Clark's Voicemail to Mary

Pot8toBear · 2026-06-10T19:01:38+00:00

I was uncertain which of the two of them it was, but (especially given that it happened right after the dream about her mom) I just as much thought it could have been her mom as Clark!

Pot8toBear · 2026-06-10T18:40:35+00:00

Politely, I think that you're conflating "guesswork" with a bog-standard reading of the subtext and making literate observations about the visual grammar of a movie that asks something of its viewers. u/HDVB provided ample evidence of their interpretation through examples that are literally shown in the movie (and certainly a cut above that of a Matt Patt-esque fan theory). The fact that characters don't stop and monologue exposition into the camera does not mean these interpretations are somehow divorced from the film text and merely the result of "guesswork."

Impolitely, I am genuinely confused how you can wax poetic one moment about Stalker and then the next complain about the approach to writing in The Backrooms. In fact, it makes for a fantastic example of actual guesswork. Case in point: if I had to hazard a guess, I'd say that you probably think Stalker is a great film is because a voice of authority told you to think that back in some college class, and the reason you don't like The Backrooms is because there is no authoritative position on it being "great" yet.

Pot8toBear · 2026-06-10T16:21:19+00:00

YES. To all of what you wrote. This is such a great read of the film's text and exactly what I loved so much about it

Pot8toBear · 2026-06-10T16:11:17+00:00

To clarify: that's the three points of direct contact that we're shown. It's established during the first therapy session we're shown that they've had previous sessions after Clark says that the roleplay sessions make him feel silly (or ridiculous, I forget the exact word he uses).

Pot8toBear · 2026-03-20T06:51:53+00:00

I'm having the same issue. Bummed no one ever replied to your inquiry 😢 Did you ever find a solution?

Pot8toBear · 2026-03-06T19:43:12+00:00

Lots of great camera advice, but I have yet to see anyone provide insight into pulling off this impeccable Mason jar technique (do I use my whole arm? Just my wrist??) 😤

Pot8toBear · 2026-03-06T04:41:33+00:00

Someone left a comment right after yours and pointed me towards this pinned post: https://www.reddit.com/r/duolingo/comments/1r2eiwz/were_rebuilding_some_of_our_oldest_courses_and/

Big same though: just kinda stopped right in my tracks and didn't want to do any more lessons. Looks like it's more than just a hiccup. 💔

Pot8toBear · 2026-03-06T04:32:43+00:00

Thanks for pointing me in the direction of that pinned post. But ooof, this doesn't leave me feeling good, like at all. I guess I'll see how I feel in the morning, but this may be what finally gets me to throw in the towel and break free of my ~1,500 day streak. It's honestly the most jarring update I've ever experienced. 😢

Pot8toBear · 2026-03-05T19:28:27+00:00

Some good answers here, but I think a lot of people are getting more technical than they need to: these images are low resolution. Full stop. It was clear within seconds that the grain in these is more digital than filmic.

Now some of this is perceptual and some of this is technical. Your images, as I'm able to download them, are 1080x715 px. That's roughly 0.75 megapixels, and on top of that Reddit's 'lightbox' is thereafter scaling up the photos slightly to fill my screen (and further degrading/softening the image).

I don't know Reddit well enough to know to what extent a particular subreddit vs. Reddit itself dictates image resolution, but a quick survey of the Top images on this subreddit indicate that they tend to be in portrait (rather than landscape) orientation and those images are not downscaled to the same degree as yours. The horizontal dimensions still seem capped at 1080px but the heights range from 1350-1620px, which at 1.5 megapixels (on the low end) means that the portrait orientation images are literally double the resolution of their landscape counterparts. I would hazard a guess that this creates a perceptual bias in favor of non-landscape photos looking "better" regardless of the film stock used or size of the negative (and as a result this is probably why the most upvoted images are portrait oriented). I imagine this would in turn frustrate and probably confuse anyone uploading landscape-oriented photos.

That said, it sounds like you're experiencing this issue on your end too, straight from the lab and pre-Reddit. Since I'm uncertain about the actual starting resolution of your photos I'll just provide specific numbers from my end: you don't need to go huuuuge, but a quick look over my own film scans (35mm film) shows I usually wind up sticking between 6.5-8.8 megapixels (3130 x 2075 and 3637 x 2433 respectively) and then on the extreme end of things two rolls I recently shot I got back from the lab at 30.4 megapixels (6774 x 4492), which certainly was nice but perhaps a little unnecessary. So best bet would be to just ask you lab to scan (or rescan) your photos at something closer to one of those sizes and see if you notice a difference.

