Microsoft Releases RAW support (kindof)

Microsoft Camera Codec Pack (16.0.0652.0621)

http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?id=26829
7/26/2011


**UPDATE** 
DID NOT WORK WITH MY 60D RAW FILES!
WHAT A CROCK.






This may be a day late and a dollar short for many, but for me it came right on time. It was very irritating to me to begin shooting RAW only to find that the Microsoft Windows Image Viewer did not support simply viewing my raw files. I mean really, what gives. It is my understanding that it was supported in XP, and maybe windows 2000. Nevertheless, the new codec pack allows you to actually have thumbnails in explorer of your raw files. That's all I wanted.


The edit functionality is a bit Microsoft-like in the fact that when you want to perform an edit, they convert and save a different file to .jpg, and thus you can use their native built in edit functions. What this means for me, and hopefully you, is that you will still want to edit your photos with something a little more robust like Photoshop, maybe even Picasa, or God forbid the photo software your camera came with.


I am glad to see this. I would like to think my e-mail(s) to Microsoft had an influence on this. Maybe it did; probably not, but maybe. 

I finally made the leap

I finally dove into the exciting world of the SLR camera. Awesome world it is. At the advice of my wife I spent a little money and bought a 60D. I know it isn't the 5D Mark II that I wanted, but it is a good start. Plus where I want the most zoom I can get for the art I typically shoot, having the conversion factor of 1.6 to 1 on the full frame lens that I bought should maybe be a little advantage. Yeah, that's what I'm going to keep telling myself until I can convince someone that I am worthy of one; Whether that be God, who has blessed my family mightily, or Canon who has given great advice, or National Geographic, or another super awesome company who happens to have one lying around...

Anywho, I will be posting a whole lot more photos in the future. My freakin cheeks hurt from smiling so much more these last few weeks than I have in a long time.

Posting Art

I still like my DeviantArt account, and the community, but many didn't like the name, or didn't care to visit.
http://cyberpriest.deviantart.com/
Only 2,320 page views in 2 years isn't great. Plus many stole but none paid, especially overseas.

So, I moved a lot of them to an album on my FaceBook page.
http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.1191388138833.2029614.1052257001
Let me know what you think.

Awesome timing on the blog. Wow, almost two years. I am so into this.

Ok, life got hard for a while, then it completely changed. Now, I am back in.

Let us begin:

While at a family function, my well battered SX100 took a nasty fall onto the lens while in the hands of my daughter. While sad at my camera's demise, a little polish, and some super-glue made it possible for her to inherit and still use said SX100IS camera. One hell of a little trooper this camera is. Bravo Canon. I loved it so much I decided to upgrade to the SX120IS.

Now I am a little sad.

See, with the SX100IS I was able to use the firmware from the Canon Hack Development Kit. I loved it. It was awesome. It added everything I could have ever wanted from that little guy.

Now here I sit with a similar camera with less features and what seems to be more issues in medium light.

Sadness.

I just checked the CHDK blog http://chdk.wikia.com/wiki/CHDK. SX110, in the money. SX120, SX130, SOL. Still in beta. Man, I wish I was a programmer. I will probably give it a go before the day is out. I want my Histogram, dang it. So, off I go to review the sites, many in German, to see if I can't just brick this little thing.

--Update-- CHDK on SX120IS did not work.

Anywho, earlier this year I had intended to purchase a Canon Rebel T2i. But life stuff happens, and I was unable to. It was a matter of priorities. Stupid priorities.