Pan-o-RAMA

For as long as we've had our digital camera I have been looking for a good way to make panoramic photographs. Some models come with camera-based "stitching" built right in. Others provide software-based stitching. Ours included neither.

Therefore, I have, on rare occasion, made various manual attempts at achieving the same general effect. An opportunity recently presented itself and I decided to have another go.

In January we sustained some material damage to our driveway near the culvert in connection with the flooding in the Northwest. Our culvert was too small to handle all of that melting ice and snow running off of the surface from every property upstream. Ours is the last culvert before the storm water drains into the creek. Every year a little bit of water flows over the top of our driveway, taking just a bit of gravel with it. This time, however, the water was flowing over the top of the upstream driveways as well, meaning we had a lot of water to deal with. The rushing water carried a fair portion of our driveway downstream, leaving it impassible for the Camry.

My first attempt at a panorama of the damage, using a web-based converter. "Just upload your photos and the rest is automatic." So they claimed.

Disappointed, I turned to my old friend, PhotoShop, with much more satisfying results (also much more labor intensive).

Now, however, I have finally discovered the solution I've been longing for: Microsoft ICE (ICE = Image Composite Editor).

It is difficult to imagine a simpler process - you literally just drag-and-drop the photos, 13 in my case, into the workspace. ICE then goes right to work. After my previous experience with a free panorama solution, I really was not expecting perfection - but perfection is exactly what I got two minutes later. Take a look.

ICE is way too easy and way too good to be true - but it is true. I feel like I've cheated and won, only to learn that cheating is not only acceptable, but encouraged. Try it. You'll like it.

**UPDATE 2/27/09 10:04 pm** I'm not sure why I've got itsy-bitsy photos here. Check back next time and I'll hopefully have them fixed so they can be viewed with the naked eye.

**UPDATE 2/28/09 12:01 am** Still getting some odd behavior from Blogger, but I think I've got large enough images now.

Moeroids

The big story in the news today was about Alex Rodriguez admitting to having used performance-enhancing drugs several years ago. If you recall my earlier post on this topic, you'll understand that I'm a bit leery about getting into this again.

To me, we - and by "we" I mean society, journalists, congress - we are not focused on the key issue. "We" are mistakenly concerned with cheating and lying and scandals and records and asterisks. 

It's true that Barry Bonds perjured himself to a grand jury and that offense constitutes a crime.

But my question is, why was Barry Bonds made to sit before a grand jury in the first place.

Baseball is a sport. Sport is entertainment. Why not leave it to baseball fans to decide whether or not to buy the product that professional baseball is offering? We vote with our pocketbooks everyday on any number of products. The Dixie Chicks suffered in album sales and radio air time for their anti-George Bush remarks. Tom Cruise is arguably punished at the box office for his occasional bizarre behavior and comments. Kobe Bryant lost tens of millions in endorsement deals due to to his indiscretions. Why then are we not capable of dealing with A-Rod?

I heard a radio interview with the author that broke the story in Sports Illustrated. Her main point was that A-Rod now must explain himself. Why? What do we expect him to say? We already know why any player takes performance-enhancing drugs - to enhance their performance, hence the term. 

Why are we not issuing subpoenas to supermodels? I understand their blemish free physiques may be the result of PhotoShop "enhancements" and plastic surgery.

Is this any different than the high school or college student pulling an all-nighter to cram for finals with the help of caffeine or No-Doze?

The part that really upsets me in all of this is the government's involvement. Does anybody remember the baseball senate hearings several years ago? What a waste of taxpayer dollars! The drug testing in which Alex Rodriguez participated was purported to be anonymous and not subject to discipline. Why then do we know the identities of so many perpetrators? Why then are these individuals being punished? True, maybe they have not been suspended by Major League Baseball. But dragging their names through the press and talk radio and forcing them to testify before congress hardly seems like a reward.

I want my government to focus on the well-being of the citizens of our country. I don't want them conducting federal investigations and televised hearings about a game. Let's assume for a moment that all of the offenders are somehow prosecuted. How do we benefit? Will America then be better off? Will it be safer? Will it be stronger? More powerful? More financially sound?

The responsibility for teaching children about the many undesirable ramifications of drug use falls to parents - not professional athletes. Charles Barkley said it best in an old Nike commercial for which he penned the script, "I'm not a role model." He has long argued that parents and teachers need to be the role models for children, NOT professional athletes. Here's an excerpt.

