The newly-announced Fujifilm HS10, while sporting an impressive zoom range, has a much smaller sensor than its predecessors, the S100fs and S200EXR.
View Kevin Coppalotti’s comparison chart of sensor sizes on DPReview to get an idea.
Recent Updates RSS
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Fuji S100fs vs Fuji S200 EXR vs Fuji HS10: Sensor Sizes
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Download the MacHeist nanoBundle (Nano Bundle, late 2009) - 6 Top Mac Apps for Free
Some very nice Mac apps included in the time-limited MacHeist bundle, all for free.
I’ve already activated WriteRoom, which normally has a $24.95 price tag.
The 6 free software are:
- ShoveBox (normal price: $24.95)
- WriteRoom (normal price: $24.95)
- Twitterrific (normal price: $14.95)
- TinyGrab (normal price: £10)
- Hordes of Orcs (normal price: $24.95)
- Mariner Write (normal price: $49.95)
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Jack Hollingsworth on shooting portrait stock photos
From the Fotolia Newsletter, November 2009:
30 years in the biz, Jack Hollingsworth has a few tips on shooting stock portraiture.
Tip 1: Content Trumps Craft Photographers love talking about the “craft” of how images are created, but most customers are looking for content and concepts.
Tip 2: Avoid Traditional Portraiture Set-ups Traditional portraiture is stiff and predictable. Today’s buyers are looking for imagery that is completely authentic, emotive, credible and unrehearsed.
Read more on Jack Hollingsworth and microstock photography.
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Nikon 16-85mm VR vs Tamron 28-75mm (Nikon mount)
Kevin Nguyen gives his reasons for selling off the Nikon 16-85mm f/3.5-5.6G AF-S DX ED VR Nikkor Wide Angle Telephoto Zoom lens and keeping the Tamron AF 28-75mm f/2.8 SP XR ZL Di LD Aspherical (IF) lens:
I have both of those lens. End up selling the Nikon 16-85 VR and kept the Tamron 28-75 f2.8.
Then again, I do have the Nikon 17-55mm f2.8 as my primary I guess. I find living without the wide-open aperture of f2.8 was a pain. I would rather have that over VR. The ability Tamron could do macro at the same time was a huge bonus. The bokeh was great.
I’ve had D200 for 5+ years, the Tamron was my primary lens for 50% of the time. Love it.
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10 Things To Do When You're In Perth
This flyer from Malaysia Airlines arrived in the email, with a list of 10 interesting places to visit and things to do in Perth, Australia.
(click to see a larger version)
1. DNA Tower in Kings Park offers majestic panoramic views of the city skyline, Swan River, the mountain range & the Indian Ocean.
2. Head to the beach! Swim, surf, sail, kayak or just relax & soak in the sun at Scarborough Beach, Cottesloe Beach or Mettams Pool.
3. Bring the kids to AQWA (Aquarium of Western Australia) for a first-hand experience of the region’s sea life!
4. Take a day out to explore the port town of Fremantle where cafes and outdoor markets are abound.
5. Swim with the dolphins at the seaside town of Rockingham. Fishing & crabbing are also available. Or head to Penguin Island for an up close with the Fairy penguins.
6. Indulge in some retail therapy at the city malls, King Street or at the factory outlet centre Harbour Town.
7. Sample local fares especially fish and chips in cafes by the river. Or opt for succulent, freshly-caught blue manna crab & seafood feast at Peel Inlet.
8. Spend a day or two at the Yanchep National Park, a favorite nature & wildlife attraction for both tourists & locals alike.
9. Feel as though you’ve stepped back in time as you wander the historic country towns in Avon Valley. Go rafting on Avon River!
10. Catch a ballet or an opera performance at His Majesty’s Theatre, the only Edwardian theatre in Australia that has been operating since 1904!
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TriTag on the Mac for building MP3 tags from filenames
I had a bunch of Chinese songs in MP3 format whose Song Name / Title and Artist tags didn’t match the filename, and I needed a way to edit the MP3 tags in bulk.
After searching around, TriTag from Feedface.com works best for me.
Below is a screenshot of the program. I used the pattern “%n %s %a” to populate the tags, and everything ran without a hitch. In fact, the batch process completed in less than a second for 171 songs.
(click to see a larger version)
MP3Machine.com has user comments on this software.
