Eye Level Pictures, iOS 8.0.2 Update & Picture Storage

I had a comment from Tom a couple of days ago, that his best pictures of his dog were taken at below eye level. He even mentioned that might be hard to do with Heidi ... I found out yesterday it was doable but interesting laying on the ground looking up or close to eye level with two basset hounds. During the process I may have taken "the best" picture I have ever taken of Winston after 10 years. Here is that picture.

Of course when I got down on the ground with a camera in one hand, all three hounds thought I was either hurt or playing, and either way they were all going to run to me and make sure I was ok or find out what the playing strategy was. I mean it was three hound heads right on my face and Sadie's paw in the middle of my chest.  lol

I got back to my feet, took Sadie over to where I could connect her to her anchored rope. Of course that made her quite curious on what was going on because both basset hounds were able to walk or run freely. She was confused right before I walked over to hook her up, at least she stayed there to pose for a picture.

As soon as Heidi saw that Sadie was hooked up and she could get out of Sadie's range, she took off sprinting ... it surprised me enough that I didn't have the camera ready to take a really good picture but did take one that was a little blurry.

With the two bassets now in a relaxed mode, I was able to lay at the base of a very small incline in the yard. That position got me close to their eye level. After I looked at the pictures I had to agree with what Tom said, I thought they were much better pictures when taking them at below eye level or in the basset hound's case ... "close" to eye level. It could be hard to do that the majority of the time though.

As you see, after a few short weeks from receiving an allergy shot, Heidi's skin rash is coming back on her lower rear legs and all four feet. They are worse this morning as I type this. I have a couple of new things to try that fellow readers have suggested. I will try those separately to see if/what works and hopefully will not do any more shots.

After a little more reading about Picasa 3.9, Flickr, and iPhoto, I found some information on a blog that made it very easy to understand. I found out that I was wrong what I thought about Picasa 3.9. I understood the process, which I don't like having it download every picture you have ever had on your computer even after deleting them, but I was wrong thinking where it was. I found out that it is on YOUR HARD DRIVE, and isn't web based like Picasa Web Album ... or like Flickr. I found out that Picasa 3.9 was just like iPhoto or my new Nikon ViewNX 2 ... to edit and store pictures.

I knew it was a picture editor and storage but I thought it was located on the web, not on my hard drive.

After playing around with Picasa 3.9 some more, I decided to stick to the web based Flickr. I like the program a lot. The main reason I was looking for a different storage program for all of my pictures to begin with ... I wanted them stored "off location" in case my computer crashes or I have a problem with the external hard drive backup.

It is a long process uploading them to Flickr and I found out yesterday it sucks up a lot of my monthly internet data limit of 15Gb's per month. Just like any other website when you are uploading files, it uses a lot of data. I do have a free period of unlimited data I can use between midnight and 5am, so I will do my Flickr uploads after midnight.

I'm sure most of you have heard in the news about all the trouble Apple is having with their latest iOS 8.0 update. They came out with a fix to those problems in 8.0.2. I did some reading online at MacRumors Forum to find out what the geeks were saying and as well as the normal users like me. I normally hold off before doing any new updates to the iOS, but I wanted to check out this new Health program that Apple has doing ... it basically can track about everything imaginable about your health, even your sleep routine, without any wrist devices.

With a lot of users not having problems of any kind and after a lot of reading, I thought it was safe to do the updates to my iPhone 5s and my iPad Mini. There is the option of doing these downloads (huge file) via wifi but I was reading on that geek forum, it was recommended to do the following simple steps:

For Apple devices only !!!

1. Do not use wifi, plug your device into your computer and use iTunes to update.
2. Download only ... do not do the download and install option.
3. After the download is complete, back up your device to your computer, not iCloud.
4. In your device settings, under the general, reset, click "reset all settings".
5. Install the update
6. Set up device like a new devise.
7. Then restore from backup.

One important thing is NOT to sign up for iCloud Drive yet. That causes a big problem of losing documents in some cases if you have saved your documents to iCloud Drive. It will not work until the new OS update for Mac comes out in a few months, called Yosemite.

Now, once that OS update does come out for iMacs, Macbook Pros and Mac Air .. called Yosemite ... and you activate iCloud Drive ... you will be able to use the Office programs in all three devises and even start an email or work on one device while finishing it on your other device.

Right now I think the iOS 8.0.2 is worth it, just to be able to use Apple's new "HealthKit"....which is called just "Health" once that program is automatically uploaded during the update.

After my updates to both devices, I've had zero problems and have seen nothing going on with my two devices that i have heard on the news. At least in my case iOS 8.0.2 works great.

For Window readers, what I have just said will probably confuse some. I am not sure what PC users have the ability to do with these new Apple apps because I don't have Windows PC. For Apple readers, I hope this information helps.

To close this post that has turned out longer than I planned ... I thought my iPhone took great pictures when using it most of the time for the past couple of years. As it should, the Nikon D3200 takes so much better pictures it's hard to describe. I am really happy that I made the camera purchase.