I think the media demands that athletes be role models because there's some jealousy involved. It's as if they say, this is a young black kid playing a game for a living and making all this money, so we're going to make it tough on him. And what they're really doing is telling kids to look up to someone they can't become, because not many people can be like we are. Kids can't be like Michael Jordan.

See Barkley's Wikipedia entry for the full details. 

Let's let the free markets decide the outcome of this debate. Assume responsibility for instilling strong values in your children. If you can't support the behavior of certain professional athletes, then don't. Don't attend games. Don't buy hats or t-shirts. And for heaven's sake, Congress, before addressing the critical issue of steroids in baseball, could you please look at things that are actually important to our sovereignty and security?

My Christmas Gift to You

I've got another gem of a tool for you.

Sumo Paint is like Photoshop's little brother. It can do many of the same things that Photoshop does, and just as nicely. Its interface is quite a bit simpler due to the fact that it lacks most of the highly complex, professional-level functionality intended for Photoshop's uppercrust. 

Big deal, right? Image editors are a dime a dozen, right?

Well, not only is Sumo Paint simple and powerful, it's also free.

Oh yeah. It's also entirely web-based. This is Web 2.0! 

It's as though you have the software installed on your machine, but you don't. It's on the Internet. You've got your File menu, your Edit menu and all of your other menus, just like when you use applications on your computer. But Sumo's not on your computer. It's on the Internet. 

Processing power? Compatibility? Upgrades?  

Forget about it. You're in the cloud now. If you have an Internet browser, you can use Sumo Paint. You can still store your images on your local machine, so don't worry about privacy. Not that I'd recommend Sumo-ing your driver's license or credit card - you know, being that the app is web-based. Or, if you want, you can store your images on Sumo's remote servers. Personally, I'm keeping mine in house for now - but I don't object to outsourcing the storage should I ever feel the need.

Let's face it, Photoshop is the Everest of image editors, but it is also quite expensive AND extremely complicated for the average user. GIMP is a free, open-source alternative, but still complex. You could pick up Photoshop Elements or Paint Shop Pro or something, but those still cost. Sumo Paint doesn't.

I may not use it at home because I still have an old, primitive copy of Photoshop that is still functioning, and I am trying to become more proficient with it. But for work? You bet. When my only employer-provided option is MS Paint - are you kidding?

WordWeb

Every day I get an email from radio tech talk show hostess Kim Komando. Every day she offers a short review and recommendation of a free computer software download. These are things like organizational tools, security software, system tools, games, graphics/music/video programs, etc. In all cases she has investigated the companies behind the product and tested the software herself before recommending it to her listeners/readers. I've tried several of them over the years and still use many of those free apps such as:

• AVG - virus protection, comparable to Norton or McAfee
  
• Scribus - a free desktop publishing package similar to PageMaker
  
• GIMP - the free Photoshop

Most days I simply skim Ms. Komando's description of the software and move on. I keep a lookout for something that meets an actual need that I have. AVG AntiVirus, for example, saves me the $60 annual subscription fee charged by most of the alternatives. AVG does offer paid products such as their premium security suite, but they give their antivirus software away for free to get you in the door. Thus far, I haven't been compelled to step up to a more powerful product, nor have I experienced a security breach of any kind since I've been using their product.

Scribus solved a problem I was having where I needed to create unique text wraps around and within custom shapes. There may be a way to do it with Office, but I couldn't figure out how to do it. Scribus allows me to edit the points of my shapes and place text on the inside of those shapes, whereas Word and PowerPoint only allow me to wrap text around the exterior of a predefined or custom shape.

My new favorite is a dandy of an app called WordWeb that was featured a few days ago. I can't believe how much I'm using it. WordWeb is a dictionary/thesaurus/encyclopedia all rolled into one very easy to use package. It is not a spellchecker, per se. The app resides in the system tray next to the clock. You use it by holding the CTRL key and clicking on any word with the right mouse button. Up pops a small tabbed window containing everything you could possibly want to know about the word. 

I'll show you. Pick a word - "varmit" - got it. Oh, WordWeb told me that is not a word and suggested I might actually be looking for "varmint". That's true, I was. Here's a screenshot:

This works on any text (read: not words in an image file). I like having a universal solution that works anywhere within my operating system. Word, Excel, Internet browser, blog, whatever. Same process. Same interface. Just today it saved me, in two separate work-related emails, from using words that did not mean what I thought they meant. Anything that can help me not come off as a half-wit (I just used WordWeb again to find a synonym for "moron").

If you're interested in experiencing the same enlightenment I now enjoy, you can find WordWeb here: http://wordweb.info/. The download on the left is the free version.