Tamron 18-200mm Lens Arrived & A UFO??

I guess staying up until 5am three nights in a row caught up with me. I did NOT miss feeding the hounds breakfast on 'their' time, around 7am ... but after that the day was a fog.

By the time I woke up, glanced at the iPhone clock, I instantly remembered my days centuries ago of working 3rd shift and sleeping through most of the day. I guess I finally knew what it was like for Sadie and Heidi during my days of working a job. Stella did not arrive until after I was a 'full-time doorman'.

As I let the hounds outside there was a very exciting surprise sitting on my door step. My Tamron 18-200mm lens had shown up a day early and my brain cells suddenly charged. It now felt like I had been up all day. I fed the hounds their late lunch as I put on my shoes and socks ... because a late afternoon walk was going to take place with the new lens mounted on my Nikon D3200.

Before I go into details of the walk I will just say how nice it was to have a lens focus and shoot, first time every time. It didn't matter what the light was, or the distance, nor the camera setting ... it worked instantly every time.

Another cool thing was being able to get shots from a distance (200mm) and when the hounds were too close to me in the past to get a shot in (18mm). It was also nice not having to switch lens for different times of the day where I would shoot different type of photos.

I could tell as soon as I took the lens out of the box how much different it was than the two Nikon lenses that came with my camera. It was heavier, moved more smoothly. It just felt like a better built lens.

The hounds were as excited about their walk today as I was about my new lens. Right from the start they were both out ahead of me and at times pretty far ahead of me. When Stella took off running fast enough that her ears were in the "wing back" mode I didn't think it could be a deer in that location nor direction ... what was it?

After a intense inspection with nothing showing up, the only thing I could think of was a rabbit ... but she had never reacted that way before to a scent of a rabbit. In the meantime Sadie is wondering if I am ever going to catch up and walk with them ... or am I going to lay back and take photos?

You can tell that the process of fall weather is in action even with the temperature at 88° during our walk after 5pm.

As I walked along the path, the hounds went back to their exploration and eating. The word eating makes you think that it must taste that good but the book I just finished said their eating was a way they identify what has been in the area. I don't seem to think that same way when I am chomping down one or two large borritos.

Stella looked up from a long distance away just to let me know she was not leaving just yet and was going to have Sadie join her for some help in identifying whatever she found. Which was probably nothing more than deer droppings.

I was almost at the point to turn left and head home when I took this shot. I mention it because for many months I have not been able to get this shot at times due to the lens not focusing.

The BEST thing was being able to catch them running the full length of their run instead of just part of it due to the Nikon lens not focusing all the time. I should have clicked my camera faster because they were both running as fast as they could.

Notice Stella's ears to gauge their speed.

The final trot up next to me.

I knew since they had ran too hard in very hot weather (88°), they would be walking slowly the last half of the walk. Neither of them veered off the path I take very much and of course since Stella was walking right in front of me most of the way ... she walked as slow as possible.

With tall grass, weeds or flowers one thing is always easy to see ... where the deer sleep. Someone had done some work to get their bed comfortable ... or was it one of those small UFO's that land on occasion?

Stella was more than interested in finding out who it was, when it was and why were they so close to her house at night. With the bedroom windows open at night you would think she or Sadie would have heard this going on.

I took this next photo just to show how close to the house the deer sleep .. unless it was just a very small UFO.

Needless to say, by the time I completed this walk today I can say I was in love with the new lens. In just the short time it took us, the lens had done everything I wanted plus it had the range to take photos when the hounds were too close or too far away.

For those not interested ... from this point forward I am only discussing Google Photos that I am backing up all my photos with online ... but ... there is some news announced in there somewhere.

I am almost finished with my Google Photos migration. I had a very productive night last night. I am down to just two groups of folders to upload with a total of 11,013 photos of Sadie and Stella. That count does not count the yesterday and today's ... but I will load those first.

