Well that was fun

I decided that my Canon EF400mm needed recalibrating, seeing as I don’t think that I recalibrated it after replacing the lens mount last year, at least it was dry outside, can’t say that it was particularly warm though, but I can’t believe the amount of pollen that settled on the camera and the laptop in the hour or so that I was doing it.

The recalibration would appear to not really have been necessary, as the Micro AF adjustment just changed from +6 to +5, which in the real world is not particularly significant. I also ran few a few other test options and can report that all seems to be well.

AF Micro Adjustments

Time to match the new lens to the camera bodies, so fire up the FoCal. It is once you are used to the software quite simple to use, even easier if you have a camera that supports fully automatic AF micro Adjustment. Set up your target, hook up the camera to the computer and away you go.

After you have done a series of photographs at different levels of adjustment the software calculates what the final adjustment should be (on Canon if you are adjusting zoom you repeat the process for the Wide & Telephoto end).

The software is capable of a number of tests, including calculating what is the best performing aperture.

 

 

Upgrade time

Having been a user of PhotoShop CS5 since it’s introduction, I have decided  that it is time to bite the bullet & upgrade to the current version, as it was only £79.99 for a year subscription I have updated both the Desktop & the Laptop to PhotoShop CC 2018.

There appear to have been a few changes in the  last 8 years or so, but the most immediate change that I spotted was the Camera RAW screen, which offers quite a few more options when processing RAW images, including profiles including “Landscape”, “Portrait” plus others including my new favourite “Vivid”.

 

iPad Workflow

For shooting football I mainly use an iPad for moving images quickly. The Workflow is quite simple and effective. The camera bodies are connected to the iPad via WFT-E6s and configured to work with ShutterSnitch. I have the cameras set up so that I can select individual frames to the iPad.  ShutterSnitch recieves the images and performs a couple of automated tasks, including a basic caption, renaming & copying to the camera roll.

Safari 4 Beta

I feel like a James Bond Villain, sitting in front of a 23 inch HD monitor with the latest version of Safari running. It’s like sitting in front of my own bank of TV screens. 🙂

I have been using the new version of Safari 4 for the last few days and I have to say that I am impressed with some of the features. It also seems to refresh fairly quickly, and I do like the new Top Sites function. I haven’t come across any bugs yet, (this is the public beta version) which doesn’t really surprise me.

It is available to download from Apple.com. I will report back in due course if I find any problems.

Handbrake Turns

Whilst contemplating whether to upgrade my Photo iPod I decided to see what videos where available for it and was a little disappointed, however having an extensive collection of DVDs built up over the last 8 years or so, I though I would search out a method of ripping my existing DVDs. If I was p.c. based there would be no end of free applications out there to help my computer crash.

Transmit FTP

Most of my images are now sent to the picture desks via FTP and as a result I have recently upgraded from Transmit 2.5.1 which had a number of issues running under OSX. It originally worked fine but upgrading to OSX.4 caused a couple of glitches that seemed un-resolvable. Even though it was a fully licenced version the ability to edit favorites and add new ftp addresses stopped working.

Pocket Phojo Review

Pocket Phojo Version 3.0

p>Togsblog Star Rating

Superb

I carry far too much equipment around with me on a regular basis and really want to cut down, now the most important kit is the camera equipment, the least used is the laptop. The camera will shoot for hours but the edited down images are usually transmitted in a matter of minutes. So lugging a 6lb laptop, plus charger, plus Datacard and CF card reader and other ancillaries is a real pain. Even though many companies have tried to design camera bags to accommodate laptops, they invariably forget the stuff that goes with them.