Backies…

Hello! Here I am, posting again, after some break from blogging. Actually, this post is just a little announcement to tell that I'm still around and didn't forget completely about blogging, despite the lack of content really!

August had been such a busy month for me and still. To add more load to the mix, I'm officially back to work now (with all the rush-hour jams and those nasty stuff). However, I've been taking my first steps in recognizing my disability with Retinitis Pigmentosa; Meaning, I will be given the "special needs" (or "disabled" if you will) status in an official way and in return I'll be given some "small" advantages here and there (like a special permit to park my car in special needs/disability parking lot vacancy). However, the far-fetched goal is to get a "medical retirement" if possible.
The whole story is just still at its beginnings and I'm already having some problems or glitches in the system because of the paperwork and the messy job done by some in such governmental agencies. From my side, I've done all the required tests so far and I'm just waiting for the final decree in my case by some committees (and all that related jargon). I'm living in somewhat strange status, where I feel pressed and relieved at same time. I just hope these people don't make it harder for me to get that certificate and getting my retirement ASAP. Worrying is inevitable here and I just wish that I could blink and all is over with. 

Photo Work

Aside the paperwork that I've just mentioned, not much has been done photo-wise except for editing some old photos. However, I did indeed re-create some new panoramas from old ones as I was planning to be adding them to my Mostphotos exclusively, as large files to be downloaded and printed. As I'm typing this, I've already uploaded 2 more, and 3 more are waiting to be keyworded to be uploaded, but I'm having some hard time in creating keywords for these panoramas, and to focus in general. My brain feels fuzzy and blank. 

Failakan Sunset

Entry

In editing old photos, I've been revisiting old folders, as far back as 2011 (and even 2009) and been trying some new tricks on these old photos, specially those that were never touched because I deemed them useless (and this is one more reason to not delete bad photos). In the process, I've kind of "invented" some technique or style I would say for creating a linear art out of the photo. I'm also considering writing a blog post in Arabic for my Arabic blog about this technique specifically.
I liked the style of these images actually and I'm considering also doing a series of photos (or even taking new photos for this purpose) all to be in such linear art form and upload them to the stocks. Just an idea so far and if I would go ahead with it, I might consider mainly photos of fishes or plants. I think this technique is also suitable to create some of these "coloring book"-styled images.

The Shining Kisser (linear)
A sample of such art

Anyway, all of that is going on at the back of my head at the moment since I'm busy with other things specially with me going back to work right now. My mind is totally blank that I'm out of new ideas to shoot with my camera, and I didn't touch it in months right now. In order to get my fingers cracking with it, I've tried to shoot my 8-month old nephew in the house (it was also some practice for using the back-focus button, but seems this method is not in my favor for the time being).

Finale

So, this is a quick coming-back post. Without much fuss for the time being! I think I need to check previous posts to see where did I stop with photos, or maybe I'll start something completely new away from that series of posts.I'm not sure yet. Meanwhile, I need to prepare for that Arabic post for my Arabic blog, so I'm not sure I will be able to prepare a post for the week after the next. But I will try.
On the other hand, the weather here is miserable (i.e. normal) and I just can't wait for winter to be here, or at least fall (if such thing exists here). In the past few days I had to run errands, coming and going with my sister, under such sun, and such hell. Also most of the days in the past week were humid that it feels like drinking water just by going outside; And it's NOT a cold one.
As my brain is wandering off with ideas and images of what would happen next as I'm going through my plans for retirement, as well as Retinitis Pigmentosa itself, I'm trying hard to keep my feet firm into reality with this mundane day-to-day life. Other matters are also occupying my mind and take space, and it feels like my head will explode any moment now. But all in all, I'm trying my best to keep calm (and that makes me tired all the time really).
So, as for the camera work, I'm waiting for winter as I'm thinking of doing something at night like in the old days. These ideas were ignited when I started looking at some of my old panoramas from the seaside and I noticed how the stars did actually show clearly in the night sky in that panorama despite the high ISO and the noise, but they are there (and I will upload it soon to Mostphotos after keywording). This time, though, my plans involve using the modified camera to capture the seascape at night and not a full panorama. I wish though. We'll see about that when winter comes. For the time being, there are things that are just about enough to keep me worrying… and they are doing such a great job.

