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“Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow” is an innovative movie which pushes the boundaries of technology — a fact that is not evident at first sight. The look and feel of “Sky Captain” is reminiscent of classic comics from the 1930s. However, the actors (a well-chosen cast of Jude Law, Gwyneth Paltrow, Angelina Jolie) play entirely on greenscreen stages. Everything else is computer-generated. This movie is the first work of its director, which is even more astonishing. Well worth watching!

Something I have always dreamt of inventing. Just imagine a table like this, used in the same manner as the writing tables of the monks who copied the Bible. Especially intriguing is the ability to use several fingers and both hands at the same time, which makes for a much natural interaction but also requires new interface paradigms.

http://cs.nyu.edu/~jhan/ftirtouch/index.html

For some time now I have been listening to the weekly podcast Understanding the Times by Olive Tree Ministries. This radio show offers background information on current political and social problems from a biblical view, especially regarding the topics Israel, Islam, etc., as well as critical evaluations of developments in Christianity.

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After about 600 shot images I noticed a couple of things that I had been handling wrongly in my photo workflow until now. The following is a detailed description of my solution to these problems, including code excerpts. I hope that this will be useful to some of my readers, be it for photo editing or other areas.

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I have learned a new photography term: Bokeh (pronounced with equal stress on both syllables since it is Japanese and not French). It describes the quality with which a lense reproduces out-of-focus areas. I am excited that my new Nikon AF 50mm/1.8D lense, one of the sharpest and at the same time cheapest Nikon lenses, has a very beautiful bokeh. In this picture, this is best seen on the vibrant twigs of the trees in the background.

Quote from an interview with nature photographer Tony Sweet:

Tony [Sweet] tells his workshop students that they’ll know they’re getting better by the number of frames they’re shooting—and the number they’re keeping. “The better you are, the fewer frames you shoot,” he says. “When you come back from a vacation or a field trip with five thousand pictures, you’re not a photographer, you’re an editor. The better you get, the fewer pictures you come home with. Fewer frames, more keepers—that’s photography.”

More about and from Tony Sweet can be heard in the first Nikonians Podcast, which I highly recommend.