O'Reilly Digital Media

Good article in today’s NY Times about the One Laptop Per Child initiative.

“Mary Lou Jepsen, the chief technologist for the project, likes to refer to the insight that transformed the machine from utopian dream to working prototype as “a really wacky idea.”"

Check it out!

—-
BTW, you don’t need the OLPC laptop to check out one of the cool applications that will be shipped with it. eToys, based on Squeak, can be downloaded and executed on your Fedora installation. See the eToys page on the OLPC Wiki.

The Squeak VM and Etoys are packaged as RPMs. Easiest way to get them:

wget http://etoys.laptop.org/olpc-etoys.repo
cp olpc-etoys.repo /etc/yum.repos.d/
yum install etoys

Related links:

Nice introduction to Squeak
Doom on the OLPC hmmm… probablly will not ship with unit :-)

Technorati: olpc etoys

Last week I talked about persevering with your projects. Continuing last week’s post, after getting a flurry of rejection letters from publishers about my proposed book, Empty Sky: The Pilgrimage To Ground Zero, I tried a different way of approaching my publishing problem. The late Susan Sontag lived in my building. She was connected to photography through her seminal volume entitled: On Photography. She was also an opinionated and well-known New Yorker. I thought that if she would agree to write a forward for this project, then maybe book publishers would take more notice of the work.

So I got the doorman Ralph Garcia to get my book dummy to her, which he did. The very next day I got a call from her assistant telling me how busy she was and it might take a few months for her to even look at it. I mentioned that I had extra copies and no expectations; I really just wanted her to see the work, and he promised me that Ms. Sontag would see the book dummy. That was that.

Months passed, I continued to seek a publishing deal, but kept getting rejection letters. I never heard back from Susan Sontag or her assistant. But one day I did get a call out of the blue from a photographer named Andy Levin, who told me he was looking at my work from Ground Zero, and that he liked it very much. He told me that he had purchased a book dummy of my work from a guy who sold it to him on Seventh Avenue in New York, for four dollars.

“What? Who are you?” I asked.

He went on to tell me that the guy who sold him the book dummy, plucked it from Susan Sontag’s garbage! I don’t use explanation marks often, but this was a lot to take in. Andy Levin told me about his friend at Life Magazine (Barbara Burrows) who was publishing a commemorative volume of images post 9/11 that would be published on the one-year anniversary and asked if he could show her the work. To make a long story shorter, Life’s book, The American Spirit, with an introduction by George W. Bush–published 8 pages of my work from Ground Zero. I got my biggest paycheck since moving to New York in 2000, and with the credibility of the Life Book, I was able to find a small publisher in Montreal who published Empty Sky-The Pilgrimage to Ground Zero.

I don’t know if Susan Sontag ever actually saw the book dummy, but that’s okay. In my acknowledgements I thanked all the players in this story, including a fellow named Steve in my building, who often sets up a stand on Seventh Avenue to sell the stuff that people throw away. I had done all the right things in trying to find a publisher, but it was a recycling bin in my building that lead to my biggest success in publishing to that time. The moral of the story for me was that if you truly believe in what you are doing, things will work out. You never know where your next success will come from, so don’t give up. Get the word out, and keep the faith.

Susan Sontag’s Recycling Basket

A new book: Heroines & Heroes: Hope, HIV and Africa by Steve Simon
(Designed in Aperture)
Book Launch & Lecture, December 1, World Aids Day
7pm, Barnes and Noble, Chelsea, 675 6th Avenue, New York City (Corner 21 Street)
http://www.stevesimonphoto.com
Heroines on the Time.com site

I see TIME has a breath-takingly stupid list that pupports to be “the greatest and most influential records ever.”

Not one non-English-language record. Not one record from continental Europe. Not one from Africa. Not one from South America. Not one from Asia (I don’t think the Plastic Ono Band counts). Australia/Pacific gets one for AC/DC. Only four non-US artists in the last twenty years? Only one album vaguely related to dance music?

When I listen to the radio, 50% or more of the material has a Kraftwerk infulence. On the list? Nope.

I suppose “the greatest and most influential English-language records that made it to America” doesn’t have the same zing.

I spent the last month making my own home-made USB control surface: a Velleman USB IO board, a multiplexor board of my own, some home-made pressure pads/ribbon controllers, and various pots, switches and plugs for external pedals and controllers. Looks good in a brown leatherette upholstered box. I’m working on programing the USB to MIDI software so that it can be an input for VSTs. Lots of fun.

Then, I return to the office this week only to discover that while I have been away, our friend Gilles from Cordanova had popped over from France to Sydney to deliver a Cordanova VMX Studio MIDI/USB control surface. Gilles used to work at my office when he started designing the VMX, so it was interesting to see which of the ideas that people had floated about had made it into the final design: I had suggested that it should have at least one big knob and a slider so that it could function as a DJ control surface as well as for synths and mixing, and also have a variety of switches and knobs, and I am happy these made it through.

But it is embarrassing to see how much better build quality the commercial product has over my home-made one.

With the Aperture 1.5 update came an additional feature within the Loupe tool called “Centered Loupe”. The original Aperture Loupe tool was, and still is an excellent way to check focus and detail on images of any size, including thumbnails, but the Centered Loupe is more flexible and it feels more natural to me (more like a real loupe). It can serve as both a focus check tool as well as a “before and after” window for edits made in the adjustments HUD.

Following are a few tips and suggestions for using the Centered Loupe option. I recommend following along with your images. For the purposes of this tutorial, I will call the Loupe, when in non-Centered Loupe mode, in “original Loupe” mode.

GETTING STARTED

1. First, display the Loupe tool in one of the following four ways: Under View>Show Loupe; by pressing the ` key (the key is in the upper left-hand corner of your keyboard and that’s my preferred way to access it); by choosing the Loupe icon in the top right corner of the browser (it looks like a gray circle); or by ctrl/right clicking-then choosing “Show Loupe.” The Loupe will appear in original Loupe mode, unless you had previously changed it to Centered Loupe mode. Aperture remembers the last state the loupe was in. While you are in original loupe mode, another option when ctrl or right clicking is to choose “Detach Loupe from Cursor (shortcut is the ~ key).” This makes it similar to the Centered Loupe tool. However, I much prefer how the Centered Loupe functions.

Next, enter Centered Loupe mode (while still in original loupe mode) in one of the following ways: Select View>Use Centered Loupe; Use the keyboard shortcut: Cmd + ~; or Ctrl/Right Click and choose “use Centered Loupe.”

2. You can then display color values (RGBL), which will change as you hover over different areas of your images. There are three ways to do this: The first is to select View>Show Color Value in Loupe; the next is with a keyboard shortcut (Option + ~ ); and the last is by Ctrl/Right Clicking and choosing Color Value in the contextual menu. This tool is especially helpful for determining blown out areas (RGB values of 255), or very dark areas. However, the box can be distracting, so keep in mind that you have another RGBL readout at the top of the Adjustments HUB that serves the same purpose.

3. Next, decide at what size, zoom level and in which position you want the Centered Loupe to be. This will change from image to image and will depend on the subject. The size of the “magnifying glass” can be adjusted easily by clicking, holding and dragging on the bottom right of the tool (white area). The small contextual menu (see fig. 1 below) makes it easy to adjust the zoom percentage. There are other options in the contextual menu as well. I generally use 100 and 200 percent to judge image sharpness.

fig. 1: The Loupe tool in Centered Loupe mode with the contextual menu showing.

If the Centered Loupe tool is sized down to a relatively small circle, the small arrow in the corner that displays the options will disappear (see fig. 2 below). Just click in the bottom right gray area, and hold the ctrl key (or right mouse click) to access the contextual drop down menu. If you place your mouse over the magnifying glass area of the Centered Loupe, the scroll ball on the Apple Mighty Mouse, or scroll wheel on most mice will cause the center area to increase or decrease in zoom level. Like most things in Aperture, there are also shortcuts for zooming and for adjusting the size of the Centered Loupe.

fig. 2: Centered Loupe mode shown when it is too small to display the small contextual menu icon.

4. Another great feature of the Centered Loupe option can be accessed by clicking and dragging inside the Centered Loupe (see fig. 3). This will temporarily create a circle in the center of the Loupe surrounded by a shaded area based on the zoom percentage you have selected. And at the same time, while you are choosing the “focus area,” the whole tool can be moved around the screen. When you release the mouse button, the area in the center will enlarge to the zoom percentage you specified.

fig 3: Clicking and dragging inside the Centered Loupe.

5. Now for the real fun (drumroll, please). If you are in Centered Loupe mode, any adjustments made using the Adjustments HUD (for example, White Balance or Edge Sharpening) can be seen inside the Centered Loupe area, which makes it an instant before and after comparison tool. Just click on and off the HUD adjustment item or items to see the before and after effect. Depending on the system you’re using, and the adjustments you choose, the adjustments may take a few seconds to redraw.

This tool is especially helpful when reducing chromatic aberration in RAW files. The adjustment for chromatic aberration in the HUD is called Chroma Blur (under RAW fine tuning and circled in red in fig 4a (top). Fig. 4b (middle) shows an area of a RAW frame with some chromatic aberration, and fig. 4c (bottom) shows the same image after applying a Chroma Blur radius amount of 3.3.

fig 4a (top), fig 4b (middle) and fig 4c (bottom)

6. If you choose “Focus on Cursor” from the contextual menu, instead of Focus on Loupe, the tool works in a very similar way, but the center of the loupe will sow the areas where your cursor is hovering. This is not as good a choice for checking before and after adjustments (as described in Tip 5) because there will be no image visible inside the loupe while making Adjustments. I find the Focus on Cursor option ideal for checking focus on thumbnails.

I hope that these tips help you to get the most from the improved Loupe tool. The real power of the tool comes with experimenting with it until it becomes second nature. I look forward to hearing how you use the new Loupe features.

All demonstration images ©Andrew Darlow. All Rights Reserved.

Is there anyone out there in reader-land who has a PC, a Zune, a USB Sniffer and some development experience? I’m dying to see what’s going on during a Zune sync so that I can figure out how to simulate that with the Mac/Linux command line.

The addy as always is erica@mindspring.com.

Thanks.

Browsing through my Funny folder today, I came across this bizarre press release from 1999:

TOKYO — Sanyo Electric Co. Ltd. will market a digital still camera that supports the 340-Mbyte Microdrive introduced by IBM Corp. earlier this month.

Microdrive will enable a digital still camera to store over 10,000 frames of VGA pictures, or 7.5 minutes of JPEG video at 15 frames per second in VGA quality, or 18 minutes in quarter-VGA quality. For audio, the Microdrive is able to store 12 hours of 8-bit 8-kHz sound.

Imagine how it would feel to listen to 12 hours of that!

• Eight is Enough (176KB AIFF)

(You can hear the original 16-bit, 48kHz file in Mark Nelson’s review of the Edirol R-09 recorder. I crunched this one down with SoundHack.)

I use Aperture almost daily. I have found that it satisfies 95% of my digital imaging needs. And I appreciate the fact that Apple has made tremendous strides with Aperture. In less than a year, Apple has ramped up to version 1.5.1. The company has continually worked to improve the application’s performance, value and extensibility. But there’s always room for improvement. And just as programs like Photoshop have been improved over the years, I have no doubt that Apple will work diligently to improve Aperture. So I’ve decided to help.

