Frequently Asked Questions &
General Information
Last updated
22/05/2009
1. What is www.tworavens.org?
This website has been a personal hobby of mine for quite a few years now (10+). There have been many incarnations over that period of time. www.tworavens.org as it presently exists came into being in October, 2003. Before that I ran it on various host sites, in plain HTML.
I am quite happy with the
Gallery foundation of the site. I don't expect to make any serious changes
for the next few years, though from time to time I may add more in the way of
features and of course continuously update the photographic content as my
education in PHP, photography and my resources grow.
Specifically, it is a repository of my photos in the Kingdom of Ealdormere.
In an effort to get my photo's up in a reasonable time, I often am not able to research the names of the people in them as much as I would like. You can add comments to the photos in the galleries and you can supply names to any of the people shown in my images.
I will respect people's wishes to remove any shots that are an exclusive portrait of themselves, if they feel they don't look particularly good or just don't want their image shown. Also if people want copies of the images in full resolution from the original shots, feel free to ask me.
2. Who runs www.tworavens.org?
| My name is Kyle Andrews, known
in the SCA as The Honourable Lord Eirik Andersen. I reside in the
Kingdom of Ealdormere, in the
Barony of Septentria, as a
member of the Canton of Ard Chreag. I've been a member of the SCA since late 1992. I started when I was 13 years old and I have been taking sca photos since about 1998, when my interest in Photography grew. Mundanely I work in a digital print shop/design studio and I have access to some pretty nice tools for printing, both digital B&W and full digital color. My training here has taught me much in the way of color adjustment and compositional layout. In the SCA I am one of those guys that does a little bit of everything.. I am currently a squire to Sir Siegfried Brandbeorn, and am working on my fighting skills. I've also been spending my time acting as Chronicler for The Tankard, the Canton of Ard Chreag's newsletter, autocrating events or assisting with events in other various ways. |
|
 Eirik in Armour, Snowed Inn V 2006 |
 How you will usual recognize me... |
 Eirik shooting a few rounds at Bonfield Battle 2003 |
3. Why do you keep this site going?
I do it because I like photography and manipulating images. Photos are a great way to record historical events, and the SCA can be a very photogenic place for shooting. A good number of my photos end up in my Canton and Baronies chronicles, and my friends and many others appreciate being able to go back and look at pictures from the events they loved. So do I. I consider myself a manner of chronicler.
Over the years I have found SCA photo websites few and far between, often only temporarily available to view. Each newer version of this site has been a step towards stability and continuity.
4. Recognition
I've actually received several
awards in relation to my sca photography:
For as long as I am able, I will maintain this site for all to enjoy. |
|
5. Is this a commercial venture?
Not at all. This is part of what I do for fun in the SCA. I'm not out to make my living from the SCA, though I am strongly considering becoming a professional photographer. It seems like it would be a lot of fun!
| You can also make a donation to www.tworavens.org. All funds will be directed to the operational costs of the website or towards upgrading my photographic kit (If ever I was to take in enough to do that). |
Make a donation to www.tworavens.org |
You'll notice that I do not run any banner or pop up ads on my site, so pictures load up fast.. I currently have about 2.5 Gigabytes of SCA photos online (including thumbnails). Please don't hotlink to my photos (Hotlinking is when another web site owner links directly to one or more of your images or multimedia files and includes it on their web page. Not only is this theft of my intellectual property, but I am paying for the bandwidth used by that site.). You may of course freely link to web pages on/within my website.
6. How can I take part in www.tworavens.org?
Primarily, you can comment on the photos in the galleries. I often do not have time to comment on them myself, and also quite often I don't know the names of the people in the photo. So, if you can identify or otherwise elaborate on the content of a photograph, which is a big help to me.
