Category: Photography (Page 4 of 12)

The Nikon CoolPix gave up the ghost, as noted previously, and for a while I didn’t think I’d bother replacing it. I don’t take many pictures, after all.

And yet. And yet.

I researched my options for a “bridge” camera, which is apparently the common term now for a device that’s not merely a point-and-shoot, but not a full DSLR or mirrorless body rig. In other words, a bridge camera is a fancy point-and-shoot. I avoided the Nikon brand, because that “take a picture, then vaporlock” bug seems to show up in several of their bridge-range models. Yuck. One particular model seemed to hit the sweet spot of being moderately well-reviewed (considering it’s a budget camera) and staying below my desired price threshold. And this week, after what’s been an absolute bastard of a month, I went ahead and ordered one.

My new piece of shutterbug gear is the Panasonic Lumix DC-FZ80, which came in at a bit under three hundred bucks (on sale).

Here’s the first pic taken with it, just a few minutes ago:

My first few shots show that I’ll be fighting against a certain amount of graininess, but thanks to my research I knew that before making my purchase. (The amount of money required to escape certain problems is… more than I’m willing to part with.) What’s definitely missing is the Nikon’s weird feather-shaped smudges when you zoom in on the image file. I was worried that those smudges were going to be common to all image-stabilization algorithms. Apparently, no, just the CoolPix has that bizarre quirk.

Hopefully I can dial in a combination of ISO (to reduce grain) and aperture (for depth of field) that gets me the kind of results I want on this new rig. Then… it’ll be time to (re)start the Rubber Duck Image Gallery Project!

Huzzah!

Instead of focusing on three dimensional digital fakery, I decided on my recent vacation to spend some time focusing on three dimensional edible foodstuffs. That’s right, it was time to try my hand again at making fresh homemade bread. I used a different recipe (sorry, “formula”) from The Bread Baker’s Apprentice, my guiding tome. Lesson learned from the first go-around: Don’t be so knead-y.

Here’s how that panned out.

Ingredients: Assemble!

I started at six thirty in the morning on the last day of my vacation, the day after the DST change no less, because I had a movie I wanted to see shortly after noon. A madman I may be, but I’ve always worked best to a deadline.

Last time, my inaugural breadmaking foray, I over-kneaded the dough and it was a bit dry besides, so the final product came out a bit on the dense side. I did not make that mistake again, though I overbalanced a bit and ended up with too sticky of dough for a while. Luckily when I added some flour to fix the consistency I didn’t go overboard.

Arise, my doughy mass, arise!

One nice thing about this hobby is that a large percentage of the time spent making bread involves waiting for proofing (rising) stages to complete. This meant that I could read, goof off a bit, and take care of other chores.

One of the minor miracles of this project? I managed to get a nearly even split of the dough into two loaves.

That (somewhat blurry) photo above shows another of the problems with this attempt: The instructions call for spraying oil lightly atop the loaves, but all I had available was a silicone brush so there’s a fair bit more oil on those things than actually intended. Whoops.

Two plain loaves of boring white bread, but they’re MY plain loaves of boring white bread. I did that!

I can’t complain about the results, though. Not one bit.

Lessons learned from this go-around: Get an oil misting bottle instead of using a brush, and have a small amount of flour and water on hand during kneading in case things get too sticky or too dry, respectively. Other than that? All’s well that ends deliciously.

I meant to get a couple more posts out last month. Clearly that didn’t happen. I blame the stomach bug, the weird work stuff, the weather, and a solid week where I didn’t want to do much of anything at all of any kind.

On the upside, I did make a loaf of bread all on my own. I set a goal late last year of doing something about my interest in learning to make my own bread, and here we are:

Letting it sit for an hour to cool was torture, let me tell you. I wanted to chow down IMMEDIATELY.

It turned out okay, albeit a bit dense because I accidentally did a bit more kneading than intended. Not bad for a first try, though. We had that thing devoured within 24 hours. For instance, it made a helluva grilled cheese sammich:

Apologies for the blurry photo, I’m still a lousy photographer.

Seriously, that was the high point of the month. On the Blender side, I learned to make a snowflake and took notes on how to do things like animated fireworks and so on. There’s a project coming, I’m just not yet certain the shape and scope of it yet. News to follow once there is some.

I also got around to assembling the two Nanoblocks Pokémon kits gifted to me over the last year or so, a Vaporeon and an Eevee. Immediately afterward I insisted that nobody buy me any more Nanoblocks kits. There are simply too many small fiddly bits for my hands and eyesight to manage. Ugh.

These Nanoblock builds are not even remotely sturdy, with some bits hanging on by one lone post. Ugh.

Other than that, I’m just keeping on keeping on. I have a book review and two music reviews to get out there; look for those in the relatively near future.