Camera Hackery

Courtesy Tom, I've been pointed to a piece of software allowing one to enable RAW support on Canon DIGIC II cameras which don't normally support that image mode.

Called CHDK, it's hardly new, but it's a piece of software that sits on your SD card and it's enabled only when you want to use it. Other than enabling RAW mode it allows other functions based on what build is used and what model camera you use. As silly and basic as it sounds, I suspect I'll get a fair amount of use out of the real-time battery charge indicator enabled by the program, something which should have been there from the word go from Canon.

Basically one copies the program to one's SD card, turns on the camera, and enables the software by tricking the camera into thinking it's doing a firmware update (that's how the app is loaded to memory). Turn off the camera and the program is wiped from memory and if you don't want to use it the next time you use the camera, just don't enable it.

The way it's handled is wonderful in that it's non-destructive to the existing firmware on the camera however a couple glaring issues do crop up, both of which can be fixed by me changing the way I do things.

First, the software has to be copied to the SD card directly and thus far I've not found a way to enable mass data storage mode when directly hooking the camera up to my MacBook Pro via USB. That's not a huge deal if one uses a memory card reader, and I of course have a USB memory card reader, however the unit I have doesn't support SDHC meaning I'm limited to 2GB SD cards despite the fact the camera supports SDHC just fine and can support (at least) 16GB cards. This is fairly unfortunate if I plan to do much shooting in RAW mode given images stored in RAW are, well, raw and uncompressed and therefore take up more space. The answer to this is to buy an SDHC-capable card reader, or suffer with the 2GB SD card I keep in my camera bag.

Second, because the software is resident on the card it means I'll have to go about changing the way I erase images. Normally, unless I'm importing items into iPhoto, I'll format the SD card as it's simply the quickest way of getting rid of the contents. Doing that will of course wipe out the software and require a reinstall, something which could become tedious if I have to do it over and over. That means I will have to manually erase images on the camera one by one (unless my camera has a batch erase mode - I may have to look into that, though I have doubts about it existing) or import everything on the roll into iPhoto and delete the images from iPhoto. Alas iPhoto doesn't support directly erasing images on a memory card, one has to import them first. If that was a supported function then I'd be happier as it'd be faster to do a batch delete via the software than a one-by-one manual delete on the camera via its clunkier interface.

So far since arriving back in England I've not actually used my standalone camera. To date I've used the camera on my N73 or my iPhone when I've needed to snap images. In part this is because I've not bothered to take my camera with me when I go out, in part because I don't currently have a battery charger for the AA batteries used by my camera (the one I had in Canada didn't support 230V) and lastly in part because I've not really gone anywhere touristy this time around. As such I'm not sure how much use this software will actually get, but it's nonetheless nice to know it's available. The software beeing free is of course another bonus, making the price right.

GO SENS GO

One of the Sens games I've been waiting all season for has just wrapped up, with the Sens winning of course. The sole meeting of the Oilers and Senators this season occurred in Ottawa with Mike Comrie, fittingly an ex-Oiler, icing the game in the shootout. The game was quite decent, at least it seemed that way despite the sketchy NHL Radio broadcast (Windows Media support on the Mac is terrible, even with Flip4Mac).

So, to all the Oiler fans with which I cohabitate this berg we call Edmonton, neener-neener.

Of course it's far less fun to listen to the game on the net as opposed to going to the Oilers/Sens game here in Edmonton last winter where I got to razz the Oiler fans in person. While wearing my lovely Sens jersey. Rubbing it in. Pissing them off. Oh, the memories.

For the love of...

I knew about it since about a month after I bought my MacBook Pro, but until tonight I never bothered to install SmackBook. Holy cow but if this isn't the most useless but THE MOST FUN thing to use. I really hope there's a way to get this going under Leopard if you're running Spaces.

Well...

Okay, yesterday's Smallville (which I finally got around to watching today) wasn't horrible. Certainly not as bad as I expected, but far from fantastic. We finally got to see Martian Manhunter in action (properly, anyway) although I kept wanting him to act more like Jackie Chiles. Acting was pretty darn good, especially the paranoia from Chloe (schwing!) and the anger from Lex. Tom Welling was his usual mediocre-at-best, but he fared acceptably. I give it a thumbs barely up (bureau42.com wasn't as nice as me this week, though) and I still hold out hope for good episodes this month.

