Geeky

Oh plastic grapes, is there anything to which you can’t add a touch of class?

Friday, July 30th, 2010

Green Sea Turtle in Kona, Hawaii. 6/2010

Sunday, July 18th, 2010

Green Sea Turtle in Kona, Hawaii. 6/2010 from ZachFine on Vimeo. If you’d like to watch the video in HD, start playback of the video, make sure the “HD” toggle is set to “on”, and click the video’s full-screen button (Vimeo's Fullscreen Button) during playback.

I was a first-time visitor to Hawaii recently, and shot a lot of photos and video. I’ll be dribbling it to my blog in bits and pieces as I go through the footage. Here’s a taste: a green sea turtle at Ho’okena Beach in Kona, Hawaii. This turtle popped up as I was snorkeling in deeper waters and swam alongside me all the way back in to shore. A beauty. Perhaps she was amazed to see a film/video editor out in direct sunlight?

Meandering tech notes:
Shot with a Creative Vado HD solid state 720p camcorder (1st generation)1, in a Creative-branded Aquapac underwater housing.

The Vado HD is very similar to the Flip Mino HD and the Kodak zi8; I like it because it features a much wider-angle lens than its competitors. The Aquapac is basically a $30 very clear plastic bag with a watertight seal. Though this one’s branded for the Creative Vado HD, it’s probably large enough to fit two of them side-by-side2. One one of my snorkeling adventures I brought along my Canon HV20 in a dive housing, and its remote control (to start and stop the camera’s recording) in the Aquapac alongside the Vado. I probably could have put my cell phone in there as well but didn’t trust the bag yet and honestly didn’t really want it along.

This turtle clip is from the 2nd day of my trip, before I’d figured out that if I squeezed out all the air in the Aquapac before sealing it, the plastic would remain taut over the lens, resulting in a sharper image. Less air in the bag also would have resulted in a tighter fit against the screen of the Vado HD, which would have given me a fighting chance of seeing the image on the Vado’s screen underwater –most of the footage I shot on the trip, including this turtle clip, was shot by blindly pointing the camera and hoping.

I snorkeled with the Vado in the Aquapac bag all week and had no problem with leaks. I was a little worried about this, but wasn’t risking much as the 1st and 2nd generation Vado HD go for $49 these days (B-stock of the 4Gb versions on Creative’s website as of 7/2010).

I think the iPhone 4G’s video quality may best that of the Vado HD and competitors, and the iPhone definitely has the edge in terms of viewfinder (screen) quality and recording capacity. I’ve placed one in the Vado’s Aquapac case, and the iPhone’s capacitive screen was usable even while it was in the case. I suppose salt water might interfere with that use due to its conductivity. It’d be interesting to try using an iPhone for underwater video recording on my next trip, and I may be fool enough to risk it.
  1. I’ve written up the Creative Vado HD previously here and here. []
  2. 3D anyone? []

Adding a bluetooth audio input to my car stereo for <$15. Phase 1: research and experimentation.

Friday, July 9th, 2010
The stereo in my friend’s 2010 Prius1 has a very useful feature: bluetooth audio input. As soon as he steps inside his car, his iPhone connects to the stereo wirelessly, and he can then play music from its library or using Pandora without connecting any cables.

The BCK-08 device.
I noticed that DealExtreme sells a bluetooth stereo music receiver for $12.992. This tiny, battery-operated device looks like an ugly cousin of an old iPod shuffle, sporting a big bluetooth symbol in the middle of its control pad. It’s designed to accept wireless transmissions from your iPhone, computer, or other device that supports bluetooth audio streaming, and then play that received audio out headphones connected to its jack. $12.99 falls well within my speculative hacking budget.

So I bought the device and have tested it out. When I plugged a cable between its headphone jack and my car’s audio input jack and streamed audio to it from my iPhone, it worked a treat. It shows up in the iPhone’s bluetooth menu as a device named,”BCK-08″.

