List of bug fixes, including:
• Addresses several stability issues with VoiceOver
• Addresses a usability issue with VoiceOver and Genius Mixes
• Addresses issues with converting songs to 128 kbps AAC while syncing
• Addresses other issues that improve stability and performance
New features:
• Sync with iPad to enjoy your favorite music, movies, TV shows, books and more on the go
• Organize and sync books you've downloaded from iBooks on iPad or added to your iTunes library
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Can I have Facebook Like button?
Apparently it's just three lines of code inserted to you blog layout template.
<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == "item"'>
<iframe allowTransparency='true' expr:src='"http://www.facebook.com/plugins/like.php?href=" + data:post.url + "&layout=standard&show_faces=false&width=100&action=like&font=arial&colorscheme=light"' frameborder='0' scrolling='no' style='border:none; overflow:hidden; width:450px; height:40px;'/>
</b:if>
Monday, April 5, 2010
Timelapse video from images revisited.
After a number of trials described in my previous post on this subject I decided to purchase QuickTime Pro cause I could not find any decent free alternative. I am not saying it was wrong decision but for some reason my searches did not locate a great utility I am going to write about now. It is called Time Lapse Assembler. It free as a beer and quality is really great. Yes, it cannot handle TIFFs but if you got high quality JPEGs it should be all you need.
Features
Features
- Exports MPEG, H.264, and RAW movies
- Select between 15, 24, and 30 fps
- Allows resizing of finished movie
Monday, March 29, 2010
Mac OS X v10.6.3 Update
This is my first experience with major OS upgrade. I must say it went pretty smoothly on Mac. Update includes long list of security updates and many general operating system fixes and improvements.
General operating system updates (I am crossing out the ones that could not really make any different for me):
•performance of Logic Pro 9 and Main Stage 2 when running in 64-bit mode.
• printing reliability (nothing to report here, my printer got updates from Brother anyway).
• sleep and wake reliability when using Bonjour wake on demand (I haven't experienced any problems).
•a color issue in iMovie with HD content.
•glowing, stuck, or dark pixels when viewing video from the iMac (Late 2009) built-in iSight camera.
•an issue in which the Finder reports a -36 error when copying directories to a drive formatted as FAT32.
• reliability of photo screen savers.
•compatibility issues with OpenGL-based applications.
•an issue in which shadows in PDF of Aperture book are black instead of gray.
•an issue in which the microphone level in iChat may not increase the volume after reducing it to prevent a feedback event.
• the reliability of certain third-party USB devices (the only one which actually cause problems turned to be defective and I got it replaced by manufacturer).
•the Accounts preference pane can now limit login to members of groups hosted by a non-Apple directory service, such as Active Directory.
• DNS server ordering as specified in Network Preferences and DNS reliability.
• the reliability and compatibility of QuickTime X ( I am actually using it a lot so hopefully it got better).
• Data Collection: Mac OS X v10.6.3 can collect diagnostic and usage information from your Mac and send it to Apple for analysis automatically.
General operating system updates (I am crossing out the ones that could not really make any different for me):
•
• printing reliability (nothing to report here, my printer got updates from Brother anyway).
• sleep and wake reliability when using Bonjour wake on demand (I haven't experienced any problems).
•
•
•
• reliability of photo screen savers.
•
•
•
• the reliability of certain third-party USB devices (the only one which actually cause problems turned to be defective and I got it replaced by manufacturer).
•
• DNS server ordering as specified in Network Preferences and DNS reliability.
• the reliability and compatibility of QuickTime X ( I am actually using it a lot so hopefully it got better).
• Data Collection: Mac OS X v10.6.3 can collect diagnostic and usage information from your Mac and send it to Apple for analysis automatically.
Friday, March 26, 2010
Timelapse video from image sequence
On my Windows machine workflow was pretty simple I shoot images in sRaw2 mode frequent enough to get at least hundred. Then I converted to JPEG with 100% quality and size slightly larger than 1080p frame, usually 2000 px for larger side. I found great free software called PhotoLapse3
I tried to find free tool for Mac that would do the same with no luck. Most of programs, Gawker for example, can create timelapse video from webcam as a source but they cannot accept folder with images as input. This is not exactly what I need.
I was also Linux user for a while so I know that there are few command line media converters that do excellent video converting job. I decided to try if they can convert from images to video.
First, I tried mencoder.
I do not know which step I am doing wrong. Maybe because I am using JPEGs but as far as I know mencoder would not accept TIFFs as input. After all of this trials I gave up on ffmpeg. I think mencoder with libavcodec option is actually using ffmpeg. Also ffmpeg cannot handle wildcards for specifying input files. I do not like the idea of renaming files to have sequential numbers in file names.
It's just to much time consuming so maybe I need to pay and something easy to use? Again browsed thru many search pages, lloked at few apps I will not mention cause eventually all seems like a joke when compared to Apple's QuickTime Pro. For just $30 I got tool good enough to make me uninstall all free converters :-)
Let's see how it works with QuickTime Pro (I could actually use TIFFs a input).
I got professional quality video with just couple mouse clicks. I think it is worth all them money I spent.
I tried to find free tool for Mac that would do the same with no luck. Most of programs, Gawker for example, can create timelapse video from webcam as a source but they cannot accept folder with images as input. This is not exactly what I need.
I was also Linux user for a while so I know that there are few command line media converters that do excellent video converting job. I decided to try if they can convert from images to video.
First, I tried mencoder.