In no particular order; Five things that I think Apple could do to improve Aperture…

At nine feet long, the IK Multimedia StealthPlug guitar-to-computer interface is possibly the skinniest way to go digital. The StealthPlug is a cable with a USB plug on one end and a quarter-inch guitar plug on the other. In between, there’s a little arrowhead that converts the analog guitar signal to digital and the computer’s digital signal back to analog so you can hear it.

The arrowhead also contains a headphone jack and volume up/down buttons, making the StealthPlug an improvement on the slightly cheaper SoundTech LightSnake. And the StealthPlug also comes with a much better software bundle, featuring a slimmed-down version of IK’s AmpliTube effects processor; the full version of Mackie’s well-regarded Tracktion audio/MIDI sequencer; IK’s SampleTank 2 SE (a software sample-player); and 500MB of guitar, bass, and drum grooves from Sonic Reality.

It wasn’t clear whether the StealthPlug’s headphone output has the option to mix in the direct signal for zero-latency monitoring, but early buyers report that the latency through the software guitar effects is as low as 5ms. The StealthPlug supports both ASIO and Core Audio.

I first saw the StealthPlug at NAMM last January, so presumably IK spent the last ten months polishing it. If the StealthPlug upholds IK’s tradition of good-sounding plugins, it should be a terrific bargain—not to mention a compact, easy way to get your guitar and computer talking. It sells online for as little as $99.

Do I use Curves or Levels first? O’Reilly author Ken Milburn got an email from a reader asking about his magically layer-creating action for Photoshop that he describes in the second edition of his book Digital Photography Expert Techniques, and I thought everyone might like to share. You can apply this action to any file you’ve just opened for processing, and you’ll have an ordered framework of layers for making your initial adjustments according to the good workflow procedures Ken outlines in the book. Here are the instructions Ken sent that reader for creating the action yourself:

1. Create a new action in Photoshop.

2. Create a new layer and name it Spotting, Retouching, or whatever. Have it selected when you’re spotting and have the “Sample All Layers” box checked.

3. Create another new layer and name it “Burn and Dodge”. Put that Layer into Overlay mode. Then choose Edit > Fill Layer and fill it with 50% Gray. Later, you will use the Brush tool with the default White and Black colors at about 8% opacity to do your burning and dodging. It acts more light Fill Light than the burn tool, doesn’t throw out anything, and you can restore the original by painting in 50% gray or simpling re-filling the whole layer and starting over. You can even make several of these layers…each to burn and dodge different parts of the image at different intensities. Talk about control!



4. Make a new Levels Adjustment Layer. It will label itself. After you’ve created the Action, follow my instructions in the book for adjusting Levels channel by channel first (which also color balances), then adjust over-all exposure with the RGB channel.

5. Make a new Curves Adjustment Layer. It will label itself. Change the mode for this layer to Luminosity (keeps your adjustments from affecting color balance). After you’ve created the Action, use this layer for overall adjustment of the contrast in the image for specific levels of brightness by adjusting specific portions of the curve. Later in the workflow, you can do the same for specific physical areas in the image by pre-masking them using any of the selection tools and then feathering the selection so that it blends.

6. Make a new Color Balance Adjustment Layer. It will label itself. After you’ve created the Action, follow my instructions in the book for adjusting Levels channel by channel first (which also color balances), then adjust over-all exposure with the RGB channel.

The image shows how the layers palette will look after you run the action. For more on the actual adjustments that take place at each stage, check out Ken’s book.

A week and a half ago, Derrick mentioned that he was testing out a SmartDisk FireLite 120GB hard drive with Aperture. Since I do so much of my photography and processing with Aperture on-location at events, it’s important to me to have lots of storage at hand, and to be able to carry that storage easily. This means that small, lightweight, bus powered hard drives are perfect for the job. I have a few of these drives, all FireWire 400, but I’ve lately been running a bit tight on space. So, Derrick’s post prompted me to keep my eyes open for a new drive.

The other day, I ran across another drive that fits the bill perfectly. It’s the LaCie Rugged All Terrain 100GB drive. It sports a 7200RPM disk and a FireWire 800 connection, both of which will be welcome features when working with Aperture and RAW images.

On MacBook Pros and PowerBooks that have both FireWire 800 and 400 connections, hooking the drive up to the FireWire 800 port will leave the FireWire 400 port free for a second drive without requiring a separate FireWire hub to carry around. Enticed by a portable 7200 RPM FireWire 800 drive, as well as the option of easily having two portable drives hooked up on-location so that I can make a duplicate backup of my images onto a separate drive after pulling them off of a CompactFlash card, I picked one up for use with Aperture.

With this new drive, I’m going to try a slight change to my mobile Aperture workflow. Instead of having a fully internalized library on my laptop’s internal hard drive and using the external drive just a backup device, I’m going to start using Aperture’s new ability to store master images outside of the main library and store them on the new FireWire 800 drive. This will accomplish two things: First, I’ll be able to test drive this feature before possibly using the strategy on my main desktop library. Second, I’ll be able to flip through pictures, rate, and keyword them without connecting up the external drive while sitting on an airplane or at a cafe. Of course, I’ll make sure to back up my images to a second FireWire 400 drive and to roll them up to my home machine’s master library.

As I work through this new, at least to me, style of working with my Aperture library, I’ll report back on how it works over the next few weeks.

In case you missed the news, a few months ago Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) split into two groups. The digital group moved to the Presidio facilities in San Francisco under the ILM banner, and the physical production group stayed at its home port in San Rafael & was subsequently renamed Kerner Optical. I recently visited a colleague of mine at the Kerner offices, Roger Nelson, who is part of the newly renamed Kerner team. For special effects fans and film buffs, a visit to the Kerner facility is truly a magical experience. You never know what you’ll find during a visit there — they could be building the Black Pearl pirate ship for the “Pirates of the Caribbean” trilogy, or an ark for “Evan Almighty”, or blowing up a galaxy on the back lot. It’s truly like going to the Wonka factory (in more ways than one).

Tucked away in a group of unmarked buildings in an industrial part of San Rafael, the Kerner offices house full wood and metal shops, huge warehouses to build full scale models, plenty of open space for blowing stuff up — and they even build their own cameras on-site. It’s quite a self-contained facility.

If you’re interested in learning more about the Kerner game plan — and seeing some cool photos, check out this article on Kerner Optical. It’s worth a peek into this world of wonder; a playground for some truly talented adults. Serious fun!

Device Certificate after the jump.

Here are the folder and device properties specifically for my Zune, plus its supported filetypes. I’m guessing the Sync partner is the one computer that my Zune hosts to. Biff is the meta-syntactic name I selected as my Zune ID. The Bytes/Free bytes are accurate. The Battery level seems low as it reads as fully charged on the device and has been plugged in for over 24 hours. When I mount the Zune on my PC, the disk name is indeed “Storage”.

The native playback is also interesting. I’ve found that I can sneak around bitrate limitations imposed by the Zune software, but more about that another day.

Special directories:
Default music folder: 0×05000001
Default playlist folder: 0×00000000
Default picture folder: 0×0500001a
Default video folder: 0×0500001e
Default organizer folder: 0×00000000
Default zencast folder: 0×00000000
MTP-specific device properties:
Friendly name: Biff
Synchronization partner: {303B6311-C247-4E9E-B9E6-E9B7AE437BC7}
Total bytes on device: 29806592000 (28425 MB)
Free bytes on device: 28740386816 (27408 MB)
Storage description: “Storage”
Volume label: “14badbab - 0aee704e - 80bd1ff8 - 8ee00652″
Battery level 93 of 100 (93%)
libmtp supported (playable) filetypes:
ISO MPEG Audio Layer 3
Microsoft Windows Media Audio
Microsoft Advanced Systems Format
Microsoft Windows Media Video
JPEG file

This one is really long, so I’ve hidden most of it behind the jump. Here are the Playable File/Object Types and the object properties supported for each one.

Supported operations:
1001: Get device info
1002: Open session
1003: Close session
1004: Get storage IDs
1005: Get storage info
1006: Get number of objects
1007: Get object handles
1008: Get object info
1009: Get object
100b: Delete object
100c: Send object info
100d: Send object
100f: Format storage
1010: Reset device
1014: Get device property description
1015: Get device property value
1016: Set device property value
1019: Move object
101b: Get partial object
9810: Get object references
9811: Set object references
9802: Get object property description
9807: Get interdependent property description
9801: Get object properties supported
9803: Get object property value
9804: Set object property value
9805: Get object property list
9806: Set object property list
9808: Send object property list
9101: Get secure time challenge
9102: Get secure time response
9103: Set license response
9104: Get sync list
9105: Send meter challenge query
9106: Get meter challenge
9107: Set meter response
9108: Clean data store
9109: Get license state
910a: Unknown(910a)
910b: Unknown(910b)
9201: Unknown(9201)
9202: Unknown(9202)
9204: Unknown(9204)
9212: Unknown(9212)
9213: Unknown(9213)
9214: Unknown(9214)
9215: Unknown(9215)
9216: Unknown(9216)
9170: Unknown(9170)
9171: Unknown(9171)
9172: Unknown(9172)
9173: Unknown(9173)
9180: Unknown(9180)
9181: Unknown(9181)
9182: Unknown(9182)
9183: Unknown(9183)
9184: Unknown(9184)
9185: Unknown(9185)
Events supported:
None.
Device Properties Supported:
0xd181: Unknown property
0xd101: Secure Time
0xd401: Synchronization Partner
0×5001: Battery Level
0xd102: Device Certificate
0xd402: Device Friendly Name
0×5002: Functional Mode
0xd405: Device Icon
0xd103: Unknown property
0xd211: Unknown property
0xd131: Unknown property
0xd132: Unknown property
0xd215: Unknown property
0xd216: Unknown property

USB low-level info:
bcdUSB: 512
bDeviceClass: 255
bDeviceSubClass: 0
bDeviceProtocol: 0
idVendor: 045e
idProduct: 0710
IN endpoint maxpacket: 512 bytes
OUT endpoint maxpacket: 512 bytes
Device flags: 0×00000000
Device info:
Manufacturer: Microsoft
Model: Zune
Device version: 01.01.00322.00-00309
Serial number: 14badbab - 0aee704e - 80bd1ff8 - 8ee00652
Vendor extension ID: 0×00000006
Vendor extension description: microsoft.com: 1.0; microsoft.com/WMDRMPD: 10.1; microsoft.com/WMPPD: 11.1; microsoft.com/WMPMCPREMCONT: 1.0; microsoft.com/AAVT: 1.0; microsoft.com/WMDRMND: 1.0; microsoft.com/MTPZ: 1.0;

US only. Napster Freebies Page.