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Canon SX1 IS vs Sony HX1
Here’s Digital Camera Info’s conclusion on their comparison of the Canon SX1 IS and Sony Cyber-shot HX1:
The choice between the Sony DSC-HX1 and the Canon SX1 is a tough one; both scored well in our tests and provide an excellent selection of features. The Canon had the edge in a few of our tests (color and noise in still images), but the Sony came out tops in others (such as resolution, image stabilization and most of our video tests). In the end, the choice will probably come down to the appeal of some of the extra features that are on offer (such as the Sony’s excellent panorama and low light shooting features) or price: the Sony is $100 cheaper than the Canon SX1.
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Nikon P90 vs Sony HX1
Here’s Digital Camera Info’s conclusion on their comparison of the Nikon Coolpix P90 and Sony Cyber-shot HX1:
The Nikon has a slight edge if you look at the specs: it shoots higher resolution images (12 megapixels against the 9 of the Sony), has a longer lens (24X against the 20x of the Sony) and is cheaper. But the Sony has superior performance in pretty much every category of our tests: it has better color, resolution and much better stabilization. The only area where the Nikon was superior was noise; although the Sony has the wider ISO range, the Nikon had lower noise in images at the ISO levels it achieved. The Sony was also a vastly superior performer at shooting video. While the Nikon could only shoot grainy standard definition video, the Sony could shoot very attractive high definition video.
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Olympus SP-590UZ vs Sony HX1
Here’s Digital Camera Info’s conclusion on their comparison of the Olympus SP-590UZ and Sony Cyber-shot HX1:
The Olympus SP-590UZ has the longer zoom range of the two cameras (26x against the 20x of the Sony) and is also $50 cheaper. But the Sony was a better performer: it produced sharper images with more detail, had superior image stabilization and shoots better looking movies. However, the Olympus had very slightly better colors. Although both cameras are very close in many ways, we think that the Sony would generally be the better option as a general use camera, although some users may want to opt for the extra zoom range of the Olympus.
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Possible to design high quality zoom lenses for ultra-compact digital cameras?
Patco wrote:
It think it would have to be a fixed focal length lens, as an HQ full frame zoom would have to be much too large for a compact camera.
… to which Thom Hogan replied:
As I’ve written many times, that’s not true. It is tricky to get the design of a zoom compact enough, but as I wrote quite some time ago, it is not only possible, but there are at least three ways I know of to get there. The one that should be obvious to everyone right now is to use the Kodak/Leica offset microlens bit, as this allows you to use designs that are aggressive in the rear portion of the optics. But there’s complexity in all three ways I know to do it
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Canon S90 IS vs SD980 IS / IXUS 200 IS?
Tom Hoots outlined a couple of reasons why he’d choose the Canon Powershot S90 IS over the SD980 IS / IXUS 200 IS, here are two of them:
I hope to God that the S90 will be much, much better than even the best SD series camera. For one thing, the SD980 will have almost twice the pixel density of the S90 — 43 MP/cm² pixel density vs. the S90’s 23 MP/cm². That is an utterly huge difference, and the S90 even clocks in a click below the LX3 at 24 MP/cm².
But it’s the SD series lenses that I think are the weakest points. If you can fill the image with a close subject, in good light, you can get some decent results. Anything not filling the image will be soft, anything using any zoom at all will be soft — and so on. I think they are among the least useful lenses on any consumer camera on the market.
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Snow Leopard and Adobe Unit Types.osax
Oct 02, 2009 update: The 64-bit version of Adobe Unit Types.osax is now available, and should be the better solution to the /dev/null solution I originally wrote about below. Thanks to Ron Miller who wrote the following email to alert me about the new file:
Rather than put a link to /dev/null, you can fix the Adobe osascript
problem by updating “Adobe Unit Types.osax” to a 64-bit version. See this
link on Adobe’s website.After upgrading to Snow Leopard, I get the following error added to the top of my Textmate document when I perform a post to my Wordpress blog using Brad Choate’s Blogging Bundle:
2009-09-13 15:38:10.711 osascript[5261:903] Error loading /Library/ScriptingAdditions/Adobe Unit Types.osax/Contents/MacOS/Adobe
Unit Types: dlopen(/Library/ScriptingAdditions/Adobe Unit Types.osax/Contents/MacOS/Adobe Unit Types, 262): no suitable image
found. Did find: /Library/ScriptingAdditions/Adobe Unit Types.osax/Contents/MacOS/Adobe Unit Types: no matching architecture
in universal wrapper osascript: OpenScripting.framework – scripting addition “/Library/ScriptingAdditions/Adobe Unit Types.osax” declares no loadable handlers.It turned out that deleting or moving the Adobe Unit Types.osax file that’s found in the /Library/ScriptingAdditions/ folder and re-booting my Mac solved the problem.