Along the way I learned some of the new features Google Photos has. Each folder I uploaded has the ability for the user to choose the image they want for the "album cover". Yet there's one disadvantage that showed it's ugly self ... you cannot load more than 500 photos at a time INTO A FOLDER but can upload 1,000's at a time into the program itself.

So my plan of adding tonights 11,013 photos into Sadie's folder and Stella's folder and getting to bed a little earlier ... isn't going to work. The process turns out to be a little longer than just uploading the group of photos from the specific folder on my computer, letting Google Photos make that folder while I type in the folder name.

I have to wait for those 6,238 photos to load, then open them up and select no more than 500 photos at a time before I can add them to the folder. Luckily that selection process is easy .. click the first photo, then hold down the shift key as you move your cursor down the end of each row ... choosing the photos in that row, then clicking the last photos when the counter reaches 500. The lifesaver in this is in the upper left corner there is a selection counter working as you go so you can see when you hit 500.

There is not a way to click the edit menu, then "select all" in Google Photos within the group of photos you are working with. There is in Apple Photos.

I have all of my 60 individual folders loaded and labeled with that cover photo chosen. After Sadie and Stella's photos are loaded tonight I will be able to set the program up to work automatically. Meaning after a couple of changes to my settings, every new photo will be added automatically into Google Photos whether the photo is taken with my camera or iPhone. All the photos in Google Photos can be seen by whatever device you are using plus it does not matter if you are on a Mac or a Windows PC.

Of course a long time blog reader made a comment last night after Sunday's post about this whole process ... his comment made me second guess my decision AGAIN !! For long time blog readers you know how I love to change my mind in the midstream of the thought process.

He had a point and one I had thought of many times before deciding to do anything "in the cloud". I'll not go into the plus and minuses of what to do but I am happy using Google Photos and the more I use it the better I like it.

Yet ..... I had to try his suggestion. He had reminded me what I was going to do last year and didn't. I moved my whole photo library, about 22.4 Gb's to an external hard drive in 2 hours and 47 minutes while I was watching the Florida State vs Ole Miss football game.

Pretty nice eh? No staying up all hours of the night ... just 3 short hours all of my photos were neatly tucked into a desk drawer waiting for the next update that will not take as long.

Still ... I really like what Google Photos does. One thing I caught myself doing last night while waiting for photos to upload .. was looking at photos and seeing them just as good if not better than when I look at them on my iMac in Apple Photos. I like the format.

I also like viewing them in my Flickr account but not all of my photos are there ... the two programs are very similar. I have found that Google Photos is easier to work with than Flickr when editing photos and organizing them.

So one more night of 3rd shift work ...

If you have read this far through all of this rambling I'll let you in on a little secret change I did right before posting tonight ... I took the "RV" out of my blog title.  :)  Many hours later while reading a blog that normally has my blog on their blog roll ... it wasn't there. So I checked another blog and my blog wasn't on their blog list either. I looked at a third blog and my blog was gone on their list. So until further notice ... I have put the RVs back in my blog title.

A great day today in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.

Hounds Get An Unexpected Walk

It wasn't 5 minutes after I published today's post where I said the walk was cancelled today -- that I decided to go. Even with a short heavy rain earlier it could not be that wet ... plus the sun was out. I pulled too many photos to add to the earlier post today, so here they are ... just photos.

Remember that Stella is the only one that wears a collar.

Now, for some dinner, here in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.

Hounds Take A Day Off

In honor of Labor Day, all the hounds took the day off today. It started as soon as they woke up and continued the rest of the day.

Since they were celebrating a "day off", their routines were the same as every other day ... because they are retired.

Sadie and Stella took an early morning check of the grounds, walking every inch of the yard around the border. After they approved things were okay, I headed inside for my first of two cups of coffee. They slept ... I read more about Google Photos and did some math to find out just how long this was going to take and how much data it was going to use.

Stella let me know by howling that it was time for lunch. Of course she did that while I was on a phone call with the phone speaker on. She was fed as soon as I hung up from the call. I went back to looking at and doing some work on Google Photos while I kept my eye on the iMac Activity Monitor for any large jumps in data usage.

