Notes from a Tool User

Carnival of the Agilists

Sorry this one is a bit overdue - it should've appeared last Thursday (Oct 25).

Welcome to the Carnival of the Agilists a carnival whose editorship rotates among four editors (Pete Behrens, Kevin Rutherford, John Brothers and myself).

James Shore hits a theme that's been bothering me a bit lately (see Don't call overridable methods in constructors) : "It's the Software, Stupid!". Scott Hanselman (channeling Patrick Cauldwell) says: "If your method can't do what it's name promises it can, throw". Its a simple reminder - if you can't meet the contract implied by your name throw an exception. Finally Ed Gibbs gives us the ultimate Agile Metric: Crap4J (a real Eclipse plugin, now supports other IDEs). Simply put it measures complexity (bad) vs test coverage (good) and gives your code a resulting crap rating. Very little code I've seen looks good when viewed through this lens.

Wide Angle Zooms for DSLRs - a review of the reviews

Realizing that I'm likely to be shooting a DX camera body for a long time I'm starting to ask questions about my lens line up. When I shot 35mm film, I used a Tamron 20-40mm for nice wide angles. There were moments where I've wanted a slightly wider field of view but on the whole it's been an excellent companion especially at the price ~$800 Canadian (1998). But now I'm shooting on DX camera body and am stuck with the limitations of my 18-70mm (~= 28 - 105 in 35mm terms) - so I decided to research what my options are.

The options:

• $914.95 Nikon 12-24mm f/4G 
• $558.72 Tamron SP Autofocus 11-18mm f/4.5-5.6 
• $481.11 Tokina 12mm - 24mm f/4.0 
• $449.95 Sigma 10-20mm f/4-5.6

As much as I enjoy filling Nikon's coffers paying $900+ is currently just a bit rich for my blood. If you've got the cash then skip this post buy one. (If you buy any lens clicking on the link above then Amazon will give me 4% of the proceeds.)

Nikon D3 vs D300

The announcement of Nikon's two new camera's has really been forcing me to crystallize my thinking around buying a full frame digital camera.

For nearly 15 years I shot with a Nikon F801s (an 8008s for my American friends), it was a solid workhorse of a camera with a good reliable spot meter. About three years ago now I gave up film, sold the 801s and bought a D70. I haven't looked back the D70 has been a great camera - but when I bought it I had my fingers crossed behind my back. I was secretly hoping that Nikon would produce a full frame DSLR for the pro-sumer market. I had such a strong belief in this that I kept my 20-40mm (a useless nearly useless lens on 1.5 crop sensor).

But now that D3 is arriving I forced to question my original desire for a full frame DSLR. I've come to really appreciate the extra reach that my 80-200mm has.

The quandry: If I will eventually buy a full frame DSLR then I shouldn't invest in any DX lenses - but I will need a good midrange zoom (don't have for historical reasons). If I'm going to stick with DX then its time to start thinking about a wide angle and the 18-200 DX/VR.

Key differences:

	D3 (FX or Full Frame sensor)	D300 (DX or 2/3's sensor)
Telephoto lenses	work at their original length. But to get the greater reach I have to spend real $$$.	My 70-300, is an adequate 450mm. My 80-200 (with 2x teleconverter) makes a poor mans 600mm lens.
Wide Angle lenses	I will have my wide angles back	Hmm will have to part with some cash to get wider than 27mm.
Depth of Field (for equivalent Field of view)	Shallower depth of field in any given situation	Shallow depth of field harder.
High ISO	Bigger sensor, less noise. Definitely great out ISO 1600 Apparently even 6400 is good.	The few samples anyone has seen look pretty damn good.
Weight	heavy - especially when you weigh all those full size lens.

 

Unless Nikon has a stunning announcement of a pro-sumer full frame camera in the next 18 mths I will probably just bite the bullet and admit that I'm shooting DX cameras for a long time to come.

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Caveat Emptor - There are a lot of previews out there that look reviews of these camera's. Beware these are just reviews of the specs. Only Cliff Mautner (wedding photographer) has been allowed to play with a pre-production D3. Even his notes are based on JPEGS (nothing handles D3 RAW files yet).