I got the idea for removing the file from this Apple Mailing List discussion. However, I’m also keeping a copy of this file someplace safe just in case uninstalling and Adobe application requires the file to be put back into that folder.
Additionally, I noticed that the file was re-created after I ran Photoshop and Lightroom, so I had to resort to creating a link with the name Adobe Unit Types.osax and have it point to /dev/null. This is how I did it:
1. In Finder, make a copy of the Adobe Unit Types.osax file, then delete the original file. You might be prompted to enter your Administrator password.
2. Launch Terminal.
2. cd /Library/ScriptingAdditions
3. sudo ln -s /dev/null "Adobe Unit Types.osax"
Keeping my fingers crossed this doesn’t break my Adobe apps.
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Canon Powershot S5 IS vs Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ28
Here’s why GeraldW switched from the Panasonic FZ28 to the Canon S5 IS:
Here’s a couple of things to consider with the ZS3.
First, the color is not as good, particularly in skies where Panasonic cameras often show that as a sort of aqua color.
Second, the ZS3 has no internal adjustments for sharpening, contrast, or saturation – only a very few Panasonic models do have internal settings anymore. Canon models still retain this capability.
Third, the Canon IS (Image Stabilization) seems to be consistently better than Panasonic’s OIS (Optical Image Stabilizer) – that was certainly the case with the FZ28 Vs the S5IS.
Personally, I much prefer the Canon menus and controls.
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iTunes 9 Genius Mixes - First Run on My iMac
Seems to work well enough. Click the screen capture to view a larger version.
If you don’t see the Genius Mixes item in your sidebar, try clicking on Store > Update Genius in the menu.
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Adam T on Canon SX10 IS vs Panasonic FZ28
The SX10 is the Family megazoom here, even Ma is using it instead of Pentax DSLRs, my brother uses it too on occasion (Sis in law has my old TZ5, I have a TX1) and IMO its the best Megazoom out there, beating the FZ28 on image quality though the FZ38 may be better again (but missing the build, swivelly screen and ergonomics of course).
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Canon SX20 IS vs SX10 IS, according to Ben Hermann
Ben is seriously disappointed with the image quality on the SX20IS – see Canon SX20 IS Reviews for the link to, and summary of his opinions.
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Best explanation of the 32-bit and 64-bit capabilities in Snow Leopard
The following is a comment by TheForestFloor to the CNET article 64-bit Snow Leopard defaults to 32-bit kernel:
If you boot into a 64bit kernel, none of your 32bit device drivers will work, so people who are upgrading will struggle. Drivers built for snow leopard will have both 32 & 64 bit code, but until that happens, booting into 64bit by default isn’t the right way to go.
That said, ‘booting into 64bit’ only refers to the kernel. All of the other libraries that apps depend on, AppKit, FoundationKit, libc, etc are all 64 bit, and will load if a 64 bit processor is accessible. Also, any program that was compiled with 64bit code will run in 64bits period, giving you that (2x) improvement.
The biggest problem for users will be that their software (Photoshop, Logic, etc) will be 64 bit, but their plugins might not be. If any program has plugins or extensions that are not 64 bit, it will have to be relaunched into 32bit mode to use them. Contrary to contentcreator’s comments, OSX does not ‘grind a bit’ when loading 64 bit code, nor does it load BOTH 32 and 64 bit. It loads 64bit code if it’s dependent libraries and the processor support it. If not, it degrades gracefully (and speedily) to 32bit code.
That said, nearly all programs 32/64/ppc continue to run well on SL, and all of them get to take advantage of GCD when they run, so they run a bit faster as well.
In the pre-release versions of SL, all of the Macbook Pros, Mac Pros and XServes could be set to boot in 64bit by default (without 32bit device drivers), and the others (with the exception of the MBA and Mini) could be booted with the ‘64′ keys held down. I guess they removed it to keep users from getting confused if their devices stopped working. My guess it will be the default for all machines once the driver community has moved all of their code over.
