800

What's a good place in or near the greater Seattle area, to park and photograph a car? I'm looking for somewhere which is a nice area or has a nice backdrop, has space to stop a car, and which is generally fairly deserted (so that camera etc. can be set up without constantly being the path of people/cars, and pictures can be taken without having to wait for people to leave the frame, etc). To make things harder, this would most convenient during the day on a weekend, but if a good place is most empty during office hours (or whatever), it might be worth the inconvenience.

Where can I find pictures of empty walls with footprint of frames that have been removed?

pakoothefakoo — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 18:20:13 -0800

Where can I find pictures of empty walls with footprints of picture/art frames that have been removed? Awhile ago, I read an article which I vaguely remember being about the crash of the art market, and there were accompanying photos of rooms with empty walls with art removed leaving footprint of long gone frames.

Does this ring any bell? Where can I find them, or similar pictures?

Also any ideas how can I reproduce the effect?

How do I automatically take HD scenery pictures at our old house, transmit them to our new house, and display them on our HD TV?

925 — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 16:47:51 -0800

How do I automatically take HD scenery pictures at our old house, transmit them to our new house, and display them on our HD TV? For more than 10 years, we have been waking up to gorgeous lake and mountain views. We are now moving out of the family house, and going to live in the city. But my wife wants to take her scenery and her ducks and birds and boat views with her visually day-by-day. We can park a camera at the family house, and internet access is there. We are not looking for continuous video due to the bandwidth, but maybe one frame every couple minutes. Then transmit the frame, receive the frame at the city house, and display it on a 60 inch HD display.

It would be a big plus to be able to zoom or pan, but just a crystal clear still shot is all that I feel I need to do.

What camera/lens system will take stunning long-distance HD scenery views?

How do I transmit/receive the pictures automatically?

How do I display one frame continuously until the next one comes in, and make the frame transition non-distracting?

Is zoom and pan viable?

Can I do all of this for under $1000 in equipment costs and still get great pictures? If not, how much?

How to label pictures before putting into albums?

gtr — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 12:57:01 -0800

How do I label pictures I'm putting into albums? Our family has tons of pictures we'd like to eventually scan. They're in boxes now. First, we'd like to put them into albums for safe keeping. We'd like to label older pictures with people's names or the occasion.

But what type pen? Do they make pens for this? Or should we use labels?

Any help is greatly appreciated. We don't want to hurt in pictures in the long term.

Is there a public domain resource for pictures of people along with their ages at the time that the picture was taken?

HappyEngineer — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 19:05:38 -0800

Is there a public domain resource for pictures of people along with their ages at the time that the picture was taken? The best I've come up with is places with government info which have pictures of politicians. Anything better with a wider range of types of people and ages? Obviously dating sites would be a great place to get this info, but none of them are going to be public domain.

I don't need your stinkin public service!

mhz — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 12:05:44 -0800

How can I deal with bloggers uploading pictures of private events? In my small-ish community, there are a LOT of 'events,' usually a few every day. While tradition calls for most of these to be modest affairs, people have gone crazy with size and cost over the years. Specifically weddings and engagement parties, where anyone with any tangential connection will at least show up for a few minutes of congratulation. I don't have a problem with that, I do it myself occasionally.

While I'm still old-fashioned enough to think that invitations should be personal (and everyone still does make those personal invitations to everyone they might otherwise miss), it's become common for local 'community blogs' to publicize the dates, times, and locations of all of these events. This huge invasion of privacy is often overlooked, but…

Recently, they've 'upgraded.' Now they're posting PICTURES of many events online. Still many people are happy with this, and even consider this (along with the 'notifications' of the events in the first place) a public service. I hate it.

So, what are my options to stop it?

We're talking about various websites, who use many, many, photographers. Should I ever make such a party, there's no way I'd know everyone there, and there's no way I can stop people from entering. I don't like the idea of a sign asking people not to photograph (a. I have no problem with guests taking pictures, posting them to their Flickr and Facebook accounts etc, so the wording would be weird. b. It'd probably be ignored anyway).

I can't know for certain who might be doing this, although a good hint is anybody who's not family or hired carrying an SLR. Should I see learn somebody is taking pictures for one the (I think it's now 5 or 6 different) blogs, what are my rights?

