Artsy Fartsy Mugshot Gets Blown Away

Last week, I woke up to find my first blog and my "arty" mugshot gracing one of the inside pages of the Southeast Missourian.

It was kind of unexpected, and the existence of it in ink-on-paper form lies squarely on the shoulders of the newspaper's online editor, Mr. Matt Sanders.

My wife loved the arty photo I had created for this blog. I believe that after the first initial shriek, the words "hate it" and "you look like a thug" came from her lips.

When I got to work, I had an email from a co-worker saying that my "surly mug wouldn't look out of place on a gangsta rap album jacket."

And our long-time editor, now editorial page editor Joe Sullivan succinctly put it, "Good blog, bad photo."

OK, I get it. My art experiment was a flop. I will refund everyone's money.

I made do with what I had at hand when I created the photo (queue the violins). No photographers were around and I needed a photo. What do you know, my laptop has a built-in camera and comes with software that lets you apply various effects on-the-fly to photos. So I took matters into my own hands.

And my inner geek got the best of me.

Now, I've got a normal photo. No arts and no farts. Just a plain old mug of yours truly.

My Original Blog Photo

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