There are a few problems. The device’s built-in battery is pathetic, and within an hour or two of use it begins to beep every few minutes to indicate that the battery needs a charge. I also think the audio quality decreases in direct proportion to the battery’s charge, but am not positive about that.

My goal is to take apart this device, wire it to be powered directly from my car, and leave it permanently connected to the car stereo’s auxiliary input jack.

I’ve found a few resources on the net that may be of help:

  1. I’m sure many other cars also have this feature. []
  2. The device’s full name on DealExtreme’s site is “Bluetooth 2.0 A2DP AVRCP Stereo Music Receiver and Handsfree (Black)” []
  3. I’ve been out of China for 3 years now and don’t feel like spending an hour fighting my way through the website with a dictionary in hand []
  4. Also from DealExtreme –how about that? []

“Letterheady” – a collection of images of notable letterheads

Friday, July 9th, 2010
Python (Monty) Pictures Ltd., c.1980 letterhead from the site Letterheady
I stumbled upon a great website of old letterhead images yesterday. You should check it out if you like such things. At the moment, it features historic artifacts such as Marie Curie’s letterhead, that of the Brooklyn Dodgers, and “Python (Monty) Pictures Ltd.”, among others. Well worth a look. Go.

Where’s Chow? Aperture 3 facial recognition in action.

Thursday, June 3rd, 2010
Where's Chow
I thought this screenshot might amuse. Click the photo to see it at full-size. At the top of the image are photos that include Chow Yun Fat, cropped to just the automatically recognized face. Below a line are photos that Aperture 3 thinks may be the same person. To refine the computer’s idea of what his face looks like and tag more photos with the appropriate name I had to select all Chow Yun Fat photos from the bottom part of the screen and drag them to the top, above the line.

For more info on the facial recognition feature in Aperture 3, check here on Apple’s website.

I have about 16,000 photos in my archive, and though the process isn’t completely automatic, the facial recognition feature made it much more feasible to tag all the people in these photos. Even just the fact that the application can display an entire set of photos cropped and resized to only show faces alone would be a huge help, the fact that Aperture 3 makes decent guesses is a bonus.

Apple’s market cap now exceeds Microsoft’s

Wednesday, May 26th, 2010
If this trend holds, I may have to break out the Windows 7 party favors at my birthday party next week as per my previous blog post on the subject.

Live spreadsheet:

The official iPhone Twitter client’s “Nearby” feature is scary-neato

Wednesday, May 19th, 2010
Nearby tweets overlaid on a map

Accessing Iphone Twitter Nearby Feature-1
Click this image to pop up a full-sized explanation of how to find the "Nearby" feature in the new iPhone Twitter app.

5/19/2010 4:43pm Edit: I’ve been told this feature was in the previous version of the app. I just never happened across it

The official iPhone Twitter client is finally up in the app store, today, now. The app,”Twitter”, is actually version 3 of what used to be called “Tweetie”. Twitter bought Tweetie, and what was previously an excellent commercial app is now free and improved.

The “Nearby” feature of Tweetie v2, which showed a list of nearby recent tweets, has been updated for v3. It’s more difficult to find this feature in the new version of the app, as it is accessed via an unlabeled button, but it’s there and has been significantly upgraded. Now one can see not just a list of nearby tweets, but tweets in any area, overlaid on a Google map.

On the one hand, I’m all about openness, and it seems pretty cool to be able to see what people in a given area are tweeting, overlaid on a map.

On the other hand, the ease with which any of us iPhone Twitter users1 can now be tracked down by stalkers, paparazzi, their mothers, and other ne’er-do-wells is a little scary.

Change. Scary and neato, at the same time.

  1. iPhone Twitter users who opt-in for the app’s location feature when asked, that is. []

Still studying Cocoa, making progress on iPhone app programming

Tuesday, May 18th, 2010

I’m still working my way through the iPhone application class Stanford put online, specifically the Winter 2010 CS193P course. I’d highly recommend the course for anyone wanting to reinforce their knowledge of object oriented programming concepts, regardless whether they plan to ever write an app for iPhone, iPad, or Mac.

