Jalpuna

Our Move Is Shake Shake Shake

2012-02-07T07:16:18Z

I am so ready for a second album from Phantogram. Sadly, who knows when we'll get one. Well, I suppose the members of Phantogram know, but that doesn't help me, now does it? Late last year, they released the short Nightlife EP. That's where you'll find Don't Move, which begins the following poppy playlist. I say 'pop' in a good way. All of the sunshine we've been having here in Portland keeps tricking me into thinking it's almost spring. And then the cold wind whips by and I realize winter isn't done with us yet. ah well.

Update Required To use my audio player, you will need to either update your browser to a recent version or update your Flash plugin. I realize Flash is evil, but it looks like your browser doesn't support HTML5. Bummer? Indeed.

I'll be looking forward to getting another album from The xx too. Supposedly, we'll get that one later this year.]]>

The Sweeter The Sin, The Better The Taste In My Mouth

2012-01-30T20:49:08Z

Here's a playlist of mellow covers. A few of these are downright superb. One in particular worth noting. If you listen to only one song here, I highly recommend you check out track #4: Any Way You Want It. Clem Snide's cover of the Journey classic is really... well... it's both surprising and a treat.

Most of these are really obvious, but here's a list with the original artists listed below, just in case.

Running To Stand Still | Elbow
(U2)
Girls Just Wanna Have Fun | Greg Laswell
(Cindy Lauper)
You've Got To Hide Your Love Away | Eddie Vedder
(The Beatles)
Any Way You Want It | Clem Snide
(Journey)
Up To My Neck In You | Mark Kozelek
(AC/DC)
Eye In The Sky | Jonatha Brooke
(Alan Parsons Project)
The District Sleeps Alone Tonight | Jonna Lee
(The Postal Service)
Nothing Compares 2 U | Stereophonics
(The Family )
Frank Mills | The Lemonheads
(from "Hair")
White Wedding | The Harvey Girls
(Billy Idol)
Blasphemous Rumours | Duncan Sheik
(Depeche Mode)
Who Can It Be Now? | Colin Hay
(Men At Work)

Does 'Who Can It Be Now' count as a cover being that Colin Hay was the lead singer from Men At Work? I suppose it doesn't, unless it counts as him covering his own song, but I care. It's a fun one to add to the playlist. Also, Nothing Compares 2 U was written by Prince for his side project, The Family, but the version most probably know is by Sinead O'Connor.]]>

Gun!

2012-01-23T08:36:15Z

Every now and then, the internet makes the world a very small place. A year or so ago, I filed away a link for the blog of a writer named Neil Cross. He writes horror novels, and though that's a genre I have absolutely no interest in, I enjoyed the blog he writes about his writing. Odd? Yes. One day, I discovered that Neil Cross had been writing a British TV cop show called Luther. And, what's this? Luther is available on Netflix. While watching the show, I found a piece of music called "Gun" by Emiliana Torrini. Wow. What a sexy voice. What a neat piece of music. It's the first track in the following playlist.

I'm not sure I'd recommend Luther. There's some great acting, but the show is ridded with over the top cliches. That being said... if you find yourself hopelessly laid on the couch with a bad cold, a Netflix subscription and nothing but time to kill... Luther could be just what the doctor ordered.]]>

Backwards, Forwards

2012-01-17T06:16:10Z

I'm still on a big Donovan Woods kick, so... here's another playlist with that sort of sound in mind. Last time, it was piano based. This time, it's guitar.

You can find Donovan Woods' music on Amazon or iTunes. His latest CD is called "The Widowmaker" and it's excellent.]]>

