Tralfaz

Category: blog

  • Photo Management, An Odyssey

    I was a relative latecomer to the digital photography world. We got our first digital camera in 2003, a Canon sureshot.

    It lasted us a couple years before the desire to go DSLR bit hard. But this isn’t about the camera, but instead about how to manage the deluge of images that come poring in.

    Alas, us mere mortals take lots of pictures and have no discipline as to the filing, organization, and culling of the stream. As well the early days of wonderment lead to a burgeoning collection of images that threaten to bury us.

    The early days – iPhoto

    Being Mac people, my wife and I used the bundled photography app with our Macs, iPhoto. It groks most cameras, it imports, and it “just works”.

    In 2003 it had tools to create projects, albums, and grouping of photographs. You could tag photos, and later versions also included facial recognition. You could do some rudimentary processing of images (adjust exposure, remove redeye, fix horizon tilt and some more).

    But it’s downfall was that it keeps all images in a big library (hidden in a folder) and managed it with a database. When your collection/library gets close to 20K images, it begins to choke.

    Aperture

    Not sure when Apple launched Aperture, their pro photo app (2008 or so), in 2009, I took the plunge. It was iPhoto on steroids. Better management, better tools, and some assistance for the “workflow”.

    Its plusses:

    • Much better handling of a large number of images. I probably got to 75k images without it borking.
    • Projects. Your library is easy to put into separate projects that are somewhat self contained (even if they are buried in the main library). Also tools for archiving and restoring projects. Good workflow enhancements.
    • Much better tools for image optimization. Color balance, adding presets, customizing presets. All sorts of cool things. Also it allowed easy export and import with Photoshop or some other external photo editing tool.
    • Great tracking of versions and masters. When you edit something it creates a copy. You can undo things easily.
    • The lightbox mode. Create lightboxes within projects to again instill a workflow to get to the best and most useful images.
    • It can handle a lot more images without choking. Libraries that would bring iPhoto to its knees are manageable. Additionally, there are plenty of tools for having multiple libraries, and to save them to different drives.

    But it isn’t all cookies and unicorns. There are some shortcomings.

    Its minuses:

    • The default storage is as a monolithic library. Yes, it can work with a plain directory structure, but it really guides you into a monolitic library structure.
    • If you acquire bad habits with iPhoto, it will let you continue them. This is a lot bigger of a deal than it sounds, as at some point you need discipline, and this tool will not force that discipline.
    • It is just a Mac tool. If you are multi platform, then you can’t have a single workflow across all your systems.

    But, in the balance, it is a huge step in the right direction to a good photography workflow.

    Google Picasa – not really a contender

    During the time that I was a Mac Aperture user, I started doing more with my work PC, so I grabbed a copy of Picasa.

    Picasa has been around a while, and was acquired by Google some time ago. It is an OK photo tool. It has some image manipulation tools, and it can handle most raw format files. But it isn’t really a workflow tool.

    Yes, you can create albums, and it will search your computer and index ALL your images. But its organizational schemes aren’t very robust. It is, like many Google products, more of an aggregator service. It will find all (and I mean ALL) of your images and mash them together. It will let you email them (and conveniently scale them to be reasonable), and if you are one of the 3 power users of Google Plus, it will make managing your online images a snap.

    But it falls very far short of a workflow management tool. I am pretty sure that Google is fine with this. They target the casual user, and Picasa fits that need. But even with my limited needs on my work PC, it quickly fell on its face.

    Adobe Photoshop Lightroom

    Lightroom has been in the Adobe portfoliofor some time. As a partner to the iconic Photoshop, Lightroom has some great features.