That's all from southern Indiana.

I Am Using Flickr For Old and New Photos

If you glance to the left side bar under "Other Interests", I have add a link "My Other Photos".  That link will go to my new Flickr account where they are giving me 1 terabyte of free storage. Some of the photos you have seen on the blog but there will be many others that are not on my blog.

It's a long slow process after they are uploaded, adding titles and a short description but I am working on transferring all of my current photographs on my computer, using Flickr as a "off location" photo storage. I don't have to be tied into a Google Plus account, which for me is a plus, no pun intended.

As I take more and more photos I'll add them to Flickr but some of them may not deal with RVs, Hounds or Retirement Living. They will still be sorted by subject and put in their own albums. I am only a few days into this new venture but have over 600 photos titled, described and edited so the public can see them.

Once again, there will be some duplication here on the blog but many more photos on Flickr. Some of the recent photos on the Flickr photostream will be posted to the blog, but not all of them.

If interested, click the link on the sidebar.

New Day & New Smells

It's another beautiful day in the "tropics" of southern Indiana ... Hard to believe it's just a few days from October. 

Sadie is going over her schedule mentally in her head for today ... no need for one of those stupid iPads ... she has her whole itinerary for the day between those ears.

The life of a hound is hard but someone's got to do it ... when do we eat??

Winston on the other hand may look slow and his eyes are always bloodshot but his nose is always working and something has touched off his sensors ... not sure what he smelled ... I didn't smell anything.

Heidi had the "Do Not Disturb" sign on her door ... no photos today

A Weekend of Computer Play

I turned out spending more time than I had planned on the computer this weekend but it was all at night just as I said I would do last week. I want to spend my computer time after 6pm and be able to enjoy the days outside since the weather is so nice. So I did that but I got more than I bargained for Friday night.

I was up until 4:00am Saturday morning all because of a new external hard drive I bought for continuing my backups. 

Luckily I like that kind of stuff. I like working on computer software that has problems, reading online on how to get it to work if needed and then seeing it eventually work ... so the stories below may sound very frustrating but I enjoy the process of figuring everything out.

Four years ago when I bought my iMac I bought a external hard drive for backing up all my files, the same size as the hard drive. Currently my computer hard drive is barely even filled. The way Apple's "Time Machine" works when backing up, it keeps adding backups with changes as it should but space wise, my external hard drive is full. It will keep backing up and will let you know that for it to complete the backup it will delete the oldest file, which is this case is in 2011. The Time Machine works well as I have gone back into the files and pulled out pictures or older files that I have deleted and wanted back.

So last week when buying the camera, I bought a new external hard drive twice the size of my hard drive as recommended. I thought it would be simple just to move all the backup from my older drive to the new one and then reformat the old drive and use it for backing up something else (system files). I searched on Google to confirm the transfer process and it looked simple, should be no issues.

Due to the size of the file, it took forever to start the transfer of files and eventually stopped although not completed. I started reading about the process again in case I missed something. I found out by reading online that what I was wanting to do should work but a lot of people had problems doing it with the hard drive I had. I found it hard to believe there would be any problems because when you buy the drive it was already formatted for your type of computer, Windows or Mac.

Long story short ... I was up until 4am Friday night / Saturday morning, having fun trying to configure the drive based on what I was reading. The problem was after I got it to work, it took from Saturday morning until earlier this afternoon (Sunday) to complete the transfer.

But it didn't complete the transfer ... after almost a day and a half of non-stop transferring ... it had a problem with a file on the new external drive!!!  I remained calm though and decided I would try Plan B, after almost two days after I started. During the dog walk on Sunday, I decided that I would do one more update on the older drive, take it off Time Machine as the backup drive and disconnect it from the computer with a note to myself that drive has backup files from March 2011 until today.

So far I am into 44.70Gb of backed up files on the new external drive without any problems. IF ... IF it does not finish the job without error, I will return it Monday and buy an external drive with a different brand name. WD does have known issues with Mac computers from what people say on the forums, yet like all things, some people have zero problems with that match up. The new drive is WD My Passport for Mac. No formatting required.

I found out in the early hours of Monday morning, there is a different way to transfer the backup from the old external drive to the new drive. I was on that screen the other night in Disc Utilities, but was hesitant in clicking the "erase" button like I should have. So later tonight I will try that process. I also found out since the time I bought the computer in 2011, updates to the OS has changed what the Time Machine backs up and with the current Maverick OS, it does back up the system files and a lot more.

I am not sure I even need a new drive, if I don't mind having older files deleted on the backup disc from 3 years ago.

Besides seeing that my kitchen counter top in the photo above is the original "vintage" 1975 model, there is an iPad Mini sitting next to the hard drive along with an external CD/DVD drive. A few months back my CD/DVD drive on the iMac started spitting the discs back out once I slid them into the machine. I was in the process of downsizing my music and movies to use while traveling. Once again I did a lot of reading about what the potential problems could be, some do some don't have problems. I personally think it had something to do with the last OS update to Maverick. The optical drive worked on the previous OS, so that is just my guess.

