Published at January 26, 2010
in general.
I’m always in the market for a new camera, but can never settle on a new model to replace my ageing Canon Powershot A520. The new purchase has to do HD video and needs to produce some super clean images at a moderate ISO. And it has to fit in my pocket (have the dSLR for real photo outings). And built in GPS would be awesome, as doing it after the fact with a trackfile or by memory is a pain. A few new models by Canon are starting to support my needs, but I still read that their HD video isn’t great, and they don’t do stereo audio. A few Panasonic models fit the bill, but they are priced a little out of my range for a secondary pocket camera.
Today Panasonic announced 3 new models, two of which are interesting. The Panasonic Lumix ZS7 SuperZoom does the HD, has more than enough zoom at 12x, and has built in GPS. The Panasonic models have come along way in picture quality and size. Their other model is the Lumix DMC-TS2, a camera that does HD and has underwater shooting abilities in a small package. I hope the DMC-TS2 has the same improved image quality as most of their new offerings, because I have been less than impressed with the photos from the other underwater cameras (I’m looking at you Samsung).
I’ll have to see how these cameras get priced in the marketplace.
Published at September 24, 2009
in general.
Sydney Australia (a near by cities) were bathed in red dust from the desert this week as huge sand storms blew the dust east. A number of eerie photos can be seen on flickr, and now The Big Picture has created a set that are also mesmerizing.
photo by tomhide
Published at August 23, 2009
in general.
I made the trip down to the Toronto Zoo recently and brought my new camera for some photos. I don’t have anything near a zoom lens, and you really need one to get spectacular photos of most animals, as it allows you to focus through the wire on many of the enclosures. Here are a few images that I was able to capture.
Bengal Tiger
Elephant
Hippopotamus
Siberian Tiger
Gorilla
Published at August 2, 2009
in general.
I have never found the location tagging in iPhoto 09 to be intuitive when trying to place photos in their exact location on a map. Not only do you have to do each photo separately, but you are required to create a place every time you place a pin in a unique location (as far as I can tell). The ideal situation is to geotag the photos before importing them into iPhoto. There are a number of methods to do that which I won’t cover in depth here. This post is going to explain how I was able to geotag old photos that were already in iPhoto.
I began geotagging my photos many years ago when flickr first started offering the service. I put a lot of time into geotagging each photo with its exact location (not just general area). The problem I ran into however was that I was unable to get that geodata out of flickr and into my original photos in iPhoto. This weekend I stumbled across a fairly manual process, but it goes pretty fast once you get moving.
(This process is being written from a Mac perspective. I will take a look for similar Windows solutions if there is demand.)
Assumptions:
-You have photos geotagged on flickr
-You have photos in iPhoto that you want to tag
Required:
-Geotagger – This program will insert the GPS coordinates currently centered in Google Earth into the Exif of your photos
-Flickr Photo Set to KML – This script will grab your geotagged photos from flickr and create a KML file that you can open in Google Earth
-Google Earth
Procedure:
It’s a fairly straight forward procedure. First locate the photoset on flickr that you want to use and copy the set number from the URL into the ‘Photoset to KML‘ site. Choose to download the KML and open it in Google Earth. Now locate the files in iPhoto that you want to geotag. I did this by selecting ’show package contents’ on the iPhoto Library file in my ‘pictures’ folder. Once viewing the contents go to the ‘originals’ folder then dig down until you find the folder with the images. (I think you might also be able to just open the event in iPhoto and drag the image from there to the Geotagger program.)
With the folder of images open on the computer, and the KML file loaded in Google Earth it is now just a matter of going to each image in Google Earth, letting it move to the location, then finding that same image in the pictures folder and dragging the file to the geotagger program on the dock. Most of my images were named with the default camera file name so it was easy to match up the images. Repeat this for as many photos you have to geotag.
The final step is selecting all the photos you just edited in iPhoto and cmd-clicking (right click) so that you can select the option ‘Rescan for Location’. Bam. All the images will now have the new location data and iPhoto will do a mediocre to decent job of rationalizing the GPS coordinates as a location name.
Published at July 18, 2009
in general.
I can’t remember the last time I saw a Lemonade Stand. Sadly this one was not staffed — despite the ‘now open’ sign. (Penetanguishene, Ontario)
Published at July 16, 2009
in general.
There has been a lot in the news the last few days in celebration of humanity’s first trip to the Moon that began on July 16th, 1969. NASA and the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum have stepped up to the plate with a collection of spectacular Internet websites and archival media. The Big Picture has also collected a wonderful set of Apollo 11 images.
NASA has been working with Lowry Digital to digitally restore the original moonwalk footage. They have released copies of these that can be downloaded from their website in 720p (though the original video is no where near this quality). NASA has also created an information rich website that celebrates the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission.
(via Wikipedia)
The other amazing Internet resource is the website We Choose the Moon. This website (created in Flash) is currently playing the entire Apollo 11 mission in real time, with real time transmissions between mission control and the spacecraft, along with archival images and videos. The presentation is broken up into 11 modules that unfold in real time as the spacecraft travels toward its ultimate goal of landing humans on the Moon. You have to experience the multimedia gold they have created first hand in order to truly appreciate it. After this initial real time presentation users will be able to view any segment at their own leisure.
Be sure to turn into We Choose the Moon around 4:10 pm EST on Monday July 20th (the lunar landing date and time was July 20, 1969 20:17:40 UTC) to experience the descent of Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin to the surface of the Moon.
Published at July 16, 2009
in general.
Last weekend was the Downtown Barrie Ribfest and I had the opportunity to swing by and check it out. The last ribfest I attended was in 2005 in Markham. I wasn’t overly impressed back then, so what would a 4 year hiatus bring?
Some interesting observations are that in 4 years the cost of a full rack of ribs has increased by 10% from $20 to $22. I don’t have the inflation figure for Canada in front of me, but that feels like a reasonable increase over a 4 year period. There was only one repeat ribber at the Barrie event that I tried in Markham (Silver Bullet). I did not try their ribs this year.
3 of us went down and worked it so that each of us would by a full rack of ribs from a different vendor and then share so that we could experience more of the event. We enjoyed ribs from the Gator BBQ Company, Crabby’s BBQ Shack and Uncle Sam’s BBQ. Uncle Sam’s was award the people’s choice award for best sauce, however I found their sauce think and their ribs were stringy and chalk full of fat and cartilage. My preference for ribs — hands down — were from Crabby’s BBQ Shack. The ribs were meaty, juicy, and the the sauce was a bit smoky and laid on thick.
Overall the event seemed to be a success, and given the decent weather it was a wonderful way to spend a Sunday afternoon.
Published at June 7, 2009
in general.
Last week at work there was a fund raiser for the Canadian Cancer Society in the form of Cow Patty Bingo. For those unfamiliar with the game the rules are fairly simple: you buy a square on a grid and hope the cow drops a patty in it. The highlight of the day was probably the fact that I controlled 54 of the available 130 square and did not win. The cow, who’s name happened to be Patti, had it out for me.
Published at April 23, 2009
in general.
For a week in March I was down in Florida trying out my new camera. I spent most of my time on the east coast searching for some waves, but sadly they were few and far between.
Cocoa Beach, Florida
St. Augustine Beach, Florida
Ormond Beach, Florida
Cocoa Beach, Florida
Ormond Beach, Florida
Published at April 7, 2009
in general.
Almost a year ago in July I wrote about YouCity and some test maps they had created for Manhatten. Today I ran across a post at Digital Urban that suggests they have released a final version of the map. It still looks really neat, and zooms and pans like butter.
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