    • Native directory organization. Everything is in a human navigable directory structure. No monolithic libraries. If you handle and move files from within LR, it will never lose track of them. This also makes it easy to backup, and to archive.
    • Support for the Adobe Digital Negative format. dneg files are a standard raw data format. Not a big deal if you only shoot one brand of camera, but if you have several, it does simplify the organization, and long term storage of files. Of course, this isn’t a mandate. If you prefer to keep it in the RAW format, you are free to.
    • Extensive, and customizable importation. If you are a pro, you can streamling the importing with your IPTC tags, copyright terms, and others. For us mere mortals, it allows us to save common terms.
    • Multiple vehicles for grading, sorting and ranking images. COmparable to Aperture, but the interface is a bit cleaner for setting flags, tags, and priorities. Little things make a difference, and LR has clearly put a lot of thought into the process
    • Huge variety of image processing options. In fact, much of what I would jump over to Photoshop for can be done right in LR. Aperture has much of this, but LR has more, and more extensible options. You can also choose to process each image you import with one of the processing options (but I will admit this isn’t too useful to me).

    I have just started using Lightroom, and I like it. There is, like with many pro quality applications, a learning curve. Fortunately, there are some really high quality training and videos available from Adobe.

    Final thoughts:

    Of course, making the transition is a bit of a pain. I have to extract files from my Aperture library, and then reimport them. But this gives me time to plan my organization a little better, so I don’t have to go through my entire library. I can also deep storage archive some(many) of my pictures that aren’t needed to be at hand.

    I have a CSS license for Photoshop and Lightroom, so I can (legally) have it on both my work computer, as well as my home Mac.

    Check back as I relate my experiences further.

    (Oh, today I shoot with two main cameras, a Canon 5D and a Canon sureshot G12, both take wicked awesome pictures.)

  • My Nomination for the Stupidest Drivers is:

    I would like to formally nominate the drivers in Phoenix AZ as the stupidest in the world.

    This AM, on the way into the office, there was an accident (not surprising) just before Chandler Boulevard crosses the 101. You could easily see that 2 lanes of traffic were closed about a mile and a half before this (pro tip: 8 or so police cars with lights flashing should tell you something.)

    Of course, seeing that, I got into the far right lane, the only through lane.

    Of course, idiots kept going into the middle and left lane because they were free. Only to beg and try to squeeze in.

    Sigh, I guess that as well as not teaching people in Arizona how to ride bicycles and signal their intent, they also don’t teach them when to merge right due to shutdown lanes.

    Idiots.

  • Pleasant Surprise – Cell phone

    Yesterday I had a great experience at the local AT&T store, and I have to share.

    My wife has been a Verizon customer forever. She chose them way back because they had better coverage where she spent a lot of her time. Being somewhat of a luddite, she has been using a flip phone (a pretty plain, but solid LG flip phone) for about 5 years. As time went on, she began to use it more, and often went over limits on messaging and phone calls, so she has increased her plan accordingly.

    About 2 months ago, I spied one of her bills, and almost threw up. She was spending $80+ a month on her boring, non-smart phone. About the same time AT&T came out with their mobile share plan, where all phones/tablets etc were pretty cheap to add, and shared a big pool of data.

    We can thank T-Mobile for starting this trend, but it is really refreshing.

    I had been dallying lately on getting her moved/added to my account, and giving her my old iPhone 4S (still very serviceable) since she had been dealing with her parents, and other things that kept her away from home.

    Yesterday, we just drove to the AT&T store in Gilbert at the San Tan Village. In the space of about 20 minutes, that phone was reactivated, added to my mobile share account, my ipad moved to it, and we have a 10G plan to share.

    As a last thing they asked who I worked for, as I might qualify for a discount. Thinking this was a waste of time, I played with them. Sure enough, I will get an additional 22% discount on my bill. Net results is that we add my wife to the plan, get two iPhones, plenty of data, and my ipad, all for about $40 less than we paid for our separate cell plans.

    Oh, and it took about 15 minutes for her number from Verizon to port over. Sending calls immediately, receiving them before we left the store.

    Awesome.

  • Dreaming time – SR500

    I have long desired to own a Yamaha SR500. A big, single cylinder street bike. Fun to ride. Not a lot of power, but enough. Light, easy to ride, and distinctive.