One thing that is funny when it happens, with all breeds of dogs, is after months or years of a daily routine ... they change and do something entirely different ... totally opposite ... with no warning signs. In Heidi's case that means she has decided the past two days and nights NOT to go to the front yard like she has for the 5 years that I have had her ... but head out to the backyard to dump her tanks.

The key word in all of that is "yard" and it doesn't matter where she goes, front or back, my pooper scooper still works. I then walk to the edge of the yard by the burn pile and toss whatever the scooper collects, into the woods.

Sadie liked the after lunch sunshine and you know what she does when she feels the heat beating down on her ... she sleeps. Sadie never stops and is determined that she misses nothing that may have come into her yard or field while she has been inside.

On average I can upload 1,300 photos in an hour. I'll find out if that is accurate tonight after midnight with a larger sample size because I will load Winston's and Heidi's folders which has 1,500 photos in each folder. It will be the largest number of photos I have done at one time. Sadie and Stella are more photogenic so Sadie has 4,775 and Stella has 6,238 photos before today.

Then I'll be able to move that folder of each hound into the Google Photos Uploader preference, where it will automatically upload only new photos from then on.

Heidi came out to the backyard with Sadie and Stella without me asking her too ... the backyard seems to be her place, at least the past few days.

I don't think Stella would ever move if I didn't wake her up to go back inside.

No naps outside for Sadie though ... she is finished with exploring the field and once she gets her drink of water inside ... she will be sleeping the rest of the afternoon.

Today's walk was cancelled. (Walked right after post - photos on new post above this one) We had a rare storm show up out of nowhere and dump a lot of rain in a very short period of time. Or the real reason may be I am feeling pretty lazy today when it comes to walking ... I need a day off.

I understand a lot more about Google Photos today, than I did when I posted yesterday. I had to go to the forum to ask a question since I could not find the answer anywhere ... even with other users asking the same question.

What is the difference between "upload" and "backup". When I think of backup, I picture the whole file, in this case Google Photos being backed up ... it was still using data on my computer to do that. Plus the number of photos that it was backing up never matched the total that I had uploaded.

I thought I had the answer from someone who answered my question on the forum and I understood when they said "upload" is when I do it manually and "backup" is when the system takes over and uploads the new photos that I did not with the uploader.

That seemed logical until I took a folder of 37 photos, uploaded them manually and then saw the installer saying it was "backing up 37 photos" ... I decided to stop right there trying to figure out what was going on.

This concern I have about data is because as I have mentioned many times before ... I only pay for 15Gb per month. I pay too much for that amount. I can buy more when I am running short at the end of my billing period but it's $10 for 1Gb. I think that is an outrageous price for just 1Gb. The past two nights that I have uploaded photos after midnight, the data used is close to 3Gb's each day. With 15Gb per month, that is only 1/2 a Gb per day or 500Mb's.

Once all the photos I have are loaded into Google Photos, only then will it use less data because it will only be updating the new photos that I take each day. I wish there was a way I could schedule a specific time to "backup" or upload those new photos, so I would not have to stay up past midnight to do it.

I want to be as automatic in this process as possible after I am done.

The sunshine is back out here in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.

Working with Google Photos

It's good that I am what some people call a 'night person' and in this case it's probably good that I am single ... It's 12:21am right now and I am just starting to upload my first batch of photos for the night from my computer to Google Photos.

Why now?

It' takes a lot of data to upload images no matter where they are going. I don't have a lot of data per month using satellite internet but it's my only option out here in 'the tropics' for the fastest speed. I get free data between midnight and 5am.

I was up last night until 5am before I stopped and turned off the computer for the night. The hounds?? It didn't matter to them what I did ... they slept the same amount of time in their same spots. Their two meals were served at the same time as always. I've always been able to sleep in small periods of time with interruptions between them.

While my photos are uploading I keep busy by getting caught up on my reading that I normally do during the day. Plus this blog post. It depends how images are involved but I have come up with a fairly good system I think to keep track of where I am at in the process and what gets loaded. Right now I'm loading 576 photos which will take around 30 minutes.

