Seven Months Later...

Seven months have passed since the last post. In addition to our declining economy many new and interesting hardware and software tools have been introduced. These are few items worth taking a look at.

HARDWARE

WD TV

The WD TV box is one of the best things you can buy for $100. Its a small box that will play most digital content, from an external hard drive, on your TV. It can be connected to any USB drive. I have had great success with the $114 WD My Passport Essential 500 GB drives which will hold hundreds of movies. Both items are available on Amazon. When paired with HandBrake and Pinnacle's Video Transfer device producing content for the WD TV device is limitless. Its a very easy way to play your home movies on your TV, via HDMI, without having to produce a DVD. The image quality is far superior to any DVD I have been able to produce. WD's web site also carries all the software updates for the box. Canon G10

Canon has replace the G9 with the G10. This is the best point and shoot camera I have ever owned. My only disappointment is that Canon down-graded the video capture from 1080i to 640x480. Other than that they improved on the G9 which was also an epic camera. I am never without it. Available from Amazon.

Canon 5D Mark II

I have been waiting for the 5D Mark II for a long time. I like to shoot both stills and video when I travel. This new camera allows me to capture both at the highest quality with one device and many lens choices. It sports a new full frame CMOS sensor that will capture both a 21.1 megapixel image and full HD 1080 video. I have used it for several months. I am blown away by both the images and video it can capture.


Check out "Voyage" and "Reverie". Both these films were shot with the 5D Mark II. I created a Google Document to gather some of the reviews and papers out about the camera. This is a blog that someone put up to cover all things related to the 5D Mark II. This is my own test of the camera's capabilities.

PoGo Polaroid Printer

The PoGo is a great little printer to travel with. I use it to share photos with people kind enough to let me make a photo of them. I shoot the photos to be printed with the G10. I then plug the G10 into the printer via USB. The prints cost about 33 cents each. You can buy it on Amazon. The two photos below are scanned prints from the printer. LiveScribe

The Pulse Smart Pen and Dot Paper is a useful pen/paper combination that allows you to take notes and record what is being said at the same time. You can then upload both your notes and audio to LiveScribe Desktop on your Mac or PC. Both the pen and paper can be purchased on Amazon.
GigaPan

The GigaPan is a robotic device which will take highly detailed panoramic photos that can be uploaded to a dedicated web site for viewing. This is their home page. Its a great device designed for point and shoot cameras. I use it with my Canon G9. Thus far I made panorama's of Main Beach in Laguna Beach, Pelican Hill Resort and Morningside Canyon in Laguna Beach. Griffin iPod Power Doc

If you use several iPods this charging station works great!The Monsterpod

The go-anywhere, gravity-defying tripod, will stick to just about any surface and tilt and rotate to any angle, ensuring you’ll get the perfect shot….heads and all. BlackRapid Camera Strap

This is a new take on camera straps. The BlackRapid is designed to be worn as a sling. It allows rapid access to your camera and is extremely comfortable.
Super Travel A/C USB Wall Charger

If you travel with several devices that charge via USB this Super Travel Wall Charger is a great device. iPhone Power

I have tried several external batteries to keep my iPhone running when I am away from power all day. The Mophie Juice Pac and Juice Pac Air is the best I've found. The Richard Solo battery works well also. SOFTWARE

Expression Media 2

I started using this software years ago. It began as freeware called iView Multimedia. It was the best image cataloging software I had ever used. Its far superior to Portfolio in almost every way. Then Microsoft bought the software. They changed the name to Expression Media. For some reason it began to hang on PDF's when I imported any image folders that had PDF's in them. For the last 2 years I was forced to switch back to Portfolio 8 to handle large collections of images (anywhere between 40 and 100,00 images). Portfolio still sucks but at least it didn't crash like Expression did. I still used Expression Media for dealing with small groups of images (under 20,000) and it worked fine.

This week I discovered that Microsoft released Expression Media 2. I thought I would give it a try to see if they had solved the problems I was experiencing. I am happy to report that it is working flawlessly and is extremely fast. The first test I threw at it was dumping a folder into it that held 45,000 images of all types. EM2 cataloged them all in record time. Just for the fun of it I dropped in another folder bringing the total up to just over 90,000 images! Again, no crashes!

Expression Media 2 has many new interesting features including the ability to handle Geo Tagging. If you camera does not Geo Tag. EM2 allows you to drop an image on a map and it will add the information. I think this is the best image cataloging and management software out there.

Silver Efex Pro

I have written in earlier blogs about Viveza, one of Nik Software's great image enhancement products. Their proprietary U Point selection technology gives you amazing control over the areas of your image you want to enhance. Silver Efex Pro is equally great focusing on manipulation of black and white images.

Safari 4

A beta version of Safari 4 was released this week. It has great speed and a beautiful interface. Check out its new features.


iMovie

The new version of iMovie found in iLife is great. Its now the easiest way I have found to create and export still image slide shows into my films. It has a new camera motion function you can runny jumpy clips through and an interesting option to create animated travel maps for use in films and slide shows.

MacCaching Manager

MacCaching Manager is a useful tool for managing caches you want to find. It painlessly uploads them via USB (finally) to supported GPS devices.

PulpMotion V2

PulpMotion is a new slide show creation tool that can handle both still images and video clips.

Google Docs Tips

I use Google Docs for many things. These tips are good.

DoubleTake Update V2.2

I have written before about this easy to use panorama stitchers. DoubleTake is the best I have found for the price. Version 2.2 is out.


PhotoMatix

I have wanted to try creating some HDR images. PhotoMatix is the easiest HDR image creation software I have found. These three images were created using the software.


Road Trip Effect

If you have ever wanted to create animated maps showing your route of travel to include in your movies Road Trip Effect is simple and easy to use.