“Boy Soprano” by Xiu Xiu
Named after a late-’90s Chinese movie, these Northern California indie experimentalists continue to craft seriously offbeat but surprisingly accessible music, including this track from their new album, The Air Force. [Nov 26]

“Don’t Believe Everything” by Shane Bartell
Rereleased in 2006, this track from Bartell’s 2004 debut album, Too Soon to Say, pairs Cardigans collaborator Lars Göransson’s production with the singer’s moody yet sensitive lyrics. [Nov 25]

“Hold You Down” by Jon B
A veteran of the ups and downs of the music business, the smooth R&B singer/songwriter/instrumentalist brings a renewed focus to the music part, sounding fresh and relaxed on this new piano and acoustic-driven single. [Nov 24]

“Call Me Your Darling” by Thea Gilmore
After a 3-year hiatus, this UK singer-songwriter returns with her signature breathy style intact and a new batch of songs, including this first single from her new album, Harpo’s Ghost. [Nov 23]

“Crazy” by Darien Brockington
The resident crooner of the up-and-coming North Carolina hip-hop collective known as the Justus League delivers a stirring performance on this tale of heartbreak from his debut album, Somebody to Love.[Nov 22]

“That’s All I’ll Ever Need” by Jimmy Wayne
Having survived a childhood of abuse, this pop-country singer-songwriter seems determined to wring as much joy out of his music as possible, as on this appreciate-what-you’ve-got, live-in-the-moment anthem. [Nov 21]

“Better Part of Me” by House of Fools
Alternative Press recently listed this North Carolina folk-rock sextet among their “100 Bands You Need To Know.” Listen to this introspective, bluegrass-flavored number from their acclaimed debut EP and you’ll know why. [Nov 20]

“Nothing At All” by Wired All Wrong
First crossing paths due to an MTV mix-up, God Lives Underwater’s Jeff Turzo and Self’s Matt Mahaffey eventually formed the writing collaboration that became Wired All Wrong. But as a listen to this raucous single shows, they’ve definitely wired this one right. [Nov 19]

“Steal the Blueprints” by Plus/Minus
From their third full-length album, this track finds this indie dream pop trio at its jangly but still deeply textured best. Already a hit throughout Asia, these New Yorkers seem destined to attract a broader audience. [Nov 18]

I just uploaded a post over at the Mac Blog about using XNJB to see the contents of your Zune from a Macintosh.

Before I even start with this post I must make a disclaimer: The process I’m about to describe works great for me and I have had no problems as a result of using this process. …however I do not guarantee anything and you should back up your Aperture data before attempting anything in this blog post. I am not responsible for your data.

So, with that out of the way… A while back I found that I wanted to have a current copy of my Aperture library with me at all times in case I need to search for an image, send a sample image to a client or if I just wanted to upload some images to flicker. I also wanted to do all of my editing at my desktop machine.

Okay, I know this site is all about Aperture. I also know that Aperture is nothing without its images. These next two posts are about images and faith. Faith is an element of my photography that continues to surface, from project to project. Not only in the stories I choose to pursue, but also in my philosophy and approach to shooting.

What happened to me with my project Empty Sky–The Pilgrimage To Ground Zero, was an exercise in faith and belief in my work.

This story dates back to just after 9/11. I decided to do a set of pictures documenting the pilgrimage of people who felt compelled to go to Ground Zero, to see with their own eyes, the site of such unbelievable destruction. I wanted to do the project, partly to express my own grief and bewilderment after 9/11, but also because of the reactions I witnessed, which were very powerful and told a story about the event that was different from the photographs being made at the site itself.

After shooting more than 100 rolls of 35mm Tri-X during a three-month period from late September to Christmas 2001, I felt I had a series of photographs that would work well as a book. I created multiple copies of a book dummy and had done my research looking for publishers of photography books, whom I then submitted the work to. (Aperture is the easiest and best tool I have found for editing and creating a book dummy; more in a future post)

People React to seeing Ground Zero from the book Empty Sky. Copyright Steve Simon

Though the project was well received judging by the positive comments in some of the rejection letters, they were rejection letters nonetheless–many rejection letters. Photography is a great way for us to communicate what we think is important in life, or beautiful, or scary or is a problem that needs attention; in other words, it can be a very personal way to communicate. So when you are rejected, it can hit you pretty hard. But it’s important not to take it personally, and try and learn from it.

You may know this already, but it is extremely difficult to get a photography book published, since they are often expensive to produce, and have a limited market. So if you’re planning a book, expect rejection, and keep the faith, persevere. I believed in this work and did not give up on my dream of getting it published in book form, despite the many rejection letters. I learned from the constructive criticism the letters would often contain, and finessed the book dummy to improve it.

There are many, many more of these in my collection.

Mr. Yashuda, a very wise man I had met in Japan once told me, “if you’re trying to solve a problem and after giving it a good effort without success: STOP, go back to the beginning– and try a completely different approach or way around the problem.”

This is a philosophy I often apply if I get “blocked” in a shooting situation, or whenever I’m frustrated finding a solution to a non-photographic problem. In practical photographic terms, it may mean switching locations or lenses. If you’re in tight, it may mean backing far away. Applying this philosophy with regards to my book proposal worked, but not in a way that could ever be predicted, as you will see in next week’s posting. In the meantime, if there’s something that’s just not working for you, give Mr. Yashuda’s advice a try.

A new book: Heroines & Heroes: Hope, HIV and Africa by Steve Simon
(Designed in Aperture)
Book Launch & Lecture, December 1, World Aids Day
7pm, Barnes and Noble, Chelsea, 675 6th Avenue, New York City (Corner 21 Street)
www.stevesimonphoto.com

In my last post, I detailed some ways that you can rename your master image files from within Aperture (I also ranted and raved about why you don’t really need to to this if you’re an Aperture user, and got some very interesting comments from users who offered good reasons why I was wrong). Aperture philosophy aside, this week I’d like to offer an Automator-based solution for renaming your files.

It seems that a few users have already discovered Automator as an easy way to rename your files. If you’re running Aperture, then you already have Automator - it’s a stand-alone application that sits in your Applications folder. If you’re not familiar with Automator, take a look at this overview and tutorial to learn more about how Automator works and how you can use use it to simplify your post-production workflow.

For the rest of this article, I’m going to assume that you’re familiar with Automator, and the concept of Workflows and Actions.

Automator ships with a Rename Finder Items action that you can use to rename your images, but I prefer to use some actions of my own devising. If you download my free Photo Renaming Actions, you’ll have two new actions: Rename from EXIF and Rename from IPTC, which allow you to batch rename your existing images. In addition to allowing you to rename with new text, these actions can also automatically add EXIF and IPTC information from the images themselves to the image name.

Many photographers use their original camera names as part of a larger photo cataloging scheme. If you prefer not to loose track of the original names, both actions offer the option to store the original names in the Spotlight Comments field of each file. At any later date, you can use the included Restore Original Names action to automatically rename your files with their original camera-generated names. (Note that Rename from IPTC requires Photoshop CS2.)

When you install Aperture, a suite of Aperture actions are also added to Automator. You can use these in conjunction with my renaming commands to build a simple workflow that will automatically rename your images and then import them into any Aperture project.

Both of these actions pass on the list of renamed files to the next action in your workflow. So, you can create a workflow that first executes either of these renaming actions, and then executes an Aperture Import action.

One of Automator’s best features is the number of different ways that you can execute a workflow. You can save it as an application, a folder action, or a Finder action. With these options, you can easily drop files onto an app, or into a folder, and have them automatically renamed and added to a specific project. If you choose the Show Action When Run option for each action, then you’ll be able to configure both actions at run-time, allowing you to customize your naming options, and select which project you want to import into.

Finally, you can also include these actions in much more complex workflows that might do anything from automatically copying your renamed images to a backup server, burning a CD of them.

One of the first things Aperture 1.5 users will have to decide is whether or not they want to use the new image previews. These are not required if you don’t plan to do offline library management, if you don’t want to make slide shows, if you don’t want drag and drop jpeg support and if you don’t care about sharing images with iLife and iWork.

Beware that creating previews takes time. If you automatically create previews for all your new images, you’ll certainly spend some time waiting before you can access a large group of photos that you’re importing. I turned off the automatic previews, deciding that I will apply this feature selectively after I have made my pics.

By now you may have heard the news that Microsoft has struck a deal with the Universal Music Group (UMG) whereby Universal stands to gain $1+ on the sale of every Zune device. UMG will also receive royalties for music downloads purchased through the Zune Marketplace. Deals with the other three major labels will undoubtedly follow a similar path. This is an interesting if not an entirely unique scenario; earlier this year, Sirius agreed to pay the four major labels a fee for every S50 sold after the labels complained that a device allowing users to store music wasn’t covered under the fee they are paid for music played on satellite radio. It’s clear that the labels have experienced a certain amount of frustration in not being able to participate in sales of the devices their music is being played on — especially in the case of the iPod — so this is clearly a step forward for them.

What’s less clear is how artists will get their slice of the pie and get paid on sales of these devices as well. UMG claims they will be paying their artists half of the fees they receive from Zune sales (though I wonder about how that will work out in practice given the accounting challenges artists have historically experienced with the labels around royalties). This is a very murky area. We’re not sure yet how successful the Zune will be vis-a-vis the iPod, it’s not clear how much of a cash cow this will be for the labels (let along for the artists) — that’s based in no small part on the global success of the Zune. But rest assured if the labels are making a sizeable chunk of change from Zune sales, the artists will be expecting to receive their fair share - and they’re likely to start getting much more vocal about it.

Beyond all of this of course, the next thing to watch is whether the labels are able to successfully negotiate somethiing similar with Apple on sales of the iPod when their contracts are up for renewal.

Aperture manages my main catalog of images, but I like to use iPhoto 6 too. iPhoto is much easier on my older computers — plus it has some great output options, and I like its casual workflow.

You can tap your Aperture library from within iPhoto. First, make sure you have the current versions of both applications. Then launch Aperture. Finally, launch iPhoto. In the File popup menu in iPhoto, you’ll see Show Aperture Library…

Note: You’ll only be able to use Aperture images that have previews. Also, make sure you have “sharing your previews with iLife applications” turned on in the Aperture Preferences window.

You can browse your images from your Aperture library in iPhoto until you find what you’re looking for. The browse window is adjustable, so feel free to resize as needed.

Now, all you have to do is drag the image you want from the Aperture Photos window into your iPhoto Library.

Great way to keep a master catalog and have fun with your pictures too.

The new 1.10 firmware update for the Edirol R-09 WAV/MP3 recorder reportedly makes it the world’s first SDHC- (SD High Capacity) compatible stereo field recorder. (See our review.)

SDHC memory cards break the 2GB barrier and offer increased data transfer speeds. Roland has certified the new Panasonic RP-SDR04-GJ1K 4GB cards for use with the R-09. 8GB cards are expected before long.

According to the press release, other enhancements in the free firmware update include faster data transfer, a longer power switch cut-off time, simpler file-naming, and improvements to the internal time-stamping feature.

Here’s a chance for you to learn from my mistake.

I was out shooting last Thursday night at my local airport just to work on my low light (or no light) technique. I was shooting with my Canon 30D and my 100-400mm IS L lens which is not what we call a fast lens (f/5.6 @ 400mm). So I set my camera on aperture priority (Av) mode and cranked it all the way open to f/5.6. Then I took a bunch of shots at various ISO settings until I was able to get a shutter speed fast enough to hand hold and get a decent shot. I ended up at ISO 1600 that night. I managed to get a few decent shots but not too many so I called it quits and headed home.

So, this weekend I went out to shoot a university level water polo tournament with the same body and lens. The light was not fantastic so I figured I’d better shoot in aperture priority, wide open to get my shutter speed up to the point where I can stop the action.

Funny comment over at the Analog Industries blog, where they delight in criticizing pretentious playing:

I think I will officially enunciate [Chris] Randall’s law:

I = 1/Cm

The interestingness of the music is inversely proportional to the complexity of the custom MIDI controller.

That cracked me up, but I’m always saddened by the vitriol in some of these critiques. Fortunately, another commenter adds, “While I am not a fan of his music, he at least created his own custom MIDI controller, which is inherently cool, even if it is a totally dorky MIDI controller.”

