I can't speak to DS vs. PSP on what games are coming out because I don't know what's due out on DS (or that much on PSP, for that matter), nor do I know what other people like, but I will say I really like my PSP. I'm currently embroiled in a season of MVP Baseball and it is pretty darn cool -- it really captures the essence of the game, in my opinion. It and Ridge Racer are both very fun games, to me at least. I'm hoping "GTA: Liberty City Stories" (basically "San Andreas", I hear) will be cool on PSP.
I scored a '93 Model M a few years ago from a coworker who didn't value it when he got his upgrade. It's great. I looked on the back, though, and noticed it was manufactured for IBM by Lexmark. Interesting.
While I believe you are not putting Michelangelo in that category of sculptor(/painter), I would like to say that it is my understanding that Michelangelo did not do that. At least not on the Sistine Chapel ceiling painting for which he is perhaps best known. At least that's what I remember from "The Agony and the Ecstasy" (not a bad film if you don't mind Charlton Heston's occasional over acting, which I don't). Though he seemed to have assistants helping with layout, at least at first. The film gives one the impression that when he decided to redo it after frustrations with the first go-round he did it all on his own.
In my opinion, a more relevant and serious problem is the very low quality compression used by the DVD standard. Some of the banding and aliasing artifacts I've seen on DVD conversions makes certain movies almost unwatchable for me. We're a long way from having to worry about resolution limits in the conversion process just yet.
Yes, DVD-Video's MPEG-2 MP@ML encoding does show it's limitations, especially with traditional cel-based animation. The banding is primarily a function of the consumer format's 8 bits per sample; pro formats typically use 10 bits per sample and don't exhibit banding to anywhere near the same degree. Jaggies are probably a function of the DV resolution of 720x480, but may be exacerbated by non-progressive mastering and poor-quality consumer NTSC decoders. A properly-mastered DVD played on a progressive-scan player will minimize this.
That said, having seen it with my own eyes at this year's NAB show, I can tell you that the future is looking brighter. Nascent formats like Blu-Ray (yay!) and HD-DVD (not so yay!) with support for H.264 (a.k.a. MPEG-4 AVC) encoding of either 1080p24 or 720p should yield dramatically better picture quality. Of course, the key will still be the quality of the mastering job; poor mastering choices will still yield mediocre results.
I think the key to overall, long-term quality products for the foreseeable future is studios' decisions re: archival formats. Hopefully, studios will see the benefits of high-quality transfer of degrading film assets to the 1080p24 common image format (CIF) standard, from which all manner of consumer formats can be relatively easily derived. By making the necessary investment up front, I think (as do many others) that they will be able to reap rewards in the long run in terms of asset reuse.
I believe the parent poster's post is wandering into off-topic territory and, therefore, my response is probably OT, too. However, I feel I must reply, if for no other reason than to offer counterpoint to his ideas for those who might not know much about high-end audio (and pro audio, for that matter).
No, they can't. The human ear is can't hear past 20 KHz and most people are lucky to get past 16.
You are correct in pointing out that human hearing, in general, is limited and these limits increase with age and other factors, such as exposure to certain environments, etc. However, audiophile dissatisfaction with CD audio is not all about frequency response, as you suggest in your next comment....
What these audiophiles are hearing are alias frequencies above 22.05 KHz that occasionally come out in the recorded sound as harmonic distortions. For example, a 24 KHz sound would likely come in as an occasional, faint boost at around 2 KHz.
This might be a problem, in some circumstances. I would point out that a 2 kHz distortion term will not be harmonic to the 24 kHz original (subharmonic, yes, but that's different); as a result, this form of distortion might be quite disharmonious.
This is all well and good until you consider in that any good A/D converter has a lowpass filter set to around 20 KHz so that all frequencies above 22.05 KHz are completely attenuated out of the sound before before it's converted to digital signal.
Anti-aliasing filters are difficult to design; there is a trade-off between cutoff rate, sonics, complexity, cost, etc. Brick-wall filters that cut off everything beyond the Nyquist frequency are quite difficult to produce; in fact, some undesired signal does get through. Hopefully, this is minimized in a good design (e.g., with Apogee A/Ds).
What does this mean? It means that "audiophiles" who say they can hear frequencies past 22 KHz on a professional recording are full of shit.