So, why did I not see it until today? Well, my friend Jean-Paul was in town for a few days so I caught up with him and others to go for dinner and catch a movie. The others bailed so it was just he and I off to see Pan's Labyrinth (his choice). While he quite enjoyed it, I... I don't know what to think. My first impression was I didn't like it, but I didn't hate it. The story was iffy, the characterizations were flawed and some of the plot points were completely, well, pointless. For a new movie it's rated extremely highly on the IMDB, and I can definitely say I disagree with the rating it's received thus far. I'd have to give it somewhere in the range of a 5 or 6... decent, watchable, but nothing I'd care to see again or even really think about once I've left the theatre. The upshot is I got a stack of movie passes for Christmas so at least it didn't cost me anything to see the show.

Dad and Willi are off to Mexico this coming week, and I really ought to get over there and get this PCMCIA wireless card installed in his ThinkPad since he wants to take it with him... I wonder if he got his passport yet. I know as of last weekend it hadn't yet arrived and with all the kerfuffle these days at the passport office, it's quite possible he's not yet received it.

MacWorld Expo Keynote

This morning featured the Steve Jobs keynote for the annual San Francisco MacWorld Expo, a favourite vacation destination of mine (I've gone 6 times in the past dozen or so years). Nothing says welcome to January like the San Fran pilgrimage by the Mac faithful.

There's no shortage of content out there regarding the transpirings of the event, so I'll be brief with my remarks. Basically, I'll restrict myself to why I don't care about what was introduced.

AppleTV: It's a good start, I suppose. A set-top box for the rest of us, to borrow a phrase. I'm currently in a position where I have a very viable system in place for viewing downloaded content on my TV. For better than 3 years now, I've had a DivX-capable DVD player which quite easily handles DivX/XviD, MPG, MPG2, etc. No WMV (thank God!), no fringe stuff (mkv containers, etc.). Just the basics, just the formats in which most downloadables are distributed. Download, burn to DVDRW, watch, erase, repeat. So, I don't need a set-top box.

720p maximum resolution... uh, what? Jobs proudly stood on stage at the 2005 (that's two years ago for those counting) San Fran keynote and declared that to be the YEAR OF HD. So... it's now 2007... and the Apple set-top box can't even do full HD resolution? Sorry, not acceptable. Amazingly enough, I've not seen this comment/complaint mentioned on any news sites I've read (maybe I'm not reading the right ones?). 1080p TVs are finally plentiful and are entering the realm of nicely priced, and Apple ships... uh, this. Okay, so my TV doesn't support higher than 540p (I don't count 1080i, which it does support) so if I were to use an AppleTV I'd get downsampled content (kinda like with a PS3, if I had one). Some might say I bitch because I can't even get the 720p offered by the device, but that's not the case. I bitch because the thing is incomplete at best.

No raw MPG/MPG2 playback? No VOB playback (yes, yes, VOBs are just MPG2 files, shush)? I can understand the lack of DivX/XviD playback due to the stigma attached to it, but come on, not all of us have video purchased from the iTunes Store. I live in Canada, by definition I *CAN'T* have video content purchased from the iTunes Store. If I buy a set top box (and wow there's no shortage of much cheaper options with much wider capabilities) and it can't play back what I want to see, then what use is it?

So much for "the rest of us."

iPhone: This is a sweet, sweet product. I won't deny that. It's so sweet, it's completely useless to me. Lack of Canadian availability aside, I dig the swiss army knife concept, but it's overkill, man. I don't want the cell phone I have now; I don't want a cell phone, period. I don't care about portable video; I'm quite content with music when I'm out and about. I have a USB flash drive if I want to carry around photos, and yes Virginia, loads of DVD players have USB ports for uses just like that. Internet on the go? I love the net, don't get me wrong, but I can go days without using it or checking my mail... I have no use for the ability to remotely see how many penis enlargement spam emails I have sitting in my mailbox.