7. Why don't you have any photos of me? Who do you take photos of?
Over the years a number of people have been both jokingly as well as seriously offended that I have not shot any photographs of them. I take photos of my friends and people I know will have no problem with their photo being on the web. I once ran into someone who was in a photograph I had taken and posted to the web, and they made a big stink. Since then, I normally stick to people I know. I am also very aware of the military personnel in the SCA who cannot have their photos taken for reasons of national security. I am pretty good about approaching people before taking a photo of them. That being said, If you approach me at a event I'd be more than happy to photograph you for my website. I make it to a majority of events around Ealdormere, and a few out of k
8. How do you edit your photos?
I used to use Adobe Photoshop CS extensively to edit my photos quality, color sharpness and size for the best possible look. However, I have since seen the light and now used Adobe Lightroom pretty much exclusively... I shoot them in RAW format, which is like having a digital negative. Once I complete my editing, I encode them in .jpg format at a reasonably high quality setting for posting to the web.
I place all of my photos into thumbnail galleries so you can pick and choose what photos you wish to view. Most photos will appear first in a reduced size version, which you can click on to get the full sized photo.
Camera wise, I have graduated over the years from the Kodak APS style of film based photography to the Olympus C-4000 digital camera, to the equipment I am now using, the Nikon D70 D-SLR
9. What sort of equipment do you use?
My camera of choice is the Nikon D70s, a 6MP DSLR camera. I
also have a Nikon d70 as a backup. Lens-wise, I have a 70-200mm f2.8, a
18-70mm f4.5-f5.5, and my favoite, a 50mm f1.8.
I have a few tripods which I rarely use, a external flash, and not much else beside a lens pen to keep things crystal clear.
10. How can I use your photographs?
If you wish to use one of my photographs on another website, print or web publication, etc. you must contact me at eirik@tworavens.org and I will more than likely allow you to use them. It's not that I mind them being used in other places, I just like to know where my work is going to be turning up. Be sure to read my websites disclaimer below.
11. Where have your photographs appeared?
I've had the pleasure of my photographs appearing in many publications and websites.
The Ursus - Newsletter of the
Barony of Septentria
www.heatherdale.com
www.amphismusic.com
www.bards.ca
Tournaments Illuminated
www.ardchreag.org - The Canton of Ard
Chreag
The Tankard - Newsletter of the
Canton of Ard Chreag
The Avantgarde - Newsletter of the
Principality of Avacal
The Tidings - Newsletter of the Kingdom
of Ealdormere
The Owl -
Newsletter of the Canton of Skeldergate
The Barony of Septentria Website
www.medtimes.org
http://www.pennsic.net/
The Incipient Canton of
Westbelleford
The Ben Dunfirth Light
Cavalry
DARK - Dark
Ages Re-creation Company
Colyne and Thorfinna's SCA Page
Ice Dragon - Newsletter of the Barony of the Rhydderich Hael, Ęthelmearc
If you know of any others that I have forgotten, please contact me and let me know!
12. What other SCA Photo Galleries do you recommend?
http://kottr.com/main.php Svana Laransdottir & Kolfinna kottr's SCA Photos,
from Caid
http://www.esmeraldaofthelakes.com/ Esmeralda of the Lakes, from the West
http://swein.campus.luth.se/gallery/Lia Lia de Thornegge of Drakenwald
(Sweeden)
http://www.wraithstudios.ca/ Griffin de Stokeport's SCA Photos (another Ealdormereian Photographer)
http://laurabertram.net/rhys/ Rhys's SCA Photos + Convention Photos
http://www.keradwc.com/medieval/index.html
http://www.tancos.net/sca.html
13. Who do you use as a web space provider?
I was using http://www.dathorn.com/, whom I recommend. I've been with them since October 2003 and left due to my large storage requirements in June 2006 and have had great success in terms of uptimes, bandwidth, storage, and cost. I am now on a private host with my friend Kenric is a fantastic web host.
14. Thanks!
A special thanks here to those who have helped me over the years with this project. Kenric and Tarian have been especially helpful. Kenric took this website in for a number of years as I was growing the site. Tarian helped me a great deal with my HTML. She was behind the last redesign of the site before it changed over to the PHP Gallery site it currently is running on.
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