This is really the sentence that tripped me off. I won't argue that claims of ultra-high frequency sensitivity are suspect, but your apparent dismissal of audiophile criticisms of digital sound w.r.t. analog sound, in general, are typical of less-experienced (at listening, anyway) folks. I am not trying to insult you; rather, I'd like you to more fully consider your assumptions.
I will be the first to say that much audiophile literature needs to be taken with a grain of salt. That said, many audio pros have come to understand what many audiophiles have been saying for years: Red Book CD audio is not a particularly good format for satisfying audio listening. Yes, it is convenient; that is it's #1 advantage over LPs. Yes, digital workflows in the recording/post setting have many advantages. However, any pro worth his salt today will tell you that 96 kHz, 24-bit recordings sound significantly better. Analog tape sounds better still.
Why? Because audio quality is not just about a medium's dynamic range or supposed frequency response, as CD-advocates typically think. On the frequency front, higher sample rate formats allow more gradual anti-aliasing filters, which do less harm to the signal. Less ringing, fewer phase anomalies... whatever it is, they work better. More bit depth reduces quantization noise, which, in turn, allows superior playback of low-level information that is critical to ambience (read soundstage depth, width, focus, etc.). Of course, analog does all of these things even better than the best digital.
In case people don't know it, there is a renaissance going on today with regard to LP playback. Many people, even those who wouldn't regard themselves as "audiophiles", frustrated with many of the inadequacies of CD music quality, are rediscovering analog playback. Yes, much high-end audio equipment is extraordinarily expensive, but many bargains can be found, as well. For those willing to take time out to listen to a record or two in one sitting, on decent equipment, without being distracted by all the things that conspire to distract us day in and day out, magical moments can be had.
They're trying to produce the cartoons as cheap and quickly as possible.
I agree.
I'm generally interested in cheap cartoons now, not expensive high-quality hand-processed cartoons later.
No offense to you, in particular, but... therein lies the problem. In my opinion, Hollywood and the American public (the primary target buyers) are, in general, locked in a chicken-or-the-egg cycle where the perceived need for immediate gratification often induces rushed, low-side compliant product, which, in turn, erodes future expectations. Hollywood, in general, doesn't want to spend "excess" money making inherently better product that people might not be willing to pay for, and the buying public, in general, remains more or less content (generally less, whether they know it or not) in their state of blissful ignorance of what they could be getting if only they demanded it.
Please, people, for the sake of our cultural future, try to develop discriminating tastes and vote accordingly with your hard-earned dollars whenever and wherever you can.
(No sermon-like tone intended... I just feel strongly about this sort of thing.)
Typically the SDKs don't provide full, unfettered access to the manufacturer's raw format, just a subset. Canon is as bad as Nikon in this regard.
Do you know for a fact that Nikon's SDK provides access to only a subset of the NEF data? I find that when a statement starts with "Typically...." that there's some handwaving going on. What, specifically, makes you think Nikon's SDK is "bad" in this regard?
While your other commentary may be relevant to Canon, I would caution readers not to automatically infer that the same rules apply to Nikon. As most photographers know, Canons and Nikons (and Leicas, and...) are different beasts, each with its own strengths and weaknesses. As has already been mentioned, Capture is well-regarded by many for its image quality (though not for its speed). Some find its output superior to ACR's.
I have heard that Canon's RAW processing software is pretty crappy and that ACR is better. Let's not assume that that means Nikon's software is necessarily inferior to ACR.
Thanks for confirming what I suggested in an earlier post; this is useful information for me and others. Unfortunately, in today's world, many people think Photoshop is the end all of image processing and it just isn't always so.
On the subject of a sibling poster's comments on workflow: yes, workflow is a factor but it is only one factor. Speed of processing can be important in some applications but so can maximizing image quality. In cases where image quality reigns supreme, if Capture works better, the time will be taken and the workflow will bend.
... without having to pay Nikon any more $, either directly or indirectly through the cost of software whose developers had to pay for a license to Nikon's SDK. Call me crazy.
I won't call you crazy, but I will say RTF response from Nikon: it clearly says "... the SDK is provided to the developer at no charge...." So, theoretically, Adobe could issue a free update to ACR that allowed processing of the D2X's NEF files. The fact that it appears that they're choosing to provide support through a new version of ACR, which requires CS2, is their choice, not Nikon's. To Adobe's credit, they are offering the DNG Converter to convert the RAW files to DNG format for use by earlier versions of ACR for people who do not yet wish to upgrade to CS2.