Plethora…

With Summer course coming to an end, things are becoming quiet in my workplace, which is good. Now, if only I can turn this oven off for such a weather. The quiet time has come over to my activities with the camera as well, as I've finished documenting most of the small shells collection and I'm trying to do some experiments regarding an "artificial aperture" if I can call it so. No need to talk about it for now, and somewhat I feel it will fail but I didn't finish experimenting still as I'm typing these words.

Shellelagh

Well, I know, the original word is "Shillelagh" but changed here on purpose. In this section, I just would like to list some of the latest shell shots I've made; And some of them seem interesting. I think I did have another collection elsewhere but can't remember where did I keep it. Anyway, for the time being, I'm going to satisfy myself with this one and, who knows, maybe re-shoot it again at different angles or with different magnifications... etc.

I did mention in my previous blog post here that I had a problem with my Bolt LED ring light, and that problem was that it could not be fitted on Vello's macrofier which helps me on reversing the lens and achieve greater magnification at the least effort, and with better focusing range. Well, as you can see here, the problem seems to have been partially solved with some electric tape. I had to tape the edges of the adapter ring to the macrofier (and secure that with another strip of tape on the circumference of the macrofier). Only then, I was able to click the LED ring onto the macrofier. The situation was shaky, and the main problem was the quality of the tape itself; IT SUCKED big time. That's why I needed to secure it with a strip across the circumference. Anyway, I did take some shots in this setting and things were interesting as well!

The previous two shots were shot using this DIY solution with Bolt LED ring. Of course, at f/11, I didn't use the flash property of the ring, but rather kept it on (like a modeling light on regular speedlites and strobes) and each shot for the stack did take few parts of a second (still longer than 1/250s, the sync speed). Another problem rose up here is the bulkiness of the ring which sometimes made it cumbersome to do focus stacking at specific angles, but I blame that on the setting I'm having already to shoot these shells. As I get closer and closer to the shell, there is a chance that the LED ring light would hit the edge of the box or the table upon which the shell would be residing. All in all, it is a promising venue and I might find myself using it again to have somewhat balanced lighting around my subject, as well as some interesting luster as in Shell Fudge. The baby oil here did some good job. Anyway, after shooting these two, I was back to using my speedlite to shoot.

The main reason for switching back to the speedlite (with light bender attached to it) was to add some unidirectional light to give a sense of depth to the subject this time. The grooves on this shell, as can be seen in the documentation shot above, called for some depth. Not saying it won't be beautiful under a flat light like the one from Bolt but it is just the role of the idea, and I wouldn't be able to judge for real until I see the final results and compare between the unidirectional and the flat light. Anyway, after the documentation, it was the time to do some work, as usual, with focus stacking.

Because of the relative size of the shell, I didn't wish to go with extreme macro and lose sight of the fine lines here, so I just used extension tubes to get closer to the shell with my 50mm lens. Ironically though, it does seem to be quite a magnification (by looks) despite being less than 1x even! I think it is the power of Abstract. I can't remember how many shots were taken to do the focus stack for MacroPiping but the speedlite's main batteries were dying out already, and when I started to work with An Fathach later, it went down completely in the mid of my work. So, I had to satisfy myself with that much of shots and do the focus stacking for An Fathach at that level alone.

It was a good thing that I used baby oil here but in a different technique. Instead of dipping the shell, I used cotton swabs (those used to clean the ears) to pass the oil on the shell in every possible way. Adding to that, the shell was left for a relatively longer time than other shells before to be exposed before shooting it, and that somehow made the oil get "absorbed" or something. Anyway, the luster was not harsh like before because of this AND because of diffusing (using a paper) and using a relatively lower power for the speedlite (and somewhat raising the ISO a bit).  Well, despite the lower power, still, the speedlite died out as I was working on An Fathach! Worth noting here that An Fathach was worked out using the LAB technique to enhance and pronounce the colors further. This is all for the work with shells so far but I might work further when I find more shells hiding in my room or something! I'm sure I did have more those small ones.

Stroll

As it is quiet in my workplace, I decided to take my camera gear with me (minus the tripod) just to try the new Neewer infrared filters which I got a while ago. I didn't have much in mind to do really, but the shots I've made proved to be "awesome" in their own way, as it came clear later on.