After playing with different settings, searching for answers on the net I was not able to find combination of parameters that would give me good enough quality. First example from mencoder documentation did not help. More detailed example of encoding with libavcodec did not help either.mencoder "mf://*.jpg" -mf fps=10 -o test.avi -ovc lavc -lavcopts vcodec=msmpeg4v2:vbitrate=800
I do not know which step I am doing wrong. Maybe because I am using JPEGs but as far as I know mencoder would not accept TIFFs as input. After all of this trials I gave up on ffmpeg. I think mencoder with libavcodec option is actually using ffmpeg. Also ffmpeg cannot handle wildcards for specifying input files. I do not like the idea of renaming files to have sequential numbers in file names.
ffmpeg -r 10 -b 1800 -i %d.jpg test.aviResults seem to be even worse than from previous attempt.
It's just to much time consuming so maybe I need to pay and something easy to use? Again browsed thru many search pages, lloked at few apps I will not mention cause eventually all seems like a joke when compared to Apple's QuickTime Pro. For just $30 I got tool good enough to make me uninstall all free converters :-)
Let's see how it works with QuickTime Pro (I could actually use TIFFs a input).
I got professional quality video with just couple mouse clicks. I think it is worth all them money I spent.
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Amazon releases Kindle Application for Mac
Amazon today announced Kindle for Mac a free application that lets readers around the world enjoy Kindle books on their Mac computers. Readers can take advantage of the following features:
- Purchase, download, and read hundreds of thousands of books available in the Kindle Store
- Access their library of previously purchased Kindle books stored on Amazon’s servers for free
- Choose from 10 different font sizes and adjust words per line
- Add and automatically synchronize bookmarks and last page read
- View notes and highlights marked on Kindle, Kindle DX, and Kindle for iPhone
- Read books in full color including children’s books, cookbooks, travel books and textbooks
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
3 months after the switch
I must admit that I am not missing any software I need and I am really glad to have everything I need on one machine instead of having some stuff done on one and have it copied back and fort to the other one.
Application | Mac | Windows | Linux | Comments |
Mozilla Firefox | Yes | Yes | Yes | I have been using Firefox before it got it's current name. Together with Mozilla Weave I can run same configuration on any platform it is suported |
Mozilla Thunderbird | Yes | Yes | Yes | I was running email client on Linux for years. It was Evolution before I switched to Thunderbird. |
Adobe Lightroom | Yes | Yes | No | My workhorse of image processing which was done mostly on my Windows laptop. Moving to Mac let me have it on the same machine I got everything else. |
Adobe Photoshop | Yes | Yes | No | I got Elements which does not contain Mac version so there was no way to install in on Mac. I got mac version of CS4. |
FileZilla | Yes | Yes | Yes | I was using FTP mostly on Linux sa that was best choice I could find. Likely it works on Mac. |
Vuze | Yes | Yes | Yes | Maybe KTorrent was lighter bittorrent client but there is no Mac version. |
VLC | Yes | Yes | Yes | Swiss army knife of media players that is not perfect but at least cross-platform. Native clients are sometimes better. |
MPlayer | Yes | Yes | Yes | That was my best player on Linux. I am not very impressed with Mac version but I can convert everything to mov format with ffmpeg. |
OpenOffice | Yes | Yes | Yes | Just to have something for opening Microsoft Office files before Google Docs era. |
Canon Utilities | Yes | Yes | No | Whatever comes with my camera usually got Mac version. |
MPEG Strimclip | Yes | Yes | No | Simple and efficient media converter |
MediaCoder | No | Yes | No | Partially works with Wine |
ffmpeg | Yes | Yes | Yes | Command line tool that can convert anything. |
DeepMeta | Yes | Yes | No | For now there are no signs that iStockphoto would ever support FTP upload like any other microstock agency. |
Garmin GPS software | Yes | Yes | No | Not that I have to use it every day but I might need update software on my GPS device |
Gisteq PhotoTrackr | Yes | Yes | No | GPS logger I am using. There is Mac version of sotware |
Google Earth | Yes | Yes | Yes | Nice thing that runs on 3 platform I have been using. |
Picasa | Yes | Yes | No | May work with Wine |
Photomatix Pro | Yes | Yes | No | Best HDR software |
Noise Ninja | Yes | Yes | No | My choice for noise reduction |
Genuine Fractals | Yes | Yes | No | Since I got 5Dmk2 I do not have a need to upsize images but I bought this software and it got Mac version. |
Turbo Tax | Yes | Yes | No | Read my tax return file generated on Windows. |
Skype | Yes | Yes | Yes | My connection with family on the other side of the globe. |
aMule | Yes | Yes | Yes | So far best eMule clone I have seen. |
sitecopy | Yes | Yes | Yes | Used for uploading images to multiple FTP servers |
K3b | No | No | Yes | I was pretty happy with it so I never looked for free burning software on Windows. Mac Burn does not impress me either. |
Kopete | No | No | Yes | Trillian works great on Windows, Kopete was my choice on Linux. On Mac I got Adium which does not support Gadu Gadu and beta version of Trillian. |
Amarok | No | No | Yes | I can leave with iTunes on both Mac and Windows |
huey Pro | Yes | Yes | No | Monitor color calibration tool for |
.NET | Yes | Yes | Yes | Mono is now supported. |
Visual Studio | No | Yes | No | MonoDevelop for C# development is OK. |
MAGIX Movie Edit Pro | No | Yes | No | As far as simple movie editor is concerned I did not go with Adobe Premiere Elements and I purchased MAGIX product. Now it is not supported on Mac. I need to learn iMovie. |
PtLensEdit | Yes | Yes | No | Great lens correction software. |
python | Yes | Yes | Yes | Nice scripting language |
VirtualBox | Yes | Yes | Yes | If needed I can run Windows or Linux in VM |
Zinio Reader | Yes | Yes | No | Got some magazine subscriptions in this format. Glad they created Mac version of their reader. |
Notepad++ | No | Yes | No | Runs under Wine but there are good replacements on Linux and Mac |
Eclipse | Yes | Yes | Yes | Best Java development IDE. |
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)