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Posts Tagged ‘hardware’

Family, Personal, Photography | 0 comment

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My old Desk - ©TimeLine Media
My old Desk - ©TimeLine Media
My old Desk – ©TimeLine Media

Workstation Change

This is a strangely personal post today. For the first time in 18 years, I have a new desk! In taking apart the former desk pictured above, and trying to put the new one together, so many things came to mind fumbling, and working with the IKEA directions and tools. This was similar to when I first put the desk together at my apartment in college. I was only halfway done with my undergraduate degree, and I was moving into my first place. My parents, and my girlfriend spent two days putting all the assembly-needed furniture in the apartment. Our thumbs, backs, and arms were so sore getting everything together!

The desk in its first configuration had a small shelf mounted to one side, and I filled it with Biology, Chemistry, and other textbooks. It was a writing desk, so it the only thing that was plugged in on its top was a small desk lamp. It helped me to successfully get that degree, then it travelled back to my parent’s house to become a computer desk – it held two of the old CRT monitors on it’s top with almost no room for writing, and no room for the shelf which was discarded somewhere along the way.

Moving Workspaces

When it was time to move out own my own, the desk came with me. However it only needed to hold one of monitors – I needed more room to write and stack things! This was in the first home that I have ever owned. From the desk, I continued to do lots of homework for a master’s degree, and work that I brought home from my first real-world job. It was here that I also worked on a certificate for photography, and started TimeLine Media.

The photo above was taken just before I took it apart for the last time. It has served me so well, and hope the new desk will do the same. I wonder what the new setup will help me do?

TimeLine Media – www.timelinedc.com
703-864-8208

Photography, Technology | 0 comment

New Nikon D4S Announcement – Tech Thursday

Nikon D3 - ©TimeLine Media

Upgrading Tech

Has it been 2 years already? Nikon releases new camera bodies less frequently for their top end professional line (thank goodness). For them to take such a long time in between the release of a new body, they try to make improvements making it worthwhile for users. You can find rumor and review sites to read the specs. However here are my impressions on the new developments for their flagship Nikon D4S that was just recently announced.

  1. 16.2 megapixel sensor – This is a redesigned sensor from the Nikon D4. Additionally it does have some better improvements with the link EXPEED 4 image processor. I like that they did not up the megapixel count! The 36 megapixels in the D800 are a bit of a chore to work with. They take up so much hard drive space, and they take a big chunk of memory to process on workstations.
  2. Group area Autofocus – This is a feature that Canon digital cameras have had. Consequently, I was waiting to see it in a Nikon. Something has changed in the way that Nikon has designed their auto focus systems that has made me have a little less faith in how accurate they are in locking focus. Both the D4 and D800 have had more misses due to backfocus, or other missing focus compared to older models. Considering they have not changed the options and setup of auto focus in the camera menus, I am having more trouble with them. I am hopeful that grouping together a bunch of focus points to cover an area to track focus will improve the performance.
  3. XQD and Compact Flash card slots – Disappointing! Till now, I have not seen any other still camera manufacturer support the XQD card format. I do like that it handles like a more robust SD card with super quick transfer speeds, but having to carry around two different formats of cards neither of which have built in readers for laptops is a pain. I would have preferred 2 XQD cards, or even two of the new UHS-II SDXC cards – they can transfer at up to 280MB/s, with readers that are readily available on almost any laptop.

In any case, it is nice to see that Nikon is still trying to improve on image quality. Images that I shot with the top end Nikons from 4 years ago are holding up nicely especially compared to any image made on a smartphone, and many modern DSLRs. But it still depends mostly on what is in front of the lens to make the photo. It is just fun to geek out once in a while.

Nikon D3 - ©TimeLine Media
Nikon D3 – ©TimeLine Media

TimeLine Media – www.timelinedc.com
703-864-8208

Photography, Technology | 0 comment

Hard Drives – Tech Thursday

I have been pursuing a good strategy for storage backup for close to 20 years. In college, I started to feel the need to have multiple copies of my work across different floppy discs. Luck has been on my side when it comes to disc storage. I have not had many major crashes where I have lost irreplaceable files.

Data Backup

However, I have had hard drives fail, but have been lucky to have data at another place whether it be a disc, or another drive. Since then, I have tried everything – Iomega Zip drives, Jaz drives, burned CDs, burned DVDs, and external hard drives. Some have been connected by serial port, USB 1.0, 2.0, and 3.0, Firewire, and eSATA connections. I have tried almost everything out there, but I think I have finally settled on a method that I will use for a foreseeable future.

Backing up everything to burnable CDs or DVDs has proven to be difficult to store physically. The amount of data that you can generate with the newest DSLRs makes storing discs problematic – stacked discs can be warped from long-term storage, and differences in quality of discs makes longevity of their data integrity somewhat questionable. Some discs that burned 3 years ago are no longer readable! So I have turned to duplicate hard drives for my main backups. Two identical Seagate GoFlex desktop drives connected by USB 3.0.

Hard Drives for Backups

Seagate GoFlex, www.timelinedc.com

This quick connection allows for a fast transfer for gigabytes worth of RAW files. One of the mirrored drives is stored at home, the other at another location in case something catastrophic happens in the studio. The Seagate system also has a nice feature in that the interface between the drive and the cable can be separated from the drive. This makes switching between drives very easy!

So, when one drive if full, you do not have to remove the connector/cable assembly, just pop the drive off the top, and replace it. This makes moving drives between computers at separate locations quite easy. With the prices of hard drives going down, and storage going up, this seems to make the most sense for my needs. With the connector also separate, there is the possibility that if a new connection to the computer is created, Seagate will make an adapter that can work with this series of drives. Connectors already exist for eSATA and Thunderbolt connections.

Seagate GoFlex, www.timelinedc.com
Seagate GoFlex, www.timelinedc.com

USB 3.0 connection on Seagate GoFlex Desk Adapter

TimeLine Media – www.timelinedc.com
703-864-8208

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