So far I like how Google Photos operates. I have learned some things along the way and it's amazing what this program can do, besides just sorting your photos with the most recent ones first. The picture quality is just as good as when I took the photo and it doesn't matter what device I am using to look at those photos. 'Automatically' is the key word in all this process.

Around 1:30pm we decided to head out for a walk. It was a nice sunny day today, a little warmer than last week.

Remember as I talk about this Google Photo process I am working on a iMac, MacBook Air and an iPhone. One thing different about Apple Photos, which is their program to handle your photos from your iPhone or a camera card, is this ....

Before uploading photos to Google photos from my laptop or desktop computer I have to export those photos FROM Apple Photos to a self made folder somewhere else on the computer. In my case those folders are on my desktop. I set a few up last year when Apple's new program came out and was force fed to us Mac users ... so I could upload photos to the blogs I have or had.

Tonight though, it was nice to log into Google Photos and see these photos on this blog post, that were moved on my computer earlier today from the Nikon camera to the hard drive ... were sitting in Google Photos without me doing a thing. The key was having these photos exported to that self made folder on my computer.

Since not all readers are Mac users I am just going to speak about the Google Photo process that I am working with. I can go directly from the camera or SD card but I prefer to have ALL of my photos on my hard drive or external drives that I have. Call me paranoid but after I lost all of Sadie's puppy photos due to my error ... I like having multiple copies of my photos plus other files on my computer ... an online service, just in case I have house fire, tornado damage, etc ... an unexpected catastrophe of some sort.

Just like doing it from Blogger, there is a screen of my file folders where I chose what photos I wanted uploaded. Pretty simple stuff. Of course since I take notes and like to 'track stuff' ... I wrote down each time I started a batch, when it ended, how many it started to load and how many it ended up loading (some photos cant be transferred) ... and what month I was uploading so I know where to start tomorrow after I stop this process for the night.

The problem I am in is because of the individual folders I had made in Apple Photos where I manually keep photos sorted based on subject. For example each hound has their own folder and even Heidi as a 2nd folder just for her skin photos so I can quickly glance back to see her skin history based on date.

For instance I don't want photos of my friends and tours mixed in with bloodhound photos. Google Photos do have folder options. In fact some of those folders are made automatically. I will have to wait to see how that works. The couple it had formed automatically last night are shockingly very good.

Google Photos sorts all of the photos loaded, by date, most recent on top. For the 2nd night in a row I am trying to decide if I want or even need the photos backed up here, in their own folders. Or do I use Google Photos just as one huge online fault that keeps all of my photographs for me.

It does have a pretty neat search feature. For example when I search "basset hounds" it will and DID pull ONLY the photos of my bassets from a group of a few thousand photos that I had uploaded. It knew what my Z4 looked like and only showed those when I did a search for "Z4".

So with the search system and Google Photos automatically setting up folders based on subject ... I may forget uploading manually by individual subject manner.

Google Photos will also not bother to upload DUPLICATE photos ... a very nice feature. For example my last batch of photos I just did, had only 516 of the 533 photos uploaded from what it found in the file I furnished ... due to duplication.

After thinking about it today and even a little tonight before writing this post ... I think I have decided to start by using Google Photos as one big vault for my photos and not worry about sorting by subject matter. It's goes faster that way.

CD's are an option for backup ... even in 2016. But what happens then ... I end up with a stack of CDs and I can only see them when I insert them into a computer. The neat thing is ... they last forever. Today while I was checking out some things, I found old cases full of CDs that I had forgot about. Some of these CDs were labeled "Photos 2004" ... 12 years ago ... sitting on a shelf. Rarely looked at if at all after I copied them.

Not only that but were saved using a Windows PC I had at the time. I loaded 4 different CDs into my iMac and found 1,000s of old photos that I had backed up years ago and never looked at again until Sunday afternoon !!!!

