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Collect The Set

Mar 2009

08

I’ve given in to temptation again. Damn you Jessops and your clearance sale.

Back a year ago when I was looking at what to get as a decent compact digital, the GX100 was on the shortlist (along with the Canon G9 and a couple of outsiders). In the end, the GR Digital 2 won out. And whilst I love the GRD2, there have been a couple of occasions when I’ve pondered whether the zoom on the GX would have been worth having (and others when I’ve pondered whether it was really worth lugging the K10D along with it). And now I can find out.

In the meantime, here are a few wins and fails for the GX with specific comparison to the GRD2. First the wins:

The big one: the 24mm equivalent focal length. This is the big draw of the GX for me – yes, it’s only a bit wider than the 28 on the GR, but I think it’s a big difference. A 28mm feels like what you perceive as normal vision (50mm is the oft-cited “most like human vision” focal length but whilst it might have certain similarities, I always perceive it as a cropped version of a real view), but at 24mm there’s just enough feeling of space to let you play with bringing out big skies and making cramped spaces feel huge.
The longer focal lengths. Whilst not enough to shoot deer with, for instance, they’re enough to reduce convergence a bit in urban shots, or pull in some detail when you can’t move closer.
Shake reduction. I’ve yet to see how effective it is, but certainly there are times I could have used it on the GR.
Fast AF. The GRD2’s AF is rubbish (fortunately its fixed and manual focus modes are very good and the depth of field is huge, so in all honesty I don’t find it an issue) but the GX100’s is lightning fast, since it uses an analog phase detection technique. I’m so entrenched in the habit of “pre-focus then shoot” that I almost don’t know what to do with it.

And the fails:

It’s comparatively unwieldy. The GR is thin and you’d hardly know it’s in a coat pocket; the GX is noticeably weightier and forms a conspicuous bulge. The GR is a doddle to use one-handed, the GR much less so. The detachable lens cap adds to the handling faff, too.
The lens is good, but it ain’t the GR. There’s more barrel distortion, more aberration and more dispersion. It’s sharper than some of my SLR lenses, but not as sharp as the GR, which really is a stunning bit of glass.
No 1:1 raw, which I use 95% of the time on the GR. I’m not sure yet whether to habitually shoot 4:3 and crop to square or shoot 3:2 and leave it at that.
No orientation sensor – which feels like being back in the dark ages.
It’s heavily dependent on a fast SD card. With a Sandisk Extreme III it’s quite usable, but with a ‘vanilla’ card I have it’s painfully slow.

All in all, I absolutely made the right decision to buy the GRD2 – it’s more pocketable, more discreet, more user-friendly and it kicks out better image quality. But the GX100 probably has a home alongside it, especially as I figure out how to make the most of it.

Mar 08, 2009 by Stewart Pratt Comments (3)

How to Break the Web and Alienate People

Dec 2008

05

I did a rare thing yesterday and followed an advertising link. It was an advert for Lighthouse, touting itself as an alternative to Jira, which we use at work. I was curious to see what benefits it might give.

Now, you’d expect an advertising link to take you to a page which would impress. Not so.

The link went to this page, and in case it’s not already blindingly obvious, I’ll point out Stupid Error No. 1: The whole content, bar the links at the bottom, is a pre-rendered image.

Why would anyone do this? It takes more time to produce, it increases bandwidth, it makes the page completely opaque to search engines (well, almost – see below), it makes the page pretty hard to read on some devices, it doesn’t account for anyone’s reading preferences (for example, high contrast text can be problematic for some forms of dyslexia), and for all these failings it gives precisely zero benefit to anyone.

But that’s not the worst failing of this page, oh no. Bring on the real clanger, Stupid Error No. 2.

Images on the web should, of course, always contain relevant ‘alt’ text for use when images can’t be viewed; the most obvious example being anyone who’s blind or poorly-sighted and uses a screen reader, but the most common is Google. Use an image, and it’s the ‘alt’ text that winds up in the search results. It’s pretty optimistic to think they’d put all that text into the ‘alt’ attribute (if they were savvy enough to understand ‘alt’ text they wouldn’t even need it, of course), so let’s check out what they’ve put there.

<img xsrc=”/assets/2008/11/20/jira.gif” mce_src=”/assets/2008/11/20/jira.gif” alt=”Marketing Copy – What you lookin’ here for, son?” />

Impressive stuff, I’m sure you’ll agree. They’ve jumped through all sorts of hoops purely to screw up the usefulness of their page and then they’ve put the cherry on the whole sorry cake by demonstrating that they clearly do know about ‘alt’ text, and they see it as a handy means to flip the bird at potential customers. “Blind, are you? Sling your hook, then.”

Well done, Lighthouse. I gave up on your product as soon as that page loaded.

(Footnote to developers: Never stick crass ‘humorous’ phrases in your code. It’ll find its way out eventually. Remember, you’re the sort of person who writes code. Your idea of ‘humorous’ is almost certainly a failed one.)

Dec 05, 2008 by Stewart Pratt

A Better Google Image Search

Nov 2008

27

I don’t know about you, but it’s always irked me that Google Image Search only gives you a link to the containing page and not to the image result itself. I mean, we’re searching for images, right?

So I finally pulled my finger out and wrote a little script I’ve been meaning to write for ages. Assuming you’ve got Greasemonkey of course, you’ll be able to click on the image thumbnails to go to the images themselves and click on the descriptions below them to go to the containing page (there are tooltips if you’re the forgetful type).

Happy searching.

Nov 27, 2008 by Stewart Pratt

The Bez Adventure: Job Done, Or Not?

Jun 2008

17

Firstly, thanks for the comments (which I could read en route but not reply to) and apologies for the erratic updates. I’d checked the blog posting from the phone before leaving, but clearly not with enough text to expose the encoding errors; and Flickr’s blogging functionality is wonderfully unreliable so not all the pictures appeared here (the set is here, and it’ll grow as I work through the backlog; as will the photostream which also includes pictures from the week after the tour).

On the subject of Flickr and the photos, I’ve just been transferring the pictures onto the map. During which process I noticed this (I’ve marked the route I took in blue).

That’s right: there’s a Bez which didn’t appear on any other map (and isn’t searchable in Flickr – nor are any Bezes) and which I never saw a sign for, but which I apparently cycled within 500m of.

So, naturally, I’m really bloody pleased about that.

Jun 17, 2008 by Stewart Pratt

Fin

Jun 2008

07

The end of the road: the harbour wall at Collioure.

Jun 07, 2008 by Stewart Pratt via Flickr Comments (2)

Bez, il n’y en a plus

Jun 2008

06

The penultimate day over and on more Bezes to hunt down. 160km and over 2000m of climbing makes it one of the bigger days, whilst another problematic achilles, one blown tyre and an 80km/h descent make it one of the more eventful on the road.

Tomorrow, no more big hills. Just the run down the coast to the end of the road. Let’s see how the weather pans out…

Jun 06, 2008 by Stewart Pratt via Flickr No Comments

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How to Break the Web and Alienate People

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The Bez Adventure: Job Done, Or Not?

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Bez, il n’y en a plus

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