GSM... that might be a good thing for the Yanks, but up here, at least from what I'm told, that's not a great idea. The sole GSM-capable carrier here is Rogers/Fido, and last I checked, the Rogers network was abysmal at best. I'm told the data costs on the network are also obscene. No, for Canada we need a 3G phone IIRC. Jobs in the keynote said Apple was investigating 3G handsets, but if they released such a thing, wouldn't that have an adverse effect on the internet capabilities when not in range of a WiFi hotspot (I don't actually know the answer to that)? GSM and the SIM card slot will be wonderful for the European market though, and I'm glad to see Apple at least endeavouring to make a product that can be used globally. It sucks to see cool cell phones and smartphones out there whose abilities are restricted to a given geographical region or mobile carrier.

The coolest part overall would have to be the interface. It rocks. Nothing comes close to it. I won't get into details, but for the curious, make sure to check out the video stream of the keynote to see the cool nuances offered by the interface. Oh, and the random access voicemail is very cool... but that's nothing which will be available outside the US, unless Apple/Cingular license or sell the technology to Rogers, Orange, Vodafone, whoever. That's assuming I'm getting things straight with the network infrastructure requirements for that capability.

So. One thing is severely inadequate for today's market, the other is extreme overkill. Mash the two of them together and you meet somewhere in the usability middle.

AppleiTVPhone? Nah, go with what Eric Schmidt said... AppleGoo!

802.11n Airport Extreme: While not covered in the keynote, Apple also released a draft-n spec router. Which looks just like the form factor of the AppleTV. Coincidence? Hmm. Still... draft-n. I don't own any 802.11n devices, and if 802.11b & g have taught us anything, USB adapters with wireless n capability will be few and far between for Mac availability, if we see any at all. I just bought a new router 6 months ago anyway, I don't want to spend MORE money on another one. Certainly not for $200. While other companies have far cheaper alternatives, nothing is as sleek-looking as Apple's offering. Oh, and after selling wireless routers for like 7 years or so, Apple has finally thrown in some ethernet ports on the back of the router. Way to join the party, guys.

The upshot of all this is I have zero urge to part with my money. I love Apple, but the more stuff they release, the more I realize I'm well outside their target demographic. My needs/desires are either vastly greater or lesser than what they offer.

The downside... all the stuff that should have happened but didn't. How about a progress report on Mac sales? Market penetration? Leopard progress? New displays? The options scandal? There are a dozen stories crying out to be told which weren't. Instead, we get products that miss the mark for a whooooooole bunch of people.

I love Apple, but, baby, why you always gotta make me hit you?

You waited a week to post about THIS?!

Neglect over this blog is setting in again it seems. That being said, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to post this link. The product in question, a vibrator, is apparently drawing ire from Apple, which will likely propel the product into the mainstream limelight soon.

The promo from Jonathan Ross is priceless.

Wii FAQ

Engadget has posted a very detailed technical FAQ list regarding the Wii, answering even the question that was burning most in my mind about how the slot-load mechanism accepted GameCube media. (To quote Jean-Paul, "it just works!")

It's very much worth a read.

Playstation 3

Today was the North American release for the Playstation 3. My opinion can be summed up in two words: who cares?

$660 for a bare unit that can't even display HD signals properly? That doesn't even come with an HDMI cable despite this being the hardware that's supposed to ignite the HD revolution? Pretty sad in my opinion. Granted, the Wii won't go beyond 480p, but it's not promising to do anything it can't. (I've not formally heard whether or not the Wii will ship with a component cable, but I certainly hope it does. I know prerelease review units did not.)

I'm not even going to bother with links to any of the myriad of stupid people stories out there relative to the PS3 launch. Suffice it to say if you stood in line and got a PS3 then congratulations, and please don't be one of those folks who flips it on eBay.

The one possible positive in all this is the PS3 does represent the cheapest means of obtaining a Blu-Ray player, even after considering the cost for an HDMI cable.

CylonOLantern

My friend Sean mentioned this site to me. If I wasn't so lazy, and actually gave a rat's ass about Halloween, I'd love to build one of those.