rukes.com

Updated my portfolio with new pics, as well as to BananAlbum 6.0!

Adding a few new pics to the main page slideshow too

Ended the day with just about 10,000 visitors and almost 2.8 million hits, so thanks to everyone that decided to check out my galleries

Already the biggest day by FAR in Rukes.com history, and the day isn’t over.

Props to Los Angeles Times for blogging my photos:

http://theguide.latimes.com/blogs/soundboard/2008/06/30/coachella-in-the-city-electric-daisys-monster-crowd-saturday-stuns-even-promoters/

On Monday, June 16th, I brought my new 1Ds MkIII and all my lenses in, and wanted to see if they could do a once-over on some lenses and check for focus issues (I think my 70-200 and 24-70 had some back/front focusing issues and I didn’t want to deal with the micro adjustment feature when I had the opportunity for Canon to do it over a long vacation).

I told them I would be back to pick them up on Friday the 27th and noted it down on the sheet. They said OK and decided that if I left the camera with three lenses, that was the most I could give them for it to be done by the 27th. I even threw in a priority repair sticker, which is noted to repair up to 3 items within 3 business days. Not a problem, so they can get it done in way more than enough time.

I come back from my vacation Thursday night, and head over to Canon to pick up my stuff late Friday (a bit worried since there was no call that they finished the job).

I get there and they say “Sorry, it’s not done, and we can’t give them back to you”. I tell them “How is that possible, considering all the time I gave you guys, as well as noting that I would have to pick them up on Friday the 27th no matter what (considering I have to photograph a 50,000+ person event on Saturday, EDC). They say “Well we didn’t promise you that it would be ready on Friday, we don’t make promises”. Why would I leave three lenses if I we didn’t agree that it would be perfectly fine? I would have gladly brought it down to two or even one.

They finally gave in and said “This is against our policy, you can’t do this again or else”. Great, so now because they mess up, they threaten with banning me from getting my stuff repaired? “You are taking up our time that we could use to repair other people’s items”.

I get the equipment back and get ready to pay the little bit for one of the out of warranty lenses and get hit with another bombshell, the biggest of them all. “Oh, there’s no charge. We didn’t even touch the equipment.”

WHAT?

So Canon has my equipment for almost two weeks, with a priority repair sticker, and does NOTHING. Everything is in the original shape I left it. Not only that, they don’t give me back the $100 voucher I used for the out of warranty lens, OR my rush sticker back. Great.

So now, on Monday, I have to call them back and fight to at least get my voucher back.

I think I could actually send my stuff ground to the New Jersey one and get everything back quicker. What a joke!

I come back home from my vacation to find my fridge/freezer busted while I was gone. So it smelled a bit and everything was room temperature. Had to toss everything. Got it fixed though, but I have no time to shop until after EDC.

I am not going to do the full tour, as i’m sure it would be fun, but photo-wise I would probably be super burnt out by the second week of the “same old stuff”.

I will be doing all the California gigs in early August, though, so that does leave me room to go to Paul Van Dyk in NYC this year!

Everything I take from now on will be used with it!

Just ordered it using the Amazon Gold Box technique to get a free 5% off it Getting it on Monday so I will be using it for the first time at the Tiesto shows!

Also selling my 5D too. I still have a second one with a battery grip and all that…it will be my backup now

Due to the severe problems I am having with Beatport (hopefully I can resolve them soon before I just decide to explain it all), im switching the Beatport banners with Site 5. While the Beatport banners just get me a few bucks, I can make a whole lot more money if just one person gets hosted by Site5 from a banner.

I’m going to get the CompuTrekker AW Plus. I currently have the non-plus version. With the extra room in the new bag, I should be able to keep all my lenses, as well as TWO bodies, so I can put a backup 5D in there if I keep my current 5D or upgrade to the 1Ds MkIII in June.