Photo 101: No place to go but up for landscapes

Wide open spaces. That’s what I think about when the name Anson Williams and the word landscapes are thrown around, such as Cheri did for Photo 101 lesson 15. Wait a second. Potsie Weber from “Happy Days” didn’t shoot great photographs of the world we live in. Make that Ansel Adams. I knew I was…

Drowning in the Bracket Pool after Day One?

Did you hear all those moans and hollers echoing throughout the office, bar, store, living room, every 30 minutes or so yesterday? It was an upsetting opening day to March Madness 2015. The New York Times was led to publish: Low seeds beat high seeds all over the place. Meanwhile, back at the Little Bitty…

Free Advice — How do you stay positive through trying times?

Free Advice is a periodic feature in which I answer anonymous letters sent to markbialczak.com. Today I entertain a many-faceted question, with another wrinkle you’ll discover below. Hi Mark, How does a person stay positive in times of economic stress, loss or change? We can even break it down more. How do you stay positive…

Photo 101: Finding scale in my life, uh-huh

Frankly, as enriching and rewarding as these three weeks of Photo 101 have been to my blogging iPhone 6 skills, sometimes I read my emails that contain the assignments and sigh. Take my observation about lesson 14 and scale, for example. Michelle found a tiny toy baby on a cake at a fantastic bakery in…

Vin Diesel feels family love as ‘Fast’ opening approaches

This emotional feeling about “Fast and Furious 7” is moving into overdrive. The movie made after the tragic death of star Paul Walker opens on April 3. For more than a year now, his co-stars and the crew have been dealing with the loss of their friend, who perished in a car accident in November…

Are you ready for the Madness? In Syracuse, not so much

Did you pick a bracket somewhere, anywhere, this year? My dear wife Karen and I dove into two pools. We chose our brackets by passing my iPad Air back and forth Tuesday. If my alma mater Maryland wins six games in a row, let me tell you, I may make a bit of a splash.…

Photo 101: A chilling moment, a splash of motion

Day 13 of Photo 101 brought Cheri’s instructions for us to dig deep to discover our individual moments of motion. After a business meeting in downtown Syracuse, I took a moment to stand on the sidewalk of a bridge. Down I looked onto Onondaga Creek and the Syracuse Creek Walk. On this brisk almost-Spring day…

In Syracuse, this parade marches me toward spring

It was in the 40s Saturday in Syracuse for the annual St. Patrick’s Day Parade. There was still plenty of snow hanging around. But that didn’t deter thousands of partying people. The 33rd edition of the event was the setting for my weekly community blog for Syracuse Public Media site waer.org. You can read my…

I, appeal!

Anybody fluent in Serbian-to-English out there willing to help blogger Leila Samarrai? The English Professor http://theenglishprofessoratlarge.com/author/theenglishprofessoratlarge/ was kind enough to seek help, and I follow her wise words.

Photo 101: The architecture of black and white

The lesson sent for day 12 of Photo 101 sent me to my portfolio instead of my iPhone 6. See how far I’ve come under the direction of our instructions? Instead of calling it my iPad Air stash, I’ve decided I can call it my portfolio! In any case, reading Cheri’s directives about sharp lines…