These parties, despite what they've become, are privately paid for, etc, so I imagine I can throw them out. If somebody goes without making a big deal of it, can I insist (read: force) him/her to delete the pictures taken without my authorization? What are my options if they don't want to leave? Don't want to delete the pictures? Can the fact that the time/date/location has been posted online be construed as an invitation? Does the fact that someone is invited help them at all? I don't like the idea of somebody who isn't a guest taking pictures, even if they're not being published – it's still creepy. (Nobody who's there as a guest will be taking more than a few, these bloggers routinely take hundreds.)

1,500,000 words and no where to keep them

i_am_a_fiesta — Mon, 04 May 2009 01:24:34 -0800

My dad has many boxes of the photographs he took during college 30 years ago. After completing my freshman year, I have equally as many digital pictures saved on my computer. While I would love to make 1500 prints, that isn't very plausible. What's the best way to preserve these pictures and make them easily accessible and viewable in the future? (I might be able to choose 200 or so to make the most accessible and viewable.)

L7

milarepa — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 10:26:09 -0800

I have four relatively large photographs I need framed. Where in new york city can I get a good deal? Two pictures are about 20x24 and the two others are a bit bigger. I went to the frame shop close to me and they quoted me ~250 each. I'd prefer not spending a thousand dollars to get them all framed. Can anyone recommend a place I can go? Or, alternatively, something else I could do?

Why won't my PC read my SD card?

reenum — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 16:47:55 -0800

My PC can't read my SD card. What gives? I have a 4 GB SD card in my digital camera. Last night, I tried to download the pics from the card using one of those 9-in-1 card readers.

My PC had trouble reading the card and when I finally double clicked to try and access the drive assigned to the SD card, it said that it was inaccessible due to an I/O error. This same error occurred on my laptop and work computer as well. All these computers run XP.

Any ideas on how I fix this and get at my pics?

Help Me Identify My Artwork

FeldBum — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 06:11:15 -0800

Can you help me identify my artwork, most of which I received as a gift. I put it all up here. After we were married, nearly seven years ago, my wife and I were at a party at the house of friends of my wife's family. Well, a house they had bought to tear down, and--along with the house already owned next door--build a big mansion (they're rich). We both remarked that we liked some of the artwork they had hanging up, and they said: Oh, that belonged to the previous owners (note: also rich); you can have it if you want. And so we got a lot of art (except a few Georgia O'Keefe prints). We acquired some more at flea markets and the like, so--to paraphrase what someone once to Picasso--about half the art in the house we know nothing about, except that we like it. So we need your help to figure it out.

The exgf wants pics of when we were together, what do I do?

althanis — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 08:19:48 -0800

So the ex-gf wants the pictures from when we were together, what do I do? This is a continuation of this question:
http://ask.metafilter.com/102725/Should-I-be-more-supportive-to-an-ex

So she didnt contact me for a few months. Two days ago, her cousin, who I am friends with, msgd me and told me that the exgf asked her to ask me for a DVD which I had burned and was to give the ex before we broke up, but never got around to it. The DVD has hundreds of pics, mostly with me and her, but with her family and her friends who we used to all hang around with. I told the cousin I dont have the DVD anymore.

I know the DVD isnt around anymore, it probably got thrown away after we broke up. However, I DO have all the pics on my laptop, simply because it has pics of MY friends too, and I honestly haven't had the heart in almost a year to go through them and take the ones I want out. So all the pics are sitting on my laptop.

Today, the ex signs on to MSN with her mom's account (I know this seems weird, but they were family friends before we got together, and they are nice people. I don't talk to them to maintain a link with her, I just like them). She signs on to her mom's account and tells me how she would like to have the pics, that I promised her I'd give them to her but never did, and she'd like me to burn them for her.

I told her to fuck off, but she continued to keep sending me msgs, and it continued to upset me so much, and I couldn't believe after almost one year I have not gotten over this. I just blocked the account.

My question is this. I know how important pictures are, especially after moving to another country (the ex and I have both moved to different countries). Should I just ignore her request, or should I just pop in a blank DVD, and drag the relevant folders onto it, and just find some way to send it to her?

Or did she give up all those rights to get these pictures and me going out of my way to do something kind for her, after what she's done to me?

If it matters she has moved on already, started a new relationship within a few months of us breaking up, and that relationship seems to be pretty long-term. In the meantime I have been in two destructive, awful "pseudo" relationships, one of which I have posted about anonymously.