Meet The Viewfinder In The Sony a77

2012-01-13T07:37:35Z

This is not a review of the new Sony a77. The a77 is a superb camera, about which plenty has been written online and elsewhere. Just google "a77" and you’ll find more reviews than you’ll have time to read. Most detail things like the cameras excellent specs (24 megapixel sensor, 12 frames per second, HD video, etc) and the design of the body (dual-hinged adjustable rear LCD panel, weather sealing, customizable controls) and so on and so forth. Just about every review I've seen for the Sony a77 online and in magazines entirely misses the point. They write about the a77 as if it’s just another excellent camera body, or they write about how the mirror in the a77 doesn’t slap (more on that later) as if that makes it worth buying. I’m going to take a different approach here and write about one aspect of this camera: the viewfinder... but before I begin, a disclaimer. None of the pictures seen here were taken with my a77. Obviously. I'd have to own two of them to use one to take pictures of one. Instead, what you're seeing here are pictures taken with my iPhone, in most cases, pressed against the viewfinder. Thus, the blur is from the iPhone, not the actual viewfinder. And while we're at it, let's meet our model. ]]> So, What's The Point? The a77 is not just another great new camera body. Nikon makes those. So does Canon. And Pentax, Olympus, Sigma, and everybody else. Sony has done something simple yet revolutionary here. Rather than using an optical viewfinder like every other camera maker, they’ve given the a77 an electronic viewfinder. They began doing this in 2010 with the entry level a33 and a55, but the new a77 has the 2nd generation of the technology, and it is astounding. The electronic viewfinder alone is reason enough to consider this camera a step up from a traditional DSLR, even if the DSLR you’d compare an a77 with has identical specs. I'd say the a77's viewfinder is a pleasure to use (and it is), but even that is missing the point. The a77 viewfinder will change the way you use a camera. It'll be a change for the better because the viewfinder in the Sony a77 will give you greater control over the camera than you've ever had before. When you look into the a77 viewfinder, you're looking at an OLED video screen in the eyepiece instead of seeing a typical piece of glass. It’s an electronic viewfinder (EVF) rather than an optical viewfinder (OVF). An optical viewfinder shows you what the lens is seeing. An electronic viewfinder shows you what the camera is doing. Think about that for a moment. With an optical viewfinder and a 50mm lens, you see the view at 50mm. With an electronic viewfinder, you see the view at 50mm as well as any changes you’ve told the camera to make, such as exposure compensation, adjustments to white balance, and so on. Let's say you own a Nikon D7000 and you lower exposure compensation. Do you see any change in the viewfinder? Of course not. You'll see an indicator, but you won’t see an actual change in darkness of the shot you’re framing until after you take it. That's how it’s always been with SLRs. But with the electronic viewfinder in a Sony a77, when you lower exposure compensation, you'll see the image in the viewfinder become darker, just as the shot you’d take would be darker. Now, with exposure compensation lowered (again noting that my iPhone is out of focus, not to mention the iPhone is way off with its white balance here, darnit!) Likewise, if you change ISO or white balance in the a77, you’ll see the scene in the viewfinder change accordingly. Here’s an even simpler example: Set your camera to Spot Metering. Look through the viewfinder of your DSLR and choose an exposure point. Pick a dark spot. Nothing changes in your viewfinder, right? Now, pick a bright spot. Do you see any change in the viewfinder? Of course not. You’ll see the effect of the metering in the shot you take. But in the a77 viewfinder, you will see the exposure change because the viewfinder is showing you what the camera is doing rather than only showing you what the lens is seeing. Again, think about that for a moment. If you do, you’ll begin to realize just how limiting an optical viewfinder is.

A Better Workflow

Here's how most of us probably used our DSLRs: You pick the camera up to your eye. You look through the viewfinder. You frame your shot and make a few adjustments. Finally, you take the shot. Then, you pull the camera away from your eye so you can review the shot you just took, using the LCD screen on the back of your camera, and perhaps you notice something isn’t right. "Ah, shoot. I see blown highlights." You dial down exposure compensation a bit, pick the camera back up to put the viewfinder to your eye, and you frame the shot again so you can take it again. Then you take the viewfinder away from your eye so you can check the shot again using the LCD screen on the back of the camera. Again. "Ah, crud. This time, it’s too dark." So, you adjust exposure compensation a little, raise the camera back up to your eye to look through the viewfinder again, and you start the process over. Again. With an optical viewfinder, photography is a game of shooting with the viewfinder and then checking with the LCD. Back and forth, viewfinder to LCD, viewfinder to LCD. Raise, lower. Raise, lower. Rinse, lather, repeat. With the electronic viewfinder in the Sony a77, you don't have to do that anymore. You literally see the changes you're making in the viewfinder.

