All posts by John Aldred

Senior editor at DIYPhotography.net, ASUS Brand Ambassador, photographer and geek.

Moving Linux to Smaller SD Cards

February 19, 2014 John Aldred Leave a comment

SD cards are pretty cheap these days, but that doesn’t mean we should let our smaller ones go to waste, especially when a system doesn’t fully utilise the space of a larger one that could be more useful elsewhere.

So, what can we do?

Normally, to backup and restore SD cards, I use Win32 Disk Imager.

The main problem of Win32 Disk Imager is that it creates an image file the same size as your SD card, no matter how much of the card is actually being used. If you’re using a 32GB card with a 4GB partition and the rest is unallocated space it will still create a 32GB image file.

Typically, however, I think most of us will allocate the full size of the SD card to the system.

Continue reading Moving Linux to Smaller SD Cards →

General

I’ve been quiet this month…

February 16, 2014 John Aldred Leave a comment

January was awesome, a super busy month, but I also had a lot to talk about, and a lot that I could talk about, and enough time to talk about it.

February’s been even busier, but most of what I’d love to show off, I can’t talk about (damn those NDAs and that whole “privacy” thing).

I’ve been getting a fair bit of shooting done this month, and I’ve also started working on a rather large web app project – which, again, I can say nothing about.

This all sounds a little like one of those “look at me, I’m begging for attention and some recognition for how awesome I am!” posts you see all too often on Facebook these days, but that really is not my intent.

Continue reading I’ve been quiet this month… →

CubieTruck, Linux, Photography, TTSOL

Eye-Fi on Linux Part 2

January 31, 2014 John Aldred Leave a comment

When the Eye-Fi works so well with the iPad, why would I want to seemingly make life more complicated for myself by adding more hardware into the mix?

Well, transferring to a Linux based machine like the CubieTruck offers me some advantages over the iPad. Some of them I alluded to in my previous post on this topic, but at the time, my primary thought was really just on-site backup (after making the switch from SanDisk Eye-Fi cards to Eye-Fi Pro X2 cards).

No real interaction, no file serving to viewing devices, just straight up copy the images to the CubieTruck, and then copy it all onto my network when I get back home.

Continue reading Eye-Fi on Linux Part 2 →

Photography, Photoshop

Fix it in Photoshop?

January 27, 2014 John Aldred Leave a comment

During my talk for Lancaster Photographic Society recently, I was asked a question that I’m also going to answer here. I’m paraphrasing, but it went something along the lines of…

“Is getting the right exposure in camera really all that important? Can’t we just nudge it in Photoshop?”

Before I start, I want to clarify a definition here, and a difference between “right” and “technically correct”. It is perfectly possible to make an exposure that is “right”, but not “technically correct” when you shoot with your post processing in mind in order to maximise the capabilities of your camera’s sensor.

Sometimes intentionally over or underexposing slightly allows you to capture the scene and process it in a way that gives a better final result than if you’d started off with a “technically correct” exposure. So, sometimes “technically correct” isn’t the same as “right”.

But to answer to the question, the short answer is “You can, but if you don’t have to, why would you?”.

Continue reading Fix it in Photoshop? →

Photography, Teaching

Talks and Presentations

January 23, 2014 John Aldred Leave a comment

I have been a member of Lancaster Photographic Society for about five years now, ever since my wife and I moved to Lancaster.

Each week throughout autumn and winter we meet, and usually the photographers who come and offer presentations to us are detailing projects and genres that are very personal to them.

They tell some amazing stories, they sometimes go pretty in-depth into the technical aspects of how they do what they do, detail the circumstances that led them to be where they are today, and list some of the challenges they have faced along the way.

Occasionally we have a speaker from our own membership, somebody interesting, worldly, and presenting images the rest of us could only dream of creating. So when I was first asked to present a talk, I was quite surprised.

Continue reading Talks and Presentations →

Photography

Sekonic L-758DR “Digital Master” Light Meter

January 22, 2014 John Aldred Leave a comment

In photography, there are many items we would buy if only we could find a viable reason for putting down so much cash.

First, for me, was the 70-200mm f/2.8VR. For years, I lusted after one, but didn’t really had a legitimate need for one that would justify dropping £1600+ until about four years ago.

Then there was the 105mm f/2.8D AF Micro-Nikkor. As much I would’ve loved to have been able to splurge on one, it was an expense I couldn’t justify until last year. That was another one that had been on my wishlist for about a decade.

The Sekonic L-758DR falls into that same category. It’s a handheld light meter that I’ve wanted for years, but with a retail price of £399, it just wasn’t going to happen. Certainly not when my L-718 has performed so beautifully the last few years.

Continue reading Sekonic L-758DR “Digital Master” Light Meter →

Linux, Windows

VirtualBox vs. Dedicated Linux System

January 20, 2014 John Aldred Leave a comment

I mentioned in an earlier post that I’d write a little bit more about my decision to run Debian through VirtualBox on a Windows machine.

So, here we are.

This post is more of a ramble than anything else. There’s no real substance here (and feel free to agree or disagree with that), I’m just jotting down some thoughts and providing a little background for other posts I plan to make.

Continue reading VirtualBox vs. Dedicated Linux System →

Linux, Mini Computers, Photography

Eye-Fi on Linux

January 18, 2014 John Aldred Leave a comment

My current WiFi situation on Location works for me at the moment.

As I shoot, a couple of seconds after hitting the shutter, the images come up on my iPad screen. I can immediately see which images have hit their focus and are nice and sharp without unwanted motion blur.

I can get a better overall view of the scene on the iPad so I don’t have to spend hours fixing something in Photoshop that I missed on the tiny LCD on the back of the camera. I can just see it and fix on set before taking another shot.

As I’m planning to turn the CubieTruck into a portable backup storage device for use on location, I thought “What if I could transmit via WiFi to the Cubie (or Raspberry Pi) instead of the iPad?”

Continue reading Eye-Fi on Linux →

General

My Home & Location Networks

January 17, 2014 John Aldred Leave a comment

I’ve had a few people message me on Facebook asking exactly how my network is setup, now that I’ve added the TP-Link TL-WR702N into the mix.

It looks a bit of a mess, and this isn’t the kind of imagery I’m typically used to making in Photoshop, but this is the basic setup.

I’ve set it up this way so that when I need to take certain things out on location, I don’t have to reconfigure everything to log into a different network.

Continue reading My Home & Location Networks →

Photography, TTSOL, Windows

TTSOL – Eye-Fi on Location

January 16, 2014 John Aldred Leave a comment

I’ve talked about some of the pros & cons of the Eye-Fi card before, but on location these days, it’s something I find difficult to live without.

It’s a luxury, not a necessity, but it does allow me to speed up productivity and waste less time on a location shoot wondering whether the image I just shot is adequately sharp, if I’ve hit the correct point of focus (the camera LCD is just too unreliable – especially when you need to manually focus), or just to see the overall composition on a larger screen.

Continue reading TTSOL – Eye-Fi on Location →

Photographer / Writer / Geek