The external CD/DVD drive is part of my "downsizing" ... I am putting a lot, not all of my music on the computer along with some favorite movies that I can take with me when traveling instead of DVDs and a player to use. I also like playing music on my computer while I am on it rather than the stereo in the other room. That drive has worked perfect so far and downloads 4x-5x faster, so transferring a CD does not take long at all.

I bought the first iPad when they first came out and actually used it more than the laptop I had at the time. I also thought I could use it at work for all the meetings I attended plus replace the notebook I would keep during the work day. I didn't think there would be a problem .. the first generation iPad did not have a camera, no way to connect an external drive to download anything or upload from my government computer. There was no way to break the restrictions of using or being around a government computer.

About the second day I had it at work, the department IT guy went ballistic when he saw it on my desk and that it was even in the building. Whereas just two weeks prior I was in a meeting in the corporate office that included high ranking military personnel and the iPad was the machine used to present the meeting.

So it wasn't that big of a deal, I had bought it for home use more than work anyway and I thought for what I did I could use it and sell my home laptop, which I did later on.

Since my iPad is the first generation, Apple quit including that model in their system updates recently ... good business sense ... forces me to buy a new one if I want to take advantage of their latest OS where the iPad, iMac and iPhone will all be synchronized easier and plus all the added features like all three devices using documents and spreadsheets.

I found over the years the 9.5" iPad was too big for reading a book, meaning it was not something you could hold with one hand for long periods of time. You couldn't do that with even the newer lighter Air's or iPad's but I found I could do that easy with the new "Mini" version. I like the mini version and it's still a great replacement for what I used my laptop for which mostly turned into internet browsing, email, photography, and reading electronic books. With the new upgrades I'll be able to synchronize documents from my iMac to the other two devices.

The thing is I spent all my time looking at the one with a retina display and thought that was what I was buying. I wasn't paying attention at the cash register to notice the difference in price and really didn't notice the difference on the box. When I got home and opened the box I realized the sales rep pulled out a iPad Mini with the regular screen which is nice but that retina display is unbelievable. I have used the Mini this weekend but I know that if I don't take it back and exchange it, it will continue to bug me.

I bought some Rockfish camera lens filters at Best Buy today on the clearance shelf. While there I took another look at the iPad Air, a larger screen to work with spreadsheets and a laptop replacement when traveling. I decided to go with the Mini and the Retina display. Of course that not only has a sharper screen but also a faster processor. After a few hours of working with it, the exchange was worth it. I can tell a difference in speed and picture quality, whereas these past few days i wasn't sure the difference would be noticeable.

The next big fiasco this weekend was photograph programs.

I downloaded the disc that came with my camera ... Nikon ViewNX2 ... it's great for photo editing and I think is better than iPhoto that I have been using for the past three years on this blog. I am still in the process of learning how that works, along with how my camera works and how to do things with it besides just taking a picture. I want to get to the manual mode of photography as soon as possible.

But that wasn't the fiasco.

I decided I wanted to backup all of my photos in a 3rd party program like Picasa or Flickr. I had read about Dropbox, iCloud, and some others but I basically decided it was down between Picasa and Flickr as the best programs to use. The fiasco started as soon as Picasa was installed on my computer. It started downloading EVERY photo that had ever been on my computer. For me the problem was in the past I had over 50,000 images of items I sold or loaded on my websites to sell, provided to me from my suppliers. When I stopped that business, I deleted all of those photographs and I thought they were gone.

When I moved to a new computer in 2010, all of those photos were transferred to my new computer and then deleted from their folder and from the iPhoto library ... but Picasa must have started pulling images from my 3 years of backed up files because the photos I was seeing during the upload I had not seen in years and thought they were deleted. I am not sure where Picasa was getting those photos.

I immediately stopped the upload to Picasa and un-installed Picasa from my computer. I went to Google and searched what might be the problem. I posted comments on my blog hoping for some answers. I emailed Al who is a power user of Picasa. During my online reading I was able to find my Picasa account that had been set up automatically when I set up a Google Plus account last summer. Of course I knew that Blogger keeps all the photos uploaded into the blog in Picasa Web Albums. A lot of reading and trying things. I was seeing too many people were complaining about privacy issues after Google Plus was added to the Picasa program. So I was hesitant in using it. The more I read it seemed as if I would need a Google Plus account eventually.

I noticed once I brought up that Picasa file, on the right side was my profile name and when I clicked it, it would move to a screen to upgrade my profile to Google Plus....so my Picasa was still linked to my old Google Plus account I deactivated last summer. I think think about letting it upload photograph it wanted and then I would spend many many hours deleting photos I did not want or had deleted in the past...such has the 50,000+ sports images of the memorabilia of my past online business. That would take way too much time and I didn't want to do that. I wanted to have control on what I uploaded and could do that with a bulk upload.