So, really, I wouldn't expect the "inevitable bulk of Nikon buyers" to thank you for your "pity and righteous anger" on their behalf.
Why doesn't Adobe just break the encryption outside of the United States, and keep all the infringing information on non-US servers so they cannot be sued for breaking the law in the US. I'm sure other people work around the DMCA in the same way?
At the risk of appearing naive, there is a third possibility:
3. Adobe respects Nikon's wishes, however misguided they might think them to be, and is behaving ethically.
I differentiate #3 from your #2 in the sense that in #3, the goal is not to merely avoid alienating Nikon but, rather, to simply do the right thing, legally and ethically.
I see a lot of discussion here to the effect of "why doesn't Adobe just break the law this clever way".... I've heard of America's, and the world's, declining sense of ethics; I guess this is proof positive.
Pros, and serious amateurs for that matter, will use whatever set of tools yields the best results. Yes, Photoshop will most likely be part of the workflow and, yes, Adobe Camera Raw is generally well regarded. But Nikon's Capture software is not "stupid little photo software." Although it is known to be substantially slower in its processing than ACR, it does offer additional control over RAW processing and, in some people's opinions, superior image quality.
Personally I think the improvement in quality is indeed pretty dramatic, even on a standard-definition display.
I switched to digital cable a couple of years ago and I agree with you. I view using a 32" 4:3 analog set (Sony) and definitely prefer the digital channels to the analog ones... especially HBO and Cinemax, etc., which, generally, have higher production values. (Lack of commercials and content editing are big pluses, too, of course.)
On an only somewhat related note, I was at the NAB show last week and had the opportunity to see H.264-encoded HD content on large 16:9 monitors... wow! I'm not exaggerating when I say that it looked indistinguishable from uncompressed HD. (This was at the Sonic booth, so it does probably represent state-of-the-art encoding.) HD DVDs, whether Blu-ray or HD-DVD, will be great when they become available. If cable can move to H.264, it will improve, too.
For those willing to buy in to the newer technologies, the results can be very impressive. The content still has to be there, but the industry is working on it. I think we all have to be a little patient, but the wait will be worth it for those who appreciate picture quality. (Unfortunately, I'm not sure I like going the Dolby Digital route for audio, but that's another story.)
My understanding of DTV is that it is broadcast in an entirely different RF band from analog TV (please tell me if I'm wrong here)....
Responding to my own post, but.... From looking at a few more posts, I'm gleaning that the RF bands will be the same, at least after the digital switchover, so that point is moot. However, the fact that entirely different receivers are required remains a barrier to NTSC-like backwards compatibility.
Perhaps I don't fully understand what you're saying, but I think what you're saying is a little misleading.
The NTSC standard was designed to be backwards compatible with existing black and white sets (some of the ramifications of this decision are annoying to this day... e.g., ~29.97 fps video) and I believe transmissions were made in the same bands of the RF spectrum (this being required for the compatibility). My understanding of DTV is that it is broadcast in an entirely different RF band from analog TV (please tell me if I'm wrong here) and DTV signals certainly require different receiver design (demodulation, decoding, etc.) than do analog signals.
So, I think the two systems are not, in fact, compatible in the same way that NTSC was compatible with B&W. And that, I think, is the problem we're discussing.
Yes, we could, in theory, continue to broadcast both analog and digital signals, but this would be redundant and, therefore, unnecessarily costly, as well as prevent reuse of the analog bands.
I think the bottom line is: the time has come to make the move to DTV (and HDTV). It will be painful in various ways to various folks (believe me, the broadcasters are not getting off lightly), but, in the long run, it'll probably be mostly a good thing.
While I normally don't tell people how their value systems should be structured, I can't help but find it slightly humorous that you acquired a 57" Sony HDTV set and yet you balk at spending $200 on a digital tuner you say you'd like to have. To each his own, I guess.
I do agree, though, that, for some, $200 may be more than they will want to pay.
... digital cable (which isn't reall digital for most channels)...
I'd like to clarify this statement for those folks who might not understand what you're saying here.... Right now, channels under 100 are still analog signals, even under a digital cable contract, to ensure compatibility with other folks on the cable who are still analog subscribers. Channels 100 and over, typically the premium channels (HBO, Cinemax, etc.) and other subscription channels (e.g., OTN), are digital.
