Splash of Style...Macs, Photography, Design, and other Passions

Macbook Pro LCD Calibration Problems

July 22, 2008 by debbie T | Computers • Digital Photography • Mac Corner

Regarding my first post, I was initially very happy w/ the calibration. I had purchased an X-rite Eye-One Display LT from Adorama.

I was disappointed because the Eye-One Display came highly recommended on various sources online.

So, I tried the calibration again, same pink hue. It doesn’t look bad at first, until you really start to look at it. It really shows up when looking at a white background.

I was leaving on vacation, so I had to wait to contact anyone. On my return, I had a miserable cold, and I didn’t feel like thinking, much less speaking to anyone to try to trouble shoot the problem.

Finally, yesterday I called X-rite’s customer service department to see if they could help me. Well, the person I spoke to (Kevin) was no help at all. He didn’t seem knowledgeable about the product and his advice in the end was to make sure my Mac’s gamma was 2.2 and not 1.8. I didn’t think this would have any impact on the pink hues, but alas, I did try to calibrate one last time. Nope, the same pink hue, but it just looked “darker” w/ the 2.2 gamma set.

I was fed up.

The good news is that I spoke to Adorama this morning to ask about a return, and after I explained myself, they generously agreed to the return even though it was slightly beyond the 14 day return period. Yay for Adorama!

Getting Social

July 19, 2008 by debbie T | Digital Photography • Flickr • Internet • Mac Corner • Web Development

I have had accounts at all the cool social networking sites, like Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, MySpace and Zooomr to name a few.

I have never really had the time or desire to participate with any of these networks, except for Flickr. But with all the talk (and rumors) of the downfall of Flickr, I decided to mess around with Zooomr.

When I signed up with Zooomr almost a year ago, I didn’t mesh with it, but this time, I guess it stuck, because I am totally addicted.

The addiction to Zooomr, lead to another look at Twitter, and I have set up auto updates to Twitter from Zooomr.

I have never thought of myself as a chatter, but this is actually kind of fun. I like the quick moving feel of Zooomr and the community aspect is very fun.

If you are a Zooomr member, would you like to “follow” me?

More on my thoughts on Zooomr at a later date.

Macbook Pro LCD Calibration

July 2, 2008 by debbie T | Computers • Digital Photography • Mac Software

whoo-hoo. I calibrated my Macbook Pro display for the first time! I was nervous (not sure why, it wasn’t like it was going to blow it up if I made an error).

The colors look very nice. My eyes feel like they need adjusting, and I have a tiny slight headache, so I turned my brightness down for now. I hope I get used to it.

UPDATE: no, the colors were not very nice. In fact, the calibration led to a head ache for a couple of days until I took a look at my original calibration settings. Wow, there was a strong pink hue to the calibration from Eye-One. Read about it in my updated article.

Anyway, I purchased an “Eye-One Display LT” calibrator from x-rite. You can find them on Amazon as sold by Adorama. I have purchased from Adorama twice now, and they are very good.

The instructions that came w/ the product are a bit scarce, but if you take your time, it isn’t very difficult to accomplish the process. I guess the deal is you need to calibrate regularly, like once a week. The software will supposedly remind me.

The reason I chose the Eye-One LT is because the price was inexpensive @ $140. Yes, there were other calibrators that were less expensive, like the Spyder 2 Express, but for a little more money, I could get a “semi-pro” level tool.

Plus, the reviews for the Eye-One Display LT were very good.

The x-rite website is packed with lots of information; I am going to have to sit down and read over all their tutorials and articles soon.

Untrained Applestore Salespeople

June 29, 2008 by debbie T | Mac Corner • Mac Software • iPhoto • iTunes

We went into the Applestore in Salem, NH this afternoon to possibly purchase a new iPod Touch for my husband.

When we walked in the store, I asked the greeter if someone could help us with iPod Touch questions. She sent us over to what she thought was the iPod area, and I found a Touch. My husband had been previously been playing around with one, but I thought it might be nice to have someone officially show us around before we purchased.

The first salesperson (male) came over and he seemed knowledgeable enough, until I asked him about syncing photos, bookmarks, address book, etc. He didn’t know the answers, so he brought over another salesperson (female), and she started to push the new Mobile Me (dot Mac) service, telling me that I needed to use that to sync anything. I told her I have never been a fan of dot Mac, and that I was surprised that it couldn’t be done through iTunes.

She wasn’t too sure of the answer, so she went off to find someone that might know.

