thomas fitzgerald.net

Even More Impressive iPad Magazine Mockup

thomasfitzgerald — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 22:39:50 +0000

Ok, I thought the wired one was cool, but this looks bloody amazing. If they can do this kind of thing in reality it will completely change the publishing industry.

(via Gizmodo)

Awesome Electronic version of Wired Magazine Demo

thomasfitzgerald — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 15:42:05 +0000

From the SXSW Conference, a demo of Wired’s reader App. This would make me want to get an iPad for this alone (yes, I know the demo is not done on an iPad).

Via 9-5 Mac

Canon 5D Mark II “Cinema” Firmware now Available

thomasfitzgerald — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 11:34:12 +0000

The much requested, often rumoured, previously promised firmware upgrade for the 5D Mark II is now available from the Canon website. From the release notes:

Firmware Version 2.0.3 incorporates five enhancements to the movie function and a fix to the manual sensor cleaning function of the EOS 5D Mark II camera.

Adds or changes the following movie frame rates.

NTSC:
1920×1080 : 30 fps (changed – actual 29.97 fps)
1920×1080 : 24 fps (added – actual 23.976 fps)
640×480 : 30 fps (changed – actual 29.97 fps)
PAL:
1920×1080 : 25 fps (added – actual 25.0 fps)
1920×1080 : 24 fps (added – actual 23.976 fps)
640×480 : 25 fps (added – actual 25.0 fps)

Adds a function for manually adjusting the sound recording level (64 levels).
Adds a histogram display (brightness or RGB) for shooting movies in manual exposure.
Adds shutter-priority AE mode (Tv) and aperture-priority AE (Av) mode to the exposure modes for shooting movies.
Changes the audio sampling frequency from 44.1 KHz to 48 KHz.
Fixes a phenomenon where communication between the camera and the attached lens is sometimes interrupted after manual sensor cleaning. (This phenomenon only affects units with Firmware Version 1.2.4.)

According to Philip Bloom, the update also ups the bit rate of video from 38mbits to around 44mbits. I’ll upgrade mine later today and give it a try if I get a chance. It will be great to have 25fps being from a PAL country.

Stargate Universe Second Half of Season 1 Trailer

thomasfitzgerald — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 19:50:05 +0000

This looks absolutely awesome… Related Posts Stargate Continuum Trailer Stargate Ark of Truth Trailer Toy Story 3 Trailer

Flash: King of the Impossible

thomasfitzgerald — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 09:14:35 +0000

Interesting article from Glenn Fleishman on Flash and the iPhone. Of particular interest is his point that Flash is unavailable on many other smartphone platforms and yet Adobe only loudly complains about the iPhone. It’s a good read. Related Posts Adobe begs Apple to allow Flash on iPhone, again Thoughts on Adobe’s Flash CS5 iPhone Announcements New York Times [...]

Mind Numbingly Stupid Comment of the Day

thomasfitzgerald — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 15:42:15 +0000

Slashdot links to an article by some android developer who claims that Android is actually a better development platform because it has Java. The idea of Java being a superior development environment than cocoa is bed enough, but the best bit comes from this statement:

While iPhone developers have found that one path to success is playing to our baser instincts (until Apple shuts them down), a number of Android applications are offering practical solutions that unlock the power of a phone that’s really a Unix machine you can slip into your pocket

What the ??? Are you kidding me? So, what you’re saying is that the only Apps on the iPhone are sex apps and only Android offers practical applications? Really? Is that really your best argument for the platform? The sad this is this guy probably believes that himself. What’s even scarier is some of the comments. Particularly those claiming that they “hate the iPhone” as some sort of badge of honour or acceptance requirement for commenting on the story. It never ceases to amaze me how many people resent the idea that Apple is or ever was successful. It’s actually kind of sad.

A Possible Fix for Some Aperture 3 Performance Issues

thomasfitzgerald — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 12:36:42 +0000

I’ve discovered a possible cause and solution to some of the speed issues people are having with Aperture. You can read about it on this post over at my new Aperture blog, called, funnily enough, “The Aperture Blog”. Related Posts Addressing some Aperture 3 Stability Issues About that “Aperture X” Rumour The Aperture Blog

Thoughts on the Apple HTC Lawsuit.

thomasfitzgerald — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 10:52:17 +0000

I’ve been reading a lot of negative comments about Apple’s decision to sue HTC over its patents. People like John Gruber and Will Shipley, vocal individuals in the mac community have come out strongly deriding Apple for what they claim is an affront to innovation. This move, it is argued, somehow tarnishes Apple’s image.