If you have analog cable, you will continue to get analog cable.
This is an interesting statement. I agree that analog over cable probably isn't affected by the over-the-air digital mandate, but I wonder how much longer cable companies will offer analog service. There will come a point when it will be advantageous for them to discontinue analog service to streamline their infrastructure. At that point, you pretty much will have to have a DTV-compatible setup of some sort.
Just to be clear, there are differences between the moves to digital TV (DTV) and high-definition TV (HDTV). Cessation of analog over-the-air broadcasts in favor of DTV over the air is the current discussion. This will require new sets or set top boxes in consumers' homes, as you suggest. The impact of this on broadcasters in most markets is relatively small, though, at least when compared to the impact due to the adoption of HDTV; it is primarily focused on transmission equipment. Deployment of HDTV, on the other hand, requires extensive replacement of equipment throughout the broadcaster's processing chain.
To reinforce this difference, let me remind people that 480i and 480p are valid DTV formats, defined by the ATSC, the NTSC successor. In the professional world, these are called SD, or standard definition, formats, and are easily derived from existing analog signals/infrastructure.
I like your post; I think it hits the nail fairly squarely on the head. I'll add my slight spin on things....
I went to Camelback High School (Boo, Carl Hayden!) and then MIT. I was valedictorian of my high school but, like many, only a member of the rank and file at MIT. My point is, like Dirty Harry once said, "A man's got to know his limitations." I certainly learned mine at MIT; I wonder if I would have at ASU.
Continuing in that direction, I'll recall the firehose analogy. Getting an education at MIT has been described as being like drinking from a firehose (I'm sure this has been used at other schools, too). One can drink as much from a water fountain, I suppose, but with a firehose, you can't help but get wet in the process. I think "getting wet", in an academic sense, can be counted as a plus. For better or for worse, you certainly walk away feeling impacted.
My MIT experience was my own, and I am reluctant to assume that anyone else's was at all similar; we each get different things out of such circumstances. I think parents would be wise to counsel their kids on what to expect from their college experiences, but I wonder how many really do. My overall experience was 60/40 good/bad, but I'm glad I went, anyway.
If you're interested in purchasing a Mac, I suggest you look at Apple's web site... there is a lot of information there on the PowerPC G5 (the CPU), the Power Mac G5 (the whole computer), Mac OS X, development, etc.
I don't know if a third party monitor will work with an Apple-approved video card; this is probably something to ask your local Apple dealer. The Apple web site does describe the ATI and nvidia video card options for each model of G5, and the prices for them. As for software, if you look in the "Store" you'll find a tab that lists various software available for purchase directly from Apple, including games. I believe WoW is available, along with Doom 3. Finally, Apple includes Xcode as an optional install with OS X. This is Apple's IDE for C, C++, Objective-C, Objective-C++, and Java development. These languages can target the Cocoa, Carbon, and Java frameworks. And, of course, you'll have gcc and the various Unix APIs available to you.
I'm on a buildup to purchasing a new G5. There are several reasons for this, but a lot of it has to do with Mac OS X. Of course, it is fairly well known that OS X offers a pretty good "user experience," but in looking at the upcoming Tiger stuff, I'm just blown away at how refined it's getting.
I plan to use my G5 for video capture/editing, DVD authoring, digital image manipulation using Photoshop, and professional audio/music production,as well as for general use (email, web browsing, etc.). I'll still keep a PC for games and those few applications where the PC is still king. A GNU/linux box for Oracle and an OpenBSD box for infrastructure and I'll be all set.
What a nice time we live in, as far as computing options go....
I've been thinking about my response and, having just seen a picture of Cassini, I decided to amend my answer a little to hopefully sharpen things up a bit.
If a spacecraft's high gain antenna is fixed to the structure, i.e., it is not gimballed as I talked about earlier, then the entire spacecraft must be reoriented in order to orient the antenna towards Earth. Minor attitude corrections would probably be required to maintain this pointing over time.
And, in case you were wondering how one could command a spacecraft whose high gain antenna was not yet Earth-pointing, the answer is a low gain antenna. Low data rate commands can be received by the low gain (i.e., essential omni) antenna regardless of the spacecraft's orientation.