One of the goals I had in mind, though, is to try to use the high IR filters (of thresholds starting from 820nm and beyond) to show the blood vessels. Showing the veins using IR is common now I presume in the medical field, but I'm talking here about mere photography using infrared filters. I tried to use the speedlites (well, more like the on-camera flash and high ISO) but seems it didn't work well. I thought, then, that we might need some higher intensity of infrared, and thus thought of shooting my own hand as you can see above, under the blazing sun around my workplace. Why my workplace? Well, this is the only time of the day that I have time, power, AND mood to work under the sun like that. After going back home I'll be completely exhausted and barely able to touch the camera even. Hand Veins was shot using IR950, which supposedly has a threshold of 950nm and the veins did show clear under the thumb (mount of Venus as they call it in palmistry) as well as some tiny veins around the index and the little fingers. The image above had been cleaned off noise a bit but still the veins look clear. 

I tried to shoot my own foot as well and see the veins, and they did show a bit actually but probably the distance didn't help here (using my Voigtländer 20mm lens here). The look was pretty interesting here; The black sandal turned white, the blue pants turned white, and the white nails turned black! I did take several shots trying out to adjust the focus (manual here, no AF) and eventually turned these shots into an anaglyph. The illusion of the depth is not bad either.

The remaining of the stroll spent on trying various infrared filters as well as the H-alpha (dubbed as "Night Sky" filter!). I like to call this filter a "weak infrared" since it works in the range of the Reds and infrared. Worth noting that all these shots were shot without calibrating the white balance in-camera, and all was done while processing the RAWs. 

While processing these test shots for IR750 and the H-alpha filters, I've increased the Vibrance of the colors intentionally to show the faint colors. Well, they were not so faint with the H-alpha filter in Alienizing but it was for the better. Moreover, channel swapping gave the leaves that distinctive reddish look and turned the sky blue. If I want to talk about those artistic infrared filters with their colorful look, I would say that the H-alpha filter is the one to pick for this mission here! My old B+W 092 infrared filter (threshold about 650nm or so) did render some colors as well but probably not to this degree. My stroll at work did not end there, though, and there was some more to come, but not till I had to go back home and check these test shots again and again.

Plethora

In that stroll at work, there were many test shots for other infrared filters like the IR850 and IR950 again and again and they were rather random. Some of them were even out of focus a bit (ir's hard to focus using LiveView under the harsh sun). However, it was a chance to play!

I'm not sure how things started with this play, but probably I was under the influence of the Islamic geometrical arts (naturally, I'm fond of them but never practiced them). I've been reading about some of the details of these creations, particularly in Andalusia, and I do follow already some artists who perform such arts (and they are not Arabs nor Muslims). It is mesmerizing indeed, the way of combining those abstract lines and then create complex regular patterns out of such lines. Frankly, I could never understand it. Anyway, all I have here is simply Photoshop and a single photo in front of me, with which Octuplum Abstracta and other patterns or textures were made. In fact, I already envision Octuplum Abstracta as a design on a tile or ceramics of some sort and used for building. Not sure how this is done and how it's possible but if I can I would. This actually lead me further to more abstracts, starting with Octuplum Abstracta just to envision how a tiling using this design or abstract would look like…

The result is mesmerizing. I wish now if I have a room (or even a bathroom) with this complexity (with maybe some vibrancy to the colors added). The possibilities are endless, and you can still get some regular shapes and lines with every setting you might think of; Just like in a kaleidoscope.  All of that was just from a single photo alone, but yet I had to check other photos as well (mainly those which I couldn't make out something out of).

While Octuplum Abstracta was somewhat random in its creation, Black Magic was not. Not completely but I did have this idea of creating a 16-fold star or polygon out of the photo, unlike the eight-fold done in Octuplum Abstracta. I did read that 16 points stars in the Islamic geometrical designs are not common, and probably those of 24 points are even more scarce. Thus, I've set my mind on creating 16-fold polygon out of this photo and so the work on replication and arranging the copies of ONE image were all somewhat calculated and not random completely. I can't remember even what was the original photo! In Black Magic, I inverted the colors by the end of the work and it proved more dramatic than its original almost dull blue or cyan color (typical color for processed infrared images). I was not disappointed. Now this design, I envision it to be on some sort of fabrics as well as ceramics. I don't have a commercial mind unfortunately, but these 3 abstracts above are uploaded and accepted already in a number of stock websites like Canstockphoto, Dreamstime, 123RF, as well as Mostphotos. I might even consider working on some old photos to create abstracts and textures, but I also have to make sure not to forget about my camera and to do some original photos as well (which I'm trying hard during these days as well).