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Snow Leopard: The Contact Sheet feature in Preview
A Macworld Snow Leopard feature article:
Finally, a new Contact Sheet view lets you see all of your pages in thumbnail view at the same time, a nice convenience. To get this view, however, you need to set your General preferences to Open All Files In One Window or Open Groups Of Files In The Same Window.
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Snow Leopard vs Windows 7: Upgrade Process
Mentioning Microsoft in this case is notable because, as anyone who has ever tried to buy and install a Windows upgrade package knows, it’s a complete disaster.
You have to have the previous version of the OS available — and heaven help you if it’s not the exact right SKU — in order to install the upgrade.
If anything isn’t quite right, it all blows up in your face.
And of course you need to make sure you’ve got not just a serial number, but the right kind of serial number for the exact SKUs you’re upgrading over and with.
In contrast: Apple. No serial numbers, full installer, no need to go back to previous versions of the OS in order to install an upgrade.
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New Minimize Window Behavior in Snow Leopard
Fans of the yellow button, fear not: by default, Snow Leopard still minimizes windows the same stupid way Mac OS X has for the last ten years. For us complainers, though, there’s a new alternative: A Minimize Windows Into Application Icon checkbox in System Preferences’ Dock pane. With that box checked, when you click on that yellow button, your window will still fly away into the Dock. But instead of disappearing into the mess on the right, it will minimize into the icon of the application it belongs to. That makes it easy to bring the window back. (Minimized windows are indicated in most programs by a diamond in an app’s Window menu; you can see that same list by Control-clicking on the app’s icon in the Dock.) Even better, this feature works with Exposé: When you invoke Exposé, all minimized windows line up together at the very bottom of the screen.
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The Mac Pro and Apple's Warranty and Service (AppleCare)
A-Frame reports on his experience with using Windows PC computers and Macs:
I use both Windows OS and Mac OS at work. For design and photography type work the Mac experience is a little better IMO. Adobe PS performance under Windows is mainly affected by utiilites such as antivirus programs that hog resources.
My personal computer is a Mac Pro. Apple warranty and service is very good when their product fails. My (2008) Mac Pro Dual 2.8GHz failed within the first year of ownership. After several tries to fix the problem Apple decided to replace it with a (2009) Mac Pro Dual 2.93GHz. No doubt that my next pc will also be a Mac.
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Recommended flash bracket and sync cord for the Nikon SB-400 Speedlight flash?
Here’s Alex Booton’s suggestion:
I use a D40 with an SB400 on a flash bracket quite often. I use Stroboframe’s cheapest bracket, which is called a Quickflip 350 with an SC28 cord. It works great and it’s simple, but keep in mind that unlike the bigger flashes, the SB400 does not line up directly over the camera. Very close, but not quite, so you might on occasion still get a very faint, but pesky shadow down the right side of your subject.
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Nikon D300S plus Nikkor 24mm PC-E Photo
Nikon has officially released a gallery of full-sized Nikon D300S sample images, and the following photo was taken with the Nikon 24mm f/3.5D ED PC-E Nikkor Ultra-Wide Angle lens attached to the camera (click the picture to view the full-resolution image).
Nikon D300S Tilt-Shft Cityscape / Landscape:
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Paul McFedries recommends 10 iPhone Apps
Paul is the author of “iPhone 3GS Portable Genius: Also covers iPhone 3G”, and has 10 iPhone Apps to recommend to you.
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Lightroom vs Capture NX 2 - Color and Tonality Differences
Here’s a screen capture (LR on the left, NX2 on the right) that illustrates the differences in the way Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2.4 and Nikon Capture NX 2 render a Nikon D5000 RAW / NEF file on my Mac, as far as colors, tonality and contrast is concerned.
(click to view larger)
One reason for the differences is Capture NX 2 makes use of camera settings such as Picture Controls (this specifies sharpness, brightness, saturation, hue and contrast levels) and Active D-Lighting intensity that’s embedded in the image to render the initial JPEG.
If I need the highest quality RAW conversion, I edit the image in NX 2.
Otherwise, I live in Lightroom 99% of the time for my image cataloging, management, editing and printing requirements.