RANDOM STUFF

Evolution of the Mac Laptop


Red River Paper Panoramic Card Stock

If you like shooting panoramas Red River now offers appropriately proportioned inkjet printer panorama card stock. The unique size and paper quality of these cards provide great creative opportunities.
iPhone Deal with Verizon

God I hope this is true. I am so sick of ATT.


Momenta Workshops

If you are looking for interesting photography workshops check out Momenta. I participated in workshop in Myanmar with two of the founders. I learned more about making photographs in the two weeks I spent with them than in any other venue I have participated in.

Aptera

I have been following the development of the Aptera vehicle for several years. It looks like they are close to bringing this electric vehicle to market.


Shelby Aero EV

The Shelby Aero EV is another electric vehicle worth watching. Slightly faster than the Aptera!


Time Magazine's Apple's Top Ten Moments

Interesting compilation of Apple Moments from Time Magazine

Every Swear Word on Every Episode of the Sopranos

Be warned this is definitely x rated. Crazy!

First Ever Snowmobile Double Backflip

Damn!!

In my next post I am going to list some of the iPhone Apps that are worth having.

The 3G iPhone Arrives!

With much fanfare and anticipation the 3G iPhone arrives. I waited in the line below for 4.5 hours to get mine at an ATT store.Because you had to sign up for a plan at the time you purchased the phone the turn around time for each sale was over 30 minutes. As a result the line moved very slow. Due to the demand the iTunes server was down so I could not activate the phone until later in the evening.I am extremely pleased with the 16GB version I purchased. The GPS function is a great addition. The greatest improvement is the App Store which is accessed via iTunes. I download about 20 applications. I was particularly interested in the voice recording capability however the apps that I have used the most have been Vicinity and WHERE. These apps use the GPS funtion to locate you and then offer lists of things like restaurants and entertainment near you.The internet seems to load more quickly using the 3G network. ATT coverage has not improved and I can't see that the phone has any greater ability to draw in a signal than the previous phone.

Google Docs Templates

I have mentioned the virtues of Google docs in previous posts. However, I just discovered their templates. I think there are over 700 document and presentation templates available! They are definitely worth checking out.

BLURB Books

I have also mentioned the on-line book design and print service BLURB. I recieved the two books I created using their software and was extremely pleased with the printing quality of the photos and text. The binding was beautiful as well. If you are thinking about producing a book this is a great way to go. Their free software works well and uploading the finished book was painless.

As a rule I try not to put anything in this blog that I have not tested personally. However I am going to break the rule and mention two interesting new products:

Pinnacle Video Capture for Mac

Several posts back I mentioned a great Pinnacle device I use to capture video onto small USB drives. Its a great device I use constantly. Pinnacle recently came out with a Video Capture device that looks interesting. It looks like a very simple way to get average quality video into your iTunes library from any analog source. If anyone tries it let me know how it works.

Planon DocuPen 800

The second device I discovered was the Planon DocuPen 800. While its made for PC's the article I read said it was basically plug and play for the Mac as well. The thing that interests me most about this device is it's ability to scan unique textures and patterns. The article I read said it opens up some intresting creative opportunities. I will let you know if it works.

Counting Down the Days to the New iPhone!

I am excited about the new iPhone 3G. Lots of new features and 3rd party applications. Should be amazing.

Found a few interesting new things this week.

SOFTWARE

Apple awarded 3rd party software developers at the recent WWDC. I checked out several of the award winners and found two that I have been playing with.

ScreenFlow

ScreenFlow captures in video anything on your computer monitor. After capturing, it has a great list of export functions to create QuickTime clips of many sizes. It uses the camera built into your monitor to capture audio and video of you as well. Great for adding audio to Keynote slide shows.
Timeline

Just as it's name suggests this software creates stunning timelines. The 3D time line is amazing.
Blurb

I want to put in another good word for Blurb, the online book publishing site. I used their free software to design and publish two books this weekend for my family. The software works great. The books and photos uploaded easily. I should see the books in 5 days. I will follow up and write about the quality of the books when I receive them.

Fun Outside

Have you ever heard of Geocaching? If not you are missing out. We started doing it in 2004 but had not done it until our visit to NYC over the three day weekend. Once you start you will never look at the world in the same way again. To do it you need to visit the official Geocaching web site and buy a hand held GPS. Per the site:

Geocaching is an entertaining adventure game for gps users. Participating in a cache hunt is a good way to take advantage of the wonderful features and capability of a gps unit. The basic idea is to have individuals and organizations set up caches all over the world and share the locations of these caches on the internet. GPS users can then use the location coordinates to find the caches. Once found, a cache may provide the visitor with a wide variety of rewards. All the visitor is asked to do is if they get something they should try to leave something for the cache.

Caches exist all over the world and come in a complete range of sizes. To find caches near you all you do is type in your zip code. If you sign up for a free account you can see our profile and the caches we have logged. There are many more caches than there were in 2004. This map shows some along the Back Bay trail in Newport Beach.These are photos of the caches we found this weekend.If you don't have a GPS unit Garmin makes a great one called the eTrex Legend HCx.It has a built in map of the world although not detailed it works. There are a couple of things I like about this unit. The interface works well and is easy to use. Its small and compact. The best part is it can be connected to your Mac via USB so you can upload cache coordinates directly from the Geocaching web site. Garmin provides the free software to make it work. It also has a micro sd card slot so you can add more detailed road and topo maps.

HARDWARE

Fastmac External Battery Charger

I ran across this useful device on one of the Mac news sites. If you have several batteries for your laptop you can use this device to charge your batteries outside the laptop. Very useful for travel. Check out the stand-alone charger at FastMac.