Finale

I've probably talked about this poem which I was thinking of jotting down in my previous blog post, and after some hard mental work (with the help of some randomness from some brainstorming websites) I did pin down something, which I've callled Smashed. 

Smashed

The poem was originally inspired by the looks of a shell as I was doing my work on documenting them (as you can see on the left). I loved its shape, its colors (channels swapped here) and the stripes, despite all the breaks and holes in it. I think it even lost its topmost tip. Yet, it still looks beautiful. I was moved and I have to say that I don't usually get moved by a static object like this and typically I would need more to ignite my writing appetite. But well, let's say challenge accepted. 

Smashed

Common as it appears to most
an apogee had never risen up
But how often obviously hidden
truth of matters out of a sudden
Beauty need not to boast.

Such as a Palestinian home
deprived, and setting off a ghost town
Attitude never deemed it hollow
on the struggles, it has to follow
A home sweeter than Rome.

A rider over the heart-breaks
mending it life-long as you are
By the cracking, the shimmering glow
elegance, of hope, of which you show
Despite the mistakes.

In swiftness pass over my cheek
the glamour, and all that keeps me warm
By the touch, which in holes is filled
and by sweetness which you've fulfilled
Smashed and so is unique.

The rhyming scheme here is ABCCA. I've stated before that I use Verse Perfect to write poems and it has many aids including rhyming styles, yet ABCCA is not one of them. I'm not sure why I picked this style really but probably things were initiated in that way from the beginning of the writing (typing) process. I did find some samples on the internet as I was searching for more information about this style, yet it didn't really have a name it seems and samples of such a rhyme are rare (in my case I've found only one). Yet, after reading it further and further, I might apology with some regret for the (B) part in the rhyming scale; Probably should have turned it into (A) to be AABBA. But is not that rhyming scheme so common? The rhyming here is not the end of the story actually. The hardest part for me was to keep a static syllable count for the verses as much as possible, and that was kept at (8,9,9,9,6). I'm not sure if readers usually pay attention to the count of syllables when they read poetry, but my thinking is that keeping them concrete and static does help the harmony in some way, specially if the syllable count was the same between supposedly rhyming lines.

Putting this now, I'm still working on some pinhole experiments, which unfortunately didn't work out well till now but in hope that I might be able to post about it in 2 weeks or so. We'll see. I do need to write a poem as well. Many feelings are there in the air but it's just the time needed and the focus to pick up one of these seeds and grow it in a soil of thoughts; Plus the work of course. 

In a bit more than 2 weeks from now, my birthday is coming and I'm turning 38. Ironically, at this age, I don't know where I'm going or heading. With all the blessings I have, despite the things that swing my mood like a golf club, I'm still unable to focus nor really enjoy what I have. Not sure why, but maybe I'm tired of everything? I know that I have a lot of things to be thankful for, yet I feel there is something missing that without it, all is nothing. Probably this is what they call Midlife Crisis? I don't know. Travel, travel, travel... if only I know when or how, or where to. A change of scenery is long due and I can't do anything about it yet…

50mm..

Less than a week left, and I'll be off for some time. I'm not sure if I would be able to post in this blog when I'm away, but I'll see to that. The place I'm staying in is provided with Wi-Fi service, but with the schedules I'm having for myself there, I might be even too busy to sleep! I don't know...

Still Life
I've been skipping a lot of the group's activities because I wanted more time for myself, and because such activities are usually followed with a huge number of images that I need to sort out and filter out (and, of course, process). With my taking off time getting closer, this is not possible to be done right now.

Photography
Canon EF 50mm USM, f/8,
100^-1sec, ISO 100

However, I didn't cut myself off completely. There is a contest among the group members that extends till October 20^th (by which time I would be out of the country already). The contest is for Still Life images, and I've decided to work on it a little bit, majorly on some simple ideas. Just needed to submit the images and forget about the results of the contest. One of the ideas is to pack all my photography books into a stack, over some smooth table and use my speedlites to light the scene. After many trials (with gel filters, snoot, and honeycomb grid) I've made a version somehow close to what I was aiming for, Photography. It is not exactly as I wanted it or as I had it in my mind. I wanted a lighter yellow streak almost mimicking the real light coming from the sun through the window. Also, I wanted some dust particles in the air to reflect the antiquity (despite the books being relatively modern and new!). I have to satisfy myself with this image for now and might use this experience in something else in the future.

