I’m a strobist now

January 24th, 2012

My flash has arrived, and a 5m cable to take the flash waaay off camera.

PS the rolling shutter on the iPhone has caused the strange effect at the bottom of the photo.

Sherlock

January 17th, 2012

Wow.

Just finished Sherlock. If you haven’t been watching it, then definitely do.

The second series is better than the first (second and third episode of first series are mediocre), but all are worth watching. I think it might be the best TV I’ve seen, and brilliant finale.

Definitely very ‘fresh’. The filming style, English wit and dry humour are notable. If you can watch it in HD then do. Some of it is very beautiful.

Healthy

December 18th, 2011

Tastes healthy, too :p

We’re eating all the fruit and veg we need for the Christmas period in one meal. Better to get it out the way.


I didn’t realise we had THREE babies on the way!

December 11th, 2011
I didn’t realise we had THREE babies on the way!
I didn’t realise we had THREE babies on the way!

(I’m practising my Dad Humour)

Jubilee Christmas Party 2011

December 10th, 2011
Jubilee Christmas Party 2011
Jubilee Christmas Party 2011

I’ve borrowed a flash, and this is a shot at a (very dark) Christmas party. I’m pretty pleased that it’s possible to capture a nice portrait, even when it’s pretty much pitch black.

I’ve been reading Strobist, so want to get an off-camera flash. For now, I’m making do with reflecting the flash off something.

Next time, I’ll have to play with the camera more in manual mode, to try and get at least some of the background, and Christmas party atmosphere!

Another comic – Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

December 9th, 2011

I’ve run out of Batman Comics, and because I’ve put all the next ones on my Christmas Wishlist, I can’t get any more until Christmas (as an aside, I’m the most excited about Christmas I have been since I was a child. I’m putting that down to having a particularly childish Christmas List this year!)

So, I was browsing Comixology, and came across Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep. I’m astounded to discover it’s the full text of the book, set out as a comic with full illustrations. It’s fantastic and thorough and complete.

20111209-100201.jpg Read the rest of this entry »

Personal victory of the day

December 2nd, 2011

Have you ever played the game where the players submit a number (a positive integer, specifically) and the lowest unique integer wins? I played strategically, with 986,543,210… and won! The other players were all to aggressive and only picked 1 or 2, making mine the lowest unique number.

Even the RAF know the caps lock button is in the wrong place!

November 26th, 2011


The UC Davis incident and personal responsibility

November 24th, 2011

The first post I read about the pepper spraying incident at UC Davis was this article about the effect the incident may have had on the policeman doing the spraying.

The author, Madrigal, recalled a quote from the NYT about a similar incident from the 1960s.

[Clark] cannot be dismissed as a total monster; I am sure he loves his wife and children and likes to get drunk. One has to assume that he is a man like me… Something awful must have happened to a human being to be able to put a cattle prod against a woman’s breasts. What happens to the woman is ghastly. What happens to the man who does it is in some ways much, much worse.

The article goes on to consider the system that produces police that will do (and believe they should do) terrible things to other people.

I think personal responsibility is so important, especially in systems that require authority and control. On the one hand, we can’t be constantly questioning, arguing, undermining and overriding our leadership, but on the other we we can’t always blindly follow orders given. We have to take personal responsibility for our actions, which involves balancing what we personally believe to be right with trusting our leaders.

Spoiled by SSDs

November 23rd, 2011

I just accidentally booted my computer using it’s backup system drive — A traditional hard drive. It was soooo slow! Did I really wait this long for applications to load?

I’ve had an SSD in my home computer and work computer for a couple of months now. They are awesome! Just so much less waiting around for the computer to catch up with what I’m trying to do.