It's nice those photos are still in pristine condition, high quality ... but I have cases full of CDs, with more subject matter than I can write on front of the CD or it's case, as a label.

One other thing I have found to where I had to google and find out the reason why ... I have a folder that came with my computer called "Pictures". It is what I have been uploading from right now ... but it's something I am not real clear on until maybe this afternoon.

I think the only way photos can be put in that folder automatically is when I export photos from Apple Photo on my computer, where as before with their program iPhoto ... they were moved to that Pictures Folder automatically.

I have a big gap of time after January 2011 in that Pictures folder and not sure why.

When I thought about moving the photos by subject matter to Google Photos so I could make my own new folder as I uploaded ... today I exported every photo I had on my hard drive in Apple Photos, from it's own personal folder to a newly made (by me) Folder on my desktop with the same folder name as it came from.

That works well but it takes time to manually highlight what photos you wan to use to make that new Google Photos folder. From what I have seen I cannot just click the first photo ... go to the bottom of the page, hold my shift key down and click the last photo to include 4,000 photos for that folder (Sadie's).

In Google Photos you do click the first photo of that batch, hold your shift key down as you move your curser over rows of photos ... which highlights them as you go ... then click the last one ... which selects all the ones you have moved your curser over.

So as I end this rambling this morning (tonight) it's a choice I have to decide, whether to upload large batches at a time and not worry about folders or take more time and load them by individual folder ... that I already have set up in my Apple Photos program.

Of course, some Google Photo users that are reading this might be laughing because they already know what the program does and I might be thinking this is all more work than it really is.

Lynn ... please chime in if you see this.

Hounds are snoring ... I'm wide awake uploading photos, with plans of doing this until 5am. Yes, I still get my football games in and have already seen some great college football the first weekend of the season.

It's beautiful weather in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.

Football And Google Photos

Even with a beautiful day outside today, it's been nothing but watching football starting at noon. I am kind of in between games right now, so I have time to blog and we also fit in a hound walk.

From midnight to 4am last night I was reading about and working with Google Photos, for an online free photo backup service. By 3:30am I decided I was not going to use it and spent the next 30 minutes adjusting settings and deleting apps along with over a 1,000 photos I had uploaded.

By this morning I was doing more reading and seeing a lot of the computer experts were recommending Google Photos as the best way to back up your photos online for free. I was a lot like Stella below ... I couldn't make up my mind.

CNET recommended it, some of the bloggers for Apple Mac computers also recommended it so by 11am this morning I was reloading the apps, adjusting the settings and uploading photos. I did over a 1,000 this morning but have hundreds of thousands of photos to go.

Soon after the hounds had their lunch it was time for football. It takes too much data to upload photos during the day and night before midnight. I have to watch my data pretty close because with satellite internet service I only get 15gb per month or $10 per gig after that, if I chose to buy more data. One of the disadvantages of living in a rural area, is the choice of your internet provider.

Soon after the 3:30 games were over, the hounds and I took off for an afternoon walk. While carrying the 55-200mm lens and the hounds staying pretty close to me, I didn't get a lot of photos on the walk ... they were too close to the camera.

Temps have risen a few degrees, at least Stella acted like it was warmer. She not only walked slowly outside but would pant inside, which means she wants the AC turned on. After it's turned on, she will lay down and sleep but not until then.

Sadie walked right behind me most of the way home, so out of photo range.

After the football games are over tonight I will be back on the computer working with Google Photos and taking advantage of my free data between midnight and 5am. I don't plan on staying up that late but I'll be uploading photos at least until 3am.

I'll discuss what I have found out about Google Photos tomorrow in it's separate blog post. I will say the quality of the compressed files are good, the photos do load fairly quickly.

The main thing is ... it does not use hard drive space nor space on your phone or tablet. Since it is a website within your google email account and password protected, you can access all the photos you are backing up from all the different devices have you have. All of them synchronize the photos very well. They will also load automatically based on the way you adjust your settings.

More tomorrow ... football season has arrived for this sports addict in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.