Non-Destructive Cropping!

I actually found something in Photoshop CS5 that makes me a happy Panda.  Non-Destructive Cropping.

Cropping non-destructively After you create a cropping rectangle with the Crop tool, select Hide from the options bar to preserve the cropped area in a layer. Restore the cropped area anytime by choosing Image > Reveal All or by dragging the Crop tool beyond the edge of the image. The Hide option is unavailable for images that contain only a background layer.

The Informant

When polar bears hunt, they crouch down by a hole in the ice and wait for a seal to pop up. They keep one paw over their nose so that they blend in, because they've got those black noses. They'd blend in perfectly if not for the nose. So the question is, how do they know their noses are black? From looking at other polar bears? Do they see their reflections in the water and think, "I'd be invisible if not for that." That seems like a lot of thinking for a bear. We took the kids one year to the Renaissance Festival in Indiana. You get to be the White Knight. The kids get to ride a horse and joust against the forces of darkness with a helmet on. And the White Knight always wins - the forces of darkness fall onto an old mattress. Someone plays a Lute and plays a song from Medieval Times. The day we went it was maybe 90 degrees out and the heat and humidity index I can't even remember what the radio said. We were next in line and the mare collapsed. Went down in a heap. Ginger was eating Ye Olde Drumstick and she dropped it in the dirt. The kids were crying. I remember this farmer saying he had a gun in his truck. Just like that. From the White Knight to a gun in the truck. They had everyone turn their backs before they put the animal down, but even if you couldn't see you could still hear. How do you get that back? How does that get to be fair?

I've been to Tokyo. They sell little-girl underwear in the vending machines right on the main drag, the Ginza, or whatever. Guys in suits buying used girl panties. How is that okay? That's not okay.

One of the Japanese guys told me a story. This lysine salesman is in a meeting with someone from ConAgra or some other company, I don't know. And the client leans forward and says "I have the same tie as you, only the pattern is reversed." And then he drops dead, face down on the table. Alive and then dead. Brain aneurism. Maybe everyone has a sentence like that, a little time bomb. "I have the same tie as you, only the pattern's reversed." Dead. The last thing they'll ever say.

Via Riley Dog, Radish King.

RIP

Dennis Hopper, 1936 – 2010

I didn’t use a light meter; I just read the light off my hands. So the light varies, and there are some dark images. Also, I’m sort of a nervous person with the camera, so I will just shoot arbitrarily until I can focus and compose something, and then I make a shot. So generally, in those proof sheets, there are only three or four really concentrated efforts to take a photograph. It’s not like a professional kind of person who sets it up so every photograph looks really cool.

-Dennis Hopper

Dead Kennedys- Live. 1984.

Dead Kennedys, Jock-O-Rama. An all time punk classic and this is surprisingly good recording of it dang it. Check out the crowd just boiling over literally. I wrote a essay on this song for one of my high school english classes and got a mo freaking A on it you know.

Have another from the same set. What the hell.

Thoughts on the iPad

It is time for me to bore you with Tales of the iPad! Are you prepared? The lovely wife picked one up for my birthday and I have spent a decent enough time with it to get a understanding of it's uses and I have to say it is a great little device. First off, it is not a computer, if you want a computer buy a damn computer and shut up. If you want a media device with internet this is for you. Do you want to replace the video card, hack it to run linux and make a remote controlled Cory Doctorow to fight for your copyleft and what the fuck is that waffle iron made into a composting toilet for your urban treehouse device? Well, fuck you. Really, just fuck you and your smug hair. Do I bitch because my can of coke is not a beer. Well yes, yes I do. But I digress. Let me break it down.

Magazines on this thing are awesome to read and look at. Time, Vanity Fair and Popular Mechanics are all awesome and look great. I wish I could subscribe intsead of paying out the nose for them though. Wall Street Journal and USA Today do a great job with the newspaper angle. WSJ even has videos embedded. Very cool. I find reading books on it to be quite nice as well. I hope art books get ported over to it sooner then later as I would love to look at some high quality art history books on it. I can only imagine if done right how good they could look.

This brings up what I think is the best part of it to me. I honestly think this device can be a bridge between what was good about old print media (depth of content, quality content) and what is good about new media (instant updates, all in one location, connected) while eliminating the bad of each. Old media was unconnected and a day late, slow sluggish and fat. New media is shallow, anything longer then 3 paragraphs is hard to read and most imagery is the size of a postage stamp with the quality of a disc camera. This device makes the cheap content look cheap and the great content shine. Reading a well laid out newspaper (Wall Street Journal knocked it out of the park) or magazine is amazing. And instant updates to WSJ and Reuters make both very new media.

