Great New Portable Strobe Mods From David Honl!

Check this out!

I've been so busy getting my new Win Vista computer up to speed that I neglected to mention the great new products I just received from David Honl at HonlPhoto.Com. I was so excited when I received the package that I tore into the box like a kid at Christmas and unlike socks from grandma, these products did not disappoint! David sent me 4 items total, including his 8"regular speed snoot, the 5 inch "shorty" snoot, 1 speed gobo and the heart of the system, a rubberized Velcro speed strap that all the modifiers mount to. From the look of things, David has invested a lot of time and money into the craftsmanship and materials that go into each unit. Don't confuse these portable strobe mods for the cheap imported stuff you get at your local camera store, these babies are made to last! Pricing from $9.95 US ( Speed Strap) to $22.95 US for the 8 Inch Regular Snoot, puts these in the 'crazy affordable' price range. You might as well buy a set for each portable flash in your kit bag.

from his site:

"Put an end to rubber bands, tape or sticky residue from gluing Velcro to your expensive strobes. My Speed Strap fits any shoe-mount strobe unit, attaches and removes in seconds, and provides a large wraparound surface area to quickly attach gobos,bounce cards,barndoors, and snoots. Non-slip so it won't budge when attached." ...........'David Honl, WWW.HonlPhoto.Com'

Sometime soon, I will review the products in greater depth and put up some pics showing how I used each item. But for now, I must return to the war with my new Windows Vista operating system.

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VLUT In A Rut..." Windows Vista Is Killing My Calibration!"

Quick update:

Still in the death struggle with my Win Vista Home Premium OS. I have loaded, booted, rebooted, registry tweaked, downloaded and safe moded till my brain hurts. The good news is that I am winning the battle with my new operating system and I expect to be running at full steam by the middle of this week. With even more upgrades since my last post "Vista is a pain", such as a PCI Express raid controller for E - Sata and 2 new external Sata drives, I should have uber speed and storage to spare. It's possible that I might have to consult with Dr. Pimento to get the damn raid setup working properly, but when I do, the externals should access data as fast as my internal hard drives. Ain't that awesome!

Warning : Windows Vista will force unload your VLUT ( Video Look-up Table ) during boot up. This will generally happen after your color calibration has loaded and when the last start up program has come on line. Your screen will go from no color balance to proper color balance ( ICC profile, as determined by your calibration software : X-Rite, Monaco, Eye One etc... ) and then back to default windows color at the last second. This is frustrating as hell, but can be overcome. By dragging the monitor calibration shortcut in the Windows Start-Up-Folder to your desktop and executing it with a simple doubleclick, you can restore your perfectly calibrated ICC profile. This should stay in effect until your next system re-start or until your computer goes into Hibernation Mode. As a photographer using my PC for pre-press, I would suggest that you not use that feature ( Hibernation ) until Microsoft solves these problems. With any luck, I should have a registry tweak to fix or work-around this issue by the end of the week!

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Vista Is A Pain... But Not A Lost Cause...Yet!

Frustration!

My attempt at making Windows Vista run with the reliability of Win XP Pro is as of today an unfinished and not too certain experiment. I'll have to say, Bill Gates is kicking my ass at this point! With nearly every unneeded service and resource hogging application disabled or removed, I am still finding new bloat and processes that require battling on an hourly basis. Adding the long list of programs that won't yet work with Win Vista, Apples Quicktime as one example and the problem of installing software that hasn't yet passed the Microsuck seal of approval and you get a frustrating experience. If I thought that XP Pro SP2 had all the drivers to run my internal hardware, I would be burning the hardrive and performing a ritual curse on microsoft as we speak.

I've got to get this thing up to speed by the end of this weekend, Installing 2 extra Hard Drives, one 250 GB SATA as a scratch Disk for Photoshop, a 500 GB SATA Monster to hold the photoshop finals and a 3rd Gig of RAM. I will also be testing out the Ready Boost feature with an external 1 GB USB thumb drive for running background programs like antivirus, firewall etc...

If you see someone running wildly down your street carrying a large desktop, mumbling obscenities, it might not be me, but it's probably someone who's upgraded to Windows Vista!

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New Canons Trigger Expected Price Drop...5D Looking More Affordable!

Canon USA...where are those rebates?

Canon Europe is offering rebates on three of their top selling DSLR's, anywhere from 70 Euros for the 40D and 400D to a whopping 200 Euros for the EOS 5D. Purchasers can get a rebate check mailed to them from Canon or have their refund directly deposited into their bank accounts. For those of us not living in the land of wine and cheese, fish and chips, goulash etc... we'll just have to wait and see if Canon USA is going to give our bank accounts some love too.

Rumor has it that rebates are the first step in clearing out the inventory to make way for newer camera models. We've just seen the introduction of two great new Canon DSLR's, the EOS 1Ds Mark III and the very affordable EOS 40D. Speculation is growing on the possibility of an upgrade ( replacement ) for the full frame 12.8 Megapixel 5D, coming as soon as early February 2008! With the significant improvements implemented in the recently released Mark III and 40D, I can't imagine what digital goodness the folks at Canon are preparing for the highly regarded 5D. I just hope the damn thing has autofocus that really works!

P.S. If your gonna buy any new camera or photo equipment, please visit our friends at B&H Photo, via the Banner Ad link above this post. They are probably the largest and most trusted Photo / Video retailers in the world and no one has lower prices! 95 percent of my cameras and equipment have come from B&H for well over 20 years. Just click on the link and surf to find your next Canon or Nikon, strobes, digital media etc... and I will receive a big fat check that will help to support a starving family ( Not Really ) in Cary NC. I might even pay the occasional cell phone bill with the proceeds:)

COMING SOON: My update to Widows Vista...Stud or Dud!

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Windows Vista...Stud or Dud?

No time like the present!

Windows Vista...Stud or Dud? I still don't know the answer to that question, but I'm about to find out. My dependable Compaq, 2.8 GHz, 1 GB Ram enabled file muncher, has given up the ghost. After tens of thousands of raw files converted and countless hours of flawless photoshop actions, my CPU has taken an early retirement! I have been forced into one of the hardest purchase decisions in recent history, to Vista or not to Vista.

I have been dreading the moment that I would have to make the choice to give up my beloved Win XP Pro Corporate, which has been the most dependable operating system I have ever used. Not one blue screen of death or error message in nearly 2 1/2 years. It booted quickly, didn't fight with my Photoshop ram settings and raced through the Internet like a bullet. Win Xp never asked me any questions that I didn't know the answer too and pretty much kept to itself. I'm afraid that Windows Vista Home Premium isn't going to be so well behaved. I might have to take the digital scalpel to the registry and beat this OS into submission.

Here are the specs on my new desktop computer:

*AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 4400+2.30 GHz, 32 bit OS and 2 GB of DDR2 RAM

I'll keep you posted...

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Sony's OLED's To Replace LCD Technology?

Coming soon!

Sony Electronics will be offering television purchasing consumers a new technology this Christmas to compete with the LCD flat screen display. Organic light emitting diodes (OLED) are billed as having superior levels of contrast and brightness and an expanded range of color reproduction. Without the need for backlighting, the electroluminescent organic materials can be used to make thinner and lighter televisions and computer monitors. Manufacturing with OLEDs is said to be easier and less expensive than the competing process used to produce LCD displays, utilizing a technique similar to inkjet or screen printing to lay down the screen surface. With a touted contrast ratio in the 1,000,000 : 1 range and color reproduction unparalleled by LCD or even plasma display technology, the OLED option promises to be a big hit with consumers. Displays for graphic artists and photographers are rumored to be in the works!

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