Welcome to my technology blog!
The iPhone Book 4th Edition by Scott Kelby and yours truly, Terry White is now available! I got my first glimpse of it at the Photoshop World book store this week in Vegas. I checked stock at Amazon.com and it's available there too. This 4th edition is loaded with all kinds of iPhone 4 and iOS 4 tips and tricks. So don't walk, but run over to Amazon.com and order yours today!
Thanks!
You might remember last week when I posted my video showing how to publish your photos to Facebook directly from Lightroom 3.2, well now that Lightroom 3.2 is officially out I can also tell you the same exact publishing feature is there for Smugmug users too! That's right if you're on Flickr, Facebook or Smugmug you can now publish your photos directly to any of these popular services directly from Lightroom. Even if you shot in RAW, Lightroom will make JPGs and upload them for you all in the background.
It adds camera support for:
This update also adds support for a ton of new Lens Profiles and several bug fixes.
Download Lightroom 3.2 update (Mac | Win}
Download the Camera RAW 6.2 update for CS5 & Photoshop Elements 8 (Mac | Win)
Continue reading “Adobe Lightroom 3.2 & Camera RAW 6.2 are here – Smugmug users rejoice!”
Adobe's Worldwide Web Evangelist, Greg Rewis returns to give us his 3rd installment on Creating HTML 5 and this time it's how to Get Started with HTML 5 Video. Greg shows how to use the HTML 5 Pack for Adobe Dreamweaver CS5 to create HTML 5 video that reaches the largest audience of viewers.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3xYyxLP9Ec
It's that time of year again and I'm looking forward to heading out to Adobe Photoshop World this week in Las Vegas! I'll be teaching my usual two InDesign classes, but this year I'm also teaching a Lightroom class and even a Social Network – Facebook class.
In addition to the conference track classes I've got something up my sleeve for the keynote as well as a couple of lighting demos (Bogen – 2:15 on Wednesday and Westcott 1:30 on Thursday) on the tradeshow floor. Lastly I'll be doing a quick demo of the Wacom Intuos 4 in the Wacom booth (4:00 on Thursday) too. Yep, it's going to be a busy week and I'm excited to go and see many of you there!
It's FREE! Learn more about it and get it here.
See you in class!
I have to say that this was definitely one of the BEST events I've ever presented at. The Johannesburg crowd was fun, engaging and inspiring! A full house with standing room only. You guys rock!
Thank you for a great day and I'm looking forward to coming back to Johannesburg and also going to Cape Town and Durban again.
The line to get in was around the building!
One thing that I was really delighted by was the Live "Ask a CS Pro" session via Facebook on Friday morning. This was a great way to answer questions from South Africa and around the world LIVE. We'll definitely look at doing more of these going forward.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0Mh1CK6z0Q
Adobe is just about ready to release the Lightroom 3.2 update, which features support for several new cameras as well as a slew of new lens profiles and bug fixes. In addition to these features there will also be a new Publish Service – Facebook. Just like the Flickr Publish Service, you'll be able to upload your photos directly to your Facebook albums from Lightroom 3.2. Above is a video I recorded to show you how the process will work.
You can download the latest Lightroom 3.2 RC (release candidate) here on labs.adobe.com
The NEW highly anticipated 85mm f/1.4 lens is here. I have the older model and it is definitely one of my favorite lenses. The depth of field is amazing! I LOVE IT! So what's new with this updated model? For one it's nano coated and everyone that I've talked to that has a nano coated lens swears by the difference it can make in cutting down glare and getting sharper shots. I have the new Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8 lens with nano coating and it's very nice. The other thing that this lens supports AF-S autofocusing on some of the consumer/prosumer bodies like the D5000. Although I'd love to have this new lens, I can't really justify the upgrade unless I sell the one I have (hint, hint). My current lens works great, so I may have to sit this one out for now.
You can pre-order the Nikon 85mm f/1.4 here for $1,649.95.
When I travel and I can only take one lens, it's usually going to be my Nikon 18-200mm lens. However, that's a DX lens and therefore isn't really designed for full-frame cameras like my D700. This new 28-300mm changes all that. This would be the ONE lens I'd want to carry if I could only carry one lens for my D700 or my D5000! It's also a VRII lens and has the nano coating. Papa needs a new travel lens baby, and I think this is it!
You can pre-order the New Nikon 28-300mm f3.5-5.6 lens here for $1,049.95.
Although the first two lenses I mentioned above are the ones that I'm currently drooling over, Nikon did announce two more lenses:
The AF-S Nikkor 24-120m f/4G ED VR and AF-S Nikkor 55-300 f/4.5-5.6 ED VR.
In case you missed it, Nikon introduced their New D3100 DSLR body just this past Thursday. This camera was rumored for quite a while and the rumored specs were pretty accurate. So it wasn't a shocker to see it, but there was one feature that I was hoping to see that didn't seem to make the cut. My current travel camera is a Nikon D5000 and I like the size and weight of the D5000 for travel, plus the ability to shoot video. The one thing that would have made me upgrade (or downgrade) to the D3100 in a heartbeat would have been audio in. Sigh…. While the D3100 steps up to 14.2 MP, adds 1080p video (Yay! and about freaking time), continuous auto focus in Live View (we'll have to see if it really works or not) and 12,800 ISO (equivalent), the audio for video recording is still limited to the built in Mono mic.