I went to check out Flickr and I liked that program. I spent a short time loading around 500 photos of my dogs and VWs, not all of them on the dogs but a lot of them. I'll work with those 500 photos to find out how Flickr works and after I find out how it works I plan on putting all of my photos on my computer into Flickr for a 3rd party storage. They give you 1(Tb) terebyte of free storage. 

Where I almost made a huge mistake was earlier this afternoon when I had bright idea to go through my iPhoto Library and delete any duplicated photos and increase some of my hard drive space plus clean up my photo files before I would upload them to Flickr.

Also the new Apple OS 8.0 update will change iPhoto drastically, moving folders around and naming them something different. I have not read all about it yet but what I saw when glancing at the article there will be some major changes to the photo program. To much info to discuss here.

Well I spent a lot of time going through the Library and deleting duplicates, luckily I didn't not empty the trash and could restore them if I needed to. Well I needed to. The first folder I looked at was Sadie's and 2/3 of her photos were not in the folder. I checked some VWs folder and they had the same result. So I am still in the process of going through photographs and adding them back to their correct folders. When I saw photos missing, I restored all the images I deleted and added them back into the iPhoto Library. They are all there, around ~2,100 of them.

So it was a relaxing weekend but also a lot of unexpected time spent on computer with things that should have been very simple.

I am posting this while I take a break from working with Flickr. I like that program so far.
 

Heidi Comes Out of Hiding

For the first time I took the new Nikon with me on the dog walk. For the first half of the trip, Sadie was off leash so I could use the camera on the way. Still I remembered the last time she was off leash years ago, in the middle of a December snow where she saw a deer and took off. The deer jumped the short worn down fence and so did Sadie. She returned to the door step 5 hours later and didn't even wake up the rest of the night.

Due to that experience I always have her on the 25' retractable leash for these walks, but today I thought I would take a chance. No problems, but I don't think I'll do it again because I can't take that chance with her and there are signs of deer everywhere.

So I took a few photos during the walk and then afterwards I had Heidi come back out to the yard to get some updated pictures of her. She didn't want to come back out into the yard at first and really wasn't thrilled about getting her picture taken but she finally faced the camera. She was extremely happy when I said "ok" as she sprinted for the door and wagging her tail until I let her in. Food was not the motivating factor since she had been fed before the walk.

Let me know if these pictures show up to big when you open the blog. I'd prefer to fill up the available space on the sides of the pictures but if it causes problems from your point of viewing the blog, let me know and I'll decrease them down one size.

Sadie is ready to go outside anytime the word is mentioned and will walk in any kind of weather EXCEPT rain. She loves this field. For some reason she will face this camera instead of the iPhone. I mentioned that before but I don't know the reason why. The photos are in sequence of the walk.

 

Winston completed the walk without a leash but has to have a collar put on him so he feels that is part of the walk. There are times if I don't put the collar on him, he will sit in the backyard watching us walk away ... he will not walk any further unless I put a collar on him. So really it's just for looks and is used on occasion where a leash is needed. Otherwise he and Heidi do not wear collars anytime unless they are walking or in the car.

I touched up these photos using my basic iPhoto program that I have been using the past 3 years on this blog. Friday night I did download the Nikon ViewNX2 to use not only to edit the photos but also use that program possibly as storage. The few photos I worked on in that program was much more detailed than the iPhoto so I will eventually start using that on the blog photos.

I am happy with the new camera and the quality of photographs. It's more than just quality, it's what can be done in the future after I get more experience. Also the different lenses have already made a difference in other photos I have taken. That might turn into a different blog for just photography, not sure.

As requested, I will try to get more photos of the hounds on the blog but their daily routines are about the same so the differences in photos could be slight.

Winston Loves the Camera & Sadie is Starting To

Yet, Heidi doesn't go back outside after she gets back from her walk ... so I didn't get any pics of her. I will either have to start walking the hounds later for better camera light or take pictures of her earlier when she is outside.

Sadie may not like the iPhone because it's a phone. She has always ran away when I pointed the iPhone at her and likes to bother me the few times I am talking on the phone. When I point the new camera at her, she will face the camera when I call her name. Can you see a dog that size living in a 17' Casita trailer, with a 6'x14' living space? Plus two other long hounds.

Winston has always liked the camera, I'm not sure if there is anything he does not like ... he is just a very mellow basset hound.

He is actually sitting down in the top picture. Not a lot of clearance between the ground and the bottom of his stomach.

There are more weeds than grass in my yard, but it's green and cool once the sun goes down. He would lay there all night if I didn't call him to come inside. Due to Winston having some lower back problems that come with the basset breed, he doesn't play with Sadie as much as he use to but they are still pretty good pals.

Not quite the sunsets like the western states but you can tell it's fall by the way it looks, although the weather temps are not cool at sundown. It's continues to be great weather and not sure when it's going to end. Interesting.

That's it for today ... but I have a lot of ideas of where I want to explore around here. I'm going to try to take all three hounds with me and hopefully the more they ride the better adjusted they will become instead of acting like it's dinner time every time I stop the FJ.