Interesting photos wanted!

sixcolors — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 17:30:38 -0800

Nonlamephotopraphyfilter: What are some websites, books, and/or magazines that have some neat photos? Flickr pools and sets, count too. :)

Picutres of young presidents meeting old ones.

bjork24 — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 18:22:53 -0800

Are there other pictures of future presidents (prior to their political life) meeting current presidents besides the one of a young Clinton meeting Kennedy? I'd also like to exclude military pictures, so no Grant meeting Lincoln, or Eisenhower meeting FDR. Within those parameters, do any others exist?

Picture collection - how to make it straight?

widdershins — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 06:22:40 -0800

What's the best way to hang a collection of small-to-large picture frames so that 1) they're all straight - and 2) stay that way? About a year ago, I made a 'family photo wall' with lots of pictures in varying sizes - about 25-30 pictures varying from 4x6 to 12x20. The pictures together form a rectangle on the wall, with the top of the top tier, the outside sides and bottom of bottom tier of frames lining up. I'm now hanging something else on this particular wall and want to move the collection to another wall. I've run into 2 problems:

1) It was really hard to get all the pictures to line up straight as needed. Because the frames are not uniform, there's a considerable difference in the distance between the hook and the top of the frame. I worked really hard at it the first time and it still didn't turn out exactly the way I wanted, so I'm looking for advice on how to do it better the next time. (Note: buying more uniform frames is not an option - I like the frames themselves very much.) Is there an easy tip I don't know about that doesn't involve measuring hook-to-top of frame distance to the millimeter for every single picture?

2) We have small kids and there is much potential for the pictures to get moved around and hang crooked. To eliminate this, I put doublesided stickytape on the bottom corner of most of the pictures - but that's causing the paint and plaster to come off the wall as I'm removing the pics. What's the best way to fix the pics in place when I redo the picture wall - with minimum damage to the wall?

Thank you very much for your help!

How do I post many photos for a group to view?

rdauphin — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 09:27:57 -0800

I'm taking lots of photos for my community theater group, and I want to post them online for cast members to view and download. What's the best way to do that? Before the show is over, I'll probably have 400 high resolution photos to post. I want to leave them up for 6 weeks, so I don't need a long-term storage solution, just a way to provide easy access to cast members.

I opened a Flickr account, but I would be way above their free account limits. I use Picasa for editing, and Picasaweb has similar limits. I thought about setting up an online group through Yahoo or Google, but I don't have email addresses for cast and crew. I'm not sure if those are ideal for pictures anyway.

Free is best, as I'm donating my time and talents to the group, but I would be willing to pay a small amount for this service. What would you suggest?

Help my turn images into eye-candy

parma — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 10:21:28 -0800

What is the best tools to turn image collections into eye-candy? (Printable a bonus!) Example: John's Background Switcher [homepage] will take a folder and randomly arrange images on your desktop. [screen]. What other programs (Photoshop plugins?) have you come across that give similarly nice effects?

mystery.app - File Not Found

Samizdata — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 20:09:30 -0800

Does anyone know of a wireless packet sniffer for Linux that shows pictures and only pictures? A while back, while testing LiveCD based auditing Linux distros, I ran into an interesting F/OSS package which would go promiscuous, packet sniff, capture and display only graphics files being sent over the wireless LAN. It kept the packet and all other information invisible and would, if I recall correctly, just display each captured picture as an overlay on an evergrowing collage.

Unfortunately, I no longer have that CD available, and for the life of me, I can neither remember the name of the application or actually find anything on Google about it that rings a bell.

Any help would be appreciated.

Take my pictures....please!

um_maverick — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 10:32:26 -0800

My snazzy new DSLR camera (Canon Rebel XS) just arrived, so now I need to know what to do with it. My Google skills have failed to find me a useful photography class south of Boston (Brockton/Tauntron/Attleboro-type range). Please help! I'm looking for classes that will show me how to take pictures - composition, color, lenses, settings, etc. At this point, I've read a lot online, but am a hands-on noob. Something once or twice a week, maybe with some field trips built in, would be ideal.

I found courses at the Cambridge Center for Adult Education, but that's farther than I'd like to go. I also checked some area community colleges, but the only one I found (at Bristol Community College) looks like a film class - darkroom techniques, etc... Maybe I'll get to that point eventually, but right now I just want to take some good pictures, and maybe learn digital post-processing techniques.

Thanks!