The Author – Bart Busschots
Creative Commons
Unless otherwise stated, the content on this site is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution, Noncommercial, No Derivative Works 3.0 License
Mar
27
Why Jing Is Absolutely Not For Me
Filed Under Computers & Tech on March 27, 2008 | 5 Comments
Before I explain what it is about Jing that makes me grumpy I’ll start by explaining what Jing is. The product was entirely designed around the idea of making it easy to show someone how to do something on a computer. Rather than trying to laboriously describe what to do step-by-step you simply fire up Jing and record yourself doing the task. It’s the standard a-picture-says-a-thousand-words idea. A very sound idea indeed. Jing also goes one step further and provides one-click web-publishing for your little screen-casts. So, it’s certainly safe to say that Jing is built around a very sound concept. My problems are with the implementation.
Mar
24
If You Want Something Done Right ….
Filed Under Photography on March 24, 2008 | 2 Comments
You may have noticed that at long last there’s a picture of me on my blog. I always prefer blogs where the author is not anonymous and I think having your picture there on every page is about as un-anonymous as you can get. The reason my picture wasn’t added sooner is that I simply didn’t have a picture of myself that I didn’t hate. Yesterday I finally decided to take matters into my own hands and keep taking pictures of myself till I got one I didn’t hate. I took a fair few goes (about 40 shots as it happens), some serious cropping, and the removal of all colour, but in the end I finally got a shot I don’t hate. In fact, I actually kinda like it.
Mar
23
Photo of the Week 5 – Nightfall at Taghadoe
Filed Under Photography on March 23, 2008 | 1 Comment
This photo was taken on the evening of the 26th of July 2007 at Taghadoe Round Tower just outside Maynooth. One of the things I really love about living in Ireland is that there is history all around you if you just go out and look. What disappoints me a little is how few people who live in Maynooth realise that this little treasure is hidden just a mile or so from the edge of the village on one of the smaller back-roads.
Click to View Full-Size (1.2MB)
For those of you interested in such things here are some of the technical details of the shot:
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 1/10 Sec
- Focal Length: 22mm
- Focal Ratio: F5.6
- ISO: 1600
- Camera Mode: Aperture Priority
- Exposure Compensation: -2.0
[tags]Ireland, Maynooth, Sunset, Taghadoe, Round Tower, History[/tags]
Mar
21
Tips for Shooting the Moon
Filed Under Science & Astronomy, Photography on March 21, 2008 | 1 Comment
It can be very nice to include the Moon in your shots of buildings or landscapes but it’s not easy. The reality is that the Moon is very small in the sky and that it’s hard to pick up detail on the Moon while also properly exposing your subject. That’s why so many people cheat and get the Moon into their shots using PhotoShop. They stick on a massive zoom lens, shoot the Moon, then stick on a normal lens to shoot their subject and finally combine the two shots into one. If that’s the way you want to do things that’s your call, personally I look at it as cheating and would prefer to do it the hard way and actually capture the Moon and my subject in a single shot.
[tags]photography, DSLR, the Moon[/tags]
Mar
21
To The Death of Catholic Ireland
Filed Under Polemics & Politics on | 8 Comments
The title of this article is a toast I make each year on Good Friday while enjoying an alcoholic beverage with some form of meat dish. Before continuing I think I need to give my non-Irish readers some background. In theory Ireland is a secular state. In reality it wasn’t for much of the last century when it was in fact a Catholic state in which the church wielded significant power and influence. Much of the church’s influence is gone but there are still a few glaring reminders of a more theocratic past. The law banning the sale of alcohol on Good Friday is one such out-of-place reminder. My own private little protest against this probably unconstitutional law is to toast to the death of Catholic Ireland each Good Friday.