A Camera Has Been Purchased

Maybe a surprise but this is usually my normal process about purchasing decisions ... want something, do some research, and buy it. It usually doesn't take longer than a week for a decision to be made. Why can't it be that simple when it comes to me buying an RV?

After I posted about my interest in buying a new camera, something different than my iPhone 5s and getting back into photography as a hobby, I had answers to my email questions, comments on my blog post, and a phone call from my long time friend of 45yrs. All of these people had taken or are taking great pictures currently. Almost all those that replied are using different model cameras. So I received the feedback I was looking for and by the time I made the 25 mile drive to Bloomington to Best Buy, a decision had been made.

Some of you may be asking "why Best Buy, you could have gotten a better deal". As it turned out, Best Buy was the best deal for me and I'll explain.

First of all to all that commented here on the blog and those that emailed me ... I looked and studied all of your suggestions. There were a lot of positives to sort through but I finally had to ask myself what my plans were for photography. Once I knew what I wanted to do and then built a little buffer into what I wanted, the decision was close to being made.

The camera searches included Amazon, Nikon, Canon, Best Buy, Adorama, Craig's List, eBay, some local camera shops and Walmart, even though I would never buy any electronics from Walmart.

I knew in the future I was going to be needing a zoom lens in the range of 200mm or more. I thought I'd have to buy that separately, so I looked at new and used lenses, recorded their prices. I also knew I wanted to buy more than just a camera body, I wanted at least one lens that came with the camera. When I added costs of buying things needed separately, it was always higher than what I expected to pay.

Tuesday night I called my old friend Ralph. We have known each other and keep in touch on a regular basis since we live an hour from each other. The reason I wanted to call him was to run some of my thoughts by him, Ralph as a teenager had Nikon 35mm camera equipment in the 1960's that he had used during his summer hikes all over the USA. I wasn't sure if he was still into photography. I assumed he might have done what most of us did and that was to buy a smaller, more convenient, automatic point and shoot camera.

Ralph is still using his Nikon D-90 with various lens. I won't go into our discussion but will say that toward the end of our conversation he agreed that I was buying the right camera for what I wanted to do.

I decided to buy the Nikon D3200.

As you see it came as a "Bundled Set" with a bag, a 18-55 and a 55-200 Nikkor lens. Basically it was everything I wanted. I found it at three different places online, all within $3 of each other.

Those places might surprise you.

1. Adorama
2. Best Buy
3. Walmart

Adorama and Walmart had the Nikon D3200 bundle for $546 and Best Buy had it for $549.

Now here is why I used Best buy. Besides being local, there was another big advantage, more than I expected. Since I had bought most, not all, of my Apple computers there I had a few dollars in awards not used that I could use to decrease the total price.

That's not all. In the past few weeks I looked at Gazelle Buy Back to see how much I could get for my two old iPhones, the 3gs and the 4, that have been sitting in my desk drawer after each phone upgrade. Also since Apple was no longer including the 1st generation iPad with their updates and synchronization with their computers and iPhones I had thought about trading that in for a newer model iPad. I remembered those amounts that Gazelle was going to give me for my two iPhones and iPad if I chose to use their buy back system. I did not think of checking what they were worth on Best Buys buy back program while I was on the computer at home. That mistake cost me making two trips to Bloomington.

So I am in the store ready to buy the camera and saw where they had deals on "trade ins", for the iPhone 6 or 6Plus. Long story short, Best Buy was giving more money for my two iPhones and iPad as a buy back than Gazelle was. Plus I could use that amount toward my purchase of the camera bundle and save even more. I didn't have the phones or iPad with me. I would have to drive back home, 25 miles away to pick them up if I were going to use my trade in dollars before I bought the camera.

So as I have the Nikon D3200 in my hands, I get an email from Mark over at Box Canyon Blog telling me he uses a small Canon Digital Elf 110 HS for his great photos while hiking. There was a Elf 135 right behind me. So I started thinking again about which camera to buy. Since I was going back home to get the phones and iPad to trade in before I made any purchase, I decided I could think more about the cameras on the drive home.

When all of the dust settled after using my award dollars on my account, the amount for my trade ins... My Nikon D3200 Bundle was bought for $335. I sprinted to my car and got out of town before they had the chance to change their minds. (j/k)

So this morning while the camera battery was charging and over coffee, I read the manual that came with it. I covered enough material to be able to use the camera. I lot of camera stuff came back to me from my past as I started to take some test pictures. Yes, I could see my hands were shaking just a little bit as I glanced through the viewer. It's great to have modern technology to fix that issue. So here are a few samples, nothing major, just some test photos. I didn't make any enhancement changes to the photos except crop a couple.

WARNING: On the photo of Sadie below you might want to scroll past it to the next picture of Winston, as it will be gross to some people. Otherwise if you choose to look at the next picture of Sadie you will see one of the highlights of owning a Bloodhound ... you might want to duck or turn away if she starts shaking her head. That isn't a white string you are seeing ... that is good old fashion bloodhound drool, stuck to the side of her lip.