Below is a screenshot of my version of assignment #3 running on my iPhone. Every control on that screen works as expected, it’s pretty neat. Most importantly, I finally understand how and why.

You can find the lecture slide PDFs and other materials on Stanford’s website, and video of each of the class lectures are available as a free podcast in “iTunesU”.

Nice deal for runners: Garmin Forerunner 305 markdown at Amazon

Sunday, May 16th, 2010
Amazon item 201005161059, the Garmin Forerunner 305 GPS Receiver with Heart Rate Monitor
Amazon just knocked %20 off the price of the Garmin Forerunner 305 GPS Receiver With Heart Rate Monitor, which lowers the price of this handy runner’s training tool down to $125, the lowest I’ve seen. MSRP’s a laughable $299, the watch seems to sell most places for $160-180.

I have the less-full-featured version of this watch, the Garmin 205. When I’m running regularly and am in good shape, I find this watch to be handy. I can look at it at any moment to see my current pace and make sure I’m not running too fast to go the distance and avoid injury. If I’m running a particularly interesting or novel route I’ll connect the watch to my computer and look at the path I’ve taken overlaid on an online map alongside an altitude/time/pace graph. It’s also handy for biking. The Garmin 305 builds on the features of the 205 and adds a heart-rate monitor (which is recorded along with the other data for later review on your computer) and the ability to communicate with wireless accessories (such as the Garmin GSC 10 Speed/Cadence Bike Sensor). I find running to be a much more enjoyable activity when it’s combined with data collection.

If you’re in the market for such a GPS watch now1, I think this is a good buy at $1252 .

  1. and don’t feel like waiting a few years for the watch to get discontinued and show up at a local garage sale so that you can then buy it for 1/3 the price but live with reduced battery life due to the advanced age of its rechargeable battery pack []
  2. i just can’t bring myself to write “$124.99″ for some reason. $124.99 is effectively $125. Can someone explain to me the marketing benefit of ending all prices in $0.99? []

The motorized mixing control surface of the future, on iPad

Saturday, May 15th, 2010

When doing sound mixes, film/video editors often make use of hardware control surfaces like the Mackie Control Universal Pro. Such mixers connect to the editing system via MIDI.
Euphonix Mc Mix
Euphonix’s "MC Mix" hardware control surface. A nice piece of kit, costs $999. It’s a little smaller than the Mackie Universal Controller, a plus in my opinion.
The editor slides the faders on these fancy control surfaces to adjust the volume for each of the edit’s audio tracks during playback. When the editor is not moving the faders, motors built into the control surface move them to match the edit’s pre-existing settings. The automatic movement of the faders can seem a little like something from Poltergeist.

Unfortunately, the motorized movement of these faders can also be noisy, especially the clacking sounds emitted as many faders pop into position at once. This can be distracting when trying to mix a quiet, emotional scene. These controllers are also pretty expensive, starting at about $1000.

Enter the iPad and Saitara Software’s “AC-7 Pro Control Surface”:


(problems with the embedded video above? try this direct link)

The control surface in the video looks very cool to me. It’s silent, can be seen in a dark editing room, appears to function as well as I’d need, and the cost of the app is only $9.99. I’ve played with a friend’s iPad, and know the touch-sensitivity of that screen is accurate and responsive enough that I’d have no problem adjusting several tracks at once with this interface. For those addicted to the feel of hardware faders this might not cut it1, but for me it’d be a big improvement over moving the faders in Final Cut Pro’s “Audio Mixer” window with a mouse. I can’t justify spending $1200 on a set of faders I’d barely touch except a bit towards the end of a project, but $102 ? Hmm.

Ac-7 Pro

Yet another reason to consider an iPad. I wonder how long I’ll hold out? Sigh.

  1. I don’t think this is just a matter of purely subjective preference –one can feel where a hardware fader’s control is in space, and there’s probably a bit of resistance built in so the user can feel when the level has been set at unity without having to look. []
  2. $510 if factoring in the cost of an iPad, which can also be used to access the iPoo social network. []