I’ll go further: If you’re having fun making music, don’t worry what other people think. And if you aren’t having fun, try something new.

If you use Aperture, you probably really care about your photographs. You might be a pro with a library that ranges into the 100’s of GBs, or you might be an amateur with 20GB of data, but you care enough to take the time to do the right thing with your images so that you can fulfill your vision of what those images should be. So you calibrate your display, right? And you do it frequently, right? If not, let me quote from Appendix B of the Aperture User Manual:

“Aperture is a powerful digital image adjustment application, but its power is limited to the accuracy of the devices that display and print your images.”

If you want to be able to work with your images on multiple machines, print them, or share them, then you need to be taking full advantage of the fact that Aperture is a color managed environment that uses ColorSync to translate colors to your monitor accurately. But, of course, ColorSync needs to know how your monitor displays colors so that it can do the math. This is why you need to make a profile for your display. Not have a ColorSync profile for your particular monitor means that you’re driving blind when you make adjustments to your images.

As important as it is, I know lots of people that are serious about their images that don’t profile their display. And I think there are two reasons for this: 1) Color management is a complex field and it’s full of lots of big terms and complex numbers; and 2) Good profiling hardware has typically been expensive. It’s been coming down in price over time, but still, to get the good stuff hasn’t been cheap. Combine these two points and most people, it seems, do nothing.

First released for $180 in 2002, the M-Audio Oxygen8 was a breakthrough. This 2-octave USB MIDI controller with eight programmable knobs appealed to a broad audience. Desktop musicians liked it because it had a small footprint and could fit in the limited space on their desks, next to their PC keyboard. Mobile musicians liked it because it wasn’t much bigger than their laptops, and eliminated the need for an external MIDI adapter. Synthesists liked it because they needed more knobs to tweak the filters and envelopes in programs like Reason and Oddity. VJs liked it because it was a great portable MIDI control surface, and guitarists liked it because it was an inexpensive way to delve into MIDI.

The Chinese-made Oxygen spawned a few imitators, most notably some other Chinese-made keyboards from a company called Evolution. At the time, I purchased one of those clones, the Evolution Mk-425c because it was about the same price as an Oxygen8, and featured 12 additional programmable buttons. M-Audio promptly bought out Evolution’s product line in 2003, swiftly swallowing up their competition.

Since then, M-Audio has released a few incremental improvements to the Oxygen8, rubberizing the knobs and control wheels to give them a better feel, and improving the software. They have also released a slew of similar keyboard controllers, expanding their product line to 17 keyboard controllers. You can see ‘em here.

INTRODUCING THE MID AIR 25

The Mid Air 25 is essentially yet another incremental improvement to the Oxygen8. It is also a 2-octave USB MIDI controller with eight programmable knobs. There is one significant difference: it’s wireless. The Mid Air 25 transmits on the 2.4Ghz spectrum over a 30 foot range to a receiver. The receiver can either be connected directly to your musical gear, via a MIDI cable, or it can plug into your laptop via USB.

Like the Oxygen8, the Mid Air 25 features a larger cousin, the Mid Air 37, which has an additional octave, and would work nicely as a performance instrument, given a shoulder strap. Sadly, neither of these instruments include mounts for straps (they really should!) but you can work around this by screwing in straplocks on either side.

I tested a review model of the Mid Air 25 to see if the wireless feature added any additional latency, and more importantly to see what impact using a wireless MIDI controller would have on my workflow.

I have a great lineup of Inside Aperture Podcasts slated, and I wanted to answer a few recent questions from readers about the show.

First, you can subscribe to the show via iTunes Music Store. You can either power search on the phrase Inside Aperture, or go directly to our page via the iTunes URL for Inside Aperture. Both current shows are in there now, and you can automatically receive future shows as I publish them.

The next episode publishes on Nov. 28. I’m looking forward to this show because it debuts our podcaster at large, Andrew Darlow, editor of Imaging Buffet. Andrew has been busy interviewing photographers for Inside Aperture while I’ve been talking with the technical folks. For the Nov. 28 show, Andrew interviews Bill Frakes, popular Sports Illustrated photographer. Andrew caught up with Bill at PhotoPlus Expo, and I really like the insights Bill provides about the life of a big time sports photographer.

Then on Dec. 12, I’ll publish my interview with Sal Soghoian, Apple’s guru for automation. I cornered Sal on the high seas as we were returning from Belize on a Geek Cruise. As you can imagine, Sal has lots to say about extending the Aperture workflow through Automator.

Looking forward, I have two shows a month planned well into 2007. Andrew will be covering the beat on the East Coast, and I’ll track down folks in the West. I hope you enjoy these conversations.

“Let’s Get Away” by Kieran
After growing up on a steady diet of Stevie Wonder and Donny Hathaway, this Brooklyn-born R&B newcomer teamed up with hitmaker Scott Storch to make Breathe, an album full of tracks like this undeniable floor-filler. [Nov 17]

US only. Napster Freebies Page. More freebies after the jump.

In my last post I talked about getting your images into Aperture and applying basic adjustments and edits to your images. Now I want to move on to getting your images out of Aperture and getting them in front of your intended audience.

Aperture version 1.5 gave us a very long list of improvements and added features. One thing Apple did in version 1.5 is to release it’s file export API to developers so that they could develop plug-ins for Aperture. Several developers have taken advantage of this new open API including:
Getty Images, Digital Fusion, flickr, iStockphoto, Photo Shelter, Pictage, Soundslides.

I’ve been using the SmartDisk FireLite 120 GB hard drive to store my Aperture library for the MacBook Pro 17″ I take on the road. I was down to 1 GB on my previous 80 GB LaCie drive, and it was time to move up.

Even though the FireLite is only a 5400 RPM drive, I’ve been impressed with its snappy performance while using Aperture. I have the USB 2.0 model that is port-powered so I don’t have to use an external power source. It’s small enough to easily fit in my backpack or back pocket. The drive also includes a Mac version of the BounceBack Express backup utility.

Before moving my Aperture library over to the FireLite, I reformatted the drive (after saving BounceBack to another location) for Mac OS X Extended, then moved my managed library and referenced masters over. The drive is performing beautifully, and extending the usefulness of my MacBook Pro on the road.

I purchased the unit at CompUSA for $179 US with a $20 rebate.

“Touchdown Turnaround (Don’t Give up on Me)” by Hellogoodbye
This So-Cal group’s DIY attitude helped them land a record deal, appearances on MTV’s The Real World, and a spot on this year’s Vans Warped Tour. This fizzy track, from their latest album, highlights the group’s love of dance beats. [Nov 16]

US only. Napster Freebies Page. More freebies after the jump.

I think the features that grab me most about Aperture, are the ones that nod to the pre-digital era. The times when you spilled your negs or slides onto a light-table, grabbed a good loupe and in magnified glory, saw just how good you really were. Through the loupe I would choose the best frame, check sharpness and look for detail in the highlight and shadow areas, to know what to expect in the scan or print.

The importance of editing cannot be understated in my view and with film, having a good loupe makes sense–allowing you to see subtle details easily missed while looking through cheap plastic magnifiers. You had to pay a healthy premium for loupes by Leica, Schneider or Rodenstock, and a Rollei 3x Magnifier for medium format film, still sells for $100 more than the cost of Aperture!

Know that a three-dimensional loupe at any price, doesn’t come close to the magical performance of Aperture as an editing tool, and The Aperture Loupe, which has been improved in version 1.5.1.

The first thing I needed to learn was how to turn it on and off without having to click on the loupe icon, which was driving me a bit crazy. The shortcut is the “grave accent” key ( ` ) just above the Tab Key. Once you learn this, you will tap that key all the time.

In this latest version of Aperture, the new “centered loupe” feels much like dragging a traditional loupe across the film frame; as you drag the loupe over an area of the image, that area is magnified, from 100 to 1600 percent, depending on your chosen preference. Generally, I like to see my images at 100 percent since there is not much practical info you can glean from higher magnifications. Even at 100 percent, some of the noise and artifacts you see won’t be visible in the print.

Placing the cursor anywhere on an image, even over an area on a thumbnail
like in this example, magnifies that area of the image.

The centered loupe works best on a large screen, where you have room to leave it in a corner. The “old” way of dragging the loupe is still pretty cool and gets the job done on a laptop or smaller monitor. But the big advantage of the centered loupe is access to a pop-up menu, which includes all loupe options. You can change magnification, display color values, or choose the “focus on cursor” mode.

In this mode, you can leave the loupe in one place, and see a magnified view of wherever your cursor travels around the screen. This includes moving your cursor outside the main image area to thumbnails in the browser. Wherever the cursor roams, that portion of the frame is magnified, making it quick and easy to check focus or view details of any frame, anywhere in your library, even when in book or web gallery mode.

The more you play with the Aperture Loupe, the more you will appreciate its shortcuts. To quickly change the size of the loupe itself, OPTION-SHIFT-HYPHEN decreases loupe size; OPTION-SHIFT-EQUAL SIGN makes it bigger. For magnification, COMMAND- SHIFT-EQUAL SIGN increases magnification while COMMAND- SHIFT-HYPHEN brings it down.

The Aperture Loupe is the super-hero of all loupes: powerful, extremely functional, and very cool.

For some reason, a lot of the Zune documentation is striking me as unintentionally but hilariously salacious. Under Play with Zune, I found the following list of options that made me laugh out loud, particularly the differential between the first and second options:

Even the direct URL is a giggle: “http://www.zune.net/en-us/support/howto/play/default.htm”. As if Coming Zune weren’t enough!

Edited to add: David Battino points out this frenzied installation shot [via BoingBoing]:

Edited further to add that this disturbing trend doesn’t seem to just be limited to Microsoft. Check out this early Zune review “Hands on the Zune“:

Compared to my fourth-generation iPod, the Zune was lighter. The top of the Zune had a clear glass layer while the exterior had a tactile feel to it, nothing like the hard metal and plastic of the iPod devices. The ’skin’ of the Zune was a ‘rubberized’ material that had a smooth seductive feel to it. I found myself unable to stop stroking the device, so much that the demo assistant asked me to put it down.

Edited even further to add: This one isn’t even safe for work. Yikes!

Oh heavens. This is just getting silly. Now this has shown up. In theory this one is safe for work, but anyone wandering by will probably (and correctly) get the absolute wrong idea.

Every time I give a talk or class on Aperture, someone asks this question: “is there any way to get Aperture to rename my referenced master files when I import?” The short answer is: there’s no built-in way to do this, but there are a couple of workarounds. I’m going to detail both of those in this entry and the next, but before I do that, I’m gonna make you suffer through a lecture. I’m not going to do this simply because I like to hear myself type, but because if you’re asking this question, I think there’s a chance that you’re not fully embracing the Aperture paradigm.

The fact is: there’s really no reason to rename your referenced master files. In fact, there’s no reason for you to care what they’re named at all. Aperture will always keep track of what your master file is named, and where it’s stored. With Version 1.5, you’ve got all the tools you need to move this master file, regardless of what it’s named, and Aperture will continue to keep track of it. And, if you ever want a copy of the master file, you can simply ask Aperture to export it for you.

