May 2007 Issue

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Just Chat

I am sorry that all I write about is things I do myself but of later years I do live in a world of my own and don't see much of anything else other than things that interest me.

What has interested me lately? Well, I have often written of my large video library that I have transferred to DVD. I have already written of the large library of VHS tapes my neighbour has - something in excess of 300. I have now been contacted by a presenter on Portsmouth's Radio Angel who has brought me several hundred commercial VHS tapes of the type in which I am interested.

On a trip to the local tip yesterday, I looked at the items in a shed that stores dumped items that are still of some value and these are sold for a nominal amount. I discovered a large bookcase full of commercial VHS tapes. I could not resist buying a few that were sold to me for 50p each. I remember that when VHS tapes were first introduced, I sold them to the trade for £9 each. I was lucky and was able to purchase them from my own company for about £8 and thought that I had done well. Some investment!

Another Item that interested me just this week was a 15.4 inch Multimedia Notebook computer that is sold in the local Aldi store just a hundred yards or so from my own shops. The computer is a Medion MD98300 with Windows Vista and dual core technology. with 1,024MB DDR2 SDRAM and 120GB hard drive, NVidia 'GeForce' Go 6150 graphics, 8 x Multi standard DVD/CD burner with DVD RAM and dual layer support etc. etc. The computer comes with a large range of software. Price £459.99.

They also had 4GB USB Flash Drives on offer for £19.99.

It's funny how you can miss the obvious - well I can anyway. My son is an artist and also involved in photography but has little knowledge of computing. I am supposed to be the literate one as far as computing is concerned although this is far from the truth.

My son takes dozens of photographs, so with the advent of digital cameras he can snap away without incurring the enormous cost of photographs that he had when using his 35mm camera. I was never particularly good at taking photographs although I have a loft full of expensive photographic equipment. I always considered photography too expensive for the modest results that I achieved. If I got half a dozen good photographs from a 20 exposure 35mm film I was lucky.

Digital photography was a great thing for me when it first appeared on the market. I purchased my Kodak digital for £650 and it was 1.31 mega pixels (wow). My son recently purchased an 8 mega pixel camera with movie feature for under £200.

I have expensive software so that I can adjust my photographs for perfect printing which I get sometimes after playing around a great deal making adjustments.

My son came round some time ago bringing his camera with him. We took a few photographs of my garden and then I showed him how I brought the picture up in my graphics program and made adjustments. The results were quite good but not wonderful. "Why do you do that Dad" my son asked. I explained that in order to produce a good picture some adjustments were sometimes necessary. "I don't do that" my son said I just print them from the "My Pictures" feature in Windows. I use my computer a lot, much more than my son but had to confess that I had not noticed this feature but explained how necessary it was to use a good graphics program.

Just for interest though, I thought I would try his simple method. So I went into "My Pictures" and selected "Print This Picture" and followed the simple procedure. The picture came out perfect, well perfect by my standards, better than I usually achieve using my graphics program. I suppose everyone knows of this Windows feature but I had missed it being so used to printing photos through my graphics program.

Of course the keen knowledgeable photographers would make a better job of printing photographs after making adjustments in a graphics program, but I don't seem to. As they say, you learn something different every day.