As some of you may be wondering, I have been “gone” for a couple of weeks. Thanksgiving came and whizzed past me. And then I attended a terrific three-day photo workshop in Rhode Island, led by David Williams. It was just the right injection of art + photography that I have experienced in a long time. If I can paraphrase David, his message is essentially, “imbue your work as an art form and all glory will follow.”

If you are a working photographer – no matter what sub-genre your persuasion happens to be – treat yourself to one of David's workshops. You will come away a better photographer and perhaps even a more enlightened human being.

CellJournalist “permits cameraphone users to upload photos to their servers. The company then turns around and sells these images to media outlets all over the world and shares the revenue with the photographer.” [via Micropersuasion]

Tutorial Tomb is a “massive list of plugins, filters, brushes, actions & gradients” for Photoshop users. Go to town!

Preloadr is a free service providing image manipulation functions linked with your Flickr account. It is designed to pre-process photos uploaded to Flickr.

flipclips – Turn your digital video clips into paper flipclips

Tip of the turban, well, um, to Turbanhead for this link:

“Split Magazine is an online music magazine for fans rock music in India. The e-zine includes everything from exclusive interviews with Indian and international rock bands to album, song and concert reviews — not to mention all the latest music news, gig alerts and free MP3 downloads.”

Got your headphones and want to groove to streamed music? No problem. Check out Split Radio.

I mentioned The Namesake trailer here, but here it is in all its glory. I can't wait to see it. Oh, here is a blog that goes with The Namesake movie too. Is Kal Penn really authoring it?

While we met once, and only very briefly, in Dhaka several years ago, I saw in G.M.B. Akash's work the kind of depth and breadth that I wished more photographers in the region could emulate. And now, he is clearly on a winning streak.

Just because you haven't seen it does not mean it doesn't exist. There is a plethora of talent in South Asia, waiting to be discovered. What makes Akash shine is of course his vision, his use of color, his sense of timing and light. All those things one would expect from a photographer. But those skills alone will limit your beautiful images to be stored away in shoe boxes or hard drives, never to be seen or appreciated by anyone.

What differentiates Akash is his pluckiness in putting his work and his name out there in front of people who matter most in this business: photo editors. Every month or so for the past year, I have received emails from Akash saying that he has either won or has been considered a finalist in one photo contest or another. For serious artists of the medium it is easy to tell yourself that you create art for yourself and contests don't mean a whole lot. That's fine, if you want to starve. But if you want to survive and continue creating work that is useful to society, you do now have to, well, promote yourself. And, Akash is very good at that. Entering and winning contests means putting his images and his name out into the real working world where editors and photo buyers are perusing, and perhaps persuing, new talent.

Here is a typical note from Akash. It's simple and to the point.

Dear Friends and colleagues,

You will be happy to know that i have won First Place, Color in Photographer's Forum Magazine's 26Th annual photo contest. USA.

This year 20,000 images were submitted from all around the world. As a award i will receive 1000 USD and a canon Digital SLR camera.

Due to Bangladesh’s large population, inadequate seats on the trains and poverty, it is quite common to see a thick layer of people occupying the roof of a train. Frequent accidents, which occur when a free rider slips, are not enough to deter these stowaways of the railway.

If you are a finalist or won a contest send me a note. And if it has helped you garner more assignments, definitely let me know the name of the publication. Email me the contest's name, your winning image(s) and a link to your website.

“Conceived as an introspective journey that takes you from the first daguerreotypes to war photojournalism, from fashion spreads to the greatest contemporary artists, this program includes 1700 pictures, 300 artists, and will appeal to all photographers – amateur and professional alike. This is not only the history of an amazing art form, it is also the adventure of one century and a half during which photography has captured the image of the collective conscience.

Over four hours long, this trip is as dazzling as it is moving, where one crosses paths with such celebrated photographers as Ansel Adams, Brassai, Lewis Carroll, Robert Doisneau, George Eastman, Max Ernst, Roger Fenton, Eadweard Muybridge, Helmut Newton, Nicephore Niepce, Man Ray, Edward J. Steichen, Alfred Stieglitz, Andy Warhol, Richard Avedon, Irving Penn, Robert Capa, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Herb Ritts, and many more.

Disc one includes: The Precursors, The Surrealists, War Photography, Portraitists, The Photoreporters, and Fashion Photography. Disc two includes: Nudes, Photography and Science, Amateur Photography, and The Photographic Market.”

Cost: $39.95. Value: Priceless. Where do you buy it? From www.kultur.com of course!

Freelancers, get your photo portfolio critiqued by a Pulitzer prize winning photo editor, Stella Kramer. Costs $125.

Ninja Words, a fast, online dictionary that is well, like a Ninja

Pixer.us is another online photo editor. I ought to do a review of all the ones that have cropped up. Anyone want to help me compile a list? The longest list wins a TIFFINBOX T-shirt (large/x-large). So, help …

Anil Dash points to S.R. Sidarth's article in The Washigton Post.

Sidarth, as you may recall was referred to as a “macaca” by Republican Senator George Allen of Virginia in one of his campaign speeches. That didn't help him at all. He lost to the Democratic candidate, Jim Webb by a close margin of 9,000 votes.

I am not sure what a “macaca” is but based on Sidarth's article, Allen may have thought that Sidarth was an immigrant. Not that should matter, but it clearly did to Allen as he tried to play the race card in front of a largely all-White crowd.

I love Dash's ever-so-gentle warning –

“I don't mean to belabor the macaca point, and the story is much more nuanced than it seems, but I hope all the slobbering politicians, regardless of political persuasion, take away a simple lesson from this: If you fuck with Indians in America, you will lose control of both houses of Congress.”

Have South Asians finally arrived in the US political arena? Can we see more Indians running for town councils, State Senate seats or even Congress? I sure hope so.

Neil Patel's 50 favorite blogging resources

Adobe Evangelists: Photoshop Lots of PDF's to download and read about our favorite image editing program

Confused about the connection between megapixels, image file size, and print dimensions? Check this PDF out and also this site, thanks to Photojojo

Photographer's Office – “an easy way to manage customers, organize tasks and visualize your progress. Simply put, you'll spend less time doing paperwork, and more time taking pictures.”

Camera Armor

That's My Monkey is a web site by photographers for photographers of all skill levels. They have articles, video tutorials and Photoshop actions you can buy [yummy].

Is there a diet out there for Bookfat? Wonder if bloggers experience this as well. I now have two big reasons to return to the gym.

In today's Speaking of Faith, an American Public Media program, I heard an hour-long segment with Professor Emeritus V.V. Raman, a physicist, about the confluence of religion and science. Called The Heart's Reason: Hinduism & Science, it's a great listen.

As the interview winds down, the ambient music shifts to an Indian classic: “Vaishnava Vajanotho.” I had tears flowing down my cheeks. Digging around the SOF site, I went looking for the song and the CD. Though it is listed on the site, the link is a dead one. A real shame. The CD, however, is available at Waterlily Acoustics and is called Hollow Bamboo by Ronu Majumdar, Ry Cooder, Jon Hassell, Abhijit Banarjee.

Another visit to the SOF site garnered the Speaking of Faith Playlist, which has full-length versions of all the songs featured on the program. Very cool!