Ref. the subtitle of this blog, its time to note that my regular journal entries have almost exclusively switched to use of 'Momento', an iPhone app, together with a spare bluetooth keyboard which was part of the New iMac purchase.
The latter allows easy updating of the journal, and has a simple tagging system, which makes finding some cyclic event's history in a blink, such as tablet use.
So its goodbye to pencil and paper, which is just as well, because reading old pencil journals from 1998 when I had the first heart symptoms, was very difficult for me, letalone other interested parties, e.g. the girls.
Sunday, 19 June 2011
Other 'cameras'
Besides the LX5 I have been using the iPhone 4's camera, and was pleasantly surprised by the quality of the various snaps. I have accumulated a bunch of 'apps', but the one I use exclusively outdoors is Quickpix, as this is the only app which, with a touch on the almost invisible icon, will take a shot a second later and store the result in the Camera Roll.. couldn't be easier.
The Nexus One has a similar app, Qikcam, which also takes remarkably good shots, almost as good as the iPhone's, but nowhere need the LX5's superior quality!
The Nexus One has a similar app, Qikcam, which also takes remarkably good shots, almost as good as the iPhone's, but nowhere need the LX5's superior quality!
Saturday, 28 May 2011
Photography blog or not..
My finally decided upon Panasonic DMC-LX5 camera arrived a few days ago, and besides reading up on the most relevant sections in order to get the tiny beast working, I have been wondering whether to start a new 'open' blog about my experiences with taking up photography again in my 79th year. Haven't decide yet, so in the mean time I'll put my entries here.
I have had a few old snaps taken with unknown cameras up in the woods some years ago, recently added some iPhone 4 snaps, all for family viewing only, and have now started a couple of 'sets', joined a few 'groups' - all this on Flickr.
The LX5 takes remarkably good photos and has a host of advanced features like Auto Bracket, which enable HDR pictures to be 'developed' with the aid of a great piece of software called Photomatix that runs on the iMac in my case.
Setting Auto Bracket to +/-2 EV automatically takes 3 shots with different exposures at the push of a button. These are then merged by Photomatix and tone mapped to produced the results one wishes. In my case a picture of the stue table area taken near the top of the stairs produced a really psychedelic wide angle work of art!
See http://www.flickr.com/photos/cintra2/5767057795/in/set-72157626823316018
I'll leave it here for now, and add new experiences as they occur.
I have had a few old snaps taken with unknown cameras up in the woods some years ago, recently added some iPhone 4 snaps, all for family viewing only, and have now started a couple of 'sets', joined a few 'groups' - all this on Flickr.
The LX5 takes remarkably good photos and has a host of advanced features like Auto Bracket, which enable HDR pictures to be 'developed' with the aid of a great piece of software called Photomatix that runs on the iMac in my case.
Setting Auto Bracket to +/-2 EV automatically takes 3 shots with different exposures at the push of a button. These are then merged by Photomatix and tone mapped to produced the results one wishes. In my case a picture of the stue table area taken near the top of the stairs produced a really psychedelic wide angle work of art!
See http://www.flickr.com/photos/cintra2/5767057795/in/set-72157626823316018
I'll leave it here for now, and add new experiences as they occur.
Thursday, 12 May 2011
Google IO week!
Tuesday the 10th May was Android Keynote day.
Lots of interesting stuff for developers and how they can continue to make Android the platform of the future. Honeycomb 3.1 is due out any day now, and Icecream Sandwich will be out later on in the fall. It should bring tablets and phones together on a common version. There was also an agreed movement to reduce fragmentation caused by the current Mfg and Carrier skinning... lets hope that works out, or that at least there will always be a Nexus version.
Yesterday, Wednesday was the Chrome Keynote day. Both browser (with Angry Birds) and Chrome OS. Chromebooks were announced to be available in US and 6 other countries around the world in June. I might well see if I can get one via Pixmania in late June/July :)
Otherwise, although I am tempted by aspects of both the iPad and Android tablets, particularly the Eee Transformer, I think I'll hold off a bit longer.
Monday, 25 April 2011
Sunday, 3 April 2011
Mobile wonderings
I have the iPhone 4 and the Nexus One, both comparatively recent acquisitions. I like them both OK, and have gradually added apps which are really necessary to be able to share between my various Mac and other systems, e.g. Dropbox, Evernote, RTM, to name a few. I am a Google user, so most of my notes exist 'in the cloud'. I do backup things frequently tho' not in a scheduled way.
I have been checking on to the Nexus often to see if the promised Gingerbread update has arrived or not, so far 'not'! :(
I find myself using the iPhone 4 more often; there is something lighter and more attractive in some way, tho' I have apps which will do 90+ % of the same things on the Nexus.
But, more often recently I have been asking myself why I and others more than me are so keyed up by the latest and greatest new phones, when we use them so little in fact.
Is this another (tho' milder) form of the Gentoo obsession, when I spent a year or more waiting for new kernel versions to be incorporated onto my systems, spending days upgrading various components just to be 'on the (leading) edge'. If so, perhaps its time to take stock and get a life.
The lucky thing is that I am not hooked, like so many younger people, by Facebook, and/or Games!
Twitter is something I follow a limited number of people, and I only tweet occasionally. Buzz I belong to, but there are even fewer followers in either direction.
So, its time for another mindmap exercise to decide the future of my mobile interest, investments, etc.
I have been checking on to the Nexus often to see if the promised Gingerbread update has arrived or not, so far 'not'! :(
I find myself using the iPhone 4 more often; there is something lighter and more attractive in some way, tho' I have apps which will do 90+ % of the same things on the Nexus.
But, more often recently I have been asking myself why I and others more than me are so keyed up by the latest and greatest new phones, when we use them so little in fact.
Is this another (tho' milder) form of the Gentoo obsession, when I spent a year or more waiting for new kernel versions to be incorporated onto my systems, spending days upgrading various components just to be 'on the (leading) edge'. If so, perhaps its time to take stock and get a life.
The lucky thing is that I am not hooked, like so many younger people, by Facebook, and/or Games!
Twitter is something I follow a limited number of people, and I only tweet occasionally. Buzz I belong to, but there are even fewer followers in either direction.
So, its time for another mindmap exercise to decide the future of my mobile interest, investments, etc.
Sunday, 27 February 2011
Gingerbread manual update
Spent hours with update zip to no avail: ( Like several others I was getting a file check error even though the MD5 checksum proved to be correct. This is a painfully slow way to enter text so I'll add more latter. .
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