What's wrong? she asks

Winston on the other hand has just returned from the daily walk and a little aerobic exercise. He must have been feeling good today because at times he did some trotting through the field. Usually its a very slow walk with him.

After the walk Heidi refused to come back outside for the photo shoot ... so nothing of her on this post. She is stubborn and I am stubborn.

The next shot is one of the older trees still standing in my yard. Someone told me it was a mahogany tree, I'm not sure ... but it's been there a really long time.

I "know just enough to be dangerous" with the camera, I like the clarity of the test pictures I took, something I was wanting even after cropping a couple of them. I ended the day with a short mountain bike ride to town a couple of miles away, about 4 miles round trip I guess. Combine that with mowing the yard today I should be able to sleep hopefully before midnight instead of 3am - 4am. I have decided these past few days as I have tried to decrease my computer time, that my days are going to be spent outside when there's good weather. I have decided to keep my computer time after 6pm. I cannot waste good weather, sitting in front of a computer all day.

For all of those people that contacted me with answers to my camera questions ... thank you.

Cameras

A few months ago on my way to recycling, which our center is located out in the middle of some corn fields, I passed a field of horses. It was a great opportunity to take a neat photograph but all I had with me was my iPhone 5s, I had no way to zoom in on the horses themselves. I took a couple of photos, one of them when they took off running but I was too far away. That was when I had a short mental bolt of wanting a different camera.

Sometime last month I was going through some older boxes of stuff when I had a sudden urge to downsize a little more. I found an old Kodak 8x11.5" box I had forgot I had, full of photographs I had taken close to 30 years ago with my Nikon (can't remember the model) and 70-200mm zoom lens. Some of those were black and white 8x10's, some where 5x8's in color.

A few of the photographs I took as a series on the beach in Hawaii as the sun was setting, not knowing my zoom lens was picking up a kyaker moving in front of the sun. What stood out to me was how sharp they were, even after 25-30 years old. Of course most of my photos were on 35mm slides. There must have been 1,000's of them, too many to look through and the thought of scanning them was overwhelming. I glanced through a lot of them, holding them up to the light and instantly going back in time and could almost feel like I was there.

Once again ... quality was sharp and clear.

In the mid-90's I sold all of my lenses, filters, the bag, tripod and camera body to a neighbor in high school wanting to pursue photography. I am not sure why I decided to sell that stuff, except a few years prior to that for some reason I had stopped using the equipment completely. I may have started taking photos with a smaller camera with a built-in zoom lens. I don't remember the name or model of that camera, but I do have a few photos from that time period.

Maybe the convenience of not carrying a bag of equipment with me? Maybe it was having just one camera and a multiple size lens that made me change my direction in photography? I don't know but I do remember after 1994 I started taking photos a lot less. Hardly at all. My bag of equipment sat in the closet never used until I sold it.

Last month I kept going back to those older photos and looking at how sharp they were. Then I would look at all my digital photos on my blog and in iPhoto on my iMac, trying to compare the difference. I thought my iPhone took pretty good photographs but one thing I noticed was when I would crop the photo and it would zoom into a closer view, the sharpness disappeared. You can see that in yesterday's post with Heidi at the top of the page. The other two photos were not cropped but for some reason were not as sharp as normal. Could it have been my hands, the light ... don't know.

When I mentioned I was looking at different camera equipment on my blog, a few made comments, a couple answered my questions by replying in emails and other's I found out what kind of camera they were using from their websites. All of them have great photography of their travels posted on their blogs. All of them were high quality and reminded me of my older photos that I shot with my 35mm camera years ago.

I knew then I wanted a different camera than my iPhone and the palm sized Nikon Coolpix 3100. I had bought the smaller camera in 2005 to take photos of items I was selling on eBay and my other websites. I've rarely been able to take good photos with that camera without using the tripod ... too small to hold steady.

So the past few weeks I've been spending more time looking at different cameras online, reading suggestions as I get them and just like my rv decisions ... hadn't come up with one.  Still I am much closer today on what to buy than I was a few days ago.

I've looked through all the specs, customer reviews, and even wrote down a list of camera models and lenses used by people that had commented, emailed or blogs I follow. NO ... I have not put that information into a spreadsheet like I have done on everything else, so I am pretty proud of myself that my camera analysis has not gone to that depth.

I was close to buying a Nikon D3200 last week. Since it was an older model, it was on sale. It came with the bag, battery, charger, strap and an 18-55mm lens. I didn't buy it, I wanted to research some more.

Albireo uses a Nikon D3300 and is considering moving up to a heavier, larger camera, the Nikon D810. That is some great equipment but might be more camera than what I am looking for. I don't know how far I want to take this reborn hobby, so I am almost starting over with a camera that a beginner would buy .. maybe 'intermediate' would be a more accurate level.

