Neil Duffin Blog

I’ve been running a few tests on FTP packages. It’s a long story but basically I’m looking into changing over from Dreamweaver / Contribute to a CMS (Content Management System). Currently, my front runner is Expression Engine.

The reason for the proposed change is that Dreamweaver and Contribute drive me nuts. The versions I’m running (CS3) aren’t very good. They are full of bugs, seriously lacking in helpful management features and seem to get in…

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While looking through the specs of Panasonic’s other releases, I noticed that the new FX150 has RAW mode. This is a very novel feature for such a small camera, as it’s noticeably smaller and lighter than either Panasonic LX3 or the Ricoh GX200.

The camera is a bit of a mixed bag though. It does have a 28mm wide-angle (35mm equivalent) but it also crams in 14.7 megapixels on a tiny, tiny chip. There’s also no…

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It looks as if one manufacture is listening to the requests for better sensitivity and it’s Panasonic. They have just released the latest in the LX line, the LX3 and it’s most interesting features is the decision to stick with the 10 megapixels of the previous model (well, kind of - see below).

Instead of upping the count, they have improved the sensitivity of the chip. This could make it a very nice camera indeed…

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It’s crazy how much the price of 35mm film cameras have dropped. I was walking down the main shopping street of Belper (my home town) a few days ago and noticed Oxfam had a selection of (old) cameras in the window.

Whilst none of them were anything particularly…

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I notice that the march of the megapixels is continuing with Samsung’s announcement of the L310W and NV100HD. These cameras sport 13.6 and 14.7 megapixel chips respectively.

I sincerely hope they use something like Sony’s new ‘back illumination‘ technology because otherwise these models are going to be very noisy (even at base ISO). The press release don’t mention it, so probably not. The only alternative recourse will be heavy noise reduction which is quite likely to…

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I’ve decided to give MobileMe a go for syncing my main PowerMac and my MacBook. Hopefully an iPhone at some point too.

I signed up for the trial and in theory it should be a piece of cake to get everything sync’ed. Just download the update on my MacBook (it uses Leopard) and make sure the PowerMac (using Tiger) is updated to 10.4.11. Then it should be all systems go.

However, in reality it’s been a bit…

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Getty Images recently signed a deal with Flickr to allow the sale of images from Flickr. However, it looks as if you need to read the small print. A piece on PhotographyBlog states that PhotoShelter’s CEO, Allen Murabayashi had turned down a similar deal because of issues with exclusivity and rates for the photographers.

Apparently, the Getty / Flickr deal requires exclusive sales rights on the images and only give 20% of the income to the…

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While having a look at the iPhone App store I came across a link for iBand. They are using MooCowMusic’s "Band" application to create their music.

Despite a number of comments claiming it’s impossible to create ‘real’ music with the programme, iBand seem to have made a pretty good stab at it for such a simplistic instrument (no aftertouch, velocity sensing, etc, etc).

Check out their first song on YouTube and their website. It’s been around a…

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In addition to Hasselblad’s camera news, they have also released a major new accessory for the H-series in the form of a tilt-and-shift adapter. It’s called the HTS 1.5 and there’s an extensive datasheet here [pdf]. This gives more information, including possible uses, MTF charts, etc.

One very cleaver feature of the adapter is built in sensors for the tilt / shift settings allowing the camera’s DAC (Digital APO Correction) to optimise the resulting images,…

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Hasselblad have updated their H3 system with a new Kodak 50Mp sensor. It purports to have the same low noise and high dynamic range as the previous 39Mp chip but with a faster reading speeds, better colour and improved battery life.

You’ll need very deep pockets or an understanding bank manager to purchase the new H3DII-50. The kit (body, 80mm lens, viewfinder and digital back) will set you back a huge $40,000.

There is competition in the…

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