“In the end, everything is a gag.”

- Charlie Chaplin

 

When it comes to college basketball prognostication, 2011 will be remembered as the Year of the Woman.

Not only did the Roundball Oracles crown our first ever champion from the fairer of the two sexes, three out of the top four finishers were also members of the female persuasion.

It was certainly a chaotic NCAA Tournament this year.  Consider these facts:

 

• Before the Final Four was even played, our championship was already secured.
• Only two people (Jesse and I) even got a single Final Four team right. We both got Connecticut right.
• Our eventual champion’s national champion lost in the 1st Round.
• 6 people picked Kansas as their champ, 4 picked Duke, 2 people picked Ohio State, 1 person picked Syracuse, 1 person picked UCLA, 1 person picked Michigan State, and 1 person picked BYU. None of those teams even made it to the Final Four.
• Our eventual champion finished in last place last year.
• Our 3 time defending champ finished in 2nd to last place this year.
• Only Jesse got 1 of the teams in the championship game (Connecticut) right.

So who is the new Queen of College Basketball Divination?

 

It is Carrie Baier!

 

The Final Standings

Name – Bracket Name – Points – Correct Games – Last Year

1. Carrie Baier – Izzo – 100 points -41/63 – 21st
2. Jesse Howard – MeatThermometer – 94 points  – 39/63 – 13th
3. Linda Toot – LittleSister – 74 points – 38/63 – 9th
4. Dawn Krause – Duh Winning – 73 points – 34/63 – 3rd
5. Jason Baier – Duke the Fifth – 72 points – 35/63 – 7th
6. Corey Faust – Always Go Top Shelf – 69 points – 34/63 – 4th
7. Christopher D. Bennett – They Call Me Mr. Bennett – 63 points – 31/63 – 18th
8. Robert Henning – Losing Bracket – 59 points – 32/63 – 8th
9. Russell Kennerly – StackinWinsLikeJustinBeiber – 59 points – 31/63 – 17th
10. Andree Jauhari – Floccinaucinihilipilification- 58 points – 31/63 – DNP
11. Nate Buckingham – White Magic – 57 points – 33/63 – 9th
12. Tim Peterson – Dominate Monkey – 57 points – 32/63 – 9th
13. Lowell Davis – Golden voiced hobo lover – 53 points – 34/63 – DNP
14. Nader Parsaei – Oscar – 51 points – 29/63 – 2nd
15. Mark Wolfram – Taiwan Hawkeye – 26/63 – 1st
16. Shaun Kirsch – Lil_Dog – 45 points – 29/63 – DNP
17. Frank Meiners – Master Picks – 0 points – 0/63 -4th

 

If I were giving an award for the best bracket name, it would clearly go to Andree, but I am not. Perhaps next year.

 

Carrie’s name now sits in the Hall of Champions with the past greats:

Past Champions

2011 – Carrie Baier

2010 – Mark Wolfram

2009 – Mark Wolfram

2008 – Mark Wolfram

2007 – Tim Peterson

2006 – William McAlpine

2005 – William McAlpine

I already can’t wait for the next college basketball season to start and not only because I expect the Cyclones to return to greatness next year. At least I have the Spring Game to look forward to in a couple of weeks. It is football, but it is something.

Not so many submissions for FAST, but here are the ones that I have:

Dawn Krause


Christopher D. Bennett


Mike Vest

I’ve been down to the Random Theme Generator’s office and asked it to give me a good theme for this week. It handed over the following:

DRY

I think this is a good theme for a week where the weather is getting nicer, but the Earth hasn’t sprung fully to life. Although I my rhubarb has started to grow and I have a little bit of life in some of my flower beds.

Here is a look back at last year’s submissions for DRY:

DRY – 2010

Hopefully DRY trips the shutter release finger trigger of quite a few people for next Monday.

There were a few more submissions for COMMUNICATION. Included in this week’s submissions is 1st time contributor Cathie Raley. I’m very excited to have Cathie aboard and I hope she continues to submit.

This week’s submissions for COMMUNICATION:

Mike Vest


Lee Vest


Christopher D. Bennett


Dawn Krause


Cathie Raley

Hoping to build on the momentum of this week I skipped down to the Random Theme Generator’s humble abode and asked for a good theme for this week. The Random Theme Generator spit out the following theme…

UNFOCUSED

This theme is a slight tweaking of a theme from last year. Last year this theme was called OUT OF FOCUS. We changed the theme to UNFOCUSED to allow for a broader interpretation. A look back at last year’s submissions:

2010 – OUT OF FOCUS

I hope that there are numerous submissions for next week. After all, almost anybody can take an unfocused picture. The thing to think aobut while you are taking your picture is what does it say about the subject when it isn’t in focus?

As always, there is only one rule for the Random Weekly Photo Experiment:

The picture must be taken the week of the theme.

Email submissions to bennett@photography139.com by noon on Monday.

SILENCE did not keep people from being silent. There were a healthy amount of submissions this week. Here are the submissions for SILENCE:

Dawn Krause of Impassioned Versifier


Geri Derner


Christopher D. Bennett


Julie Johnson of The Joy is in the Journey


Carla Stensland


Mike Vest of Waxen Media

Mike and I fired up the Random Theme Generator and it fired out a kind of consumerist theme for this week:

MARKET

You can take a look back at last year’s submissions for MARKET by clicking on the link below:

MARKET – 2010

It is a good broad theme that might push the comfort levels of some people. I hope this is another great week for participation!

Here are this week’s submissions for MACRO:

Julie Johnson


Dawn Krause


Carla Stensland A


Carla Stensland B


Christopher D. Bennett


Mike Vest

I’ve been down to visit the Random Theme Generator. Without much hesitation, it spit out this week’s theme:

GO!