Al over at The Bayfield Bunch takes fantastic photographs daily. That is his hobby and although he claims he is not a professional photographer, the quality of his photos and the way they are taken are every bit professional. He has different cameras with different size lenses mounted for different shots. They range from a Nikon D3100, a Nikon D-90 and his older camera for backup, a Nikon D-40. He has a Canon SX210iS on his belt at times for the unexpected shot and a Canon A730iS near his chair inside to shoot the Phebe's. I do those kind of inside shots with my iPhone 5s, although Sadie is not a fan of being a photo model.

Chinle at Spotted Dog Ranch takes her landscape photographs of her travels with a Canon EOS Rebel T1i. A lot of her photos are using a larger zoom lens, one that I would need. I would have to buy the new version, a T3i if I went that route, unless I could find a used T1i on Amazon or Craig's list. Yet, there is just something about buying used equipment from those two sites that I don't like. I would buy used equipment from a 'old school' camera store or a friend though. From her photographs from Canada this past summer, I see that I would need 200mm or 300mm zoom capability for what I want to shoot.

Gary Ramsey has some fantastic photography at Travel Small With Ramsey. He uses a Sony NEX 5n. Those cameras are a little out of my price range, although the price for a used Sony NEX 5n is reasonable on Amazon, but you know how I feel about buying used equipment.

Basically I had been looking at different cameras that had interchangeable lenses. I was favoring the Nikon D3200 due to the customer reviews, the price and it was within a short distance from my house. I haven't bought it because I didn't know if I wanted to go back to carrying one camera and then a bag with different sized lenses. I had done that before many years ago when cameras that had multiple range lenses built into the camera were not available.

I kept reading and looking.

Then yesterday I get a comment on my blog post from Lloyd over at Enjoy The Journey. His older blog name was Wanderin Lloyd for those that follow blogs. Either way his photography is also fantastic with different cameras used over his 13 years of traveling. You will see in his comment yesterday that he uses a Canon SX40 for his trips to zoos, museums, etc and uses a Canon SX700 30x lens when hiking.

Those two cameras kind of hit home with me. Great photographs, great consumer reviews and I noticed all the photos taken from a distance were sharp. Just like the cameras I mentioned above but these had just one built in lens with a wide range of different distance. Was the Canon SX40 the camera I had been looking for?

I spent a lot of time last night looking at those types of Canon and Nikon cameras. I am thinking that might be the type of camera I need. 

What I want is one camera, ability to shoot macro shots, landscape, shots of my hounds even in "action", zooming in on the eagle that shows up in back on rare occasions. Then at times I'd like to zoom in on the 10-15 deer that surprise us at times just in back of the house. I also wanted to be able to catch action shots that requires high speed, at sport events, especially when I go to the Indy 500 to watch practice or the times I am sitting on row 53 at a football game wanting to take a shot down at the line of scrimmage or sidelines.

After reading about the Canon SX40 and SX50, I am beginning to think that is the camera I've been looking for. I would have to buy the SX40 on Amazon, everyone locally is selling only the SX50 model with the SX60 coming out in October.

So I will let those thoughts brew for a while, maybe a day, maybe hours ... before I decide what to buy. The Nikon 3100, 3200 and 3300 are available locally as well as the Canon SX50.

In the meantime, the hounds will continue to "sleep on it" before the decision is made.

Not a Lot To Blog About

One thing that has changed since I retired in April, the hounds get to go outside a lot more than when I was working. They also seem to like to go outside at the same times day and night. Just recently Heidi has been going outside every time the other two go outside and that's a good thing. Just this past summer she rarely got off of her dog bed on the floor and usually that was just to move to the couch.

But she is evidently feeling better now because not only does she go outside even for short trips, she is barking at 4pm every day to be fed.

It may take some coaxing to get her to get off the couch and go on the daily walk but once she starts the walk, she insists that she be the leader of the walk and will do anything to keep in front of Sadie to maintain the lead.

Little does she know that Sadie could care less who leads. Sadie is only conscious of what scent is in front of her nose and yesterday it was good I had her on a leash, the deer scents were stronger than normal.

Winston on the other hand is getting older and consequently is needing to go out more times than this time last year. I can tell that his aging process seems to have increased this past year and in a way that is a sad thing.

He will also put his nose to the ground as soon as he steps outside. He is stubborn, will not listen if a scent has him busy and is slow in everything he does. He is on his own clock and will not move faster no matter how much I voice commands.

In this picture around noon today he is enjoying a cool 65°. His favorite position is laying on the concrete in the sun and will spend hours sleeping, at times so long that I forget that he is outside.

Sadie have has never liked having her picture taken. I was able to when she was just a few months old, but after that she would turn her head or take off running. She definitely does not like the camera.

In this case I took eight different photos trying to catch her looking at me and every time at the last split second she would turn her head.

She might not like cameras but she LOVES outdoors. She loves going outside, will stay out for a while or there will be times that she will want to come back inside two minutes after wanting to go outside. She never barks but will just stand still until I come outside to find her.

