Quick Hit Monday: Good Deals Brewing; Maybe A Problem With The New iPad OS Upgrade; A Cool iPad/iPhone/iPod App; Photo Links Galore; and More!

Good Morning Everybody,

We made it back safe and sound late Saturday and got right into the holiday swing of things. With the snow falling on Sunday, it made it kind of easy. Hey, Cabo was great but Christmas time is still my favorite time of the year and our home and the studio prove the point with 9 Christmas trees  already in place.

Anyway, it looks like it's shaping up to be a busy week around here so why don't we get right on with today's post. Here we go...

Holidays All Around, and Good Deals Too Starting Wednesday!

That's right, this coming Wednesday we are beginning our first holiday sale at DPT. LaDawn and Jennifer have been putting the finishing touches on several holiday specials. I have to say, you are going to like what you see. Be sure to check back Wednesday for all the details.

On The Fun Side For The Holidays

Last week I stumbled across a new iPhone/iPad app that I love. It's Bill Atkinson's PhotoCard app. Bill Atkinson is both a MAC guru and fantastic nature photographer. In fact we used Bill's profiles when we started printing everything inkjet on my first Epson 9600 printer.

Anyway, back to the app. The light version is free with the full version costing only $4.99. The lite PhotoCard version works great as I've been using my own images instead of Bill's - sorry Bill. The app is soooo.... easy to use. Pick an image, fine tune it if needed, add the recipient's address - I been sending a few cards to my daughter Elizabeth during our trip - add a stamp and you are ready to go. Just hit send.

It's a great way to share your travels with friends and family. But  more than that, I think it has a place in my studio on the business side of things, too. Here's why. With the iPad it's really easy to send an uploaded image to a client, but if you've uploaded the RAW files to your iPad as I do while shooting a wedding, it's that Hi-Res file that they receive - not a good thing.

With the PhotoCard app, the image is downsized and sent as a Jpeg attachment - pretty cool. Now I have even a better and fun way to interact with my clients and vendor buddies. you can check the PhotoCard out right here.

Problems With iPad Upgrade - Maybe

Hey gang, you all know I'm an iPad fanatic. And, I was really looking forward to downloading the latest greatest version of OS 4.2. Luckily I haven't yet. I love the fact that you can use the Delkin Card reader to easily upload my flash cards into the iPad.

I blogged about it right here months ago. Here is the link to the post. Fellow blogging buddy and Adobe guru, Terry White did the same thing right here and posted a video too. OK, that all well and good. I was anticipating no problem with the latest OS version. Well, there seems to be a problem with the latest OS version not working with the Delkin card reader.

I recently received a note from Amanda Spillman, one of our loyal DPT readers. Here is an excerpt from her note, "After I upgraded I can no longer import jpegs or RAW images using my Delkin card reader. I attempted to download the same card I had last imported before upgrading & it says there isn't enough power to support my device. Which I had no issues before with importing images using that card reader previously. Wanted to see if it was just me or if there were others having the same problem. Thanks."

Anybody having any of these same issues? Not being able to get images from flash cards from a wedding shoot would be a huge deficit for me and many others who use our iPads to add a large amount of image sizzle to the wedding day with impromptu iPad slide shows. I'll keep you posted on anything I find out.

Geek Squad Report - Windows 7 Not Letting You Hook Up To A Wireless Network?

After our long drive to Cabo two weeks ago, I mentioned the computer issues Kent and I were having connecting our Windows 7 machines to his network. It was pretty frustrating for about two days especially if you are trying to get a blog post up.

I don't know if anyone else has had the same problem, but if you have, here is the solution that worked for us thanks to a post by Microsoft moderator, Novak Wu.

"This issue can occur by incorrect DNS settings. I suggest you perform the following steps to troubleshoot the issue.

1. Click "Start", input "NCPA.CPL" (without quotation marks) and press Enter.

2. Right click on the connection that you use for the local connection, and then click "Properties".

3. Click to select "Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IPv4)", and then click "Properties".

4. In the Internet Protocol window, let's change the "Preferred DNS server" to 208.67.222.222

5. Click 'OK' twice to complete the modification.

If the issue persists, please repeat the steps and change the "Preferred DNS server" to 208.67.220.220."

Thanks a bunch Novak. That did the trick for us!!

Just For Fun - Some Photography Links You Might Enjoy

It's getting close to the end of the year and several sites are posting some of their "Best of" links. Let me share a couple of gems with you today.

First off how about heading over to Tiffinbox.org to see what Master Twitter king, Seshu, has posted. (Seshu tweets like crazy and it's good information too.). Anyway, he’s got a pretty cool blog going called Tiffinbox.org right here. It's an interesting collection of posts by photographers for photographers. Check it out right here.

The second link list is over at LifeHacker, always a good read. His post, "The Most Popular Tips, Tricks, and Hacks of 2010" looks to have some fun things listed. You can find them listed right here. Enjoy!

Now To Get You In The Mood For The Holidays

Have you seen any of the "flash crowd" videos over at YouTube. Many are quite interesting. One of the first I saw was when several hundred people staged a "flash crowd" at Grand Central Station [link]. The large group showed up and milled around the station until the precise predetermined moment - at that moment they just froze in motion with the other commuters continuing on to their connections. It was quite interesting to see the visual result.

Anyway, this "flash crowd" video is pretty darn amazing. All I'll tell you is that it takes place at a mall during Christmas season. Hit the PLAY button below and get into the spirit. It's quite fun.

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Hey gang,that's it for me today. The snow is falling, the cider is warming on the stove, and presents are ready for wrapping. Oh.... you mean after two weeks of being away from the studio, I've got real work to do? OK, warm cider and presents tomorrow then ;~)

Have a good one everybody. See ya' tomorrow for another episode of Technique Tuesday.

David