Archive for November, 2006

Ok! We already knew that Japanese people were not thinking exactly like the rest of the world (it makes them both loveable and totally foreign to us Westerners). But, this time, I admit they caught me by surprise with this major (?) technological innovation serving what is at the core of every woman in the world, but maybe more in Japan than elsewhere:

Bras that transform themselves into a handbag

The operation does not seem to complicated as can be seen below. It does not take more than 10 seconds. But it leaves me wondering about the real-life circumstances where the elegant Japanese lady would really appreciate the ability to move from one to the other.

Source: Triumph web site (in Japanese).

Again in the Espace Rambouillet (South of Paris), here are a few deers that I shot in the limited sunlight of the woods. They honour the quality of the light exposure of the Dynax 7D.

Click on the thumbnails to enlarge them.

In the rush for higher resolution images, HAL9000 Iconos has a significant advance over the competition with its 8600 mega-pixel image.

They obtained this enormous image by assembling it from 1145 individual photos of about 12 Mega-Pixel each.

The result is on the Italian web site of HaltaDefinizione.com and it is impressive. You can also get a printed poster copy of the image, if you want to.

We already wrote here about it when the HD-Ready and HD-TV programs were launched, the nice black and white little logos supposed to bring the guarantee of compatibility of electronic devices with High Definition (HD) video are only adding to the confusion of the consumers.

At best, the buyer wonders what is really covered by the HD-Ready branding. At worst (and it is often the case), it ensures that purchases are done without understanding and lead to future disappointments.

Let’s be clear and simple: HD-Ready doesn’t mean a lot. In most cases, it only means that you can plug the device one onto the other. Practically speaking, if you want your screen to be really high definition capable, it needs to have a resolution of 1920×1080 pixels. Less is not HD!

If the TV set is only 1280×720 (the most usual resolution), the HD-Ready logo does not warrant anything more than the HD image will display… in low reésolution.

Marcus Karlsen is a young photographer who is publishing a lot of nice images from his many travels around the world. But it is not only because of his photos that I want to point you at his web site. He is also hosting very detailed and pro-looking reviews of some of the best tele-lenses from Minolta (later Konica-Minolta and Sony).

• Minolta AF 200mm f/2.8 Apo G
• Minolta AF 300mm f/2.8 Apo G (D) SSM
• Minolta AF 600mm f/4.0 Apo G
• Minolta AF 70-200mm f/2.8 Apo G (D) SSM
• Minolta AF 300mm f/2.8 Apo G
• Minolta AF 28-70mm f/2.8 G

Very interesting reading.

A nice little video about penguins, found on YouTube:

The next one, titled “Do penguins fly?“, is a special offer for photo amateurs. Wildlife photo may be difficult in some cases:

You’d suppose that bad news could end for Sony, but no. They just announced that they found a defect in eight photo cameras of the CyberShot series sold between September 2003 and January 2005. It would be an LCD display problem with camera refusing to shoot pictures (a software problem?)

Sony offers a free repair to camera owners but did not indicate how many cameras where subject to this issue.

Sources: AP-Yahoo, PhotoReporter.

Christmas is coming with the usual rush for techno gifts. Digital cameras are going to be (again) one of the successes for Christmas gifts. Even more, the Digital Single Lens Reflex (D-SLR) cameras are going to be impossible to avoid. Customers seem to be understanding that compact digital cameras are limited and the SLR cameras are a hit in the stores.

What should you buy?

Then, it’s up to you to decide. It seems that there is no longer bad products, but price differences are significant between all those models (from 590€ to nearly 2000€). And Canon and Nikon are overwhelmingly leading the digital single lens reflex camera market.

This is becoming obvious for those who discovered that one of the twin daughters of George W. Bush has been robbed of her handbag in an Argentinan restaurant. Not that the country is such a security risk, but the dinner was happening under the protection of the best of the best: The American Secret Service agents attached to the protection of Barbara and Jenna Bush. They did not see it happening! The thief probably did not even recognize the daughters of the more powerful man in the world, or even notice that he was making those men in black the laughing stock of the rest of the security world.

Source: BBC.

Sure! I’m not really into Thanksgiving (I’m French), but I thought it was a good idea to try and help you all Americans to have a great Thanksgiving. So, here is a link to a long article titled “How to Have the Best Thanksgiving EVER!“, for those who are not easily offended.

As Art Burchwald said once in a column, “it’s the one day of the year where Americans eat better than the French.” (Thanks Laurel!)

Al Jazeera or Al Jezira, the TV news channel from Qatar, is now available in English. It often made the news headlines of other information medias since its creation on 1st November 1996, with its policitical stance very favorable to Islam and often considered very favorable to extremism and sometimes terrorism.

Today, the channel not only broadcasts in Shakespeare’s language (originally, only in Arab) but also has a web site in English. Not even counting the additional point of view this brings to international issues and politics for people not speaking Arab, you will quickly notice that the web site is very clean, neat and tidy (it could be a good example for those web designer tempted to add one after another kludge to already heavy user interfaces). Nearly no ads, an easy browsing.

This is the tough question that BrowserShots.org web site anwsers for you. They provide a simple way to test your web site in a large variety of configurations and browsers. This is a very nice idea founded on the voluntary help of computers installed all over the world (widely distributed architecture).

This way, you will know how Roumazeilles.net looks on a number of exotic (or not) browsers:

Recommended to any web designer.