This is a new theme for this year. It was suggested by Julie. As always, I look forward to the submissions.

There was a decent response to what I consider to be the most technically demanding (with the possible exception of PAINTING WITH LIGHT) theme of the 52 different themes.

Here are the submissions for PANNING CAMERA BLUR:

Julie Johnson


Dawn Krause


Jesse Howard


Christopher D. Bennett


Mike Vest

After two weeks of fairly technical themes, I hoped that the the Random Theme Generator would give out a more interpretable theme and it did cooperate. Here is this week’s theme:

HARMONY

That is a theme that is fairly open to interpretation. Here is look back at last year’s HARMONY submissions:

HARMONY

Good luck with this theme. Hopefully it will inspire many people to contribute next Monday!

Year 2 started out with a bang! Lots of submissions! First time submitter! Welcome aboard Alicia Vermeys!

Here are the submissions for REFLECTIONS:

Christopher D. Bennett


Alicia Vermeys


Dawn Krause


Julie Johnson A


Julie Johnson B


Mike Vest


Shannon Bardole

Dawn Poetry Submission:

Reflections

She can’t be too careful anymore,
Her memories have opened up that door.
Watching the tide bury her castle,
Wasted dreams are now just a hassle.

Who she once was when she ruled the world,
That girl is gone, reality unfurled.
Demons in the people she has met,
Subdued emotion, hearts do forget

A bitter thought will eventually melt,
After all the suffering is dealt.
Time to build new castles in the sand,
Learn from the past, take time by the hand.

I’ve been to the cave that houses the new and improved Random Theme Generator. The new generator is fancy and shiny and… it doesn’t work. So I walked over to a different cave and fired up old reliable. It did not disappoint. Here is the theme for this week:

LONG EXPOSURE

This is one of the technical themes. It is hard to set a real value on what is a “long exposure”, but I would say at a minimum, the shutter speed should be longer than 1/15 of a second. I would recommend trying an exposure of at least a second, but as always, you are free to interpret the theme in whatever way you see fit.

A look back at last year’s LONG EXPOSURE submissions:

LONG EXPOSURE – 2010

It is hard to believe that this journal has reached entry 1,000.

Since I enjoy rather meaningless statistics, I’m going to go over a few right now.

According to how many times they have been viewed, these are the 10 Most Popular Pictures in the Artistic Gallery:

1. Gazing Ball Self-Portrait


2. Outburst of the Soul


3. Jen Between UnHingd Sets


3. UnHingd Publicity Still


5. US30 East of Ogden


6. 1900


6. Abandoned Piano – McCallsburg


6. Becca Senior Picture


9. Grizzly McAlpine


10. Obama Political Rally


10. Campanile Self-Portrait

These are the 10 Most Popular Snapshots Gallery Pictures:

1. Jesse and I with the World’s Largest Cheeto


2. Jesse and I Backstage at the Surf Ballroom


3. Jesse Eating a Bob’s Dog


4. Shannon Reading a Map at Backbone State Park


5. Jesse and I at Eagle Point Park


5. Cousin Amy, Sara and Jen at Bonne Finken Concert


5. Jesse Kissing the Blarney Stone in Emmetsburg


8. Jesse Onstage at the Surf Ballroom


8. Jesse and I Resting at the Sargent Floyd Monument


10. Some Kind of Deal Going Down at a Bonne Finken Concert


10. Sara and Jen at Bonne Finken Concert

The Top Ten People I Write About, Photograph or Contribute in Some Way (Tagged in Journal Entries):

1. Jay (144)
2. Jesse (143)
3. Shannon (140)
4. Derrick (117)
5. Jen (101)
6. Teresa (96)
7. Willy (93)
8. Sara (88)
9. Baier (65)
10. Dawn (64)

Of course, we will revisit these numbers and pictures in about 100 or so journal entries. Of course, it will be interesting to see what has changed!

It is the end of Year 1 for the Random Weekly Photo Experiment. The final theme was EYE. Here are the submissions:

Becky Perkovich B


Christopher D. Bennett


Shannon Bardole


Mike Vest


Becky Perkovich A


Dawn Krause


Scott Krause

The themes for this year have been slightly modified, but it remains mostly the same list. Here are a list of this year’s themes:

GO
Adventure
Calm
Colorful
Communication
Depth of Field
Diagonal Rule
Black & White
Dry
Explore
Eye
Face
Fast
Feet
Food
Framing
Hands
Harmony
Hope
Leading Lines
Light Placement
Long Exposure
Love
Macro
Market
Motion
Odd Camera Angle
Painting with Light
Panning & Camera Blur
Paths
Animal
People
Noise
Reflections
Night
Rule of Thirds
Self Portrait
Shadows
Signs
Silence
Silhouettes
Smoke
Soothing
Spiritual
Still Life
Strength
Symmetry and Patterns
Unfocused
Use of Space
Viewpoint
Wet
Games

The Random Generator has spoken for this week’s theme:

REFLECTIONS

There is still only one rule. The picture has to be taken the week of the theme. The deadline for submissions remains Monday at Noon.

Good luck this year!

There were more submissions for PEACE OF MIND than I expected with the business of the holiday season. That is pleasing to me. Here are the submissions:

Christopher D. Bennett


Dawn Krause


Mike Vest


Shannon Bardole

So it has come down to one final theme. Then this project has officially ran its course. 52 weeks. 52 random pictures.

Here is the final theme:

EYE

I think this is a great theme to end year 1 of this project on. It is a very broad theme. Everybody has an eye or two. Everybody knows at least 1 person with an eye or two. There is a holiday this week, but it is a meaningless holiday, so I hope there are plenty of submissions.