More Abilities And Tools

Since the a77 viewfinder is electronic rather than just a piece of glass, it has the ability to do some amazing things. Is the shot level? Don’t bother checking your horizon after the fact. Put a level in your viewfinder. Is the shot in focus? Click a button and the viewfinder will show you a super-zoomed in view so you can check the precision of your focus. The red/orange box here shows where the viewfinder will zoom in so you can better judge the focus. It's hard to tell in this iPhone shot, but it's easy to see in the viewfinder that the focus is on the ball entering his claw, and the rest is way off. I could zoom further in, but I'm taking iPhone shots here, and my iPhone is struggling with this already.... but you get the idea. In that second picture, the red box shows where and how far I'm zoomed in. I can easily move around the shot to check other parts if I choose. There is absolutely no way this sort of thing can be done with an optical viewfinder. Speaking of zoom... there's an excellent tele/crop feature in the a77 that crops the shot, more or less multiplying the length of your lens' reach. Thus, a 50mm lens more or less becomes a 100mm lens, and you're seeing this change perfectly in the electronic viewfinder. I say more or less because this isn’t a trick of digitally zooming or doubling your image. Instead, the camera is simply cropping the shot, and the viewfinder fills with the cropped view at a factor of 1.4x or 2x. Thus, a 2x tele/crop will result in an image cropped down to 12 megapixels, which is still a heck of a lot. You can also lay all sorts of information over the viewfinder, such as a histogram, level, gridlines and various indicators. Better still, you can have different settings for what information you see in the viewfinder versus what you see on the LCD. Everything you’re used to being able to see in a rear LCD panel, you can see in an electronic viewfinder. You can surf menus, change settings, even review shots you’ve taken. Of course, that stuff is still available on the LCD panel, but it’s all instantly accessible in the viewfinder too.

Check It

By far, my favorite viewfinder option is the auto review. If you enable this feature, each time you take a photo, you’ll be given a brief review of the shot you just took (adjustable at none, 2, 5 or 10 seconds) without even removing your eye from the viewfinder. During the review, you can click the Enlarge button (it's also the AF/MF button) to zoom in and check the shot’s focus in detail. Zooming in also cancels the end of the review period, thus keeping the image in the viewfinder for a longer review. Spinning the rear command dial zooms further in or out. When you’re done reviewing, a half-tap of the shutter ends the image review and you’re ready to shoot again. On the other hand, if you DON'T click the Enlarge button during the auto review, the shot will simply stay in the viewfinder for a brief period (I’ve set mine to 2 seconds) and then the a77 will ready to shoot again. Whoever at Sony designed the way Auto Review works in the EVF should be commended because it's excellent. How many times have you seen someone ask a group of people to pose for a shot ("Say cheese!") and then watched that person check the shot in the LCD only to have them pose again ("Hang on everybody. Get back into position. We’re going to try that again." With an auto review in the viewfinder, you take the shot and instantly see it in your viewfinder, meaning that if something’s wrong, you’re already in position to try again. It’s faster. It’s smarter. And it’ll make you a better photographer because it’ll enable you to do what you do without having to fiddle with the camera so much.

Specs, Shmecs

Specs tell you what a camera is capable of, technically, but as we all know, photography isn't about cameras. It isn’t about frames per second or X number of cross-type focus points, which is why I haven’t even mentioned those things. Photography is about the photo taken by the photographer. The viewfinder in this camera will give you, as a photographer, more control over your photos before you even take them than you've ever known. The a77 buttons and dials are customizable to give you control over the camera, but the electronic viewfinder literally puts you inside the camera. It's an amazing experience. I suspect that, ten years from now, most DSLRs will have electronic viewfinders. This is the future. So many camera reviews discuss the pros and cons of an electronic viewfinder in comparison to optical, but they fail to mention the weaknesses of an optical viewfinder. Now that I've made the switch to an EVF, I'd really hate to have to switch back. After using the viewfinder in this Sony a77 for a day or two shooting the kind of photography that you do, you'll realize just how limiting an old fashioned optical viewfinder really is. Obviously, this is a great camera, and the reviews discussing its impressive specs compared to other cameras aren’t wrong, but the real story of the Sony a77 is the viewfinder. All I can say is wow. I certainly wouldn't want to go back to an optical viewfinder after shooting with this. No way.