I'm impressed; you've managed, in a single post, to throw insults at almost every person who might read it.:-) While almost every joke has an element of truth in it, I will take issue with your last comment: "... with a Boeing/Military relationship, the 'study' phase alone is going to cost more than a truely inspired private company would spend putting the entire constellation into orbit."
It is certainly true that large organizational efforts, especially ones that involve the government, have their inefficiencies and attendant financial overhead. That said, your comment trivializes the efforts of the study teams in a most insulting way. I am willing to assume you know very little about what it takes to architect, design, develop, and implement a system as complex as the transformational satellite system, or, for that matter, any modern multi-role, multi-service, secure, and robust global military communication system.
I wonder if your hypothetical private enterprise's CEOs would be willing to put themselves in wartime situations with their systems as their communication lifelines. The rules change when billions of dollars and thousands of lives are at stake.
One final analogy: If you were a fighter pilot flying your F-whatever into combat, how much engineering/testing/support is enough?
No, I'm not saying there haven't been more than 2000 satellites launched. Your original comment was: "After a few thousand birds at many millions a pop the industry is quite savvy about avoiding these." I find this comment funny because it implies two things: (1) that there is a lot of information sharing between everyone who builds those satellites, and (2) that there are no other issues that creep in to complicate the problem.
To illustrate point #1, I ask you how much information sharing you think occurred between Soviet and Chinese satellite development and their Western counterparts? For that matter, how much information sharing do you think occurs between European contractors and U.S. contractors? The answer is not as much as we'd like. In fact, information sharing between rival U.S. contractors is controlled to safeguard competitive advantages. As a result, most organizations are left to discover, explore, and remedy most of their problems in relative isolation. This greatly slows progress against the unknown. Further exacerbating the problem is the fact that many problems are design issues that only come to the surface on a design-by-design basis; this further reduces opportunities for discovery.
Regarding point #2, even if you become aware of a problem on a given satellite program, discovering the full reach across to all your other programs and implementing corrective action is non-trivial. Often, hardware is already on-orbit and can't be fixed. Many times, hardware is so far into the pipeline that the costs of reworking force a judgement call. Here, risk mitigation techniques are used to attempt to quantify the risk associated with various candidate courses of action and the final determination may be to fly as-is. Sometimes, this comes back to bite you in the ass.
So, in conclusion, your comment made me laugh because it reminds me of what many tin-benders who now control the space business seem to believe about what we do: In many folks's opinions, it seems they think that we can declare our technologies and processes mature and focus on "cranking out" hardware as if it was 727s. What we do is inherently specialized, even tweaky. Every design presents myriad challenges that test our understanding of the technology, the space and launch environments, and our manufacturing processes. Nothing can be taken for granted.
But back to the current subject.... Yes, tin whiskers is a relatively understood phenomenon today. But back in 1997, when the subject satellite was launched, and even moreso earlier, when it was designed and manufactured, this cannot be assumed to be the case.
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I can't speak to DS vs. PSP on what games are coming out because I don't know what's due out on DS (or that much on PSP, for that matter), nor do I know what other people like, but I will say I really like my PSP. I'm currently embroiled in a season of MVP Baseball and it is pretty darn cool -- it really captures the essence of the game, in my opinion. It and Ridge Racer are both very fun games, to me at least. I'm hoping "GTA: Liberty City Stories" (basically "San Andreas", I hear) will be cool on PSP.
:-)
Just a data point... from a 40-year old dork.
I scored a '93 Model M a few years ago from a coworker who didn't value it when he got his upgrade. It's great. I looked on the back, though, and noticed it was manufactured for IBM by Lexmark. Interesting.
Interesting.
While I believe you are not putting Michelangelo in that category of sculptor(/painter), I would like to say that it is my understanding that Michelangelo did not do that. At least not on the Sistine Chapel ceiling painting for which he is perhaps best known. At least that's what I remember from "The Agony and the Ecstasy" (not a bad film if you don't mind Charlton Heston's occasional over acting, which I don't). Though he seemed to have assistants helping with layout, at least at first. The film gives one the impression that when he decided to redo it after frustrations with the first go-round he did it all on his own.
In my opinion, a more relevant and serious problem is the very low quality compression used by the DVD standard. Some of the banding and aliasing artifacts I've seen on DVD conversions makes certain movies almost unwatchable for me. We're a long way from having to worry about resolution limits in the conversion process just yet.