If you say “but when I export edited images, I want them named a particular thing” then the master file name is still irrelevant, because you can specify the exported name at the time of export. If you say “but I want my images to have meaningful, descriptive names when I work on them in Aperture.” That, I completely understand, but that’s why Aperture provides version names. Remember, each image that you work on in Aperture is just a version based on the master image. Each version can have its own name, and you can pass that version name on to your exported files when you save them.

When you’re working with images, Aperture serves as an extremely capable Finder replacement. Because it keeps track of where all your images are, you don’t have to. What’s more, you don’t have to care what those files are named. If you embrace this underlying philosophy, you’ll have a much easier time crafting a workflow that is seamless and easy to follow, because you won’t be trying to set Aperture on top of the Finder. Aperture can’t fit into a Finder-based workflow, because Aperture and the Finder try to do the same types of things - organize files. When it comes to photos, though, Aperture is much more capable than the Finder. For more on this “Aperture philosophy” take a look at this.

Some people, though, will argue that they still want to rename their master files, just in case they ever decide to stop using Aperture. Here at Inside Aperture, we don’t really talk about the eventuality of switching from Aperture to something else, but just in case you’re someone who spends a lot of time worrying about the future, here’s one way that you can use Aperture to rename referenced master files that have been imported as references. (Aperture’s Import dialog includes an option to rename images imported into the Aperture library.)

1. Select the referenced image in Aperture. For this trick to work, you need to know where the original image is stored. If you’re not sure of its location, choose File > Manage Referenced Files. The Manage Referenced Files dialog box will show you the path to the file.

2. Once you’ve figured out the original path, close the Manage Referenced Files dialog box.

3. Choose File > Relocate Master. Aperture will present you with a Save dialog box. Navigate to the location where the file is currently stored (the one you looked up in step 1). You can now use Aperture’s standard renaming options to give the file a new name. Aperture won’t move the file. Since you’ve selected the original location for the destination, Aperture will simply leave the image where it is, but give it a new name.

Using this technique, you can perform batch operations, as long as all of the images are in the same folder. If you need to rename images in multiple folders, you’ll have to do those in separate batches.

Next week, a way to rename master files upon import.

“Music Fight” by Airpushers (featuring MoZella)
The duo of Printz Board and Tim Izo Orindgreff, known for their work with the Black Eyed Peas, began stretching out with their own material in 2004. The resulting album includes this sexy neo-soul track, featuring Detroit chanteuse MoZella. [Nov 15]

US only. Napster Freebies Page. More freebies after the jump.

According to online Zune docs, it is not. Given that Vista is supposed to ship any second, this seems like bad planning to say the least on Microsoft’s part.

The prevailing theme of the InDesign Conference Master Class in Seattle last week was definitely “taking control.” Not that the attendees weren’t talented creative types, but this group seemed to be particularly concerned with how to work as elegantly, efficiently, and painlessly as possible. Sessions on .INX, XML, and scripts were where it was at. InDesigners have clearly taken responsibility for finding workflows or writing scripts that solve their own problems. Dave Saunders, the guru of InDesign scripting, was everywhere, often answering questions with the phrase “I’ve got a script for that.” (He did also point out that O’Reilly’s new Short Cut, Scripting InDesign with JavaScript, was “the only thing out there” for people who wanted to learn how to solve their own problems.)

Empowerment (for lack of a less touchy-feely word) was also the message from Adobe Sr. Product Manager for InDesign/InCopy, Chad Siegel. In the general morning session on Wednesday, Siegel showed us a very brief look at some CS3 features in the works, all of which are designed to help users gain control. (David Blatner, the conference chair, did a great wrap up of the CS3 preview here.) Of course, Siegel mentioned universal binary. (I’m convinced there is an internal Adobe memo somewhere that insists all demos of any CS3 product must be done on a Mactel and use the words “screaming fast.”) Later, Seigel hosted a session where this very technically savvy set of users talked about their wish list for CS3. The room had Adobe engineers scattered around the edges weighing in and asking follow-up questions, and a laptop-equipped Adobe note-taker writing it all down. My guess is that popular scripts probably give Adobe a fairly good idea of what power users are looking for in the next version of InDesign.

According to a Bloomberg.com report, Microsoft plans to “eventually” add video-sharing to the Zune and may add a Zunephone model to the line. “The race is on,” CEO Steve Ballmer reportedly said. “I’m confident we can keep up. They have brand and image going for them, and we have some innovative ideas.”

“Sex & Mayhem” by Devastations
Since moving to Berlin in 2003, the Devastations have traveled around Europe, where their first album was hailed as the best debut of 2004 by Billboard Germany. This track is from their highly anticipated sophomore release, Coal. [Nov 14]

US only. Napster Freebies Page. More freebies after the jump.

Aperture has a 10,000 image limit per project. This does NOT mean that you can’t have more than 10,000 images in Aperture. Just that you need them in more than one project.

If you create a folder in the Project Panel (call it Project Folder) and then put all your projects (up to 10,000 images each) within that new folder, you will see what amounts to a multiple project - project. So if you had three 10,000 image projects nested within the new folder, you’d have a total of 30,000 images.

Photo Copyright Scott Bourne 2006 - All Rights Reserved

One of the many delightful surprises in the latest version of Aperture is tabbed browsing. That’s right, you can have multiple albums, projects, web galleries, etc. open at once, then switch among them just like you can with multiple web pages in Safari.

To create a new tab, just hold down the CMD key when clicking on a new collection (such as an album). Aperture will create the new workspace and display the thumbnails. You can switch back and forth among tabs by merely clicking on their labels.

This is very handy when you’re working on projects and need to quickly toggle among several albums without searching for them in your Projects pane.

Wait…just a sec…the phone is ringing. “Hello? What? What’s that? You’re calling from where? A Mile Away??? And you saw this COMING???”

“Stunning” by 8mm
Former Trent Reznor/Marilyn Manson collaborator Sean Beavan and wife Juliette conjure a moody L.A.-via-New Orleans groove, matching sultry vocals with subtle, pre-ominous whisps of ambient noise-fear. [Nov 13]

US only. Napster Freebies Page. More freebies after the jump.

I’ve been asked many times recently what my equipment setup looks like behind the scenes when I shoot a conference, such as last week’s Web 2.0 Summit. I’ve been able to take a few people backstage and show them in person, but that doesn’t scale. Luckily, photos do. Here’s what my setup looked like last week:

It’s not pretty, but it served as my office away from my office for a few days. What you see here is:

• My trusty 17″ MacBook Pro maxed out with 2GB of RAM (alas, it’s not the new Core 2 Duo version).
• An external 21″ LCD monitor provided by the show staff so that I can be a bit more efficient.
• A Lexar Pro high speed FireWire CompactFlash card reader.
• A Monaco calibration puck hiding underneath the external display. This lets me calibrate any device I run across into usuable shape.
• A 100GB FireWire hard drive hidden behind my Mac Book Pro that serves as a backup device.
• A list of all the speakers. The Web 2.0 list was especially nice as it had photos of all the speakers so that I could better match names to faces.

What do I wish I my out-of-office workspace was powered by? Simple answer: A full tilt MacPro loaded up with 4GB of RAM or so, a fast video card, and a 23″ or 30″ Cinema display. That would really help out. It’d probably increase my productivity by a fairly significant amount. But, that’s still a dream for the future. To pull it off will require a bit of research into travel cases and the like. For now, it’s “Have Laptop, Will Travel”.

I hope you enjoyed the peek behind the curtain. Now, it’s your turn. If you’re a road-warrior photographer, what does your on-the-road setup look like? Please use the comments to share some links to photos.

At every trade show, there’s one product everyone says you have to see. The gadget that kept coming up at last month’s AES conference was the Core Sound TetraMic.

This tiny microphone contains four capsules arranged in a tetrahedral pattern to pick up sound in the Ambisonic format. Basically, the mics together encode front-back, left-right, up-down, and level information that can later be presented in a variety of ways. According to Ambisonic.net, the technique produces a 3D audio image—including elevation information—that’s “largely unaffected by listener position.” In other words, with just four speakers, you hear a true surround recording, and there’s no sweet spot. The four channels can also be decoded into conventional two-channel, 5.1-channel, 7.1-channel, and other speaker systems.

Before now, Ambisonic mics cost thousands of dollars. Core Sound expects to sell the Tetra Mic for less than $1,000. But the other breakthough is that when paired with Core Sound’s 4Mic analog-to-digital converter (also under $1,000), the TetraMic can record the Ambisonics information to a standard two-channel flash-RAM recorder like the M-Audio MicroTrack. So for about $2K, you’ll soon be able to carry a versatile, handheld surround recorder in your fingertips.

I’ve got an amazing dentist who I’ve been seeing for about twenty years — his name is Dr. Meng Syn. Meng has also become a close friend over the years, so I actually look forward to going to see my dentist if you can believe it. Meng is not only an extremely talented dentist, but steeped as a technologist as well. He’s constantly moving the needle (pardon the pun) in creating new software to advance dental technology, and you’ll often find the most state-of-the-art equipment at his office months, if not years, before it’s available in most dentist offices.

Meng’s also got the most eclectic collection of dentist-oriented TV shows and films you can possibly imagine — including “Little Shop of Horrors”, “Secret Lives of Dentists”, “Compromising Positions”, and many more (along with episodes of favorite TV shows featuring visits to the dentist). It’s pretty wild.

Beyond the dental side of his practice, Meng is also immersed in the world of digital media (video and audio). When you sit in the dental chair, you have a very flexible flat screen TV mounted above you — where you can watch cable TV, movies, music videos, or play Xbox games. On my recent visit, Meng showed me how he places it strategically above younger patients so that they’re ‘anchored’ with their game play & keep their heads straight while he’s working on them. He actually does everything possible to make a dental visit fun — guaranteed. So if you live in the San Jose area, check him out at Almaden Dental Associates.

Zune Disection [GearLive]
Taking the Zune apart and putting it back together.

Zune Marketplace Walkthough Video [ZuneDashOnline]
10 minute walkthrough of the new software.

Promote Zune? Rocketboom says “no”. [DemBot]
Why use a Zune logo on your site if you can’t contractually say anything negative about the product?

Early Zunes [Engadget]
Assorted Best Buy Zune Sightings.

Zune Marketplace Software [ZuneCorps]
Early access–for now.

What’s the Deal with Microsoft Points [MacDailyNews]
Points as interest-free “loans” from their customers.

“Nothing Like Your Touch” by Vikter Duplaix
This multi-talented Philly DJ/producer/singer/instrumentalist specializes in steamy bedroom music. Having taken a break from his work with other artists, he now applies his skills to his own material, which is just right for romance. [Nov 12]

Napster Freebies Page

More freebies after the jump.

“Can’t Get Enough (California Edit)” by B2Dance
Since hitting paydirt in 2004 with the chart-busting Halloween dance track “Gonna Get Ye,” this NYC act continues to build its reputation for producing dependable floor-fillers. [Nov 11]

US only as far as I know. If anyone has any success downloading from non-US locations, please drop me an e-mail. Thanks.

More freebies after the jump.

You need to sign up for a (free) Napster account in order to access these free MP3 files. Here’s the direct link to the Napster download page.

“Nothing Like This” by J Dilla
Taken from the Adult Swim/Stones Throw compilation Chrome Children, this dreamy psychedelic soundscape plays like a voice from the heavens–the voice of the late, great J Dilla. [Nov 10]

More freebies after the jump.