This brings up another interesting point about the iPad that has been written about but is hard to explain. It becomes what you use it for as it does not feel like a specific thing. When using a computer you are aware of the computer no matter what you are doing. You are reading on the computer, watching a movie on the computer etc… Same with a Nintendo DS or other such devices. You are always aware of the device. On the iPad, when you play a game, you are playing a game. Reading a book or magazine just feels like reading from a dead tree. The device becomes what you are using it for. And that is what is important about it. This could usher in a new wave of similar devices that we did not have a use for until now. I could see laptops becoming a thing of the past as people keep a desktop / office system for bills, accounting backups and use a iPad device around the house all day long. The computer being almost more like a appliance that they use for specific high intensity tasks.

Some quick fire style points about it:

I can remote desktop to my server and see what is going on from my couch. I used remote desktop to control a camera tethered to my computer on a shoot yesterday as well.

Photographs on this thing look amazing, hands down jaw dropingly awesome. It is like holding a old 8x10 Cibachrome. How long till the rich ass photographers in the world start mailing these around as a portfolios instead? I wonder?

Games are a hoot. Prepare to lose a few days to Plants vs. Zombies. Hell, I even got the wife to play some of that. The HDR driving game is stupid fun. It's not a console killer but Nintendo has called Apple enemy number one.

Drum machines work like drum machines did in 1986. Yes, that is a good thing.

I can use it no problem for email. Almost prefer it for email over my work station but can not blog worth a damn on it.

The Art Authority app is hours of art history browsing.

Wall Street Journal beats out the New York Times for best newspaper.

Epicurious is awesome in the kitchen.

All in all I would say it's a device worth having. I could see my mom using one more then she does her laptop honestly. It would be nice if it was more open and computer like but that limitation, like in a haiku, could be what makes it so interesting.

This got me mad....

Seeing this just really got to me today. Really, no shit. None of that apathy bullshit. This is a massive train wreck that is ruining our biggest fishery. And BP will walk away from it all and people will keep drilling away. Keep chanting "drill baby drill" you god damn twits.

For more outrage if your blood pressure allows see this link at Metafilter with many links. Unctuous Gunk in the Bayous.

Oil from the Deepwater Horizon spill hits the Louisiana wetlands.More photos here. Meanwhile, the state department confirms US officials have begun talks with Cuba about how to help the small island nation deal with the environmental impacts of the disaster. And as McClatchy and other news agencies are now reporting, the latest independent scientific estimates appear to confirm a rate of flow much higher than BP has previously been willing to acknowledge, in the likely range of 95,000 barrels a day, amounting to roughly an Exxon Valdez size spill every three days. Meanwhile, ProPublica reports that the industry seems intent on keeping the lid on just how bad things really are in the Gulf, and quotes company spokesmen as saying that the actual rate and amount of flow is “not relevant to the response effort.”

Steam for the Mac

Next up let's discuss Steam for the Mac. Steam is basically a iTunes store for games on your computer mixed with a instant messenger / email client to be used in game. You can see what games your friends are playing and send them a chat asking if they want to play something. Very fun. Also until the 24th, Portal is free. As in beer. As in cheers. It's free to install just be sure to read up on the Mac system requirements to run the games. No Mac Minis or Macbooks I am afraid.  You need a independent graphics card and it won't tell you this till you download a game and try to run it.

I am loading up Steam everyday hoping they will release a new game and I can lap it up.  Which is a problem. Which is a Mac problem.  The problem being, there are no games on the damn Mac. Well there are, but I can list them on one hand. Indie games don't count so shut up about World of Goo and Braid.  I mean real 10 gig texture packs big ass fancy games. I await with baited breath TF2 , Half Life, Modern Warfare, etc...

Yes, I can boot into Windows via bootcamp (installed) but I could also go sleep with a crack smoking, toothless hooker if I wanted. Yes, I am comparing Windows to a crack smoking, toothless hooker and really, is this the internet fight you want to get into? You may like crack smoking toothless hookers and want to sing the praises of the various flavors of such, but I sir do not share your tastes.

The first week on Steam was rough though. Portal was crashing left and right, Steam was hanging, lots of little glitches. But it seems like a lot of those bugs have been ironed out already. Kudos to them for that.

I just wonder why Fallen Earth, Warhammer and Eve Online do not show up as ported to the Mac yet?

You know why I think I like Steam so much though? Mac gaming is a lot like this Eddie Murphy's joke about a cracker. I'm just so glad to see such a major for in PC gaming step up to the Mac I'll sing it's praises till the end of the earth. If anyone wants to track me down on steam look up Dankred. I have all of two games currently on the Mac side, lol!

Photoshop CS5

So after using Photoshop CS5 for a week or two I thought I would post my thoughts on it to date. Unleash the hounds! This app just makes Steve Job right in bashing the living crap out of Flash on his mobile devices. And yes it is going to be one of those ripping Adobe a new asshole posts. Skip it now if you want. This app is once again another buggy release from Adobe.