Yes, DVD-Video's MPEG-2 MP@ML encoding does show it's limitations, especially with traditional cel-based animation. The banding is primarily a function of the consumer format's 8 bits per sample; pro formats typically use 10 bits per sample and don't exhibit banding to anywhere near the same degree. Jaggies are probably a function of the DV resolution of 720x480, but may be exacerbated by non-progressive mastering and poor-quality consumer NTSC decoders. A properly-mastered DVD played on a progressive-scan player will minimize this.
That said, having seen it with my own eyes at this year's NAB show, I can tell you that the future is looking brighter. Nascent formats like Blu-Ray (yay!) and HD-DVD (not so yay!) with support for H.264 (a.k.a. MPEG-4 AVC) encoding of either 1080p24 or 720p should yield dramatically better picture quality. Of course, the key will still be the quality of the mastering job; poor mastering choices will still yield mediocre results.
I think the key to overall, long-term quality products for the foreseeable future is studios' decisions re: archival formats. Hopefully, studios will see the benefits of high-quality transfer of degrading film assets to the 1080p24 common image format (CIF) standard, from which all manner of consumer formats can be relatively easily derived. By making the necessary investment up front, I think (as do many others) that they will be able to reap rewards in the long run in terms of asset reuse.
We'll see.
I believe the parent poster's post is wandering into off-topic territory and, therefore, my response is probably OT, too. However, I feel I must reply, if for no other reason than to offer counterpoint to his ideas for those who might not know much about high-end audio (and pro audio, for that matter).
No, they can't. The human ear is can't hear past 20 KHz and most people are lucky to get past 16.
You are correct in pointing out that human hearing, in general, is limited and these limits increase with age and other factors, such as exposure to certain environments, etc. However, audiophile dissatisfaction with CD audio is not all about frequency response, as you suggest in your next comment....
What these audiophiles are hearing are alias frequencies above 22.05 KHz that occasionally come out in the recorded sound as harmonic distortions. For example, a 24 KHz sound would likely come in as an occasional, faint boost at around 2 KHz.
This might be a problem, in some circumstances. I would point out that a 2 kHz distortion term will not be harmonic to the 24 kHz original (subharmonic, yes, but that's different); as a result, this form of distortion might be quite disharmonious.
This is all well and good until you consider in that any good A/D converter has a lowpass filter set to around 20 KHz so that all frequencies above 22.05 KHz are completely attenuated out of the sound before before it's converted to digital signal.
Anti-aliasing filters are difficult to design; there is a trade-off between cutoff rate, sonics, complexity, cost, etc. Brick-wall filters that cut off everything beyond the Nyquist frequency are quite difficult to produce; in fact, some undesired signal does get through. Hopefully, this is minimized in a good design (e.g., with Apogee A/Ds).
What does this mean? It means that "audiophiles" who say they can hear frequencies past 22 KHz on a professional recording are full of shit.
This is really the sentence that tripped me off. I won't argue that claims of ultra-high frequency sensitivity are suspect, but your apparent dismissal of audiophile criticisms of digital sound w.r.t. analog sound, in general, are typical of less-experienced (at listening, anyway) folks. I am not trying to insult you; rather, I'd like you to more fully consider your assumptions.
I will be the first to say that much audiophile literature needs to be taken with a grain of salt. That said, many audio pros have come to understand what many audiophiles have been saying for years: Red Book CD audio is not a particularly good format for satisfying audio listening. Yes, it is convenient; that is it's #1 advantage over LPs. Yes, digital workflows in the recording/post setting have many advantages. However, any pro worth his salt today will tell you that 96 kHz, 24-bit recordings sound significantly better. Analog tape sounds better still.
Why? Because audio quality is not just about a medium's dynamic range or supposed frequency response, as CD-advocates typically think. On the frequency front, higher sample rate formats allow more gradual anti-aliasing filters, which do less harm to the signal. Less ringing, fewer phase anomalies... whatever it is, they work better. More bit depth reduces quantization noise, which, in turn, allows superior playback of low-level information that is critical to ambience (read soundstage depth, width, focus, etc.). Of course, analog does all of these things even better than the best digital.