In my post entitled “Digital Workflow of a Semi-Pro Part 2″ I stated that after I get all my images into Aperture, that I “…select all the remaining images and apply the Edge Sharpen (CTL-S) command with the default settings…”

It’s true that I Edge Sharpen all my images (because I shoot RAW and all RAW files need sharpening), but I failed to go into detail as to how exactly I do it. Here are the steps to Edge Sharpening (or applying any adjustment/adjustments) to all images in an album.

1. Select the first thumbnail in the album
2. Apply the adjustment(s) to that image
3. Click the Lift-Stamp tool
4. Click the adjusted image to “lift” the adjustments
5. Click on the second thumbnail in the album to “stamp” the adjustment(s) to that image
6. Scroll all the way to the end of the album and Shift-Click the last thumbnail to apply (stamp) the adjustment(s) to that image and every image in between that one and the second one in the album.

That’s it, you’re done, you’ve just applied an adjustment (or several) to all the images in the album.

Until next time,

Keep shooting.

Allen Rockwell
Allen Rockwell Photography

According to the Zune Insider website, Universal Music Group will receive a device royalty on every Zune sold. Specifics of the deal are not forthcoming from either Microsoft or Universal, but the article suggests that a portion of the royalty revenues will be relayed to recording artists. This makes me wonder how the sharing will take place and whether it will use some sort of ASCAP-type model.

Today’s download suddenly switched from a simple URL to a big-old-complicated one, suggesting that Napster is going to be a little more protective about its new free download program. If the link I provided does not work for you, visit the download page directly.

Before:

http://www.napster.com/mds_daily_download/media/110606/Mandrake.mp3

After:

http://condir.napster.com/gf/Get_on_with_Your_Life.mp3?mob=AQEAT2MAAABDSwUAAJ4BRQCaTUWLzoC7gIDk.0l3d3cubmFwc3Rlci5jb20vbWRzX2RhaWx5X2Rvd25sb2FkL21lZGlhLzExMDYwNi9HZXRfb25fd2l0aF9Zb3VyX0xpZmUubXAzmRb8ATBEnQpRRWsYn74iK2.RomXvyJMTuec-&ext=.mp3

“Get on with Your Life” by The Purrs
These Seattle alt-rock vets have been described as the Pacific Northwest’s best-kept secret. This track, with a dose of melodic intrigue and an appealingly laid-back jangle, show you why. [Nov 9]

More freebies after the jump.

In the past, I really liked the white balance presets in Adobe Camera Raw. Trying different options from the pop-up window in ACR let me preview different temperature/tint combinations for my Raw images. I’d been expecting to see similar functionality out of the box in Aperture, until the light bulb went on (that would be 2850K) that I could create it myself.

The process for building white balance presets in Aperture is quite simple. Start by entering a temperature/tint combination in the White Balance panel of the HUD - such as 5500K/10. Choose the “Save as Preset” from the pop-up menu and label it with the name you want, such as “Daylight.” Continue through your list of settings until you’ve entered all of your presets.

Once you have all of your presets configured, you can freely preview their effect on your images by selecting the one you want from the list.

If you want to return to the “as shot” white balance setting, just hit the “Reset to Default” arrow that’s next to the presets pop-up menu. You can set as many presets as you want. If you want, you can start with this list as a starting point.

If you have additional temperature/tint combinations that you think would be helpful to others, please list them in the comments area of this post.

Harris Fogel sits down with O’Reilly author Deke McClelland at NAPP Photoshop World Las Vegas to talk about Photoshop Elements, InDesign, and his new training videos. You can tune in yourself by going over to Mac Edition Radio and downloading the podcast.

You can catch Chuck Joiner interviewing digital photography pioneer Stephen Johnson on the MacVoices podcast. (O’Reilly Media recently published Stephen’s latest book, On Digital Photography.) In the interview, Stephen talks about his philosophies of taking and manipulating images, the future of digital photography, why his approach to photography is to capture light and not objects and more.

“Mandrake” by Chrisopher Blue
Compared to the likes of Tom Waits and Bono, this singer-songwriter describes his style as “American road music tied into a noose knot swinging in the wind.” What does that sound like? Download this song and find out. [Nov 8]

More freebies after the jump.

I recently found a 90-year-old digital recording in my library. Titled Elite Syncopations, it’s a CD from Biograph featuring modern recordings of piano rolls played by ragtime pioneer Scott Joplin in 1916, a year before he died. The recordists played back the rolls by pumping the pedals on a 1910 Steinway player piano.

Firing up the disc, I was shocked to hear how square the performances sounded, with metronomic rhythm and near-absent dynamics. I found it hard to believe that a musician whose nickname was “the Entertainer” would play so stiffly. Check out this excerpt of one of Joplin’s most famous songs:

Like many in the photo community, I have made the pilgrimage to New York City’s annual photo-tradeshow, PhotoPlus Expo, many times. As I made my way around the show floor, I reaffirmed my view: It is a great time to be a photographer.

Part of what should make us happy, is the intense competition fueling practical and low cost innovations as seen at the show. You feel the energy as you maneuver your way down the narrow aisles with other show-goers gawking as they inch forward to check out the latest stuff.

At the Apple Booth, Aperture 1.5.1 had standing room only crowds and you could see eyes lighting up, from f8 to wide open as some of Aperture’s coolest features were explained: Color by color adjustment controls, editing with stacks on the light table, the new and improved loupe and perhaps the biggest obstacle lifted from the original version–images in the Aperture library now can be stored wherever you want them to and the hi-res previews let you take your entire library with you on a pocket drive or Powerbook, easily accessing the raw files from a remote location.

The wow factor continued if you heard futurist Tom Wujek’s talk about 10 GIGAPIXEL cameras, with tiny liquid lenses capturing three dimensional data allowing photographers not only sharpen their images, but actually fix the focus later. All stored on a 100 Petabyte drive.

“Scotty… ENERGIZE!”

(A Petabyte-2 to the 50th power (1,125,899,906,842,624) bytes. A Petabyte is equal to 1,024 terabytes)

Shaking my head in wonderment, thinking about the future I saw a crowd gathering under a big yellow sign where I heard a man ask why there were 75 people waiting to get to the Kodak table, where a pyramid of film was neatly stacked under glass, like a museum piece.

“Is there some sort of sale?” he enquired.

Kodak was giving away free film, flogging their five new and improved Portra color negative films and the price was right. A Kodak representative conceded that 90 per cent of professional photographers had gone digital, “but two thirds of those shooters still shoot some film, often for their personal work”, he added.

The line up for free film was 75 deep when I saw it.

I then bumped into Ted Harris, contributing editor to View Camera Magazine who has used a large format camera since 1954. He pointed out to me that the sheet film market is the only segment of film manufacture that is still growing.

“Film is not dead”, he said.

I won’t argue with statistics, but when I embraced digital several years ago I thought I too, would be one of those people who would be see-sawing between the old and new capture methods. But the fact is, I held onto my 35mm film cameras only until they lost most of their value, same for medium format. And in some form of unconscious backlash against digital, I went out and bought an old 4×5inch Crown Graphic camera that I promised myself I would have a use for.

But the reality is, where digital is now–the ease of use and amazing color and black and white quality, and the cost savings for me, a documentary photographer, often shooting on spec–the advantages are overwhelming.

I don’t have to buy film and pay for processing, or worry about getting 100 rolls plus equipment through x-ray machines and security at airports. I get near instant gratification and turnaround speed and I am reinvigorated with photography and growing as a photographer, because I take more chances with digital because I can. My reason’s for standing by my film cameras have all but evaporated.

Back to Aperture

Regardless of how you work, Ted Harris pointed out that 80 per cent of his large-format readers were shooting film, then scanning and printing digitally. And lucky for them and the two-thirds of pro digital photographers who still shoot some film, they can still take advantage of most of the intuitive and powerful features of Aperture, short of working with raw files. Having a tool like Aperture to consolidate, archive, create books and web pages and easily process and access your entire photographic life in images, is something I couldn’t have imagined when I took my first photographs with GAF 500 ASA film. I thought back then, it was a great time to be a photographer.

Aside from the “stuff” at the show, there were some amazing and inspiring photographers who remind us that all these great tools are a means to an end, and the end result is what most of us are working towards. Like Magnum master Elliot Erwitt, who, when I asked him what his picks for some of the hottest new stuff at the show were –quipped, “I’m really not that interested in equipment”.

I just spent three fantastic days at the PhotoPlus Expo in New York City (November 2-4). I’ve been going to the show for more than ten years and this was the second year that Apple Computer has had a booth at the show. The PhotoPlus Expo has been running in New York City for over 20 years; it’s a mix of seminars, special events, keynotes and a trade show filled with the latest photo and digital gear-or as I like to call it, “The Photographer’s Candy Store.”

Since this is my first post on the Aperture blog, I suppose I should introduce myself. I’m a photographer and digital imaging consultant based in the New York City area (New Jersey to be exact), and I’ve been shooting with digital cameras for the last twelve years. I’ve also owned a Macintosh since 1984 (the original 128k Mac), and it’s absolutely amazing to me how things have advanced since then. In the days ahead, I look forward to sharing some of my observations of the PhotoPlus Expo, as well as some Aperture tips and techniques.

Below are a few images from the Apple booth on the trade show floor at the PhotoPlus Expo. A number of very talented photographers gave presentations at the Apple booth, and I was fortunate to have had an opportunity to interview some of them during the show. The interviews will be posted here over the coming months and they’ll also be available as podcasts through Apple iTunes.

An Apple Cinema Display with portraits of eight photographers who gave presentations at Apple’s booth during the Expo.

National Geographic photographer Steve Winter giving a presentation on Friday afternoon.

The Apple booth had two display areas filled with Macs. Apple Reps showcased Aperture, as well as other Apple software on some of the latest Mac hardware.

New York-based photographer Vincent Laforet’s presentation on Saturday morning.

According to Yahoo News, starting 22 November, Microsoft will offer new TV and video XBox Live content. TV Shows are expected to retail at $1.99. Movies will probably rent for $3.99 for 24 hours. Media reports are spinning this product as the “iTV killer”, but I have my doubts. I’d like to see how easy it is to connect to the marketplace, order content and have it delivered to the TV.

Photographers who have been shooting raw for a while know that there’s no standard, accepted raw format. While Adobe has offered the Digital Negative Specification in an attempt to establish a single, open-source raw format, camera vendors have not jumped on-board the DNG bandwagon, and for a number of technical and marketing reasons they probably never will. Because there’s no agreed upon raw standard (as there is for JPEG files, or TIFFs, or Photoshop documents) it’s not possible for Aperture’s engineers to write a single piece of code that will open any raw file from any camera.

To make Aperture compatible with a specific raw format, the program needs to have a profile, or driver, for that specific camera. This profile contains, among other things, information about the color properties of the camera’s sensor, gamma correction curves, and other information that Aperture needs to decode the raw image into a final, usable picture. Camera vendors do not publish this information. Instead, anyone who makes a raw converter must reverse engineer this data, a time-consuming, complicated process.

Because Aperture is built on top of Apple’s Core Image - an OS-level suite of graphics routines that includes raw processing - raw profiles must be added at the OS level, not just bundled with Aperture. In the past, Apple has only issued camera updates as part of OS updates. Needless to say, this has made them a little slow to add raw support for the latest cameras.

However, Apple has finally taken a more streamlined approach and released the Digital Camera Raw Support Update 1.0, a universal binary update that adds support for the Canon Digital Rebel XTi, the Nikon D80, and the Pentax *ist DS. The readme for the update also says that the update addresses “handling of large Canon Raw files, DNG compatibility on Intel-based Macs, and lines sometimes appearing in images exported from Aperture.”