I have to strongly disagree with those who say that Apple defending its portfolio of patents is a bad move, or that it stifles competition. For too long Apple has been the main source of progress in much of the technology world. Other companies have thrashed around stale ideas until Apple comes out with something new and then everyone flocks to copy it. Hundreds of companies use Apple’s often game changing products as a basis for their own success and why shouldn’t Apple say “enough is enough”.

True, companies copy / burrow / steal ideas all the time, but no one gets ripped off so blatantly and so repeatedly as Apple does. Remember the iMac toaster and iMac kettles? How many companies rushed to create music stores after Apple came out with iTunes? How many iPod shuffle clones are out there? You can’t possibly look at an android phone and say it isn’t a blatant rip off of the iPhone. Yet people seem to think that Apple should just take the high ground and ignore what’s going on. The idea that this somehow stops other developments in the cellphone industry are just bull. Look at Windows Phone 7. This is a complete departure from the iPhone model. If Microsoft (of all companies) can be original why can’t others? Yet somehow by protecting the inventions that it has won patents for Apple is going to be the death of invention?

Nearly every day I read some headline about Apple being sued by this company or that company for patent infringements. Nobody says a word. And yet when Apple decides to enforce its own patents the company is declared as “evil” and that it’s “stifling innovation”. Why should Apple continue to let itself be used as the drawing board for other companies? How long should they let with others to come along, make a cheap knock off, add a few features and then have the technology blogs laud them for their “openness”. To go by what the people complaining about this suit are saying, there should be no patents at all, and that companies should be allowed free reign to rip off and copy left right and centre. It seems to me that their issues, are not with Apple but with the patent system in general. The consensus being that, despite every other company out there with major inventions defending their patents, Apple should somehow be better than that.

The root of all this stems from this constant image people seem to have of Apple as some charitable benefactor of good rather that what it actually is, a business. As I said earlier, other businesses defend their patents, then why shouldn’t Apple? It isn’t a religious organisation that puts the good of the world ahead of its own well being. It’s a company with shareholders and it’s made a business decision that many other companies have made in the past and many others will make in the future.

The other thing pundits don’t seem to be able to grasp is why they are suing HTC and not Google, when this is clearly aimed at Android. The answer is pretty simple. So simple, I’m baffled as to why so many smart people out there haven’t figured this out. Android is open source. While it’s primarily developed by Google, officially it’s developed by “the open handset alliance”. Google don’t actually make any products featuring Android. It’s up to individual manufacturers to implement Android as they see fit. HTC is the largest developer of Android phones, so this is why they’re going after them first. If Apple wins and get’s a precedence set, then everyone else who uses the same technologies won’t stand a chance. I think this needs to happen. Innovation in the market place needs to move away from companies waiting to see what Apple does and back to coming up with their own ideas. Innovation should not be who comes up with the best killer, but who comes up with something different all together. The world will be a better place when Apple isn’t the only company pushing the envelope on ideas. Perhaps this lawsuit will force other companies to get up off their proverbial behinds and start thinking for themselves.

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1000fps Pedigree Commercial

thomasfitzgerald — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 11:01:01 +0000

Check out this amazing commercial for pedigree, shot at 1000 frames per second on the Phantom. Related Posts Amazing Remote Controlled Underwater Enterprise First iPhone Commercial Airs New iPod Touch Commercial

Hairy Moment: Firewire 800 Failure on my iMac

thomasfitzgerald — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 16:23:44 +0000

I just had a tense few minutes a short while ago when I thought I’d lost the firewire 800 port on my iMac. I had pulled the computer towards me to plug back in the second monitor. When I did so it pulled the Firewire 800 cable out. There was a brief moment of worry as I the three drives I have connected to it disappeared off my desktop. That worry turned to panic when I couldn’t get them to reappear. I tried rebooting. I tried changing cables. You name it I tried it. I was beginning to think I might have done damage to the drives, but then it occurred to me to try a 400 to 800 cable. That worked so at least I knew my drives were ok. The problem was though, nothing would work with my Firewire 800 port.

Luckily a quick search on Google provided a solution. All you have to do is reset the system management chip. I guess the computer must go into some form of protection mode to prevent shorts. Anyway, on the iMac all you have to do is pull out the power cable (after it’s shut down of course) and hold the power button for 5 seconds. Plug it back in and hope for the best!

After I did that I think the boot up time was the longest I can ever remember but then I saw the lights flashing on my drives and I know that things were looking up. Once OS X had booted back up my drives appeared back on my desktop as if nothing had happened. It was a hairy moment but at least know I know what to do if that ever happens again. And now, so do you!