She will even sit sometimes in the field not moving, thinking she is stuck or her rope is tangled up. The funny thing is, she is not on the rope that is anchored. The one time she was attacked by the neighbor's dog, she just sat down and didn't move while the other dog was moving around her in circles barking.

All of these photos were taken today around noon with an iPhone 5S.

It's another beautiful day here in the 'tropics' of southern Indiana. It was all weekend actually and it is the norm for this time of year, yet it's strange seeing all the different kinds of weather hitting other parts of the USA, the fires in California, flooding in Arizona and tornadoes yesterday in Michigan. Still very nice here and one of the reasons I hardly have the urge to travel in the fall seasons in the Midwest. Plus it's football season.

Saturday was the normal college football marathon. What can I say, I'm addicted to that sport even though there are still things outside the game I don't like about it. I am hesitant to say what I don't like about the current game because it also spreads into the NFL, and society in general. It would take too long to type and discuss all the different aspects of some sad situations and wold only lead to more discussions on subjects I am tired about hearing in the news.

I'll talk about the games only and not the news outside the games.

My local team (IU) had a major upset at Missouri Saturday. They have a little split personality in them the past couple of years, meaning they can play great one weekend and next weekend they might look like they have never played the game. I'll take the win on Saturday though. Those type of wins are very very rare in football.

I only have one tv but flip back and forth to different games during commercials. I also have my remote set up to a set of sports channels on DirecTv. It's amazing how many games are televised at one time. I don't want to see all of the games but a lot of times there are a couple of games going on at the same time, so I'll record one and then watch it later IF it turns out to be a good game. My Saturday viewing starts at noon eastern time and ends after the late Pac12 game usually around 1:30am Sunday morning. I'm a night person, so there is not a problem with the late finish time.

Sunday I watched only a couple of NFL games. The local Colts games and then a Super Bowl rematch where Denver was in Seattle, a game that went into overtime. Great game to watch.

Some might be asking what do the hounds do during all of these football games? They sleep most of the time which is their normal daily activity. Throughout the day they will have me take them outside, more trips during the day since I am retired. We can usually fit those requests to go outside during commercials and we still do the daily walk either at game halftimes or between games.

Their daily routine is not changed just because I am watching football. It's good they have the room to spread out during the day, each hitting their favorite sleeping spots and those spots do change during the day. That is one thing I think about deciding whether to buy a trailer or not ... the available room. The interesting thing is their sleeping spots are the same every day and change by what time of day it is.

Heidi is feeling much better. She is actually going outside every time the other two hounds go out, where she wasn't during the summer. She hardly got off of her dog bed during the summer, only getting up to move to the couch to continue her sleeping marathons. She takes her time deciding whether to go on the daily walk but then will insist she leads the way once the walk starts.

With all the news about Apple's release of the iPhone 6 and the OS upgrade to 8.0, I am seeing today in the blogs I follow that 8.0 seems to be too frustrating so they are showing people how they can revert back to OS 7.2. I usually wait before upgrading operating systems on my phone or computer and I think I'll still follow that until the bugs are worked out. It's tempting but I'm sticking with the 5s I bought in June. I remember when I decided to renew my contract and upgrade my phone, I had decided not to wait for the iPhone 6. I wasn't sure I would like the size of it.

Really, I have no desire to be carrying a small tablet all the time when I am out and about. In fact I have been tempted recently to selling my 1st generation iPad, my iPhone 4 and my new iPhone 5s ... then going to a cheap flip phone to use for emergencies and making the few calls I make every month. When I thought about that, the only thing I could gain by selling the 5s, is part of the cost of the phone. I would still have to have the same monthly plan with Verizon, so I would not be saving anything there. I might as well keep the 5s.

Reading Rick's blog this morning, I started thinking if I should go back to a Google+ account. Unlimited storage for iPhone photographs is a pretty good deal. I have plenty of room on my iMac, so storage is not an issue for photographs, same with my 16Gb iPhone. I have 1,000's of photos on my iPhone and have barely used the amount of storage available. I still remember the reasons I stopped my Google+ account before and still feel the same way about it.

Rick did bring up an interesting point when he was talking about cameras. He said with digital photography and posting photos on blogs, it really didn't make a difference if those blog photos were taken by an iPhone or a bigger digital camera. Recently I've been thinking of buying a bigger digital camera to get back into photography as a hobby. It's been almost 20 years since I had a larger camera and interchangeable lenses. The only other camera I have besides my iPhone is a Nikon CoolPix 3100, that I bought years ago for my online sales business.

Many times I would have to use a tripod with that camera because I was not able to hold the camera still enough when I used two hands. Would it be that way if I were to buy a larger Nikon? I think a larger camera would be easier to hold and less chance of blurred photos that the CoolPix has at times.

That's about it ... nothing really going on ... and I apologize for the lack of excitement in this post. It's just part of the laid back lifestyle outside a small rural town. I'm spending less time on the computer recently, looking and reading about different cameras, and on occasion trailers and camping equipment. I have thought more about traveling this winter. I still don't see traveling is possible with my three hounds and two hands.