Knowing that Apple can now release raw support updates without having to wait for an OS update is great news, as it means they’ll be a little more nimble in keeping up with the latest raw formats. Also, because the raw converter sits in Core Image, installing this one update will add these new raw formats to Preview, iPhoto, Image Capture, and any other apps that base their raw conversion on Core Image.

Now the bad news: for some reason, this update is not bundled with the Aperture 1.5.1 updater, and it’s not currently showing up in Software Update. To get it, you need to go here.

It’s great that Apple’s taking this approach for their raw format updates. Hopefully they’ll soon make them a little easier to find.

In my previous post I got all my shots imported into Aperture, now we pick up where we left off.

So now I have all the day’s shots in Aperture, this is where the fun begins. The first thing I’ll usually do is scroll through all the images and look for the obvious rejects. Before version 1.5 you could mark a reject by pressing the “0″ (zero) key, but for some reason they have changed that in v1.5 and now you press the “-” key. Once an image is marked as a reject it will display a small X in the corner of the thumbnail and the thumbnail will disappear once you move on to the next thumbnail. If you are wondering where the rejects go, they are not deleted, they are simply moved to the “Rejected” album where you can delete them later if you want.

Now, I’ve chucked all the rejects in the bin and it’s time to move on. Scott Kelby said once (or twice, or three times…) that the only images you should apply sharpening to are images that you care about. So the next thing I do is select all the remaining images and apply the Edge Sharpen (CTL-S) command with the default settings, knowing that I’m going to eventually want to sharpen most of them anyways and I can always adjust the settings or even uncheck the Edge Sharpen on a single image if I want to later.

You need to sign up for a (free) Napster account in order to access these free MP3 files.

“The Young Idealists” by Lloyd Cole
A sharply observed look at youth and politics from the journeyman singer-songwriter and former Commotions leader. One more reason Cole’s understated approach continues to win fans. [Nov 7]

More freebies after the jump.

Aperture includes a RAW converter as part of its import function. While the images aren’t actually finally converted until exported, a basic conversion that includes sharpening takes place on import. By the way, according to software engineers I interviewed for this story, some sharpening on import takes place with nearly all RAW converters.

Any sharpening in the conversion process is done in addition to any that might be applied by the user during the manipulation stage.

Aperture’s RAW preference pane in the Inspector allows you to adjust the amount of auto sharpen applied on import. I suggest that you keep this number as low as possible since Aperture doesn’t allow selective sharpening. If your image contains large areas of sky or water or other subjects that are in the background, you probably don’t want them sharpened. So use Aperture’s new Edge Sharpen to avoid creating digital noise or save the sharpening for your roundtrip to Photoshop or some other third-party sharpening application for best results.

Photo Copyright Scott Bourne 2006 - All Rights Reserved

Zune Website Zunerama put together a nifty graphic of the Zune menu structure. It based its tree on the various reviews, demo videos and so forth floating around the net. As you’d expect, Music, Video and Picture playback functions predominate, with additional options for Settings, Radio and Community.

Of greatest interest to many of us is the sharing portion: the Community menu includes your songs-received inbox, your personal profile, nearby-detected Zunes and little else. The Settings menu lets you toggle the Wireless on and off and adjust your Online Status.

The whole map provides a neat easy-to-follow graphic, worth visiting if you’re interested in how the player-side operation will work.

“You’ve seen the teaser clips. You’ve seen the fast-moving video reviews of Zune. But you just want one place where you can conveniently view the whole list of Zune features, and maybe even get a sense of how one might navigate one’s way through the Zune menu structure.”

I’m in Seattle for the InDesign Conference Master Class; coming to you from the Adobe campus this morning, in fact. In preparation for this week, I spent some time catching up on the coolness at InDesignSecrets.com. (ID Secrets guy, David Blatner is the Conference Director here.) Thought I’d start the week by sharing a cool InDesign tip I discovered there—the ability to install the Notes plugin for free.

The Notes feature is familiar to anyone who uses Adobe InCopy, the InDesign editing tool plugin from Adobe. But you apparently don’t need the entire InCopy product (which is great, but costs $250 or so dollars per user and has a lot of features that you may not need) in order to get Notes. It’s not installed with InDesign, but it apparently can be installed manually from the InDesign disk. (Check out the InDesign Secrets post for specific details on how to install and more on the feature itself.)

The upshot is that you get the Notes palette added to your InDesign interface choices. (You also get a Notes menu added to the menu bar.) It behaves like any other palette in the interface, meaning you can move it around, dock it, and group it with other palettes if you like. The palette window actually has a big white space where commentary can be added without messing with your InDesign layout. It keeps track of who wrote it and when. (Each person gets to choose their own color.) This is great for communicating with authors who are writing in InDesign from the start, and having my decidedly visual authors work with text and images from early on is great for the types of graphically integrated books we’re doing at O’Reilly. Although I have InCopy myself, I like the idea that I can use Notes to communicate with authors who don’t.

(Now all I need is the ability to track changes in the InDesign Story editor. You can bet I might be looking for a person here at Adobe Seattle to share that desire with this week.)

Thanks David and Anne-Marie for sharing the coolness!

When I got home a week ago after shooting the Ajax Experience in Boston, and C4 in Chicago before it, I went through my now-normal ritual of migrating the Aperture project for the shows from my laptop to my trusty PowerMac. Then, in the next phase of the ritual, I started an update of the Vault into which the pictures go. Alas, that’s where I suddenly found that I didn’t have enough space on my backup Vault drive anymore. Oops. I’d added more data to my library than there was room for on the drive.

This wasn’t a big surprise. Even though my Aperture library comfortably sits on a 1TB RAID volume, I’ve been using a 400GB external drive as my Vault. It’s done a good job so far, but now that my Aperture library has hit the 375GB mark, my library doesn’t fit. Now, some of you might be thinking, “Wait a darn minute, you’ve got 20-someGB more to go!”. Sadly, this isn’t so. Thanks to disk drive makers selling their drives using a different counting method than one would think rational, a 400GB drive actually has a capacity of 372.5GB. It’s kind of like how that 27″ CRT TV never really was 27″. As well, Aperture seems to be slightly conservative with it’s numbers and this takes another few GB out off the picture.

I’ve known this moment was coming for several months. Every time I bring images back to the desktop machine, I watch the Vault bar move a bit more to the right, turn yellow, and then red. I was hoping, however, that I’d get another month or two out of the drive before needing to replace it. Alas, that wasn’t to be.

It is my honor and privilege to announce a breakthrough in audio technology, a miracle of modern science, and the most important thing to happen to game music since MIDI got promoted to General — introducing the Homunculonic Aestheticator, an interactive audio mixing engine with real-time Haptic Applicators, capable of producing multiple adaptive soundtracks encoded with True Human Emotions™, using T.H.E. algorithm. Handsomely housed in a pointless double-space half-rack mount, this amazing piece of fictional gear is not manufactured by our friends at Funk Logic, or anyone else for that matter. Nonetheless, I predict this small but pricey unit is destined to become an essential (indeed, crucial) piece of every sound designer’s studio setup.

(Click to enlarge)

I first encountered this astonishing device at the 2006 Project Bar-B-Q, and must admit, was fairly skeptical of the claims made in the PR package: “Takes mediocre game soundtracks and makes them Compelling®! Analog-style knobs and switches for full digital control of T.H.E. algorithm! Works with all game consoles, and most games!” … I would’ve ignored it as just hype, but then I saw the list of inventors. Wow! It read like a Who’s Who of Interactive Audio, so I arranged to get a review unit.

The Homunculonic Aestheticator ships in a featureless black box, which contains a white box, which contains the unit. Installation was easy: I ran my Xbox 360 audio output straight into the back of the HA, which encoded and routed the processed sound to my Dolby 5.1 surround system. And that’s all there was too it; the unit doesn’t even need a power supply!

After a recent chat with AppleScript guru Sal Soghoian (who is also the Automation Product Manager for Apple), I learned that using scripts to enhance the Aperture workflow has been a concept embraced by the engineers from the get-go. Sal talks about this at length in a podcast I recorded for airing on this site in the near future. But he also urged me to remind you about the Aperture Automator site that features a ton of goodies for Aperture users.

We’re also going to devote lots of energy to automation on this site. You might have noticed that we included an “Actions and Workflows” section in the initial launch. We’ll build out that section more in the coming weeks. But for now, you might want to visit the Automator site and get your feet wet. There are four new actions in version 1.5, and there’s more detail about them there.

A report from my intrepid boss, Executive Editor Steve Weiss, who’s at PhotoPlus in NYC this week:

The 2006 O’Reilly Photoshop Cook-off Awards ceremony took place last night, held at Javits Center in NYC, as part of the PhotoPlus Expo. Many thanks to a long list of generous co-sponsors, who donated prizes totaling in the tens of thousands of dollars, our esteemed judges, and of course, a big salute to the winners, including grand prize winner Suzanne Pitts, from Orange County, Calif. Awards were presented at a reception attended by press, winners, and judges. Here’s Suzanne with her winning entry.

There are 20,000+ photographers—professionals and eager avocationalists—here, attending tutorial sessions, portfolio reviews, seminars, and corporate receptions. This is the biggest event of the year in photography circles, save perhaps for PMA (more of a vendor event) and Photokina (held in Germany) and usually attracting what seems like a million people globally). There’s simply nothing like this event in the US for the sheer size and access to well-known photographers and the newest gear.

O’Reilly authors (or soon-to-be authors) teaching jam-packed sessions are Mikkel Aaland, Katrin Eismann, Julieanne Kost, Peter Krogh, Stephen Johnson and Eddie Tapp. (Mikkel pays us to have these lists in alphabetical order—cw).

The O’Reilly booth was packed all day; lots of interest in our books, we’re happy to say. Biggest interest on the first day was in Stephen Johnson on Digital Photography and both of Eddie Tapp’s new titles (Photoshop Workflow Setups and Practical Color Management). Lots of interest in learning more about Camera Raw; as such, Mikkel Aaland’s book also flying off the shelves. Julieanne Kost’s Window Seat continues to be popular; people attend her presentations and then seem to make a beeline to the booth to buy a copy; there’s nothing quite like her book, and people tend to be transfixed once they crack the spine and begin flipping through the pages.

The other event in Javits was registration for this coming Sunday’s NYC Marathon. 20,000 camera bugs eating hot dogs over here; 10,000 athletes in shorts, doing stretches and eating bananas over there. (So Steve, which line was the guy you mentioned on the phone standing in? The one with the track suit who was lining his hotdog with fries.—cw)

Thanks for the report, Steve!

I’ve found that I use two different kinds of workflow in Aperture: the kind that I maintain for my permanent library; and the kind that I use on-location. The reason for using two distinct workflows is that the demands of working with images during a shoot–typically handing off intermediate copies of good photographs as I go, or even just showing them off to friends via Flickr–doesn’t give me the time to fully caption and keyword my work for my permanent library on my office Mac. Instead, I’m almost always in run-and-gun mode. I’ll shoot for a few hours, pull images to my MacBook Pro, cherry pick the best, apply some adjustments, and then I’ll go back out to shoot some more. Needless to say, I don’t have the time needed to fully keyword, annotate, and super fine-tune the images as I want them in my permanent library.