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Malayan Water Monitor Lizards on Tioman Island
These large, strong swimmers are everywhere on the island.
They’re not dangerous to humans, unlike the venomous Komodo dragons.
References: Malayan Water Monitor Lizard (Varanus salvator), Wikipedia.
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Canon 18-55mm lens on the T1i / 500D
Read up Photocrati’s T1i/ 500D review, where you’ll find a couple of web-resized photos (one macro, one candid, miscellaneous pics) shot with the EF-S 18-55 IS lens.
The 430EX Speedlite flash was used for some of the images.
Jack has the following remarks on the 18-55 lens:
I was happily surprised by the lens’s performance. I don’t think Canon souped-up sharpness and contrast in the T1i to make up for possible deficiencies in the lens optically, since I also tested it with one of my regular Canon zooms. So I’d have to say, in terms of sharpness, contrast, and color rendition, this lens appeared to hold its own. Another pleasant surprise was the close-focusing limit, at just under 10 inches.
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Stunning underwater photos with the Canon G10
Simply superb dive images by Jan Messersmith – there’s Lionfish, Clark’s Anemonefish (Amphiprion clarkii) and Bulb Anemone. He’s also posted his opinions about the image quality of the camera.
Jan used the WP-DC28 waterproof case to get the G10 underwater, and added:
I’m really happy with my new rig. People pay thousands of dollars for underwater cameras that don’t produce images any better than these. The difference is that the extra money buys you mostly more light on the subject. If you are willing to stay within the confines of available light and limit yourself to close shots when using flash, you can take professional quality underwater photos for way under a thousand US$. The G10 costs about US$400 and the housing was, I think, less than $200.
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The World Atlas of the Artificial Night Sky Brightness
If you’re planning your next trip to photograph your award-winning star trails image, be sure you know the levels of light pollution in the surrounding areas first.
Visit The night sky in the World for this data – see two examples of their maps – The World Atlas of the Artificial Night Sky Brightness and North America (notice how polluted the night sky on the eastern side of the US is).
Armed with this knowledge, you can then decide on your exposure (how long to keep the shutter open, what ISO) and stacking / blending (normally done with Photoshop) strategy.
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How To Get More Free Space on Dropbox
Dropbox already offers you 2 GB of space for free upon signing up, but you can get up to 3 GB of additional storage if you take part in their referral program.
Each person who signs up via your referral link earns you 250 MB, so if you get 12 people to use your referral link, you’ll get that extra 3GB.
However, there is a faster way. You can have an extra 250MB, right now, if you use my referral link and sign up for an account.
This way, both you and I will get the additional 250MB – a perfect win-win situation.
Aug 28, 2009 update – eight days after putting up this post and a tweet, I got my first referral! The Dropbox team kindly dropped me an automated email (titled ‘Dropbox referral status’) to announce the fact.
Sep 03, 2009 update – My second Dropbox referral is in – I’m up another 250MB!
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Should You Run Windows 7 or XP on a Netbook Computer?
… I’m typing this on a netbook running one of the RTM escrow builds of Windows 7. I certainly could have installed Windows XP on this machine instead of its newer sibling. However, the hassle of patching, tuning, and hunting down drivers just to get XP to boot on this newfangled hardware would have made the effort difficult to justify. By contrast, Windows 7 simply worked from the get-go. With few exceptions, its default configuration was entirely functional.
I have a feeling this same scene is playing out across the IT landscape. Shops weary of patching and tweaking XP to get it working reliably on modern hardware are looking at Windows 7 and thinking it might just be the version that finally lures them away from their legacy environment. After all, there’s something to be said for convenience. And when it comes to seamlessly embracing new hardware technologies, Windows 7 is far better positioned than creaky old XP.
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Free Introductory Screencast on Building an iPhone App
Bill Dudney, author of the “Writing Your First iPhone Application” screencast series, announced the availability of a free, 20-minute preview which goes into some detail on using Xcode and IB (Interface Builder) to build your first iPhone program.
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iPhoto Book Quality
The photo books that you order from Apple via the iPhoto interface might not be up to the quality you expect, especially if you’re an owner of a high-end DSLR or digital camera.
In a comment to a blog post, monte says:
The iPhoto books are aimed at the general audience who uses mainly point and shoot type cameras.