Hygienic Circles
Canon EF-S 18-55mm @33mm, f/8, 250^-1sec, ISO 400.

My other idea for Still Life (and actually done first) was a snap from the top for a collection of circular objects. My idea was to bring one form of geometry into the scene and make it dominate - however, framing a circular object in a rectangular scene proved really difficult. I didn't know how to arrange the objects, beside shooting exactly at -90^o degrees. In the beginning I was planning to use my relatively-new lens, the Canon EF 50mm, but that was challenging as I would have to raise the camera with the lateral arm to a level higher than my head. For this reason, I had to change to 18-55mm lens.
Using 2 speedlites here with a reflector and a honeycomb, I did change a lot of settings and positions till I've arrived at this result. Probably should have used some coloring gels to give more warmth on the scene, as the white balance setting proved problematic when changed.

50mm
As I've mentioned before, in last week's post, I've set out a challenge for myself: getting out and taking pictures with camera and lens alone; no tripod, no other lenses but the 50mm. The challenge was carried over 3 days, and as expected, most of the images I could think of were around my work place. Well, except of one which was taken as I was waiting for my sister near the garage...

In View
Canon EF 50mm USM, f/1.4, 1600^-1sec, ISO 100.

Frankly, there is no philosophy or purpose, and I believe I'm not supposed to dig any philosophy when you go out strolling like that with a camera and one lens wherever you go; it is a bit like street photography, but without waiting for events or watching out for people. Simply, training your eyes to see things you deem interesting. In In View for example, I like the reflection (yes, I'm in love with side mirrors) and how the handicapped parking lot sign resembled a dot. I took several shots from this angle with little adjustments left and right - and I believe it fits the golden spiral unintentionally!

Light Tick
Canon EF 50mm USM, f/1.4, 200^-1sec, ISO 100.

Now back to work where most of my shots took place. As stated above, I didn't care much about a message to get it through the images, but merely what really attracted my eyes. Like Light Tick, it can be an example for minimalism (a trend that I've been after lately), and some people really liked it despite its simplicity. What does it mean, and how it conveys a message, please be my guest and add your own philosophy to it. All what I know here is that my mind and imagination were on a roll!

Lost in Space
Canon EF 50mm USM, f/2.8, 50^-1sec, ISO 100.

Another plug point in my office room at work was down close to the ground level, so I've decided that day I might have nothing better to shoot. As I was preparing and getting lower to shoot, I've realized that my eyes were playing a trick on me and I almost lost sense of orientation here, and that inspired me to do Lost in Space, which is just another minimalistic approach.
I have to admit here though that I've used the cloning tool in Photoshop to eliminate the hard lines of the corner and show the plug point as floating in space. Again, some people said it's genuine; well, Thank you all!

The Last Dangling
Canon EF 50mm USM, f/1.4, 1250^-1sec, ISO 100.

And let's face it, floral arts are not mine and I don't like stepping there. But, there are moments when you just want to have fun with f/1.4 lens! This is exactly what I did here. I had to crop the image a bit to adjust the framing, but all in all, it doesn't attract me personally, even though some people liked it, and probably some of them were surprised for shooting such an image; not quite my style!

Ziegel und Linien
Canon EF 50mm USM, f/16, 20^-1sec,
ISO 100.

Now, there is one corner in the wall, in the outside of my work place, which was subject for many shots before, and even a vertical panorama. I would love to make a proper vertical panorama instead of the handheld one done before (with lot of broken lines). Here, however, all I had to do is just increase the f-number to encompass a greater depth from the start (bottom) to the end (top) and aim upward.
It didn't occur to me that I can increase the ISO to fasten the shutter further, but it did well at 20^-1sec without a handshake! Balancing my fat body in that pose proved to be an extreme job to do!

Stripes Spangled Door
Canon EF 50mm USM, f/1.4, 800^-1sec,
ISO 100.

