Archive for the 'Review' CategoryPage 2 of 2

Review: Nikon AF 70-300mm Lens

Published
on August 22, 2007
in Photography and Review
. 0 Comments

I’ve had my Nikon D40 for around 5 months now, and its fantastic! Great prosumer digital SLR, with a ton of features, but not hard to learn and use. Anyway, the lens that came with my D40 is 18-50mm. Its a good lens if your standing 2 to 3 meters away from your subject, but sometimes you need to get closer. For example, at the zoo, a better lens allows me to take good photos of my subject between bars and far away.

So I went onto Amazon and started “googling” round, (I know its the wrong term, but hey) and found a few good lenses. Up came the Nikon AF 70-300mm lens for £70. Perfect. Placed and order and in it came a copel of days later.

Unfortunetly I forgot to read the small print. The AF feature of the lens does not work with the D40 (my camera). Bugger! It seems the lens was made a few years before the D40 so there is no new AF connection. Oh well, Manual Focus works fantastically thought. Its taking some time to get used to, but I’m getting used to it.

The basic length of the lens is long, and it gets even longer when fully expanded (Insert penis joke here). Its 20cm fully, and 25cm with the lens hood (which is included).

Some people complain about the build qualitiy of the lens. Personally, I’m not a photographic snob. It doesn’t feel like sand paper, so I’m quite happy with it. Its rubber, not plastic, grips feel fine on my hands. I can hold it tightly and adjust the focus easily with no pain at all.

Over the lens is great. Its a bit of a bummer that AF don’t work with my D40. But hey, I’ll get used to it for long shots.

Review: iTech DAB One

Published
on April 10, 2007
in Design, Radio and Review
. 0 Comments

For the last few years, the UK has had DAB Radio. “Crystal Clear and more stations”. Most of these radios look like something out of a bad 1960’s sci-fi movie. Some are ok, made out of wood. Some of them though, are quite nice. There fashionable. Thats the first thing I thought when I saw iTech’s DAB One.

This model was released in 2005, so it doesn’t have all the latest features. It does though have an SD slot (for recording and MP3 playback), FM radio, DAB radio, alarm clock and a line in jack (so you can plug in your iPod). Its initial price was £130, which has now dropped to £35.

The design of the radio looks like something that would have come out of the mind of Apple. It has a click-wheel shaped button device for selecting menus and changing volume. It does not though act like a click-wheel, you have to push the buttons. A bright LCD display shows what stations playing and what tracks is on. There is also a record function and you can set your 5 favorite stations to 5 buttons on the top.

Setting up is simple. Plug in the radio to the power socket or batteries. Press the green button and it scans for stations. The sound is strong very strong. I only have it up to 30% of its volume and its loud enough to be heard all over my room.

All in all, this little radio is a fantastic buy. If you want a stylish DAB, get this!

iTech DAB One

Review: Aperture 1.5

Published
on February 9, 2007
in Apple, Photography and Review
. 0 Comments

One thing that I love is Photography. I’m a huge fan of Flickr and use it daily. I have about 5000 photos in my iPhoto library. But iPhoto can only go so far, perhaps you need some sort of pro app for your Mac.

iMovie has Final Cut, Gargeband has Logic, iPhoto has Aperture. Aperture is one of those tools that that spans both levels. Consumer and Professional. If you just want a little more power, Aperture will touch up the photos with the little advances you need. If your a pro, its got enough power to do pretty much whatever you could want to do with photos.

The first thing you notice if your coming from iPhoto is the change into the GUI. The iPhoto has a Candy-like interface. Its very consumer based. Aperture has a clean steel black interface. Its easy on the eye and makes it simple for you to edit your photos in.

On the subject of editing, the sidebars are your new best friend. One you left you have all your albums, on the right you have your editing tools. Lets say your photo has a little too much yellow on a white photo. That wedding dress looks like a yogurt instead of sugar. Remove Red-eye, add shadows, patch and remove spots, ect. All the features that are needed can be edited.

I don’t shoot in RAW, just JPEG. RAW can be imported, edited and exported. One more thing with exporting is the ad-dons. I’m a big fan of Flickr. The online photo social site. With an add-on, it can be sent and easily exported to Flickr. Add a caption or titles, its all there. Including a little status bar that shows how much space you have left.

All in all, Aperture is a fantastic app for the amateur to pro photographer. Its quick and clean, and is easy to redo and export you photos. If you use your small USB pen cam to much or are a dabbler of Digital SLRs, its fantastic.

Aperture is £219 and has a free 30 day trial.

Aperture

Ecto : Less mess, more blogging

Published
on December 6, 2006
in Apple and Review
. 3 Comments

I’m a fan of Wordpress, I use it for everything. From a basic site to manage, to a full blown blog. There is one thing I hate about it though, its web based. I like all the “web 2.0″ stuff, Flickr and digg to name a few, but to blog, I prefer a native application.

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