In case people don't know it, there is a renaissance going on today with regard to LP playback. Many people, even those who wouldn't regard themselves as "audiophiles", frustrated with many of the inadequacies of CD music quality, are rediscovering analog playback. Yes, much high-end audio equipment is extraordinarily expensive, but many bargains can be found, as well. For those willing to take time out to listen to a record or two in one sitting, on decent equipment, without being distracted by all the things that conspire to distract us day in and day out, magical moments can be had.
Please... open your mind.
They're trying to produce the cartoons as cheap and quickly as possible.
I agree.
I'm generally interested in cheap cartoons now, not expensive high-quality hand-processed cartoons later.
No offense to you, in particular, but... therein lies the problem. In my opinion, Hollywood and the American public (the primary target buyers) are, in general, locked in a chicken-or-the-egg cycle where the perceived need for immediate gratification often induces rushed, low-side compliant product, which, in turn, erodes future expectations. Hollywood, in general, doesn't want to spend "excess" money making inherently better product that people might not be willing to pay for, and the buying public, in general, remains more or less content (generally less, whether they know it or not) in their state of blissful ignorance of what they could be getting if only they demanded it.
Please, people, for the sake of our cultural future, try to develop discriminating tastes and vote accordingly with your hard-earned dollars whenever and wherever you can.
(No sermon-like tone intended... I just feel strongly about this sort of thing.)
Typically the SDKs don't provide full, unfettered access to the manufacturer's raw format, just a subset. Canon is as bad as Nikon in this regard.
...) are different beasts, each with its own strengths and weaknesses. As has already been mentioned, Capture is well-regarded by many for its image quality (though not for its speed). Some find its output superior to ACR's.
Do you know for a fact that Nikon's SDK provides access to only a subset of the NEF data? I find that when a statement starts with "Typically...." that there's some handwaving going on. What, specifically, makes you think Nikon's SDK is "bad" in this regard?
While your other commentary may be relevant to Canon, I would caution readers not to automatically infer that the same rules apply to Nikon. As most photographers know, Canons and Nikons (and Leicas, and
I have heard that Canon's RAW processing software is pretty crappy and that ACR is better. Let's not assume that that means Nikon's software is necessarily inferior to ACR.
Thanks for confirming what I suggested in an earlier post; this is useful information for me and others. Unfortunately, in today's world, many people think Photoshop is the end all of image processing and it just isn't always so.
On the subject of a sibling poster's comments on workflow: yes, workflow is a factor but it is only one factor. Speed of processing can be important in some applications but so can maximizing image quality. In cases where image quality reigns supreme, if Capture works better, the time will be taken and the workflow will bend.
... without having to pay Nikon any more $, either directly or indirectly through the cost of software whose developers had to pay for a license to Nikon's SDK. Call me crazy.
I won't call you crazy, but I will say RTF response from Nikon: it clearly says "... the SDK is provided to the developer at no charge...." So, theoretically, Adobe could issue a free update to ACR that allowed processing of the D2X's NEF files. The fact that it appears that they're choosing to provide support through a new version of ACR, which requires CS2, is their choice, not Nikon's. To Adobe's credit, they are offering the DNG Converter to convert the RAW files to DNG format for use by earlier versions of ACR for people who do not yet wish to upgrade to CS2.
So, really, I wouldn't expect the "inevitable bulk of Nikon buyers" to thank you for your "pity and righteous anger" on their behalf.
Why doesn't Adobe just break the encryption outside of the United States, and keep all the infringing information on non-US servers so they cannot be sued for breaking the law in the US. I'm sure other people work around the DMCA in the same way?
At the risk of appearing naive, there is a third possibility:
3. Adobe respects Nikon's wishes, however misguided they might think them to be, and is behaving ethically.
I differentiate #3 from your #2 in the sense that in #3, the goal is not to merely avoid alienating Nikon but, rather, to simply do the right thing, legally and ethically.
I see a lot of discussion here to the effect of "why doesn't Adobe just break the law this clever way".... I've heard of America's, and the world's, declining sense of ethics; I guess this is proof positive.
... Nikon has already responded violently ...
Exactly how has Nikon responded violently? I read their response and it seemed very civil to me.
Moderators, I fail to see how the parent post can be considered particularly informative. It seems closer to troll material to me.
Pros, and serious amateurs for that matter, will use whatever set of tools yields the best results. Yes, Photoshop will most likely be part of the workflow and, yes, Adobe Camera Raw is generally well regarded. But Nikon's Capture software is not "stupid little photo software." Although it is known to be substantially slower in its processing than ACR, it does offer additional control over RAW processing and, in some people's opinions, superior image quality.