The Yeahbut

There is a price to be paid in exchange for all of the power and convenience of an electronic viewfinder. No, I’m not talking about the $1400 price tag of an a77 (body only). I’m talking about a slight loss of light. If you’re reading this, you probably already know the Sony a77 is not an SLR. Technically speaking, it’s an SLT. SLR stands for Single Lens Reflex, which means the camera has a mirror that reflects light coming through the lens up into the piece of glass that is the optical viewfinder. When you take a shot with an SLR, there’s a "ka-chunk" sound as the mirror flips out of the way, enabling the light to reach the sensor. SLT stands for Single Lens Translucent, which means the camera has a translucent mirror that allows the vast majority of light to pass through it (thus, always reaching the sensor), but a sliver of that light is reflected upward, feeding the phase detect autofocus. The mirror in an SLT never moves, so there’s no risk of vibration from mirror-slap, nor is there any mirror noise. And here’s the "Yeah, but…" The mirror in an SLT causes a slight loss of light from reaching the sensor which has led to a lot of discussions about high ISO performance. Most of the chatter isn't about photography or even photos. It's about theoretical numbers (DXO.com) and studio test shots produced under near ideal but not perfect and thus flawed methodology (dpreview.com). I'm not knocking DXO or dpreview. They each have a job to do and they tend to provide excellent information. But their info can lead certain types of people astray. Those people end up debating numbers rather than enjoying or even judging actual photos. I wouldn't be surprised if, under the harshest of dim lighting, A Nikon D7000 could outperform a Sony a77. But if the sort of photography you do is consistently in those conditions, you're probably not considering a D7000 or an a77. You need full frame. And then the question becomes, is it even fair to judge a $1400 camera against a $2700 camera? Or a $6,000 camera? Comparing them is actually a compliment to the $1400 camera, even if the $1400 camera loses in the comparison.

The Bottom Line

In terms of DSLRs, the electronic viewfinder marks the biggest change to photography since the dawn of digital. I couldn’t imagine wanting to give up all of the things an electronic viewfinder enables a photographer to do. When I bought my Sony a77 a few months ago, I kept my previous camera (a Nikon D7000). I planned on shooting with both in order to compare the results. The D7000 is a fine camera, but after an hour with the Sony a77, I knew I’d hate going back to the D7000. The D7000 has one of the best, if not THE best, viewfinders in its class… but compared to the electronic viewfinder in the Sony, it’s just a piece of glass. A very limiting piece of glass. I sold my Nikon 10 days later and I haven’t missed it even once. I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend the a77, but I don’t recommend going to a store to play with one. You need to use it to shoot your style of photography before you’ll really understand what the electronic viewfinder can do for you. In a store, the viewfinder may feel like a gimmick, but in real world use, it’s astounding. It’s empowering. And it’s the future.

Dear Nose

2012-01-12T04:50:23Z

Dear Nose; Come on. We've been fighting this cold for over a week. Enough with the goo. All you're doing is pissing me off. You get blown, you get blown, you get blown, and then you end up sore. I don't know what kind of game you think you're playing, but we're both losing. P.S. Dear Penis; I know what you heard, but nobody was talking to you. Or about you.

Jail

2012-01-10T06:11:43Z

I wish there were a better way to find new music. Sure, there are all sorts of streaming options online, like Slacker and Pandora, or lists upon lists, like Last FM. What we really need is a combination of the two. Pandora with charts, perhaps. A list that is based on your tastes and changes with input, such as "Only albums released in 2011" or "Only artists not listed in my iTunes Library (or Last.fm maybe). I'll follow up on this rant below... but first, a piano-based playlist that begins with a recent and amazing find. Jail, by Donovan Woods. Jail is such a great song. It's a simple song. It doesn't tell a story. It just sets a scene and it leaves you there.

Donovan Woods is a relatively unknown artist, and that's a shame. He's released two CDs and they are both absolutely excellent. You can find them on Amazon and the iTunes Store. I wish there were a better way to find new music. I'm glad I recently stumbled onto music by Donovan Woods, but I can't help wondering how many other amazing artists I'd really enjoy if only I found a way to find their music in the first place. There has to be a better way.]]>

Can I Wake You Up? Is It Late Enough?