On Safari with Nathan Myhrvold. Or will work for used 600mm VR.

Nathan Myhrvold (yes that Nathan) is apparently a prize winning photographer and occasionally writer. He has recently written an excellent article Digital Safari Equipment Tips. Unfortunately Nathan has lost touch with the world the rest of us inhabit. He recommends we have nearly $30,000 worth of equipment saying its a "once-in-a-lifetime opportunity both to experience incredible scenery and wildlife and to make some amazing photographs". Sure it is Nathan.

Remote Desktop Pain

Have you been using Remote Desktop to work on a two monitor machine? Have you ever had a modal dialog from your current application open on that other machine? I have. It happens nearly every time I remote desktop. Now here's the solution:

1. Make sure the application has focus. 
2. Press Alt-Space (displays the windows menu) 
3. Press M (for Move) 
4. Press an arrow key - to lock in the move mode. 
5. Move the mouse until the offending dialog appears 
6. Click a mouse button to end the move operation.

Dead simple really. Its amazing how useful keyboard navigation can be. Thanks to Chris Anderson and Craig Andera on the Win Tech Off Topic mailing list for answering my question.

Ken Kozman suggested an alternative: Version 6.0 of the RDP client allows you to have a Remote Desktop session that spans two screens. The only downside the screens have to be the same size - my laptop is 1024 x 768 and the 21" CRT beside it is 1600 x 1200. Yes its a CRT - very good for photographic editing its tough to get an LCD with blacks as good as CRT. The limitation is the backlight.

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LightZone Review

Several readers commenting in Mike's blog The Online Photographer have asked about a comparison between Lightroom, Aperture and Lightzone. I'm up to the challenge with some caveats. First: I have a day job and young family so this won't be quick. Second my image editing abilities are a bit weak - I really struggle with deciding whether many changes I can make are improvements - especially wrt colour. I only have direct access to Lightroom - since the Mac I expected to buy used wasn't available for sale in the end. Finally Lightzone appears to be focused on developing the image - not managing your photos, so the comparison will be between Lightroom's Develop module and Lightzone. If you want to help out leave me a comment or email me (Thanks to Jim and Ed for their offers of help).

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Lightroom - And'ing keywords

Ever since I bought Lightroom I've been trying to figure out how to 'and' two keywords together. My collection has over 5000 images of my daughter. To find an image of her reading I need to be able say "name and reading". In Elements this was easy - I just clicked on both tags and I got the and'd list. 'Or' wasn't an explicit option instead a check box appeared at the bottom of screen saying "near/close matches".

 

Lightroom Tip: How to Successfully Import your Photoshop Elements Catalog

Or how you can learn from my mistakes. In the Lightroom Forums there have been many complaints about the import from Photoshop Elements. I’m here to tell you the problem may be your own. I’ve seen two problems – not all images get imported and some of their tags get left behind. Most of the complaints assume the problem is Lightroom’s. I think the problems are from what we didn’t do before we left Elements.

Lightroom isn't a reaction to Aperture

Many in the blog-o-sphere and beyond have claimed that Adobe Lightroom was written in reaction to the Apple Aperture. In "The Shadowland/Lightroom Development Story" Jeff Schewe smashes that myth. Reality check applications like this take years to develop - not months. I'm astounded by how quickly Lightroom has evolved since its first beta.

Congrats to the Lightroom team. BTW what happened to the light table metaphor? aka Shuffle. I would kill to have that feature in Lightroom.

if you're interested in comparisons between the two apps visit: Aperture vs. Lightroom - best comparisons

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Adobe Lightroom

Aperture vs. Lightroom - best comparisons

Like many other readers of this blog I've been look for a good head to head comparison of Apple's Aperture vs. Adobe's Lightroom. I make the comparison myself but I have neither the time nor a Mac of my own. So the notes on this page merely represent what I've learned from others.

Hands down the best work is coming from a pair of O'Reilly Digital Media Bloggers: Micah Walter and Michael Clark. Micah is an Aperture user trying Lightroom for 10 days, Michael is a Lightroom user trying Aperture. Between them they're starting to paint a very interesting comparison. BTW Spend the time to read the comments they add alot of extra information.