At the same time, I don’t want to make a complete mess of things on-location which would necessiate starting over ranking my images when I’m back in the office. I’m still working on my personal process for this, but right now here’s what I do when on-location:

• Pull the images from CF into Aperture into a project for the shoot.
• Pop Aperture into full screen mode and make a pass through the images, immediately rejecting any obvious loosers. I’m looking for photos that are unusable due to focus problems or simply subject issues such as closed eyes and the like. These images need to hit the bit-bin as soon as possible.
• I then make another pass giving a star to any image that I want to keep. An unstarred image means that I’m undecided about it. Typically I’ll reject a some more of the images during this pass. It’s also during this pass that I’ll group similar pictures together into stacks and select an initial pick for the stack.
• After the one-star pass, I perform another to add a star to any image that I would be happy for a client to see. This lets me keep outtakes as one-star images and bump client-worthy images to two stars. I’ll do some basic processing to these images to pull in levels, correct white balance, and tweak contrast.

If it’s a rapid fire event, I’ll stop right there and dump out the two star images to hand off before going off to shoot some more. If I’ve got a little time, I’ll perform one more pass for images that I’d recommend the client use. These are the ones that I consider worthy. An event client will typically get both 2 and 3 star images at this point.

You’ll notice that I’m only using up to 3 out of the 5 stars that Aperture lets you rank with. That’s because the on-location workflow is just an initial cut. After an event, I’ll export the project from my MacBook Pro back to my desktop G5 and import it into my permanent library. Then, as I have time, I’ll sort through and perform a slower sift through the project. It’s during this slower evaluation that I might award a 4 or 5 star ranking to an image. But while on-location, things are just too hectic and preliminary to award these ranks which, in my own system represent the “best of shoot” and “best ever” rankings. The goal of the on-location workflow isn’t to find the cream of the crop. It’s to weed out the obvious loosers and get to the point of handing off respectable work in as short a time as possible. And, to do this, I only need 3 stars. The rest can be awarded later.

With Aperture 1.5’s ability to import files as references, you can easily keep your images on a portable, external drive. If you regularly move between a laptop and desktop computer, this is the easiest way to quickly move data back and forth - just move the drive between computers.

For more thorough portability, though, you might want to consider placing your Aperture library on the same external drive that you’re keeping your external images on. Simply go to Aperture’s Preferences and click the Choose button beneath the Library Location field. In the resulting dialog box, select your external drive.

Now Quit Aperture. If you restart, you will see an empty library, because Aperture is pointed at your new library, which hasn’t yet had any images imported into it. If you’d prefer to work with your old library, copy the Aperture Library.aplibrary file from its old location (by default, this file will be in your Pictures folder) to the new location that you specified. When you launch Aperture, you’ll see your library, just as you’d left it, but it will now be stored on the external drive.

Plug the external drive into your other Macs and configure those copies of Aperture to point to the library stored on the external drive.

Now, whether you import images into the Aperture library, or import them as references to files stored on the external drive, you’ll be able to move the drive from computer and work with the same library. And, of course, your referenced files will be easily accessible from other applications. Remember, though: referenced files are not backed up using Aperture’s Vault system.

Effective with the latest Apple tower, the MacPro, Apple is stressing its new Build To Order sales approach. Instead of multiple configurations, there’s a standard configuration and everything else is custom.

If you’re buying a new computer for the sake of running an Aperture workstation, take heed. The standard configuration MacPro may not satisfy you. Here are my suggestions for building the best system you can at the lowest cost.

It was an important lesson that would stick with me and help make me a better photographer.

During the many years that I worked as a photojournalist, I developed the habit of taking time at the end of the year to look back and pull out my best work to enter into various contests. Now, as a full-time freelance and documentary photographer, I continue this practice, which gives me my contest entries, as well as a critical look back at the year that was. It’s kind of a photographic road map from which I can update my portfolio; track my progress and spot weaknesses that I can work to improve.

The merits of entering photography contests are often debated, but for many it’s a way to raise one’s profile and see the level of work that is out there, which can inspire and motivate. It’s a very subjective game, and even if you don’t get picked, at least your work will be seen by influential people on the jury of the competitions.

Aperture is a great tool for organizing and tracking your best work, making it easy to see all the 2006 images you gave the prestigious “five star” designation, for example. And because I know that at year’s end I will be going through this ritual, I make a separate album titled “Contests” as insurance, adding the keyword “contest” to those diamond images I think have a chance for glory at year’s end. This can save you an enormous amount of time accessing your year’s best work.

But the somewhat surprising and ultimately disappointing reality I find after completing this exercise, is that when I pulled out the best of my best from the year–those truly special, magical moments when something extraordinary happens in front of the camera; there were just not that many of them.

All the more reason I think, to make an effort to recognize “the magic”, when it happens during the shoot, to make sure you maximize the opportunity. The picture of the young boy with the painting will illustrate my point. It was taken in Krakow, Poland and I remember following the two boys each carrying a painting, with their Dad lagging behind. I have to say that I’m not unhappy with the resulting photograph, but the experience taught me a lesson.

Boy holds painting in Krakow, Poland. Next time I’ll keep shooting until the opportunity is gone. Copyright Steve Simon

When the boys turned the corner, and they were moving fairly quickly, I stopped and went the other way. Why did I stop? Well, I figured I had a decent image. But to this day, the fact that I didn’t continue following and shooting, nags at me and reminds me not to take anything for granted. I won’t give up on a moment, on a potential great photograph if I don’t have to, even if I think I may have it. I pledge to follow it through till it goes away, the light fades, the subjects are tired or the moment is gone. Photography is a passion and it’s fun, but I feel it’s important to push limits, work a little harder and see where it takes you. I didn’t have to stop when those kids turned the corner, and though I had taken a picture I thought I liked, the great photographs missed, I will never know.

As this is my first blog entry on the Inside Aperture, blog I’d like to use this first paragraph to let you know who I am and what I’m all about. My name is Allen Rockwell, I’m 43 years old and I’ve been taking photos most of my life. I am not a full time professional photographer, you might classify me as an “advanced amateur” or a “part-time professional”. I have a business that pays my bills and allows me to work on my photography either as a hobby or a part-time business. I rather like this arrangement and I think there are some full time pros out there that would probably prefer my situation. I’m an all-around technology geek and more often than not an early adopter to all new hardware and software. I’ve been using Aperture since the day it was released and have never looked back, I was running software update every few minutes on the day that Aperture 1.5 was released, I ordered my Intel MacBook Pro the day it was announced, I ordered my Canon 30D the day it was announced … you see where I’m going with this? … I like my tech toys. While Aperture is a “Pro App”, I hope to bring a sort of “regular guy’s view” of Aperture to this blog, I want to talk about how a semi-pro or an amateur uses Aperture and how it helps me with my digital workflow.

So, for this blog entry I thought I’d run through my workflow and describe how and why I do things the way I do. As I write this I am in the middle of shooting the ISA World Surfing Games at Huntington Beach California. The event is a nine day event and we are 5 days into the event. So as this is something I’m actually doing right now, I figure why not use it as an example.

There is no shortage of opinions about the fate of television - be it professionally created or user generated content (UGC.) Views range from the misguided “UGC has changed TV forever! Power to the People!” — to the pensive “TV ain’t what it used to be… where’s Milton Berle?… I want my MTV!” To say that the future lies somewhere in-between these two extremes is to say you’ve been resident on a dwarf planet for the past year. No one knows the future of television with any certainty. Period.

Online video has seen major changes since the appearance of inexpensive video editing tools in the hands of the common man. Some are even free to use online. And there are plenty of places to store your masterpiece. World-wide distribution of your “Citizen Kane” is inexpensive, and viewers need only a PC and broadband connection to experience your masterpiece. I won’t rehash what many have yarned endlessly in the past several months, re: the video aggregators such as YouTube and Grouper.

But, I do want to discuss the technology and some interesting products deployed for video. There are several online editing tools (checkout FORscene by Forbidden Technologies and try Jump Cut.) Some pretty darn good content too (Current TV .) Interesting technology such as Hypervideo (see View Magazine and the Economist article: From hypertext to hypervideo.) David Battino recently discussed a new product to cleanup of your consumer-grade, highly compressed video (see David’s blog: Amazing Video De-Grungelizer)

Still, what has really changed for the viewer? Be it PC or television, not much besides content: the few good shows on the web and this season’s wonderful television lineups and their on-line re-broadcasts. Hey. I’m pleased the TV networks have remembered that good content sells. But, the vast majority of online video, especially UGC, is ho-hum — why waste our precious time? Some would say that the advantage of online content is that you can view at your leisure. I contend we accomplished this capability in the 70s with the consumer video tape player and then the PVR of the 90s. There’s not much difference.

That gets me to the crux of this post. The US is in the midst of switching from analog to mandated high definition digital by 2009. But the technology to deliver and display isn’t all that new. MPEG2 has been around for a while. At least displays are becoming cheaper. What has technology done for us lately? Any new technology pushing the envelope to help creators tell a story in a different light?

What about interactive TV? BSkyB is a leading broadcaster of quality interactive TV programming and they are doing some cool things (check out their website.) Likewise in other parts of the world, interactive TV is still going strong. In the US, Dish Network deploys OpenTV interactive TV services and the major cable companies have iTV deployments coming out “soon.” (embarrassing that the US is behind in several deployments. We’ve been slow to adapt iTV that’s been around since the late 90s. We’ve been slower than some to adopt high-capacity broadband. Several countries already have fiber to the home. I know of only two deployments in the US.) But to answer my own question: I haven’t seen any top production companies utilize interactive TV to it’s fullest. Does Lost or 24 have iTV deployments?

Unfortunately, to take advantage of interactive TV on your television, consumers are bound by the use of a digital settop box. According to Larry Gerbrandt of Nielson Media Research, 66% of US households have cable but, of those, only 41% have digital cable. What’s that, about 29% of households that are capable of receiving iTV content? (I don’t know the numbers, but I bet a lot of those are the underpowered DCT2000. I’ll guess over 20 million.) That severely limits the possibility of interactive TV penetration. In contrast, Pew Internet & American Life Project reports 42% have broadband Internet connections, twice that of digital settop boxes. And WebsiteOptimization.com reports that of those US households that use the Internet, 70% are above dial-up speed today (which is not really “high-capacity broadband”.)

The TV networks know these stats very well. What are they doing to enhance video deployment technology on TV. Well… nothing that I’m aware of. It’s tough to change hardware in the field. What about the Internet? Ah… it’s easier to change software.

OK, let’s talk about the PC. Is there anything new here? Nothing earth shattering. What’s good is that more and more households are becoming broadband connected. Adobe Flash has given us the ability to jump. That’s cool. And, there are some good examples of it. The Indianapolis Museum (my hometown) has an interesting production on African Art. Weyth developed an interesting clip if you’re a women, and Philips if you’re a man. But, we still have linear video, there is little in the way of arbitrary interactive control.

What new technology will be embedded in the television in 5 or 10 years? It’ll be HDTV for certain and most likely have an RJ45 and an IP address. But, will it have the processing power to do anything cool? Will it have a PC built in? Will it download software? I’d like to hear your predictions for the future of television technology? Who’s innovating and moving beyond linear video? I’d like to know what’s going on out there!

Audioforce.net is a directory of free online audio-production tutorials. The external links call up everything from single-sentence tips to digitized magazine articles to movies.