There is a fixed, limited amount of digital information that the book download from your computer to Apple will take.
New DSLRs with 15-24 megapixels’ images edit great as RAW or JPGs on Photoshop and similar higher end photo apps.
The resulting files are large. You can set up a book in iPhoto with these large file images and they will look great when you see them on your computer.
The shortfall is when you order the books and send your image information to Apple, it is compressed (so they get softened quite a bit).
Again, iPhoto is geared for lower expectations of image quality and hasn’t the capacity nor the ability to capture large files.
For the vast majority of buyers the image quality is very acceptable. The books (at this time) don’t do justice to more advanced photographic images and are far from museum quality.
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2009 Digital SLR Group Test
If you’re still agonizing over which mid-range DSLR to purchase, perhaps ePHOTOzine’s 2009 DSLR Group Review Report might help.
The article compares 5 DSLR bodies: Canon EOS 50D vs Nikon D300 vs Olympus E-30 vs Pentax K-7 vs Sony A700.
The A700 emerged as the overall winner, with the following verdict:
The Sony Alpha A700 wins because of the specification being so similar to the other models, it gives good noise performance, has great color rendition and a good dynamic range that seems to work even when dynamic range compensation is switched off.
A useful summary of pros and cons of each camera is given at the end of the review.
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ASUS 1005HA / 1008HA vs Dell Mini 10 vs HP Mini 1000
In this gdgt.com discussion, the ASUS Eee PC netbook / ultra-portable laptop computers seem to garner the most favorable user reviews, who rave about the speed and network performance of the machines when running Windows 7.
JohnLeBaron says:
First, I would say to skip both those computers (the Dell inspiron Mini 10 and HP Mini 1000) and get the Asus eee 1005HA or the 1000HE (an older model). They are both incredible machines and if the Dell 10 is anything like the Latitude 2100 then it will be a dog compared with the 2 Asus ones.
I have had both Asus’s and loved the HE (but I killed it on a freeway so I got the 1005HA as a replacement and it is incredible). The extra speed of these processors may not seem like they will make a difference but they actually do.
And for the $ you cant beat them. Asus also offers a 2 year extended warranty (you have to go on line for it) that covers some types of damage.
They also run OSX nicely (http://discuss.gdgt.com/asus/eee/pc/1005ha/tips/osx-on-1005ha/#20427).
backbeatcat added:
I loaded Windows 7 ultimate (RTM) on my new 1005HA about a week ago and it is working very well. Performance seems about the same as with XP and the machine runs the aero interface very well. The installation was fairly easy as described in a few good articles on the web. I used a 4GB USB drive formatted using the HP format tool to be an active partition. Drivers for XP worked fine. Just run the installations using the XP compatibility mode.
Network performance on this thing is OFF THE FRICKIN’ CHAIN. The 802.11n network adapter really screams on my network. Netflix movies load in about 7 seconds from the the “play” click.
Since I got this, three people in my office have seen it and ordered one. The thing sells itself. Just be sure to keep a 4GB-8GB USB drive around to load software from.
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How to make and market a successful Android device
Carefully select a handful of areas where you can beat the iPhone, and then promote the hell out of these features. Over-the-air calendar, contact, and email syncing through Google services should beat MobileMe hands down, if only because MobileMe costs $100 a year and Google’s services are free.
There is no better advice than this:
If your goal is to sell more smartphones than Apple, you’re going to fail. If your hope is to gain a strong foothold in the market with a sub-par device, you are mistaken. So aim high, and set your goals such that you can smugly claim victory with just a fraction of Apple’s unit sales. If Apple is BMW, you can be Porsche.
In an addenda, John admonishes:
Display, processor, RAM, storage capacity, build quality. Match — or come really close to matching — the iPhone on these criteria and then add just one thing that beats it, at least for some segment of the market. This is where there’s room for several Android handset makers to flourish. Say, one with an amazing camera. One with twice the battery life. (Or even better, combine those two, and when you make room for the bigger battery with a thicker case, use the extra room to add a larger camera sensor.) But add at least one thing that might make some iPhone owners envious — something to hang your hat on.
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Deleting Apps on the Mac with Forklift
Removing / unistalling programs and unwanted software on my Macs is now so much easier with Forklift.