2012-01-02T17:38:58Z

I'm on a bit of a Bombay Bicycle Club kick lately. 'How Can You Swallow So Much Sleep' is from their latest album A Different Kind Of Fix. The album came out in August, but somehow I missed it. Ah well... It's one of the things I was looping while editing all of the code it took to rebuild this site last week.

I must have listened to How Can You Swallow So Much Sleep a thousand times before I realized it has almost no lyrics. Here's the whole song:

Can I wake you up? Can I wake you up?
Is it late enough? Is it late enough?
There's a story in which my eyes shut.
Could you back me up? Could you back me up?

...there's also something mumbled towards the end but I have no clue what that is. I love the song though.]]>

Hello Lover

2012-01-01T18:02:49Z

Rob: "Hello coffee, my long lost love." Coffee: "Long lost? What the hell? I see you all the time." Rob: "I haven't seen you since LAST YEAR!" Coffee: "FACEPALM." Rob: "You can't facepalm me! You don't even have a face." Coffee: "I don't have a mouth either, but that hasn't stopped you from having a conversation with me." Rob: "Touche, coffee. Touche." Coffee: "FACEPALM!"

Jalpuna, V4 - a.k.a., How Steve Jobs Wrecked My Website!

2012-01-01T16:40:36Z

Obviously, I kid. Steve Jobs didn't wreck my website. The continuing march of technology made my site's design confusing if not unusable on touch devices. There is no such thing as an image rollover (where scrolling over an image reveals something hidden such as a link) on a touchscreen. Before I get into that, let's take a stroll down web-design memory lane.

Previous Designs:

This was the original design for Jalpuna, launched back in March of 2004. You can see an outdated but still working page based on that design here. Next, I moved on to my brief flirtation with orange for Jalpuna, Version 2. You can see an outdated but still working (though not orange) page based on that design here. That brings us to Jalpuna, V3. Ooh, minimal! I loved it! In fact, I've been tinkering with that design since 2005. It held up nicely until iPhones and iPads came along. That's when the design began to break down. The image rollovers don't work with a touchscreen. Here's the box that used to sit at the top of that design. The photo is random (reload the page for another). Scroll over it and you'll see some hidden "extra" links.

If you're reading this on a touch device, the links look like this when scrolled over: The links were hidden in an effort to add extra content while still keeping the site's design minimal. The links led to some extra info as well as my other websites. I really liked the effect, and I liked that the way it was built into my site made the overall design look unique. There are a bagillion websites out there. I like mine to look unique.

The "New" Design?

I realize this latest version of Jalpuna doesn't look new, but I coded everything from scratch, changing a few things along the way. The goal was to refine the look and feel of the previous design, which I liked, while making the site usable on mobile devices. The changes can be summed up as follows: - a new "Big Pic" header box. - better left/right menus. - flickr integration. - a new media player for playlists. - it works on mobile devices now! The most obvious visual change is probably the "big pic" box I wrote about above. On a touchscreen, there was no way to see the hidden buttons, which meant that touching the picture could take you anywhere with no explanation as to where or why. Now, the box is larger, to hold a full image rather than a slice of one, and if you click the image, you get a bit of info about it instead of seeing hidden links. The images and info because they're pulled automatically from my flickr stream. I also overhauled the left and right page menus. The left is now a "Blog" menu that leads to categories of stuff I've written or posted in the blog. The right is now a "Photos" menu that serves up different categories of my photography, all of which are pulled automatically from my flickr account. Neato! And, last but not least... the flash audio player I've been using for my playlists is finally getting replaced since flash isn't available on many mobile devices. I've switched over to an HTML5 audio player with flash fallback, meaning that it works regardless of which technology your browser has. Or, more simply, new playlists here will work on mobile devices such as iPhones and iPads. I'll post a new playlist with the new player tomorrow... but here's a link to a previous playlist I converted over to the new player while testing things.