    The Yamaha SR500, the classic big single street bike
    The Yamaha SR500, the classic big single street bike

    Several times in my life I have run across one for sale, but never had the money to buy one. And, when I had the money, they were scarcer than hen’s teeth.

    Yamaha took the SR500, and its successor, the SRX600 off the market in the US in the mid 1980’s, but the bike has lived on in many markets. There is a market for a reliable, easy to maintain, frugal with the petrol conveyance.

    For 2014, Yamaha brought the SR400 back in the European market, and in mid 2014, will bring it back to the US. Slightly less displacement, but it is still the same basic bike.

    Alas, my riding days are over. A shame, as I could totally see myself with one of these in the garage.

    Getting old sucks.

  • Wow – high end audio

    Last week, I fancied a bit of nostalgia, and enjoyed playing LPs on a real turntable. The ritual of playing the music harkened back to a much simpler era, and it was quite enjoyable.

    I can't way that the vinyl sounded better, or even different than CD's (alas, I don't have an apples-to-apples comparison set), but there was something satisfying from digging out a Miles Davis album, removing it from the sleeve, cleaning the dust off, and dropping a needle on the vinyl. 20-ish minutes later, getting up and switching sides.

    Good stuff.

    So, to extend the experience, I thought I would look up some old school hifi gear. Tube power amps, tube preamps, better turntables. Exotic speakers. Hand crafted, walnut knobs that improve sustain (yes, they make lame claims like that).

    Bwah ha hahahahaha. So much money you can spend. Alas, I think I will be satisfied with the hand me down gear that we will pick up from my father in-law's estate.

    Even 60 year old, Harmon Kardon tube amps in questionable condition can cost well over $1,000.

    And phonograph cartridges. C'est bon!

    I don't think I will even dream.

  • Mountain bike buyers guide – the internet disappoints

    In just about every way, the internet has improved life. From booking airline tickets, to looking up local businesses in the yellow pages, the internet has streamlined the process, and upset business models everywhere.

    $9,000 of dreaming
    $9,000 of dreaming

    But I found something it didn’t improve. I am moving back to the bay area, and I am contemplating getting back into mountain biking to explore all my old haunts. I had to sell some things so I have some cash, so I thought I would do a little research.

    A google search for mountain bike buyers guide returns a huge number of hits. Cool, right? Not so much. Unfortunately most of them are either for true noobies, or for the extra elite (bikes that cost $7,000 or more).

    Nothing for that mid range that I might be able to afford (note to my wife, I am just browsing). So, I figure I will just go to the maker’s sites, and look around. Giant, and Specialized are the big players. There are a lot of smaller marques that are interesting, but for a full line, these two will give a lay of the land.

    Unfortunately, their product lines are complex and confusing. From inexpensive good starter bikes (which I am not interested in) to elite bikes.

    But to figure out what I should look at, I am still as confused. Lots of questions. Unfortunately not really easy to find definitive answers.

    So, I guess I will go back to how I used to shop for bicycles. Go to a couple of different dealers and talk to the staff.

    Seems like I have gone full circle.

  • Simple pleasures – Going back to vinyl

    Early in my life, I became a music buff. Sometime in High School (probably by my sophomore year), I pieced together a simple hifi system, saved my paper route money, bought a decent turntable and the best needle I could afford, and started buying records.

    A vinyl LP recordLots and lots of records. I could be found at Tower Records in Campbell California at least once a week. When I started driving (at 16) we would trek over the hill to the record stores in Santa Cruz (can’t for the life of me remember the names) to buy exotic, rare, used, and even ahem, bootleg albums.

    Then in 1982, Sony and Phillips rocked the world with the introduction to the audio compact disc. Clean, clear, digital perfection. A format that didn’t wear out. I bought an early player, and started accumulating CD’s instead of LP’s.

    Somewhere along the line, I sold or gave away all my vinyl. The turntable failed to make one of my (many) moves, and I was all digital.

    Fast forward to today

    My father in-law passed away a couple weeks ago, and we’re all gathered for his memorial, and to sort through the lifetime of memories and ‘stuff’. Sitting on an entertainment center (that doesn’t have a TV) is a simple component stereo. Amplifier, receiver, CD changer, and a turntable all setup.

