Monday 31 March 2008

My problem with Facebook

Surely it wouldn't bee too difficult to send all taggings or anything else that warrants an email notification at once, when a person leaves an application, or signs out?

Maybe one email containing a list of things that have happened?

Instead, I get this:


I'm sure with the many thousands of Facebook developers that there are out there that this kind of problem could be avoided.

Anyone fancy a go? I dare you.

Please?

Friday 28 March 2008

The reach into the past

New technologies are not exclusively applicable to our future, but also to our past. In fact, not even new technologies are necessary for this, just new applications of technologies that have been widespread for many years.

A piece of paper covered with soot from an oil lamp doesn't sound too interesting. Maybe drawing a kind of simple stylus across it with the intent of attempting a visual analysis of sound is of more interest.

Of course, at the time the idea that the tracks left by the stylus would be of any use other than visual reference probably didn't even enter the mind of Édouard-Léon Scott de Martinville.

At that time, the idea of recording and replaying sound was totally alien to people. There were no MP3 players, no CDs, no vinyl records. Even Thomas Edison's wax cylinders were around two decades away, so the ideas that the pieces of paper had even captured the sound, or were able to reproduce it, were probably beyond the imagination of
Édouard-Léon.

The thing that strikes me is that we have used technology — not even particularly cutting edge technology — to create a link to an event in the past which previously had not remotely occurred to us. How far can this process go? It was sheer coincidence in this case that the (I don't want to call it a recording, because that was never the intention) experiment took place in such a specialised manner, but given recent (and explosive) advances in nanotechnology and computing power, what other analytic methods will we be able to wield in future to probe greater treasures in artefacts of similar age or even further back into human history?

Wednesday 26 March 2008

CAPTCHA helping the Next Generation

A while ago, I posted about CAPTCHA and how it would allow computers to understand written text and begin the process of machines being able to contextualise and 'understand' written text.

Well, it turns out that CAPTCHA is way ahead of me.

I didn't know this, but every time you submit a correct answer to any CAPTCHA challenge, you are actually telling the CAPTCHA database how to read the very text you've just been challenged with.

It seems that the challenges are taken from texts that were written before the advent of computers (if anyone can remember that far back...) and are used in the challenges to first of all, prevent machines from subscribing to web services such as email and profiles with the intention of spamming people from the accounts they create, but — and this is the interesting bit — the challenges are also used to verify single words scanned from texts which are difficult for machines to read.

In effect, every time you succesfully respond to a CAPTCHA challenge, you're making it more difficult for future web users to sign up to these services because, by the time CAPTCHA has 'solved' the problem of reading difficult to read text, the future challenges will become ever more difficult as the — self-taught — machines will be able to solve these challenges more readily.

That's the key phrase, here: self-taught.

So, if you want to be part of the future web, you'd better visit your library and dig out some old texts to brush up on your reading skills. The CAPTCHA computer database is...

Saturday 22 March 2008

Dunkable biscuits

Always beware of biscuits which, after having been dunked, absorb the drop of tea (or coffee. They're not fussy) which forms, clinging, to their lowest point.

  • You will go through an entire packet in a single sitting
  • They are prone to disintegrating
  • They will leave a puddle of scum in the bottom of your cup.
You have been warned.

Wednesday 19 March 2008

"...for every man who has ever lived,

...in this universe, there shines a star."

Epic though Stanley Kubrick's masterpiece '2001: A Space Odyssey' was, it would never have grown without the wonderful mind of Arthur C. Clarke.

The seed, his original short story, 'The Sentinel', was to evolve into a compelling story detailing mankind's desire to discover as much about this universe as was physically possible, and of the enduring goals, challenges and tragedies of our future history.

The movie had an almost overwhelming effect on me when I first watched it. Frightening, awesome, challenging and rewarding, it is a remarkable piece of filmmaking by a man who so obviously had a close, genuinely constructive relationship with its author.

The book is a startling exploration of humanity and its place in the universe and communicates to the reader ideas which may seem difficult to embrace, but which would be impossible to dismiss.

Not that I would want to. The truth, as always, will be far stranger.

Arthur C. Clarke, thank you.

Wednesday 12 March 2008

Urban. Photographers. One or the other...

Urban Photographers are of a kind, like Lifestyle Coaches, who seem to justify their 'art' solely to their peers.

Don't get me wrong, anyone with a camera has the potential to be the voice of global society given the opportunity. That, of course, is a good thing.

The ones that wind me up, though, are those with a little more time and technology on their hands than they apparently know what to do with.

Second hand
graffiti savagely exposing social truths, humour derived from the decontextualisation of street signage and visual allusions to a paranoid political commentary.

Just stop it. Most of these images are really only going to mean anything to people who are actually there.

Nice composition, good lighting, focussing really picks out the 'A' in 'MIND YOUR HEAD'. Seriously? I know it's the Internet, but that's no excuse for derivative.