CS5 crashes on quitting. CS5 Droplets do not work. Liquify so slow it's unusable. The spacebar switch to the hand tool does not always work. The cursor will flicker like crazy at times. Command + option + 0 does not take you to 100% in Liquify. It does very strange system hangs to my system where it pins one processor to max and will not let it go for a minute or so. Slow motion typing till it finally works it free. The Content Aware Fill bullshit they hyped the crap out of is simply randomly running the healing patch tool. No shit, test it out. If you want LESS control then you get with the healing patch tool, use that instead. The same bruising and blotches happen of course. So well, don't use that either if you take any pride in your work. Content Aware Scale has been useless too, but that was a CS4 wonder tool (try it on dirt or grass and look at 100%).

Why do I use CS5 then? Well, Adobe stops updating Adobe Camera Raw to new cameras unless you upgrade to the newest version of Photoshop. So if a client sends one of these files no dice on using Photoshop to process it. While annoying and I could easily use Capture One to process it it shows a evil side in Adobe IMO.

On the plus side, there is one believe it or not. Yes, it is dim and fading into the night waving with a latern, but a bright side can be found. The new HDR is going to kill Photomatrix. It's very nice actually once you learn to work in tiny, tiny amounts. They equipped this thing with enough power to destroy a fully operational battle station if you get my drift. The new (yet evil as stated above) camera raw engine does do a better job with noise and sharpening. The new Lens Correction tools and Puppet Warp are awesome. Puppet warp has a lot of potential and I feel like I have barely uncovered it's uses as of yet.

Some backstory, I use Photoshop every day all day as my main source of income at danklife. I live and sleep with this tool so when something bothers me, it bothers me all day long and I am a picky son of a bitch. Because of this I am subject to be a raving maniac about these issues more so then others. So take my opinions with that in mind. Does it make me a expert in the program and validate my opinion or make me into a crank shouting at the kids to get off the lawn? I'll leave that up to the reader.

Update 6-9-10: Just installed a new SSD (solid state drive) and did a clean install of everything and I have not had a hitch as of yet. I think the SSD speed is a key factor. I hope to do  a write up on the new SSD soon...

More on the facebook

QuitFacebookDay.com

For us it comes down to two things: fair choices and best intentions. In our view, Facebook doesn't do a good job in either department. Facebook gives you choices about how to manage your data, but they aren't fair choices, and while the onus is on the individual to manage these choices, Facebook makes it damn difficult for the average user to understand or manage this. We also don't think Facebook has much respect for you or your data, especially in the context of the future.

It's getting closer for me. The fact that I have the business and can sort of use that as a front to more people is what is keeping me there. But they really are being quite evil.

Morning Poem

Sometimes when the mind is burning brightand all is lost but for the moment one see's how that moment is what binds a life together not this bric-a-brac day to day. The iron only lives when it is hot.

Hammock thoughts

now I know I may sound like a old fart talking like this, but looking through the iPhone camera just now got me to thinking. how many of you have ever shot film and delt with that crazy world where what you saw through the eye piece was not what you would get. something tells me there is a whole generation of shooters who are used to seeing the shot right then and there. back in the film days you never knew 100%, I mean beyond a doubt, till you saw the film 2 days later. I did freaking zone system shooting and there were still surprises. on another funky note, I'm writing this in the hammock on my phone... go figure.

Scott Davis

Upon returning to California after his studies in New Mexico, Davis took the unique moods of the desert and applied them with deftness to urban settings. By nature, Davis is a loner and seeks settings that can be as much one place as any other anonymous spot on a street or lost highway. His saturated nightscapes are composed with a single existing source whose light hugs and frames elements in the subject matter. This effect yields work that is luminescent in a manner that evokes night as much as day. You can feel the heat and lingering effects of drenching sunshine imbuing the streets, pavements, parking lots, buildings, valleys and billboards. Moreover, in his latest work he explores by taking pictures of buildings specifically on San Fernando Road. This focused survey has brought his work to a new plane that culminates his vision and training. In 713 N. Victory Boulevard, Davis captures a desolate corner that makes a viewer look twice because its richness and depth evoke a tangible painterly sensibility that makes one look back for confirmation that it is a photograph, rather than a hyper-real painting. There is no trace of Hollywood glamour; solitude is palpable and LA takes on a majesty unlike its actual, sprawling self. One can imagine if Edward Hopper were a photographer these are the pictures he would have taken.

Scott Davis, another fine photographer at Hous Projects.

Marian Drew

Drew sets her deceased on kitchen tables amidst fruit and fauna in a manner that evokes Renaissance still-life painting. In particular, reference and parallels are found in the vanitas genre, which were constructions by painters to warn of the bouquet of hubris man weaves. The senselessness of death for Drew’s subjects is poignant even more so with the realization that these animals will not be consumed as the fish and fowl shown in classic still life. Sport is cruel; careless discard is unforgivable. Rather than bucolic examples of a landowner’s fortunes or flexed exertions of man’s control over the natural world, Drew’s tables are dressed to implicate the disregard humanity has for the wild animal. The warmth of home, sweet home’s family gathering to share a meal is tainted when barriers are removed between the beasts and us.

Marian Drew, photos. Nice stuff. I am a fan of this look.