Tag: Tech

I saw this via Hack-a-day. It is a pinhole camera that you put together and it resembles a real 35mm camera. It was originally printed in a magazine and you follow the instructions and create your camera. I thought that this was a especially worthy hack considering what you can do when you have very little to work with.

Dirkon – The Paper Camera [pinhole.cz]
During the 1970s, magazines published in Communist Czechoslovakia were controlled by the state, like the majority of other enterprises. Very few good magazines were available and were difficult to get hold of, so people would borrow and exchange them when given the opportunity. This also applied to magazines aimed at young people, which was probably one of the reasons why almost everyone from my generation, when we get on to the subject of pinhole cameras, has fond memories of the cut-out paper camera known as Dirkon*, published in 1979 in the magazine ABC mladých techniků a přírodovědců [An ABC of Young Technicians and Natural Scientists].

This is utter garbage. I just got a Nikon D70 and I am loving it…just to find out recently that they started farting around and pulling a Microsoft by encrypting the whitebalance information for RAW formatted image so that only Nikon’s software can work with it. So this effectivly locks out third party RAW converters or Open source applications too without risking DMCA litigation. I don’t use Photoshop or Nikon Capture. I use Gimp. I am getting tired of the out of no where “gotchas” that is a source of income for someone…Come on Nikon, this is how children act. I may just go get a Canon camera next.

tigert.com | my life and stuff » Blog Archive » Disappointed at Nikon
Not about the hardware, I am loving my D100, but this sucks rocks.

Such idiotic games with encrypted file formats are not something we need in this century. It’s my own business what software I use to open my RAW photos, why should Nikon decide for me? This sucks for all the free software projects that have support for NEF-format. I rather wish Nikon would concentrate on making the best cameras instead of playing power games with Adobe.