    My father inlaw’s tastes ran to a lot of big band from the 30’s and 40’s, some jazz, and classical. But lots and lots of vinyl instead of the ubiquitous CD.

    Firing up the turntable, dropping on some Glen Miller or Miles Davis (including an album where John McLaughlin) was the axe slinger). Some great background, and nostalgia is in the air.

    I won’t lie, I can’t hear the sound being any “warmer” than a well encoded/digitized CD, something that vinyl freaks swear by. But there is something tangible about removing the album from the sleeve, cleaning the accumulated dust off, getting the speed right on the turntable (it has a stroboscopic speed gauge), and dropping a needle.

    Having to get up and walk across the room to flip the album, something that I had forgotten about, is a nice way to break things up. And then the ritual of replacing the album, and selecting another disc of black plastic to repeat the ritual.

    I have become so cocooned by the digital world. Playlists on my iphone that run for days, streaming via Spotify or iRadio, really good sound that never degrades from over playing, that a trip to the past is a bit of delight. Delight I thought I would never succumb to.

    No, I am not likely to give up my digital library. I have enough music to fill a room with albums. I am not going to hunt down vinyl for all my purchases (but I will probably buy some). But having an old school system will allow me to indulge in my origins.

    I am just bummed that all those boxes of LP’s are long gone. Sigh.

    I have hinted to my wife that I wouldn’t mind if she claimed the LP collection and the gear to play it.

  • Going legit. Real photoshop

    I have an admission to make. I have long been a scofflaw. I have been a Photoshop pirate. I am not proud of this. And indeed am somewhat ashamed. But to be fair, I haven’t used it for professional purposes, and mostly have used it to re-sample images for use on the web.

    I have not felt too guilty, as I have purchased Photoshop Elements a few times. So Adobe has gotten money from me for my photoshopping in the past. I also have a version of Acrobat pro that I have bought (with my cold hard cash). Yes, I use that just about every day for my job.

    Photoshop is one of those programs that you love to use, and is probably the most pirated program apart from Microsoft Windows.

    What tipped me over the edge?

    Well, I have been less than thrilled with the direction Apple has taken Aperture. Aperture was/is the Apple “pro” package for photography workflow. It does work well. Or at least it did.

    Lately, Apple has spent more time updating it to be more iCloud friendly, working with streams, and sharing. All things I don’t give a rat’s ass about.

    So, I was going to the Adobe site, looking for a evaluation version of their photography workflow product, Lightroom, when I was hit with a banner. Get the Adobe photographer’s creative cloud package for $9.95 a month. Get access to both lightroom, and photoshop. Install it on every computer you own.

    Yes, I know that it is ~ $126 a year perpetually. But no longer do I need to buy two licenses, one for my PC and one for my Mac’s. It seems like a no brainer to me.

    So I am now up with Photoshop. I have wiped off the uhm, non returnable versions of Photoshop that I had, and I am beginning to migrate from Aperture to Lightroom. I have it installed on both my Macs and my work PC. So I am ahead (no, my work PC never had an illicit version of Photoshop. I am not that crazy)

  • When Sarcasm Doesn’t Work

    I like to post funny memes to my facebook page. Often they are real, and poke fun at some situation that is bizarre. Sometimes they are complete satire.

    There is one class of meme that when I post, inevitably a handful of friends can’t grasp the humor. They make comments like “Who creates these? Who thinks this is right?”

    Truth and sarcasm collide
    Truth and sarcasm collide

    A typical one is this gem. This is sarcasm. I often post sarcasm involving Michelle Bachmann, because it is damn funny.

    Of course, a lot of people get butthurt by my obvious sarcasm posts (hint: Anything by the facebook page “Christians 4 Michelle Bachmann” is sarcasm, is patently obvious sarcasm, but is damn funny, so I post it. Even funnier are the people who are on that page who think it is serious.)

