Depth of Field
Depth of field is easy with a film camera and a fast prime lens, and tricky to get with digital cameras – most have small image sensors, slow zoom lenses and image stabilization. One of the reasons I bought my Pentax MX-1 was that it has a large, relatively fast (f/2.8) zoom lens and a larger sensor than my trusty point-and-shoot digital camera. Shots like this show how close digital has come to film photography. I’m still not ready to get rid of the case of film in my freezer, though…
Stanley Kubrick’s Vision
(Stanley Kubrick/Look/Museum of the City of New York)
Before Stanley Kubrick became a great director, he was an accomplished photographer. He sold his first photograph to Look magazine when he was 17, and sold 30 assignments to the magazine by 1951.
There’s a great article here regarding his early work.
[via timeline.com]
Virtual Scarcity
Remember Second Life? Apparently the world will be filled with dormant rabbits now that their DRMed virtual food supply will be shut down after a legal battle.
The rabbits aren’t dead, they simply can’t wake up without their DRMed virtual food.
Ozimals are a brand of “breedable” animals in the Second Life universe, players buy an egg with the hopes of getting an artificially scarce, rare version. In the case of Ozimals, they’re fed a DRM-protected virtual food (reminiscent of a William Gibson novel)
The Latest Google Phishing Scam
Here is a great summary of the latest Google phishing scam. In a nutshell,
You get an email from a friend asking you to look at a Google Doc. When you click yes, Google Docs asks for permission to your account, including the permission to see and manage your email, as well as your contact lists. So far, you’re fine, but the second you click that button, your account will send out messages to all of your contacts with a link similar to the one you got in an attempt to spread itself further. Then it disappears. It even deletes itself from your account, having squirreled away plenty of your data no doubt.
Microsoft Office 365 changes will lock out perpetual users
According to Microsoft, versions of Office no longer on mainstream support will be blocked from accessing Microsoft business online services like Onedrive for Business, Skype for Business and Exchange mailboxes hosted on Office 365.
This means that all perpetually-licensed office applications will lose the ability to interact with Microsoft online services by Oct. 13, 2020.
Microsoft explains the change in this blog post.
Nonda Smart Car Charger
I received a nonda 30W Quick Charge 2.0 Smart Car Charger today. It’s an interesting concept; in a small form-factor Quick Charge 2.0 compatible car charger, it includes a battery monitor and Bluetooth car locator. Apparently it’s tracking your car’s location and when you stop, puts a marker down that you can use to trace a path back to your car.
Installation is easy – download an app, create an account, let the app look for the charger, let them sync and you’re done. All you need to do at this point is log all of your location data with another company who can track all of your car trips including location, mileage, speed (based on GPS data) and time. How could that be any problem?