- Introducing iOS Beta Builder – Make distributing beta versions of iPhone software so much easier.
“Warm,” this weeks PhotoFriday, is a bit of an alien concept here in the UK so I had to go a little further afield in order to find a picture to represent this weeks theme. This was taken in Tennessee, USA.
Please also vote for my entry in last weeks challenge, “The Street.” I’m entry number 215.
- This Summer’s Sexiest Images From Saturn – Wow. Amazing images from Cassini.
This weeks PhotoFriday, “The Street,” was one where, unusually, I had quite a few options that I was happy with. In the end I figured that it had to be somewhere where pretty much all of life happens on the street. There were a few images taken in Vietnam that came close, but I like this one in Havana, Cuba, because everyone was completely oblivious to my presence; life goes on even when there are nosey tourists with cameras.
- Pope merchandise – “The pope is visiting the UK soon, and the merchandise is already on sale, but it’s rubbish. This week’s challenge is to show the Vatican what they should be selling to mark the occasion. God will be delighted.” (via @bengoldacre)
- The Creativity Crisis – “The age-old belief that the arts have a special claim to creativity is unfounded.” It’s always bugged me when people refer to ’the creatives’ when talking about designers or artists. This is why! But back to the article… it’s interesting that you can “teach” or at least encourage creativity.
I nearly didn’t take part in this weeks PhotoFriday challenge, “Photoshop Skills,” as I’m not a big Photoshop user. I tend to tweak images, enhance the colours, maybe a little dodging and burning, but nothing that would show my Photoshop skills — the whole point of my edits are normally that you can’t see them!
Then I remembered that I’ve spent quite a lot of time over the years trying to make the perfect panorama. The above image, taken in Siena, Italy, is perhaps the best that I’ve managed. (I’ve used a variant of this one before for PhotoFriday.)
- The origins of abc – “We will begin where civilisation began, meander through the Middle Ages, race through the Renaissance, and in doing so discover where our alphabet originated, how and why it evolved, and why, for example, an A looks, well, like an A.”
- Icelander’s Campaign Is a Joke, Until He’s Elected – This is brilliant. “A polar bear display for the zoo. Free towels at public swimming pools. A “drug-free Parliament by 2020.” Iceland’s Best Party, founded in December by a comedian, Jon Gnarr, to satirize his country’s political system, ran a campaign that was one big joke. Or was it?”
For the past few weeks I have spent almost as much time in Switzerland as I have at home. Unfortunately with business trips you can never guarantee that you see anything more of the place than the airport, and office and a hotel1.
Fortunately I did finish “early” a couple of days though and the weather did manage to cooperate.
My first time in the city I arrived at the office in a taxi and walked five minutes to the hotel. Dinner wasn’t far away either. I had no impression of the orientation or size of the place. Well known for being next to a lake, I couldn’t have told you which direction to find it.
If you’re seeing any pictures missing from ZX81.org.uk at the moment this is because of a glitch in the way that I synchronise my pictures from my computer to Flickr. In short a large number of images were removed and I’m having to go back, find out which pictures I’d used and update all the relevant blogs. Please let me know if you find one that I missed.
For this weeks PhotoFriday, “Best Friend,” most people seem to have gone with pictures of their slobbering dog or grinning, cutesy couples.
That’s not my style.
I found these ducks in a hotel in Zurich, the yellow one in the bathroom, the chocolate one on the bed. I thought it would be nice to introduce them. They got on famously until one came to an unfortunate, albeit tasty, end.
Please also vote for my entry in last weeks challenge, “Crooked.” I’m entry number 187.