Mar
18
HDR with a Nikon D40, Bracketeer & iPhoto
Filed Under Photography, Computers & Tech on March 18, 2008 | 23 Comments
I’m no expert on HDR but since I spent most of my weekend playing with it now seems like a good time to write about it, while it’s all nice and fresh in my mind and all that. One of the first things I noticed when I started shooting DSLR is that the dynamic range of the camera was a lot narrower than the dynamic range of my eyes. I didn’t know it was called dynamic range back then but that’s not really the point. When a scene has a big range in brightness between the brightest parts and the darkest parts then it’s said to have a high dynamic range. Our eyes are quite good in those situations, DSLRs on the other hand are terrible at capturing them. On a sunny evening when the sun is low in the sky casting shadows all over the place you can still see just fine but a DSLR gets into all sorts of trouble.
[tags]HDR, Nikon, Bracketeer, iPhoto[/tags]
Mar
15
Photo of the Week 4 – Venus with a Crescent Moon
Filed Under Photography on March 15, 2008 | 1 Comment
This photo was taken on the evening of the 18th of June 2007 on the playing fields on the South Campus of NUI Maynooth. The playing fields are large open grass areas for sport surrounded by wonderful old trees. This photo was taken just as twilight was ending when the Moon and Venus were very close together in the sky.
Click to View Full-Size (1.6MB)
For those of you interested in such things here are some of the technical details of the shot:
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 1/30 Sec
- Focal Length: 34mm
- Focal Ratio: F5.6
- ISO: 1600
- Camera Mode: Aperture Priority
- Exposure Compensation: -1
[tags]Ireland, Maynooth, NUI Maynooth, Venus, Moon[/tags]
Mar
12
Don’t Be So Pushy!
Filed Under Computers & Tech on March 12, 2008 | 5 Comments
I think it’s only fair to start this post with a warning. This is more of a rant that any form of coherent or well argued polemic. To me this stuff is as self-evident as the fact that 1+1=2 so I don’t see the need for fancy proofs.
What am I prattling on about? The ‘push phenomenon’ as I call it. You know, push email, push calendaring, that kind of thing. For those of you lucky enough not to have encountered it, push email is a new ‘feature’ in which email gets turned on it’s head. Rather than emails coming in when you ask for them they are pro-actively pushed at your device the moment they arrive at the server. You don’t have to check your email anymore, it comes and harasses you!
[tags]Push Email, Exchange, Apple, iPhone, Microsoft[/tags]
Mar
10
A Twist in the Tale of DRM
Filed Under Computers & Tech on March 10, 2008 | Leave a Comment
It can certainly be argued that Steve Jobs kicked off a flurry of anti-DRM sentiment with his open letter on music last year. Since then we’ve seen a sharp rise in the availability of DRM free music. All four major labels are now selling music without DRM in some form. However, the letter is not the real reason for the demise of DRM, it was just a catalyst. Steve Jobs is still responsible though, just for two very different reasons. It’s these reasons that have ensured that the last company to benefit from the demise of DRM will be Apple, the very company responsible for causing it!
[tags]Apple, Music, DRM[/tags]
Mar
9
Photo of the Week 3 – El Castell de Guadalest
Filed Under Photography on March 9, 2008 | 1 Comment
This photo was take way back in 2000 with the Olympus OM-1 I inherited off my parents. This was my first real camera and was completely manual. It was a great way to really get to grips with the technical aspects of photography. This photo was taken on our first trip to Spain as a family and it’s a trip I have many very fond memories of.
El Castell de Guadalest is an old medieval town high in the mountains in the provice of Valencia in Spain. It has been largely preserved and is now a tourist attraction. The village is surrounded on all sides by sheer cliffs and can only be entered via a single gate which has been cut into the rocks. The beautiful white tower you see in this photograph is perched at the top of the cliff over-looking the entrance.
Click for Full-Size Version (1.1MB)
Since good old fashioned 35mm film doesn’t store EXIF data I can’t give any technical specs for this shot.
[tags]Spain, El Castell de Guadalest[/tags]