    Michelle Bachmann is probably the greatest gift, as well as the greatest curse to meme writers and people who practice extreme sarcasm. The reason why is that she says so many batshit, insane, dumb, completely made up (and untrue) things that the reality is far worse than the humor. Every time she opens her mouth, odds are excellent that something completely idiotic will come out.

    And people keep putting her on TV, and recording what she has to say.

    I guess that makes it hard for people who actually like her to differentiate between the things she says in real life, and the made up sarcasm. BECAUSE IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO TELL THE DIFFERENCE.

  • What makes me tick – Intellectual Curiosity

    While walking recently (for exercise), I was thinking about me, how I live my life, and what keeps me going. One phrase comes to mind that is pretty descriptive. I would have to say that I am “Intellectually Curious”. That doesn’t mean that I focus to the nth degree, or that I am casual in my interests.

    I have always read widely. If something catches my fancy, I will chase it down the rabbit hole until my curiosity is sated. Some examples will clarify.

    Example 1: US History

    In grade/middle/high school, (largely in the 1970’s) I had the usual classes and instruction in US history. Nothing surprising there, but it didn’t strike me as worth knowing. Of course, as public policy, we learnt the “victor’s” version of history, unbeknownst to us at the time.

    Then my third year of college, to fulfill a general education requirement for graduation, I took a university level US history course. My eyes were opened. My thoughts at the time were that everything force-fed to me via the public school system in California at the time was complete, absolute, and utter rubbish. Key facts were omitted. Atrocities were whitewashed or spun in favorable light. In short, we were not merely misled, we were lied to.

    If I had known or discovered this prior to entering university, I might have changed my academic proclivities to history.

    Now, I read a lot of history, US, European, from the early middle ages, through the colonizing of the Americas to the present. I have learnt to not trust a single source, but to read a few different authors from a few different time periods.

    Very intellectually rewarding. But frustrating. Watching the ignorant, yet very vocal people speak out about things that they know no more of than the brainwashing that was fed us during our public school days is maddening. I have given up refuting, and pointing these poorly educated masses to sources of true information.

    I still read a lot of history, and I still enjoy it. I am not at the end of that rabbit hole yet.

    Example 2: Control Systems

    I work with a technology that is really cool. Atomic force microscopes. We literally can see atoms, and interactions on a scale that is truly mind-boggling.

    The foundation of our technology is something called a PID control loop. PID stands for proportional, integral and differential. It is a system for controlling a process.

    When I started here, I had a fuzzy idea of what a PID control system was, but it was clear that I needed more depth on it. So off to the research section.

    First off, control theory isn’t really electrical engineering, nor is it computer science (as the earliest PID control loop systems were completely analog). It often falls to the physics department, or mechanical engineering.

    Physics. Cool. I got my degree in that. Of course upon diving in, one quickly learns that it is tied to many topics in computer science. And immediately I run into a deficiency. Computers, numerical analysis, and processes modeled or run on them are essentially “discrete” systems. All my education, all my knowledge was centered around continuum mathematics. Yes, I had done some programming and numerical analysis, but I just hacked my way through things that relied on the discrete nature of computers.

    But to truly understand control systems, to really grok what is happening with them, you must understand discrete mathematics.

    Rabbit hole time. Fortunately there are plenty of sources of knowledge. A lot of the basics are around the foundations of mathematics, continuum and discrete alike, have the same or very similar vocabulary. You learn to think differently, you go back to basic definitions like what a function is, and domain/range etc.

    Of course, you quickly delve into topology, and combinatorics, all key subjects.

    But then my intellectual curiosity is quenched. I understand what I need to know.

    Oh, and another of my passions? The history of mathematics. Fascinating, illustrating, and a worthy subject of inquiry.

    Summary:

    These are but two examples, but they are illustrative. At various times in my life, I have been taken by an intellectual fancy. I usually dive in to a surprising depth, but I always get to a level of understanding that satiates my curiosity, and then I back away.

    The real problem is that there are far too many targets that spur my curious instincts.