The sounds of Darren Aronofsky, including fantastic movies like Black Swan (2010), Requiem for a Dream (2000), Pi (1998), and The Fountain (2006). Simply brilliant.
The sounds of Darren Aronofsky, including fantastic movies like Black Swan (2010), Requiem for a Dream (2000), Pi (1998), and The Fountain (2006). Simply brilliant.
Understanding a camera’s burst rate is crucial for DSLR users in certain scenarios. For instance, a high burst rate is helpful for photographers who are shooting fast action, motion, or trying to capture a Henri Cartier-Bresson’s “decisive moment.”
A “burst rate” is the number of consecutive pictures that a camera can shoot continuously until the “busy” signal turns on. When your buffer memory is full, your camera will slow down (or even stop) shooting until the images transfer to the memory card.
The Canon EOS-1D X has the highest burst rate of any EOS Systems out now. A high burst rate is dependent on a number of factors including a large buffer, the camera’s “throughput” speed, the camera’s processing power, as well as the file type and size. To learn more, read this article from Canon’s Digital Learning Center, where we explain burst rates in-depth and compare different high-end systems. We also made this short video to illustrate the article.
For several weeks I’ve been seriously thinking about our education system, and today I’d like to share my ideas on the subject.
The current education system is broken, outdated, and, dare I say it—dangerous. How did we arrive at this point, and what can we do to remedy the situation? Let’s start by answering this question: why are things such a mess? I believe the system we have today is structurally the same exact system that our parents, and in some instances, even our grandparents experienced.
The egalitarian arrangement of the system is chiefly designed to mass produce factory workers. Uniforms, bells, 2B pencils, standardized tests and textbooks, and strict schedules prepare kids to follow the same rules after graduation—memorize what’s important, don’t think deeply, obey the rules, don’t question authority, work hard, and follow the clear and designated path, in order to be rewarded with a raise, a promotion, and, finally, a decent retirement.
You may be inclined to ask “What’s wrong with this set up?” I believe that the educational model no longer takes into account the reality of post-educational life. How many students finishing college right now will have a job waiting for them? And, of the lucky ones landing a paying job, how many have a clear and relatively safe career path until retirement? We are told a degree is a must. Why? Most of us will work for small business or as freelancers from now on. Did you know that 15% of parking lot attendants have B.A. degrees?
I can remember my father buying IBM shares for a fairly consistent annual return. If today the price keeps going up, but the return is uncertain until the end of the year, would you buy IBM? I certainly would not. Now replace IBM shares for “college education” and annual return for “jobs” and this is exactly the situation we are facing today. Only 49% of graduates from the classes of 2009 to 2011 had found a full-time job within a year of finishing school, compared with 73% for students who graduated in the three years prior.
Click to continue (more…)
My hotel view in Savannah, GA, where I attended the super awesome Silver&Ink event. I took a gazillion of images of the window with my phone, but for some reason my favorite was this one, the very first I took.
Last week I attended the Silver & Ink event at the Savannah College of Art and Design. I was invited to see the graduate students’ work, teach a video class, speak at a “business of photography” panel discussion, review undergraduate and graduate portfolios, discuss technology trends with faculty, exchange my views about the future of photography with career advisors, and attend a stunning art opening. Among the many questions I received, there were two particular questions that were asked many times over—and I could sense a mix of fear and excitement in those who asked these questions.
The answer is really simple: access to more future opportunities. According to careerinfonet.org there is a better than average annual growth in job openings for photographers, yet video editors, as well as audio and video technicians make significantly more money—either through an hourly wage (freelance) or yearly salary (part– and full-time employment).
I compared national averages with New York state averages, and the results are pretty clear.
In New York, video editors can make from $35,000 to $102,000 per year. Photographers make from $18,000 up to $81,000. As you can see, salaries for audio and video equipment technicians fall right in between the salaries of photographers and video editors
I personally know very few photographers at the high-end of the spectrum, but I know of several video editors who make a lot more than $100K.
What about employment growth?
Serendipity: noun; the occurrence and development of events by chance in a happy or beneficial way.
One of the many super cool boutique hotels in New York City, the “Dream Hotel” is located “between the hip, cool Meatpacking District and chic, charming Chelsea.” According to its website the hotel offers a “new experience in full-service luxury travel, complete with deluxe amenities and unique dining options.”
I wouldn’t know, since I’m pretty sure I could’t even afford breakfast there. I just like the façade.
A few days ago Canon confirmed the light leak issue in the 5D Mark III: “In extremely dark environments, if the LCD panel illuminates, the displayed exposure value may change as a result of the AE sensor’s detection of light from the LCD panel. Canon is now examining the countermeasures and once the countermeasures are decided, we will post the information on our Web site.”
This issue is somewhat serious because I doubt it can be fixed via firmware. It is unclear right now if it is affecting the entire production (which would be a major design flaw) or a localized manufacturing problem. Some dealers are reporting that shipments to Canada and the UK have stopped in the past few days, which seems to be either a recall or that Canon is being extra careful.