The bomb was that, in a period of one week only, I've got two of my images into Flickr's Explore feature! Meaning they are featured as something interesting. Not sure how did that happen, but in both cases, the image went into Explore directly the next day after uploading them. The first was Stripes Spangled Door, then followed by Ziegel und Linien the other day. Despite the simplicity (or so I thought) of Stripes Spangled Door when I shot it, it proved to be one of the difficult (and surprising) shots that I've ever done. Unlike Ziegel und Linien which comprises, mainly, diagonals, Stripes Spangled Door is mainly composed of straight lines; horizontal and vertical. I did my best to shoot face to face (and the door was a bit raised up from the ground), and when everything did look fine, my computer and Photoshop had another say. The image was out of perspective and I've spent some hard time fixing it, and even DxO did not do much to help me out. I had to resort to some old tricks of skewing and stretching and manual perspective fixing. On the left side of Stripes Spangled Door I've kept some tiny stripes so as not to dock the the vertical lines on the side as, as I see it, typically done.

Finale
Now, this is my last post before taking off. I will try to post when I'm abroad, but I'm not quite sure if the time will allow me to do that. That will be one big city, and I'm not fond of cities, but I just need to finish this to see what's next. Beside the worrying about my tools and camera before the travel, there are matters that I've postponed till after the travel; matters of projects, business plans if possible, and on the top of them all, matters of the heart...

See you after some time...

My bro goofing around. Guess he never heard of a barber?
Canon EF 50mm USM, f/1.4, 30^-1sec, ISO 200.

Yikes!

Another discovery of missing numbers! This time 4 lines are missing between 374 and 378. The story is not missing but only the numbering is messed around. Under the light of the new event here then the total lines of the story is 2993.

Today, I translated only one verse (which was started yesterday but completed today) as I was sick of the place here. I had to do adminstrative job and translate 3 pages typed by my colleague before his travelling to his vacation. The contents were highly scientific in terms, and sometimes I had to leave them as they are, untouched, leaving the document look half Arabic and half English. I had also to drive to some computer stores to buy a converter piece (USB to 9-pin) with the money I had from the adminstrative office (purchase department here) as we need for some laptop connectivity. I barely had time to translate my own project with Alexander's story. In fact I had no mood at all. I was planning as well to write some words into my diary which I brought with me today, as I had some thoughts and wanted to pin them down on paper, but I guess this won't be for now since most of the ideas are vaporized by now. I'm trying now to write down something for my story as I didn't write down a thing yesterday and was trying to think of some way to fabricate the events.

I googled some sites for tips on writing a mystery and some views contradicted somehow, so I guess every author has his or her own unique way of thinking and approach. One of the authors in his tips actually suggested the same thing I did in the beginning, which is a random start and the story would go by itself as you go writing, but with an exception that the end must be well established and outlined already for the rest of the show.

Starting as well now to play "Still Life 2." A thrilling game I've been waiting for. It's about some serial killer that practices his rituals in US. The story is a continuation for the first part, thus it is better to play that one first and then the second. It is a detective game with some vulgar language (so check out your age rank) and some unpleasant views and violence... but hey, I'm not intending to apply these in real life... or ... ?

Slow Time...

Still writing the story and recording the previous parts. I reached part 4 but yet did not start with it. Weird feeling I got... as if the time was slowing down and I have no sense of anything at all. All what I wanted to do is drink tea and just watch some videos, beside playing around with my images.

an image taken from Failaka, before and after edition

Beside playing around, I finally extracted some words out of my mind and started to write a new poem. I called it "Chamomile." I was writing these words with a chamomile tea mug in my left hand and listening to the exotic music of Shahzoda, of Uzbekistan.
Recording the voice for my story is now relatively easier than before, but I have to edit after recording of course to erase some mistakes. Yet, some vowels that I might not have spelled correctly are left untouched.
I wonder if this change of senses for time was mainly caused by my state of rage yesterday... the Chamomile certainly has its own effects.

I need to find some time to accomplish of the other projects that I have in my mind... like creating the script of Beten Yamta nomads. The set of letters is almost ready, but needs writing with a calligraphic pen, and scanning images. On the other hand as well, I need to work on vectorizing my image of "Charnagút" which I sketched and scanned, but now needs some coloring. So much that can keep me busy, but would I have the power and mind to do so?

My story writing has slowed down for some time now because of the circumstances at work... this is the only time I can write in, otherwise, at home, other things occupy my mind... but until now I reached the limit of 1776 lines... this will absolutely make me exceed the 2000 limit, I suppose.