Another older gentleman came over. I assumed (wrongly) that he would perhaps have an answer about syncing. nope, more Mobile Me sales pitches. In fact, he took me over to a nearby iMac, and started to browse the apple.com website so he could show me more about Mobile Me. Again, I told the that I didn’t want to use dot mac or Mobile Me.

I spoke to no less than 4 sales people, and no one could tell me answers to simple questions, like syncing photos, address book, and iCal. Would you believe that no one actually knew the sales return policy either!!! That had to be figured out by asking another sales person as well.

I should have just went over to a Mac myself, and searched for the syncing answers on google (which is what I did when I got home). Truth is, you do NOT need Mobile Me or Dot Mac to sync your iPod. You can do it all through iTunes, which is what I originally thought, but no one in the store could confirm it.

Seems the Applestores have a lot of new sales staff, probably in anticipation of the iPhone release on July 11). But you would think they would go through a little bit of training. It’s almost like they were told if anyone asks about the iPhone or iPod Touch, just play stupid and push the Mobile Me sales crap.

I was really discouraged and disappointed. I expected more knowledge from the sales staff. The Applestores have always seemed to be a step above the Best Buys and Walmarts, in that they know their products. If we were an uninformed customer, we might have possibly been talked into purchasing a Mobile Me account, when it wasn’t even necessary! Very disheartening!

We left the store w/out an iTouch. My husband isn’t sure he wants one anymore. I told him that he should wait until July 11, just in case something (like a price drop) happens. Who knows, I have been eyeing an iPod Touch for awhile. I might get one after July 11!

Creating an Encrypted Backup to External Drive

April 26, 2008 by debbie T | Digital Photography • Mac Software

Note: This tutorial is for Mac OS X - I am using Leopard, but older versions of OS X would still work fine.

My photo files were getting out of hand. I had no problem backing up to my external hard drives, but I needed a better off site backup solution. I was using Amazon S3 for my original files, but there was so much meta data in iPhoto that I didn’t want to lose, like keywords, plus all the modified versions as well.

I regularly burned my photo files onto DVDs for storage at my parents’ home, but that was becoming time consuming and inefficient.

So, what to do? I decided to purchase another external hard drive to store at my husband’s office. But security was an issue. What if the drive was stolen? I needed to add a level of security to the drive in case it ended up in the wrong hands.

I searched online, and figured out that I could create an encrypted disk image (.dmg) file that could be saved on the external hard drive. I could use my syncing software Chronosync to regularly back up all my files.

First, set up the disk image on the external hard drive using Disk Utility

Choose File>New>Blank Disk Image

New-disk-img

  1. Type a “save as” name. This will be the name of the file.
  2. Browse to the location of your external hard drive. Don’t worry, because this is just like any other file, it can be copied or moved to a new location later.
  3. Volume name: is the name of the mounted volume. I just left the default, but you can choose a more appropriate name.
  4. Volume size: choose “custom” and type a slightly lower size quantity of your external hard drive. Make sure you choose “gb” from the pull down menu. For example, if your drive is 500gb, you might want to set a volume size of 460gb. If you don’t want all your files to be encrypted, then choose a smaller size. It is very flexible.
  5. Volume format: I chose Mac OS Extended (Journaled)
  6. Choose either 128 or 256 for encryption. I chose 256
  7. The partition is where I got a bit confused. I chose Single Partition, but there could be other choices that are more appropriate. This is a new setting in Leopard, and all the Disk Image tutorials I found were older.
  8. Lastly, choose “Sparse Disk Image” - this is something very cool that I just learned. It allows your disk image to be more flexible in size. For example, if you set your volume size for 30gb, and the files saved to the volume are only 10gb, the size of the disk image will be 10gb. It grows as you add files.

IMPORTANT NOTE: It has come to my attention that there could be problems using such a large sized file if a hard drive sector becomes corrupt. I don’t know if this is true or not, but I did find another program that might be a better solution.

TrueCrypt is an open source app for Mac, Linux, and Windows. It looks very intriguing. But for now, I will use my solution, and hope for the best.

More articles found online:

Aftermarket Camera Batteries

April 4, 2008 by debbie T | Digital Photography

I have been reading up on aftermarket vs “brand” batteries, and found some interesting information.

First I found a wonderful thread on the Canon Digital Photography Forum and on page 17, a link was posted to a conversation over on dpreviews.

I never really thought about mAh ratings for batteries. I just assumed that the larger the number, the longer the battery will last. Well it appears that it is all just an inflated marketing ploy by battery sellers to persuade you to think you are getting a better product than “brand”.

