I found it!

Way back in December, my camera died. I was loaned a camera, but it was a bit older and the battery wasn't the best. I could not use my Eye-Fi card in it because it would flatline the battery in about 15 minutes.

So, I put the card aside and told everyone to leave it alone. It soon disappeared. No one had a clue where it went.

Saturday night it reappeared. Apparently it was assumed to be a game card for one of the boy's video games and was put in the game bag.

So, now I get to play with my Eye-Fi card again! WooHoo!

Hello world!

My very first official WordPress blog entry.  Still trying to figure out how stuff works.  Much more detailed than Blogger.com is. Sorta intimidating for a new user at first.

New Title

I have changed the title of my blog. My family tells me that I am no longer insane. Now I just don't remember anything anymore. So... What was I talking about?

The Smugmug/Flickr/Picasa Saga

I am back playing with Flickr again. I really like their ability to assign a picture to multiple interest groups. I'm not really fond of Picasa for bulk picture storage and use. I find there are too many hoops to jump through for my tastes.

I'm thinking that I'll go back to Flickr when my Smugmug subscription expires.

What to do? SmugMug vs Picasa

I started out photo sharing on Flickr. It was fine, but I had to pay to upload more than 200 pictures. I liked that I could take one photo upload and designate it to several albums/topics/galleries/etc.

And then my year was up. Do I pay again or find something better/different? Some photographer friends in the area use SmugMug, so I looked them over. Using a 50% discount, I signed up for a year and imported all my pictures from Flickr. That was a minor disaster. The import software (Smugglr) banjaxed a bunch of the descriptions and tags in the photos. After 8 months, I still have some pictures that I need to re-edit, or delete.

I agree that SmugMug is not really good for general upload and display of daily, routine, pictures. But, I’m turned off from Flickr, too.

So, I’m looking at PicasaWeb. I’ve had Picasa for a while and love it for tagging and noting pictures. I like the plug-ins for uploading to FaceBook and SmugMug, too. However, the PicasaWeb user interface feels a bit clunky to me. As a uploader, there are way too many option buttons to contend with.

However, when you use Picasa and PicasaWeb together, it is powerful for ongoing events. You can sync a folder in Picasa and it will automagically update the contents online in a like-named folder. And vice-versa.

I had never played with this Sync option until yesterday. We are having our carpet ripped out of the common areas of the house, and replacing it with 18″ tile. I am at home babysitting the installation, and my wife is at work. She keeps badgering me for photos of the work.

I am snapping several pictures, transferring them from the SD card to Picasa, and tagging/notating them. They are automatically uploaded to the web, where she can show all her friends at work. I used to have a Eye-Fi card, which would have made it seamless, but it went missing a couple of months ago.

I guess this ramble is not really a “this or that” post. Maybe it’s more of a “this AND that” type of thing. SmugMug works great for photos of events and such, and Picasa for right-now, constant update stuff. Although, I’m not sure which I would use on a crime scene, or fire scene, accident, etc, shoot.

All I know is that I miss my eye-fi card. Maybe during the tile install, it’ll turn up. I hope so.

What's up with church?

I attended a Catholic Mass this morning, and I was a bit disturbed by the apparent dress code.

In the service I observed girls (10-12 years old) going for Communion in mini skirts and other clothing that is more appropriate on a street hooker.

Adults wearing sports jerseys. Adults wearing moderately offensive attire. Shirts with totally inappropriate phrases, slogans and logos on them. The tamest example is, "I'm grumpy because you're dopey." Cute, but inappropriate in a religious setting.

I don't advocate 3 piece suits in church, but the other end of the clothing spectrum (short shorts and mid-riff tops) is just as bad, if not worse. We come together to worship, not to "style and profile."