There is a statue of William Wallace on Union Street in Aberdeen. Below it, a plaque tells the story of a man who fought for his country. Besides documentary evidence, a photo of this plaque would not do the monument or the location any emotional justice.

To understand its story and what it means to the people who live with it every day, you have to appreciate the time and the place of the subject. Taking a snapshot of it and posting it on the Internet may elevate it to the realms of culture, but never art.

That's that dealt with. I'm off to icanhascheezburger...

Tuesday 11 March 2008

HDR Images. The easy way.

I've read quite a bit about HDR (High Dynamic Range) imaging recently. Up until now, my stock method of producing good, wide exposure photographs was to shoot three images, each a stop apart. Typically, I would then take the darkest of the images and the lightest of the images and use a faded composite to allow a nicely exposed sky to show through above a nicely exposed landscape.

All good, but what about where there are details in the foreground that are lighter? Or where the line between land and sky is not even roughly straight? How do you draw the line between the different exposures?

Well, after looking around and finding lots of tutorials about HDR images I decided to have a go at developing (pun not intended) my own technique.

Using Photoshop, I have been able to easily blend the darkest exposure with the lightest exposure and get Photoshop to do the difficult bit of deciding which bits of each image should show through to produce a final, wide-exposure image.

The first steps to producing an HDR image are getting (in my case) three different exposures. Some folks might use five, seven or even more different exposures but my technique hasn't developed that far yet.

However you do it, ensure that it is the exposure time you use to control the exposures as the aperture obviously has an effect on depth of field and can have some odd side effects when it comes to blending your final images. Although this could be interesting...

Anyway, you will typically have three exposures:

  • A sky exposure. This means that the sky looks really good with lots of cloud detail, but the landscape looks dark or even black.
  • A land exposure. This is where the landscape is well exposed, the grass is good and green but the sky is washed out or even white.
  • A middle, or 'correct' exposure. The land and sky will ultimately be a compromise and will probably look weak and washed out.
Open Photoshop and load up your three images. You will need to organise them into layers, with your darkest exposure on top, your middle exposure in the middle and your lightest exposure at the bottom.

Obviously you used a tripod to take the three separate exposures. If you didn't, go get one and start again.

Your three layers will be lined up, pixel perfect. Now for the magic.

Your top layer, change its blend mode to Screen.
Your middle layer, change its blend mode to Multiply.
Your bottom layer, change nothing.

Yep, it looks a pretty mess. However, now the really clever bit. The middle layer is about to work as a kind of mask, allowing the dark bits from the lightest exposure to show through to the middle layer, and allowing the top layer to show its lightest exposure over the middle layer. We do this by doing two things to the middle layer.

First, we desaturate it because we already have all the colour information we need in the darkest and lightest exposures (the top and bottom layers).

Next, we invert it. This has the effect (because it is 'Multiplied' with the bottom layer) of darkening the light parts of the bottom layer. The top layer, being 'Screened', will add its light areas to the Multiplied bottom layers.

The result? See for yourself:



Not the most attractive image, I hope you'll agree, but it does show a wider range of exposures than certainly my camera is capable of.

The image does show a lack of contrast, but I think I can overcome that with some judicious leveling of the light and dark exposures.

I'll be perfecting this technique over the coming weeks and hope to have some better images to show you.

Friday 7 March 2008

The Unconstitutional State of America

It seems you can fight for your country but only as long as you are Christian.

If you are Atheist, you will apparently be prevented from advancing through the ranks on the grounds that you may not be that good of a leader despite the fact that — in my opinion — a person devoid of any religious prejudice would be in a better position to lead.

The American Constitution was formed and signed by people who agreed that the way forward was to allow individuals the freedom of speech, expression and belief. The text of the First Amendment goes like this:

"
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

Apparently in the current global political climate, democracy is once again being allowed to destroy the rights and beliefs of an individual.

Spc. Jeremy Hall was allegedly denied his Constitutional Right to freely discuss Atheism while on duty in Iraq and it appears his promotional prospects have been adversely affected because of his beliefs.

Now, I can understand how this has come about, and how difficult under the circumstances it must be to deal with. Soldiers in combat must do whatever it takes personally in order to justify killing people and they must believe they are right to do so. That must be extremely difficult.

But an attempt to prevent someone from using their own justification and beliefs is commonly called bigotry.

The problem as I see it is not between Jeremy Hall and his superiors. Rather it is in allowing Atheists into that situation. There is a choice to be made:

Either allow and support people with no beliefs as you do people with beliefs;

or

Decide that — as a nation — you are not happy having your society split in this way and extradite all the Atheists.
Or Christians. Or Scientologists. Or Muslims. Or Jews. Or Buddhists. Or Rastafarians. Or Hindus. Or Sikhs. Or Zoroastrians. Or Taoists.

I could go on all day, but that's it. That's all you have to do. You really can't have a free and open society on the one hand, when it comes to someone being productive and making money for you and then — in the next breath — tell someone that they don't live in a free and open society and that they must submit to your beliefs and deny them their own.

There. I've said it.