(click to view a larger version)
In Forklift, just select an app in the Applications folder (Syncplicity, in this example – Dropbbox serves my needs better), and click on the Delete App toolbar icon. You’re presented with a list of related items for deletion.
Remove the tick in the checkbox next to an item to keep it.
Click Move to Trash, and the app is completely removed.
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A Photographer's Guide to Santorini, Greece
Sebastian Vaida writes a fantastic article on Santorini for the photographer – places to see, locations to photograph, what equipment to bring, how to get there and around, interacting with the locals, and other tips.
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iPhone vs Android
The woeful performance and usability of Android is precisely the reason that Apple can treat developers (and consumers) however they like; it’s not even playing the same game, much less on the field with the iPhone. That Android is a mobile Linux platform is sadly apparent. Android suffers from the same issues that have plagued Linux on the desktop for years: the lack of integration between software and hardware, buggy and under-featured applications, a lack of attention paid to user experience issues. The encouraging openness and bits of innovation in Android are overshadowed by mediocrity.
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Learn Ruby
The Ruby Study Notes / Tutorials on rubylearning.com is a good place to start learning Ruby.
I’d already written my first “Hello” Ruby program in Textmate.
First, I created an empty
p001hello.rbfile and opened that in Textmate.Next, I pasted and tidied up the sample code, and executed the program by pressing ⌘R, which opens an HTML preview window showing the results.
That was all there was to it. I’m pretty amazed how smoothly it all went.
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Disable "Wake On Lid Open" on MacBooks
Remember this Terminal command:
sudo pmset -a lidwake 0Andy Ihnatko explains why:
It’s a safety thing. Way, way too frequently I’ve picked up my laptop bag and it felt…warm. I unzipped it and heard a screaming fan. At some unguessable point in the recent past, the MacBook got jostled just enough to twitch the screen sensor and it woke up.
Inside a sealed bag whose thick padding acted as thermal insulation. Result: a white-hot $1500 computer. That can’t be good. If there are any weak points in the hardware, that sort of abuse will cook ‘em right into a hardware failure.
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Almost Zero Shutter Lag on the iPhone 3GS
John Gruber comments on Adam Lisagor’s experience on snapping photos with the 3GS, and notes:
… a few times where I thought I’d missed the shot based on my experience with the original iPhone and 3G, I’ve gotten the shot with the 3GS. But after reading Adam’s piece and testing it out side-by-side with my old 3G, there’s no maybe about it. As Adam says, something smart is happening here.
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Wrong dateTime.iso8601 error when fetching posts from Wordpress to TextMate
If you get a wrong dateTime error when fetching posts from your Wordpress blog using the Blogging Bundle in Textmate, this could be due to the existence of a recent draft post.
If you create a Draft post in Wordpress using the browser-based Wordpress editor, a record is created with all zeros in the post_date_gmt field of the draft post record. I used phpMyAdmin for this screen capture of the posts table.
(click to view larger)
You can do one of two things to address this problem.
Firstly, you could just go ahead and create a new post in Textmate and publish it to your Wordpress blog – it will successfully publish.
Or, you could force a proper date to be updated in the post_date_gmt field by calling up the draft post in the Wordpress editor and changing the publish date of the post from “Publish immediately” to a specific date in the future, and re-saving the draft post.
This issue only crops up when creating draft posts in Wordpress itself. Draft posts made using Marsedit or Textmate have the post_date_gmt field filled in with the date and time of the post creation. However, you would need to remember to manually change the date and time later, at the point of publishing the post.
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Why Both Kids & Parents Love The iPhone
Nice post (and comments) on kids and the iPhone / iPod Touch.
The kids definitely seem to prefer Apple’s devices over the Nintendo DS and Sony PSP.
I’m also making note of graham’s recommendation for an educational app for the kids:
An iPhone kids application you should check out is iStoryTime. It’s a library of narrated and illustrated kids books for the iPhone. There are 6 books available in the Apple AppStore today: http://www.istorytimeapp.com/appstore With new ones coming out every week.
Great for driving in the car, on the airplane, or at a restaurant waiting for the bill when the kids are going crazy.
Books are $1.99/ea from iTunes and can also be purchased on your phone from anywhere. Great for entertaining the kids in a guilt free way. All the wholesomeness of a book with the convenience of your phone.
Enjoy!