It is refreshing to find a newer company called Diamond Back Battery that changed their sales and marketing practices. They are now listing mAh ratings truthfully.

Read the company’g blog entry on this course of action. While you are there, take a look around and you might even find a discount coupon!

I think it it so cool that a DPReview discussion influenced and changed the way a new company is doing business. That is awesome!!!

I have been thinking about a new battery or two for my Canon XTi, and I found the battery I need at Diamond Back. I send them an email to ask about battery covers, and if they are included. I will update.

Ipernity

February 3, 2008 by debbie T | Art and Graphics • Digital Photography • Flickr • Internet

Due to the impending doom of a Microsoft takeover of Yahoo and Flickr, I have been checking out other online photo sharing “communities”

I just found Ipernity, and hey, this could be an interesting alternative to Flickr. I will be checking it out for a few days. We’ll see how it compares in the long run, but so far it is VERY Flickrish!

http://www.ipernity.com/

Visit my Ipernity page: http://www.ipernity.com/home/debbiet/

I have a feeling that community sites like this will become much more popular in the very near future. Flickr members are in a panic and will be diligently searching for alternatives. I really hope Microsoft doesn’t take over Yahoo!!!

UPDATE: After playing in Ipernity for a couple of hours, I can honestly say I am enjoying myself, and this could have some potential as a Flickr replacement, at least for me.

What I like: It looks and acts A LOT like Flicker. Groups have pools, the photo pages look the same, favorites are the same, there’s even Explored photos. But there are a few bits that are even better than Flickr. For one, there is an option to add video, blog posts. I also find the interface a bit more detailed. It is easy to track who is visiting your photo stream.

As for the upload process, it isn’t as easy as uploading from iPhoto, but there is an upload downloader (based on jUploadr): http://www.ipernity.com/tour/iperupload

Fun Greasemonkey scripts to make life at Ipernity similar to Flickr: http://www.ipernity.com/apps/gm Some favs:

Easy Photo Post Import Flickr photos (either in full, or one at a time) Add Referrer into Comments IpernityFox - photo sidebar viewer similar to flickrfox.

I have found some interesting groups, uploaded a few photos, and time will tell if I will convert fully over to Ipernity. One big thing that is missing in Ipernity, is all my Flickr friends. Who knows, maybe eventually we all will be moving over to Ipernity or another online photo community!

Microsoft Trying to Take Over Yahoo (Flickr)

February 3, 2008 by debbie T | Flickr • Internet

Microsoft is trying to take over Yahoo.

Microsoft & Flickr?? Oh no!

Whether it’s a hostile takeover or not, this is something I am not happy about. As it is, Yahoo seems to neglect proper upkeep of Flickr. If Microsoft takes over Yahoo, I don’t want to think what they will do to Flickr.

I don’t care about Yahoo Mail or Search engine, but the community at Flickr is unmatched by no other photo sharing site.

I can easily upload my photos using the iPhoto Flickr plugin. I have made so many wonderful friends at Flickr. If Microsoft makes negative changes, I will be very sad. I know it sounds a bit pathetic that I could be so addicted and affected by a website, but it really is a fun community. And unfortunately, there really is no other place to go.

I really hope the purchase doesn’t go through, but truthfully, I can’t see it NOT going through….so hold on Flickr users, it is going to be a bumpy ride!

Online Resources to Check Out:

Cheap Alternative to a Tripod

January 30, 2008 by debbie T | Digital Photography

OH I have to try to make one of these:

Cheap Image Stabilizer for any camera

Looks pretty easy to make, and from what I heard, it will work:

Found on MacRumors forum: http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=424423

iPhoto Library Manager

January 27, 2008 by debbie T | Digital Photography • Mac Software • iPhoto

Well, I still haven’t finished rebuilding my iPhoto library, but it’s mostly due to time restraints, not any additional problems. But in the meantime, I found a wonderful little app to manage my iPhoto Libraries.

The iPhoto Library Manager from Fat Cat Software, is a shareware app that easily organizes multiple library databases. I have been using it for a couple of weeks, and I just love it. I paid the $20 so I can have full access to the advanced features of the app, but it still works very well if you want to mess around with the free version.

What I love about the iPhoto Library Manager:

If your iPhoto albums are out of control and too large to handle, then give the iPhoto Library Manager a whirl. I am really excited to really get my albums in order, to free up some much needed space on my MacBook Pro.

Download the free version from Fat Cat Software: http://www.fatcatsoftware.com/iplm/