In Closing:

A few geeky details in case you're curious: Jalpuna still uses Movable Type for serving up posts. I'm using an old version (v3.34) because I think the current platform is bloated to the point of stupidity, not to mention slow and cumbersome. Movable Type V3 was snappy and easy to configure. Sure, the interface is ugly, but I'm the only one who sees that (when I'm posting something), so who cares? I realize most people use wordpress, but I prefer static pages and I absolutely loath the wordpress template system. Movable Type is so much simpler to design for. Well... older versions of Movable Type were simpler to design for. I'm using jQuery for some of the site's functionality, such as the jQuery based "jPlayer" media player, plus scripts that pull my flickr images and display them on my pages. So there you have it. New year, new code. Hooray!

The Holiday Shift

2011-12-31T04:22:10Z

I think we should make a list of all of the late-December holidays. I'm talking about Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Ramadan, Winter Solstice... Boxing Day... Santa Lucia Day... surely there are others. Let's make a list of them all. Then, every other year, let's all shift our chosen holiday one place down the list. On even years, you return to celebrating your own holiday. On odd years, you return to the list, shifting down to the next holiday in order to learn about someone else's holiday by celebrating it with gusto. Christians have been celebrating Christmas for hundreds of years. That's all fine and good, but come on... I think they've pretty much got that one down. In the next odd year, let's give them Hanukkah. For the next even year, they'll get Christmas back, and then the next year, they'll celebrate Kwanzaa. I want to see the Pope light the Mishumaa Saba. Damn straight! And for the Jews... They'd celebrate Hanukkah in the even years. Next odd year, give 'em Kwanzaa. Then back to Hanukkah, and then, in the next, they get whatever's next on the list. Ramadan perhaps. And all of the people whom celebrate Kwanzaa... let's give them Christmas in the next odd year. Not only that... we should ask them to hip that sucker up a bit. Jesus! Could Christmas BE any whiter of a holiday? First on the list of changes - get rid of the red hat with the little white fluff ball at the end. Surely there's a better option - something with style. Subtle changes to each holiday are permissible - but that's not really the point. The point is understanding. I know jack-squat about Kwanzaa, and that ain't right. I know jack about Hanukkah too, which is odd since I know a guy named Jack who celebrates Hanukkah. I'm certain I'm not alone in terms of cluelessness there. I bet the average Christian can't even spell Hanukkah. Or Kwanzaa. If you can't even spell it, how can you know anything about it - let alone having even the slightest understanding of the people who celebrate it? For even years, you celebrate your chosen holiday. For odd years, shift one down the list and celebrate it with gusto. Absodamnlutely.

Another Day, Another Night, Another Year

2011-12-26T08:00:02Z

Goodbye 2011. Though you weren't half bad, I've never been one to judge how good something was based on how bad it wasn't. In many ways, you arrived with more potential than you could possibly live up to, leaving me feeling let down in the end. Then again, I have to remind myself that you could have been worse. Regardless, at the end of this week, I will be pleased to welcome your younger sister 2012 with open arms and a toast in her honor.

Oh, what a waste of time it is to indulge inside of bliss, getting ready for another year like this
- K's Choice
"Another Year"

]]>

But The Very Next Day, You Gave It Away

2011-12-19T08:08:02Z

A gentle Christmas playlist. Make sure you don't miss a superb cover of Wham's Last Christmas, by Findlay Brown. Everybody and their sister's best friend's trashy cousin has covered that song - mostly badly - but this one is actually quite nice.

It's almost almost Christmas
And you might, maybe you could
Break a heart or two now
And I think you should
I think you should

"It's Almost Christmas" by Chris Garneau]]>

My Dear Acquaintance

2011-12-13T01:04:21Z

Raise a glass and we'll have a cheer, my dear acquaintance, it's almost time for a happy new year. I'll post a Christmas playlist next week, but today, my mind is already thinking about 2012. If you're in the mood for a Christmas playlist, click here.]]>

Sea Wolf's "I Made A Resolution" is a bit of a stretch, but people always make resolutions on NYE, thus its inclusion in this list. "The Ice In Boston" is my current favorite. Follow along with the scene he sets as he realizes he's got, shall we say, unresolved issues. I love it!

An Egg Nog Playlist

2011-12-05T20:38:44Z

Death Cab's version of Christmas (Baby Please Come Home) is my favorite modern Christmas song - cover or otherwise. And since it is that time of year again, I can't think of anywhere better to begin a playlist than that.

I have to admit, I love egg nog. It's one of my favorite holiday treats. MMMmmmmm...]]>