Image stabilization

These handheld shots were taken shooting images playing on a DVD on a Mac, using image stabilization and with full 2.5 optical zoom, on my new Canon. See entry below. Stills are from the history of England by Simon Schama. Click to enlarge.

Location, location, location

We visited the new Book Shelf/Blue Heron today. Nice! Turn down the volume control before playing.

Whitewater camp

Whitewater camping

This seemed like the shot.

Memorial Day Picnic

Create your own newspaper

Cool app. Times organizes RSS feeds into a newspaper format, with sections, pages, and sources I choose. What's RSS? It's a way to subscribe to a site so that new entries are automatically fed to your RSS reader; it's a subscription service. RSS links are so common, it's a wonder it took me about five years to figure out why I would want to use them. Times makes it obvious.

Babbit

Dream Compact Camera

My research on a camera brings me, inevitably, back to Apple, with the Apple of Your I compact digital camera, with killer diller features. We consumer types simply refuse to haul around DSLR monster cameras. I'm throwing it up here as a summary report on the research.

* Add HDR, high dynamic range imaging, onboard the camera. If you ain't seen it, check out Hydra or Photomatix. HDR makes great postcard photographers out of anybody. Can you say "photography for the rest of us"?

* Let me HDR my shots immediately while in the field. When I bracket a shot, make it happen automatically. Let me see it on a big bright screen.

* Put multitouch on it, so I can blow up the shot and see if I caught the spinach in Aunt Gertie's teeth. So what if it means building in OSX; so does creating the Touch.

* Let me mail my photos directly from the camera with WIFI.

* Add Ive's design touch, a great lens, image stabilization, burst mode, no shutter lag, a 1.6 sensor, and an uncompressed file setting. Sell it for under $750 list, $650 street, and send me the invoice.

Can you say unique selling proposition?

OK, why this camera?

I cancelled the order for the Canon below because it was delayed delivery. Looking around a bit more, I found another Canon that has a bit more of what I need: a bigger sensor chip, smaller body, image stabilization, no shutter lag, better low light imaging, a decent burst mode, and a great review at Steve's.

So why buy a new camera? Why this camera?

My search for a great compact camera continues. I refuse to purchase a big camera because I know I would not take it traveling or hiking. No photo is worse than a less than great photo.

I have been happy with my current Olympus S350: it can shoot a quality snap and create uncompressed RAW files. Nice. But when it comes to family and social photos, it's limited by slow shutter response time and poor low light function. So I have purchased a next step camera with a better lens, a Canon Powershot A720. It's highly rated and cheap enough that I can just do this.

Here's a site providing information about digital camera sensor sizing—mystifying info for us consumer type shooters. The sensor size decides how well a camera will shoot compared to a traditional 35mm camera. The megapixel measure is less important. Who knew? After days of research, apparently I am waiting for Canon to produce a G10 model with a 1.6 sensor chip. How's that for buzzwording?

Crabapple Thursday

I like to mess around with Photoshop filters. The top example buffed up the highlights on this shot. The lower shot offers example of extreme filters, which are a nice way to study color composition.
Click to enlarge.

Historic Herald

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Flowers Wednesday

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Chris's visit

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Feedburner

I have added a widget so that you can subscribe to my blog. Saves having to check it by notifying you of new entries. I think.

Posterino

I am trying out a new program that creates posters out of hundreds of shots. Has some real possibilities for gifts of posters combining the best shots of the year, for example.

Sesquicentennial stamp

Winona is featured on the postage stamp celebrating Minnnesota's sesquicentennial.