Website: http://www.istorytimeapp.com
On the AppStore: http://www.istorytimeapp.com/appstore(click to view full-size)
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Desktop Publishing on the Mac
A superb article at Jettison Canopy explores alternatives to Adobe InDesign for desktop publishing software on the Mac platform.
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Virtual Keyboard Comparison: iPhone vs HTC Magic (Android)
(image is copyright Lukas Mathis)
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Fuji F200EXR vs Sony TX1
The Sony Cyber-shot DSC-TX1 Preview at CNET Asia shows the TX1 to have equal, if not superior, high-ISO noise performance to the Fujifilm Finepix F200 EXR.
The on-going Sony TX1 analysis has been updated with this piece of information.
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Panic Sans Font in Textmate
Thanks to a tip in this post by DamienG, I’ve managed to install the gorgeous Panic Sans font that comes with the Coda application, and used it in Textmate.
Here’s a screen shot showing a comparison of both fonts.
Monaco (click to view larger):
Panic Sans (click to view larger):
I’m still sticking with Textmate’s Pastels on Dark theme though, as it is easy on the eyes (Twilight is a tad more contrasty).
I’ve also decided that the combination of Textmate and Forklift is best suited for my needs in adding and modifying content (Textmate) on Digital Photography Notes locally on my Mac, and syncing the new and modified files (Forklift) with my remote hosting server.
Forklift also acts as a splendid File Manager / Finder alternative, with its two-pane, multi-tab approach to presenting folders, servers and mounted storage.
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First Nikon D3000 Review Test Photos at DC.Watch
Analyze the full-sized D3000 images – brief analysis is at Nikon D3000.
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Impressive Sony WX1 high-ISO photos at DigitalCamera.jp
Navigating the site for the Sony WX1 test photos is a bit convoluted, so follow the links and explanations at Sony WX1 sample photos.
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Pentax K-7 Review in Amateur Photographer Magazine: Paraphrased
Paul Graber posted excerpts from the K-7 review (which was written by Angela Nicholson):
… she likes the camera quite a lot, finding it “extremely comfortable to hold and use”. She likes IQ and detail resolution, and unique-to-Pentax features such as built-in level adjustment. Live View now fully rounded and of genuine use. During review process, she adds latest firmware and notes improvements. But she finds a few niggling problems:-
* AF improved, but still behind Nikon and Canon
* Viewfinder not that comfortable to use and a bit gloomy
* Menu system less flexible than competitorsAlso, the Canon 50D and Nikon D300 / D300S might be preferred by sports photographers for the Autofocus speed, but “… landscape, still-life and macro photographers could well prefer K-7.”
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Tips to minimize the risk of overheating the SB-900
Digital Photography Links summarizes the points raised in the four YouTube video clips by Lilkiwiguy87 on possible solutions to prevent the Nikon SB-900 from overheating.
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TextMate productivity tips
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SiteLauncher (Firefox Add-On): hotkey based launcher for your most-used sites
Here’s a nice little Site Launcher that I’ve just started using on my Mac.
Anytime, anywhere while in a Firefox session, just hit
ctrl + alt / optionto call up an overlay where you can then hit a single key to access your favorite websites.Hitting
command + shift + swhile you’re on a web site calls up a window where you can quickly assign a shortcut key and enter a descriptive title.
[via Digital Inspiration]
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Portraits of female models with the K10D and DA 55-300mm
Nice sample photos by Kesha, who used the Pentax K10D and Pentax smc DA 55-300mm lens.
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Tons of Mac Automator Tips
You can get lots of ideas from this blog on Mac Automator Applications and Tips, written by Claire J Rottenberg.
I stumbled on to this site while searching for ways to create contact sheets from a selection of images on the Mac.
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iPhone in Business
How the iPhone is used for business operations, and usage examples.
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Sony DSC-WX1 Images at EPrice
Great WX1 portraits and miscellaneous shots.
Read more on the Sony WX1.
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Sony DSC-TX1 Images at EPrice
Great TX1 portraits and miscellaneous shots.
Read more on the Sony TX1.
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Batch Rename in Forklift
Batch file renaming – what a really useful feature to find in an FTP program.
Actually, the more I use Forklift, the more I like it. It’s less of an FTP program, and more of a File Management (or Finder replacement) application.
The files I renamed were images used for Panasonic GF1: The Leaked Photos Collection.