In reality, the leak will change about 1/3 of a stop from what the camera considers the “proper” exposure. With the high dynamic range that RAW files deliver nowadays I believe the issue is being push a bit too far. Of course I’d be pissed paying $3,500 for a camera with issues, but technically speaking, I would not stop using it if I had it.
UPDATED: Yesterday Canon had this to say:
“Based on the results of extensive testing this change in exposure value will not noticeably affect the captured image. Affected Product Canon EOS 5D Mark III Digital SLR Cameras whose sixth digit in the serial number is 1 or 2 are affected.
For example,“xxxxx1xxxxxx” or “xxxxx2xxxxxx” ([x] represents any optional number.)”click here to keep reading (more…)
After years and years of false rumors, today Google has finally announced Google Drive.
Why is this so cool, you might ask. Well, so it happens that you get 5GB for free and you can get up to 100GB. Dropbox offers only 2GB for free. Is that enough to switch? Let’s see what Google has to say about the new service:
- Create and collaborate. Google Docs is built right into Google Drive, so you can work with others in real-time on documents, spreadsheets and presentations. Once you choose to share content with others, you can add and reply to comments on anything (PDF, image, video file, etc.) and receive notifications when other people comment on shared items.
- Store everything safely and access it anywhere (especially while on the go). All your stuff is just… there. You can access your stuff from anywhere—on the web, in your home, at the office, while running errands and from all of your devices.
- Search everything. Search by keyword and filter by file type, owner and more. Drive can even recognize text in scanned documents using Optical Character Recognition (OCR) technology. Let’s say you upload a scanned image of an old newspaper clipping. You can search for a word from the text of the actual article. We also use image recognition so that if you drag and drop photos from your Grand Canyon trip into Drive, you can later search for [grand canyon] and photos of its gorges should pop up. This technology is still in its early stages, and we expect it to get better over time.
I just installed Drive on Mac, my Android tablet and my Android phone and everything is working REALLY smoothly. A PC version is already available, and Google says that the iOS version will be “coming soon.” You can download the app here and here.
I have been using Dropbox for a long time and I’ve been pretty happy. But it only gets you 2GB for free, the system is confusing for most people who move the file thinking that they are copying it, the notification system (when someone adds or removes an item) sucks and does not have OCR technology.
click here to keep reading (more…)
• Blackmagic announced a hard-to-believe camera featuring a 2.5K image sensor, 13 stops of dynamic range, built-in SSD recorder, popular open standard uncompressed RAW and compressed file formats, compatibility with quality EF and ZF mount lenses, and LCD touchscreen monitoring.
• Autodesk announced Smoke 2013 for the Mac, a new version of what the company is now calling video editing software and at users of Apple’s Final Cut Pro or Avid Media Composer who want high-end editing and finishing tools in one app. The new price is “only” $3495, down from $14,995 for the 2012 version.
• Adobe Premiere Pro CS6 is out with and enhanced 64-bit playback engine that can handle 5K resolutions, and higher, new trimming options, compatibility with Mac touchpad gestures, a Warp Stabilizer that was previously confined to After Effects, and expanded multicam editing for more than four cameras. Taking a page from its sister app, “the audio oriented Audition, Premiere Pro CS6 offers a redesigned and more functional audio mixer. Adobe also introduced SpeedGrade, a film finishing and color grading app, and Prelude, for ingesting, logging, and transcoding.
• Panasonic announced a bittersweet firmware update for the AG-AF100 that provides 1080 50p and 60p modes. That’s the sweet part. The bitter? They want users to pay $300 for the upgrade.
Panasonic AF0100
• Canon announced the 1D C ($15,000), which has the same chassis and still shooting features of the EOS-1D X ($6,800), and captures 4096 x 2160 8-bit 4:2:2 video to a CF card at 24 fps. Unlike the X, the C swaps a headphone jack for the X’s PC sync.
• The higher-end Canon EOS C500 ($30,000) offers the same ISO range as the C300 (320–20,000) and requires a dedicated external recorder, but captures in two full-RAW flavors: 4096 x 2960 (for motion picture), and 3840 x 2160 (for 4K TV). Both of these modes offer 10-bit 4:4:4 at 60 frames-per-second. There are two additional RAW option, 4096 x 1080 or 3840 x 1080 resolutions, which are also 10-bit 4:4:4, but at 120 fps. The camera also offers
By popular demand, here’s the easiest way to tell if your Mac has a 32-bit or a 64-bit processor:
Step 1: Click on the Apple icon in the upper-left menu bar of your screen
Step 2:Click on “More Info”
Step 3:Under the “Hardware” section, locate the “Processor Name”
Step 4: Find your Processor on this chart to determine whether your Mac has a 32-bit or 64-bit processor.
Yay! We got a winner! Easy, right?
View Calendar
✔ Subscribe
Add to Google
Subscribe to entries
Subscribe to comments
All content © 2012 by Eduardo Angel
