LutherHarkon

Hey there!

I haven't really been around for six months or more. I get online from time to time, answer messages every 2 or 3 months and try to keep posting some stuff. As you may guess, this is because of having too much to do at work and other stuff outside DA. This post, first of all, is to ask for your forgiveness. I will answer your comments ASAP, but I cannot say when I'll be able to do so. Anyway, thanks for your support and patience.

Moving to the question... Given that lately I've been so busy at work and, unfortunately, too happy, I can't find any inspiration to do some really artistic stuff; but I've got some good pictures which could be used as stock. As I've been mostly uploading stock works lately, do you think it would be worth creating a stock account? I think it would help people find what they want faster. If they want art, they come here; if they want some stuff to use on their works, they go to the other account.

I'd like to hear your opinion and comments on this matter.

Once again, sorry for not showing around here. I really miss some of you a lot. Hopefully I'll be able to be back soon (but I won't make any promises, sorry).

See you soon!

Enric

Hi there!

It's been like a month or so since I last spent some time around here. This last hour I managed to answer all your messages and thanks you for your faves/watches, but still got like 10000 deviations on my watch list to check... That's gonna take some time, but I'll try to check them all out

So, what the hell kept me away for such a long time? First of all, work. I'm on the edge of getting some really good results on why dark matter haloes form and evolve the way they do, which is really important for my thesis. I've also got to finish a web application to show our results in a nice way and this term I've started teaching at the University, which also takes quite a lot of time, grading students' assignments and preparing the lectures. Because that's not enough for me, I'm also taking a course on World History by the Princeton University which takes some time.

But that's not all! I spend like 6-7 hours a week rehearsing with my band (usually at late night during workdays) and at least 2 or 3 more playing on my own. I hope we'll be able to do some shows next spring, if we find a keyboard player soon enough... I've also spent quite a lot of time with stuff regarding the University Roleplaying Club, preparing some games and organizing some stuff to get new members.

And, finally, I'm creating a Metalhead's Club. My original idea was to create a University club too, but there's some legal stuff regarding university associations which I don't really like, so I'm still deciding how to arrange the legal stuff. But well, I've been looking for members, getting the name, preparing stuff... Things that come with being the president of the club.

So yeah, busy as fucking hell. I hope I'll be able to be around here more often. I've got quite a lot of pictures to upload, but the only work on photography I've done lately are some shots and uploading stuff for a Wikimedia contest called Wiki Loves monuments. Last year I managed to get one of my pictures among the best 10 from Spain, let's see how this year turns out.

This day, the year 1714, Barcelona's walls collapsed and had to surrender to the Spanish troops of king Felipe V after a 14 months siege. Thousands of people were executed, imprisoned and sent to exile. Hundreds of homes were demolished to build a fortress, not to protect the city from attacks, but to keep an eye on us and being able to bombard the population if there was any kind of revolution. Catalan laws and institutions were dismantled, language and traditions forbidden.

Today is Catalonia's national day. Today, we remember and homage those who fight and died defending their ideas and freedom. Today, we celebrate that after these 298 years, we still speak Catalan and we keep our traditions, even though they've been prosecuted for most of those years. Today, we keep on fighting for our freedom. Today, at 18.00, more than half a million people will walk through Barcelona to let the world know we want to be free!

You may wonder were does the name of the post come from? It's part of the refrain of our national anthem, Els Segadors (The Reapers). It comes from a popular song which appeared during a XVIIth Century revolution. The lyrics in English, according to a translation found in Wikipedia, would be something like this:


    Catalonia triumphant
    shall again be rich and bountiful.
    Drive away these people,
    Who are so conceited and so contemptful.

    Refrain:
    Strike with your sickle!
    Strike with your sickle, defenders of the land!
    Strike with your sickle!

    Now is the time, reapers.
    Now is the time to stand alert.
    For when another June comes,
    Let us sharpen well our tools.

    Refrain

    May the enemy tremble,
    upon seeing our symbol.
    Just as we cut golden ears of wheat,
    when the time calls we cut off chains.

    Refrain


Visca Catalunya lliure!

This last wednesday marked my first anniversary in Deviant Art. During this 365 days I've uploaded 300 works, which in the end is not a bad number, and I would say that I've improved quite a lot with my camera. I guess we just needed time to know each other

I'd like to thank all the support received from you. All the faves, comments, watches... even my first DD meant all a lot to me. Unfortunately I haven't been able to put as many time working on pictures as I wanted lately, but well, that's life. In the end I know that when I log in I'll have some supporting and nice messages, while having dozens of great works to check

I guess I won't be able to be really often online for the next 10 days or so (minimum). The 11th of September is the national day of Catalonia and there will be a big demonstration for the independence of this region from Spain. It'll be something huge, as there are already more than 300 buses and several trains sold out to get to Barcelona that day. Well, I'll be working as part of the security staff there, making sure nobody does anything stupid, so I'll be busy preparing for that. And, of course, spreading the word about our freedom yell (as I'm just doing now). I leave you here a translation of a poem done by myself written just about this by Salvador Espriu, one of the most important Catalan poets in the XXth century (Note: Sepharad is the jewish name for Spain).

We will try to built on this sand
the dangerous palace of our dreams
and we'll learn this humble lesson
through all the time of exhaustion,
so only doing this we will be free to fight
for this last victory over fear.
Listen, Sepharad: men cannot be if they're not free.
Let Sepharad know that we will not be able to be if we are not free.
And let the people scream: "Amen"

Salvador Espriu, Poem XXXVIII

Well guys, as you can see I've already finished uploading pictures from that great event Tuska Open Air Metal Festival was. Now I'm gonna start converting my RAW pictures to jpeg from the rest of the trip and upload it. It'll take a while, I guess, so be patient!

Meanwhile, enjoy a video I recorded from Insomnium's show at Tuska, their great song Down with the Sun. I know it's a bit shaky, but I'm not too tall and most Finns are, meaning I was not very comfortable holding my camera as high as I could to get it over their heads