Most video cameras have crappy built-in mics. However, most video cameras also let you plug in a better mic via a stereo audio input. To make matters worse is that the built-in audio on Nikon DSLRs is only 11hz. A bad mic with bad compression, equals really really bad audio. Giving this camera 1080p, auto focusing video is AWESOME, but the limitation for many is definitely going to be the audio. Now if you plan to shoot video with your great lenses in all of the D3100's 1080p glory and then add your own sound track or music later, then this won't be a big deal, but if you need the source audio from the event you're recording, then you're going to either have to record the audio on a different device and merge them later in post or have sub par audio to go with your great video.
I would upgrade to a D300s at this point, but I'll continue to wait and see what comes next since the D300s was last year's model. It DOES have audio in, but it's only 720p video and if I'm going to spend the bucks, I'd rather wait since I don't think Nikon is done for 2010 just yet 🙂
If I didn't already have the D5000, and was looking for a small Nikon DSLR with some pretty cool features, then I wouldn't hesitate to get this one. The price won't break the bank and it has a few features that even the higher end models don't have yet. I may still sell my D5000 (since my D5000 doesn't have audio in either) to get this if I get a good price on the D5000. For now, personally I'm in wait and see mode.
You can get the D3100 here for a great price of $699.95 with a 18-55mm VR lens
You might remember my recent post "Are you sharing too much on Facebook?" in that post I gave you some tips on how to control your privacy settings so that only the people that you want to see your status updates and photos are the ones that actually see them. It's time to revisit this again now that Facebook has added "Places".
Places is a new feature on Facebook that allows mobile users to "check in" to the different places they may visit. This is not a new concept as sites like Gowalla and Foursquare have been doing this for a while. It's a social networking thing amongst "close friends" and "family" and of course Facebook wants in on it (I'm sure there's money in knowing the establishments that your customers frequent the most). The concept is pretty simple. You visit a location, business, park, etc. and with a mobile device like a smartphone you either use the Facebook app or the Facebook mobile site to check in. That "check in" is then posted to your wall/news feed for all of your "friends" to see. If you don't want your friends to know where you are every minute of the day then don't use it. It's pretty simple to not tap or click on it. Problem solved. 🙂 However, there's a little more to it than that with Facebook at least for now. The problem is that your "friends" can tag YOU when they check in to a location. This is a plus from a convenience standpoint when a group of friends are hanging out and a big minus for those that don't want to play! Your friends don't need your consent to check you in! I can already hear the privacy groups screaming about this and luckily although it's ENABLED BY DEFAULT, you can turn it off (see below).
Here's another Privacy gotcha according to Macworld.com:
Another problem is that, while new places users create are private by default, they can become public if enough users check into them. Even if such a place is your house or apartment, Facebook will automatically promote the place to being public after an unspecified number of check-ins. For now, there is no way to prevent your home address from becoming a public location on Facebook aside from asking your friends to not check in at your next party. If a sensitive location becomes public, the only way to attempt to remove it is to flag it for Facebook to review, and ask others to do the same.
So the obvious thing not to do here is DON'T use Places to check in to your private residence. I never saw the need to do this on Gowalla, will definitely NOT be doing it on Facebook Places.
Whether you plan to use Places or not, you should adjust your Privacy settings NOW! I already use Gowalla, but unlike Facebook I only have less than 10 Gowalla friends! These are the few people that are close to me that I would want to know my current location at any given time. So the same goes for Facebook! If I do use the Places feature, I don't want my 1,500+ "Friends" to necessarily know where I am. I want those "Close Friends", "Family" and "People I actually know" to know where I am. Again, this is where the Facebook Lists Feature pays off again. You can designate a List of the people that you would want to see your Places' Check Ins.
The default for Places is set to "Friends".
Also don't forget to DISABLE the ability for Friends to check you in to Places if you don't want that:
If you don't want ANYONE to see where you are even if you're tagged, change the setting to "Only Me" and you should be OK for now.
As a frequent traveler I'm always on the look out for a portable (smallest I can find with decent sound) speaker system for my iPod/iPhone. My main interest is personal listening in a hotel room. Although there are lots of small speakers out there, the problem is if you make it too small it sounds like crap! I'm a fan of the AirCurve acoustic speaker by Griffin, but I also like powered speakers too. My continuous search led me to the iMainGo 2 Handheld Speaker Case for iPhone and iPod. First off, there is nothing really iPhone/iPod specific about this case. It should work fine with just about any phone or MP3 player. There's a standard mini plug that goes in your device's headphone/line out jack so it should work with just about anything including your laptop or iPad.
What I like best about this speaker is that it's powered by standard AAA batteries that last about 30 hours on one set/charge. It would be nice if it were AC powered and had a dock connector to charge your iDevice, but I can live without that for portability, battery power and price. It's already hard enough finding enough plugs in a hotel room. Not having to plug in the speaker to use it is actually a good thing.
One of the things I was most impressed with is the sound of this speaker in comparison to other portable systems I've tried that cost more and are bigger.
If you're looking for something small that sounds good and works with just about any device you carry, this is it.
You can get the iMainGo 2 for about $39 here.