jhofker on tumblr05/10/2008
Fall
Fall colors are starting to come in nicely up here. Here’s a few shots I took as I was leaving work.
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30/09/2008
Hydrant (via flickr)
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19/09/2008
What do you think of the new ads?
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09/09/2008
Microsoft's New Ads: An Explanation
A lot of people don’t “get” the whole ad thing. The best explanation I’ve seen was a comment on Mary Jo Foley’s blog:“It was filled with irony, which is why most commentators on here missed it. You have these two super rich dudes buying shoes at a discount shoe place. Seinfeld turning out to be an expert about the inconsequential, how to fit shoes - remember, he was the guy with the show about nothing.
Gates using his mug shot was a bit of self-deprication. The humour is high brow and subtle. The Spanish people not commenting on Gates and Seinfeld, but knowing the model of the shoe.
The “pitch” comes at the end. Seinfeld takes a Trek-Geek shot at Gates about mind-melding and asks when Microsoft is going to come out with something that has all those “comfort” features. And Gates says they already have and they go to the Windows logo - which is one of the top five most recogniseable logos in the world.
The message is that Windows is “comfort food”. Cakey, delicious, goodness. The subtlety again is that they don’t have to take shots at the competition - chocolate cake doesn’t taste any better because its not vanilla.
Is it a bit to high brow and weird, a little. But it is good fun when you watch it for what it is and not expecting it to be a Jerry Seinfeld monologue, a Windows ad or a shot at the Mac/PC Guy ads. “
Now, there’s no way I could have ever explained that, but I definitely liked the ad.
Text posted at 09:27 - Comments (View)
03/09/2008
![Does anyone know how to get this effect? blows me away every time… [Page 2]: Retouching Forum: Digital Photography Review
Steps:
1) If you’re converting from RAW, choose a warm toned WB before heading into Photoshop.
2) Use your favorite selection method to select your subjects, and save your selection to be used later. With the figures selected, make a new levels adjustment layer. don’t adjust it-just click OK, then switch the blend mode to soft light, and lower the opacity to 50%
3) Make a new solid color fill layer. Choose Color: None, and click OK. In the color-chooser, fill in the values R84, G66, B4. Click OK, then switch the blend mode to Hue.
4) Make a selective color adjustment layer. Choose Colors: Neutrals, and set yellow at 39% and cyan to -8%.
5) Make a new color balance adjustment layer. Set midtones to 0 -7 and -13. Then select the highlights and set them to 0, 0, and -3.
6) Make another levels adjustment layer. choose the blue channel, and change the output level to 200 from 255.
7) Make a new blank layer and load the selections of your figures. Fill the selections with black, change the blend mode to Coor, and dial your opacity down to 50%. This will let your figures pop out from the golden background.
8) If the intensity of the gold tone is overpowering, just lower the opacity of your adjustment layers until your picture seems natural enough.](http://data.tumblr.com/HDX1GxDzTdfonslvG3TdNsGy_500.jpg)
Steps:
1) If you’re converting from RAW, choose a warm toned WB before heading into Photoshop.
2) Use your favorite selection method to select your subjects, and save your selection to be used later. With the figures selected, make a new levels adjustment layer. don’t adjust it-just click OK, then switch the blend mode to soft light, and lower the opacity to 50%
3) Make a new solid color fill layer. Choose Color: None, and click OK. In the color-chooser, fill in the values R84, G66, B4. Click OK, then switch the blend mode to Hue.
4) Make a selective color adjustment layer. Choose Colors: Neutrals, and set yellow at 39% and cyan to -8%.
5) Make a new color balance adjustment layer. Set midtones to 0 -7 and -13. Then select the highlights and set them to 0, 0, and -3.
6) Make another levels adjustment layer. choose the blue channel, and change the output level to 200 from 255.
7) Make a new blank layer and load the selections of your figures. Fill the selections with black, change the blend mode to Coor, and dial your opacity down to 50%. This will let your figures pop out from the golden background.
8) If the intensity of the gold tone is overpowering, just lower the opacity of your adjustment layers until your picture seems natural enough.
Photo posted at 11:03 - Comments (View)
08/08/2008
Smugbook
Have Facebook? Have SmugMug? Do you want to escape the walled garden of Facebook with your photos? Try Smugbook.
This is a “preview” release of an app developed by Nate Henderson and me. It quickly walks you through the process of connecting to Facebook and SmugMug to copy all of your photos over, while keeping your albums intact.
Want to give it a try? Download it here. There’s no installer right now, just extract the folder and run the application. Keep in mind that this is an early version and most likely has bugs and may even be visually unsatisfying.
Please let us know what you think in the comments!
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05/08/2008
Virtual Earth ASP.NET Control - CTP Release | Mark Brown | Channel 9
Where was this a year ago? Looks great and I’m glad it’s finally out.
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Empire. I’m really happy to try over and over to take my own picture.
Photo posted at 09:52 - Comments (View)
31/07/2008
Wow, thanks USPS and Amazon! My package was only delivered 8 days late! Don’t worry, it didn’t look mangled at all! Reinforced plastic strips to hold it together are great!
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29/07/2008
Bennigan’s shuts doors without notice - FriendFeed
Whoa, no wonder they suddenly packed up and shut down their Fargo location.
Photo posted at 11:51 - Comments (View)