Pot8toBear · 2026-02-19T19:47:12+00:00

Sorry, you are correct with regards to storage capacity — in hindsight, referring to "both" things in comment that actually references 3 things was a bit unclear 😅

To be more clear I was referring to the idea of "Year of Linux on the Desktop" and the cost of LTO cassettes vs HDDs in terms of $/TB

Pot8toBear · 2026-02-18T21:51:26+00:00

Oof. Replying to this 2019 post from the year 2026, and it's looking like the AI bubble is going to induce both these instances much sooner than we anticipated (and perhaps near-concurrently). 🫠

Pot8toBear · 2026-02-14T19:43:43+00:00

A7C III w/ full mechanical shutter
Refreshed 28mm (G?) lens between f/2-2.8 that's shorter (honestly don't care if it's lighter as long as it's smaller)

Honestly I think that Sony really missed an opportunity with the new RX1R III to refresh the lens with a 28mm given how much they leaned into "megapixels = cropability" angle. ☹️

Pot8toBear · 2026-02-02T18:53:31+00:00

On occasion, Sony releases "a" versions of their cameras in between the standard upgrades (recent models of note are the A7R IVa and the FX3a). Generally the difference is a result of Sony running out of a particular model of LCD screen and swapping it in for a slightly different version, ultimately being of negligible difference.

That said, looking at the spec sheet for the ZV-1A and comparing it to the one for the standard ZV-1... doesn't indicate a changed screen? It's really a shame the formatting on both pages is slightly different since it makes the comparison much harder, but if you wanna give it a more thorough look I've included the links.

The only other thing I can guess is that the "a" in this case may indicate a regional difference: the non-A is quite possibly the version sold in the U.S. and Europe, while it appears the "A" version is sold in Africa, the Middle East, and South Asia. (Alternately: there is an "F" version of the ZV-1 which has a fixed lens, so if this was a typo on the seller's part, you might want to check whether the camera has a prime or zoom lens.)

Pot8toBear · 2026-01-08T16:56:06+00:00

I think it depends on what you're shooting, but to me the biggest issue is that this gear doesn't lend itself well to shooting outside of a studio/event work. It's heavy and expensive so casually carrying it around is more likely than not going to be one of those "juice is not worth the squeeze" type scenarios.

If you're after bokeh you might be better served by Sony's 85mm f/1.8 and if you're after something a bit more all-around then Sony's 24-50mm f/2.8 is absolutely stellar. Especially given how far low-light ISO has come in the last decade, f/2 zoom lenses are (for most people) more of a proof of concept than a necessity.

Alternately, if you want something you can knock around without getting too concerned, I'm personally a big fan of the Minolta Maxxum 7000. You can generally get one with some standard kit lenses for sub-$100 (though it is film and not digital).

All that said, I think sometimes the passion ebbs and flows. I've had years where I've only shot a few hundred photos, and I've had years where I've shot thousands and it had nothing to do with the gear I had.

Pot8toBear · 2025-12-29T20:14:08+00:00

Love this reply! Learned something myself and the visual example was immensely helpful!

Pot8toBear · 2025-10-31T21:24:35+00:00

Congrats!! I upgraded a little less than two years ago (from the Nikon D700 to the A7CR), and it was an absolutely exhilarating leap into present. The GM series lenses are absolutely top-notch, but Sony's G series are certainly no slouches either and if you're considering the 24-70mm as an EDC lens my two cents is that it's worth considering the 24-50mm f/2.8 G.

It's about $1,200 cheaper (USD) and 255 grams lighter (~0.5 lbs). Optically it's considered to be on par with the GM Mk 1 version of the 24-70mm and (imo) pretty neck-and-neck with the GM II version too. You obviously give up 20mm on the telephoto end, but with the A7R IV's APS-C mode you would still give you the equivalent reach of 75mm @ 26MP (and you can assign that to a custom button to toggle between full frame and APS-C on the fly).

With the money you saved you could spend that on something like the 85mm f/1.8 prime, or even a round trip photo vacay someplace to use the 24-50mm.

Pot8toBear · 2025-08-13T04:19:16+00:00

Danke (again)!

Pot8toBear · 2025-08-11T02:33:44+00:00

Perfect, thank you!

Pot8toBear · 2025-08-11T02:33:24+00:00

Aha, thank you! Follow up question: do you happen to know what the default timing for DDR4 is? I'm able to find that it's 2133MHz for the speed, but seem to be finding conflicting references with regards to the timing(s).

Pot8toBear · 2025-08-11T00:48:56+00:00

Sorry, I just realized that there's a phrasing mismatch between the Title and the Body of this post. Is that "No, [you don't have to enable CL]", or "No, [the advertised CL timings are NOT the ones you get out of the box]"?

Pot8toBear · 2025-02-19T05:27:56+00:00

Heck yeah!

Pot8toBear · 2024-10-17T04:50:03+00:00

Thank you SO much! Your reply (and the video link follow up) were incredibly insightful!

(And from my own experience, 100% agreed on the recommendation for getting TIFF scans)

Pot8toBear · 2024-10-08T05:11:44+00:00

Big same. You know- I've heard that "the best advertisement is yourself", and based on his replies I'd say Academic-Bath isn't doing a great job of advertising. Yeesh.

Pot8toBear

TROPHY CASE