Personally I think the improvement in quality is indeed pretty dramatic, even on a standard-definition display.
I switched to digital cable a couple of years ago and I agree with you. I view using a 32" 4:3 analog set (Sony) and definitely prefer the digital channels to the analog ones... especially HBO and Cinemax, etc., which, generally, have higher production values. (Lack of commercials and content editing are big pluses, too, of course.)
On an only somewhat related note, I was at the NAB show last week and had the opportunity to see H.264-encoded HD content on large 16:9 monitors... wow! I'm not exaggerating when I say that it looked indistinguishable from uncompressed HD. (This was at the Sonic booth, so it does probably represent state-of-the-art encoding.) HD DVDs, whether Blu-ray or HD-DVD, will be great when they become available. If cable can move to H.264, it will improve, too.
For those willing to buy in to the newer technologies, the results can be very impressive. The content still has to be there, but the industry is working on it. I think we all have to be a little patient, but the wait will be worth it for those who appreciate picture quality. (Unfortunately, I'm not sure I like going the Dolby Digital route for audio, but that's another story.)
My understanding of DTV is that it is broadcast in an entirely different RF band from analog TV (please tell me if I'm wrong here)....
Responding to my own post, but.... From looking at a few more posts, I'm gleaning that the RF bands will be the same, at least after the digital switchover, so that point is moot. However, the fact that entirely different receivers are required remains a barrier to NTSC-like backwards compatibility.
Perhaps I don't fully understand what you're saying, but I think what you're saying is a little misleading.
The NTSC standard was designed to be backwards compatible with existing black and white sets (some of the ramifications of this decision are annoying to this day... e.g., ~29.97 fps video) and I believe transmissions were made in the same bands of the RF spectrum (this being required for the compatibility). My understanding of DTV is that it is broadcast in an entirely different RF band from analog TV (please tell me if I'm wrong here) and DTV signals certainly require different receiver design (demodulation, decoding, etc.) than do analog signals.
So, I think the two systems are not, in fact, compatible in the same way that NTSC was compatible with B&W. And that, I think, is the problem we're discussing.
Yes, we could, in theory, continue to broadcast both analog and digital signals, but this would be redundant and, therefore, unnecessarily costly, as well as prevent reuse of the analog bands.
I think the bottom line is: the time has come to make the move to DTV (and HDTV). It will be painful in various ways to various folks (believe me, the broadcasters are not getting off lightly), but, in the long run, it'll probably be mostly a good thing.
While I normally don't tell people how their value systems should be structured, I can't help but find it slightly humorous that you acquired a 57" Sony HDTV set and yet you balk at spending $200 on a digital tuner you say you'd like to have. To each his own, I guess.
I do agree, though, that, for some, $200 may be more than they will want to pay.
... digital cable (which isn't reall digital for most channels) ...
I'd like to clarify this statement for those folks who might not understand what you're saying here.... Right now, channels under 100 are still analog signals, even under a digital cable contract, to ensure compatibility with other folks on the cable who are still analog subscribers. Channels 100 and over, typically the premium channels (HBO, Cinemax, etc.) and other subscription channels (e.g., OTN), are digital.
If you have analog cable, you will continue to get analog cable.
This is an interesting statement. I agree that analog over cable probably isn't affected by the over-the-air digital mandate, but I wonder how much longer cable companies will offer analog service. There will come a point when it will be advantageous for them to discontinue analog service to streamline their infrastructure. At that point, you pretty much will have to have a DTV-compatible setup of some sort.
Just to be clear, there are differences between the moves to digital TV (DTV) and high-definition TV (HDTV). Cessation of analog over-the-air broadcasts in favor of DTV over the air is the current discussion. This will require new sets or set top boxes in consumers' homes, as you suggest. The impact of this on broadcasters in most markets is relatively small, though, at least when compared to the impact due to the adoption of HDTV; it is primarily focused on transmission equipment. Deployment of HDTV, on the other hand, requires extensive replacement of equipment throughout the broadcaster's processing chain.
To reinforce this difference, let me remind people that 480i and 480p are valid DTV formats, defined by the ATSC, the NTSC successor. In the professional world, these are called SD, or standard definition, formats, and are easily derived from existing analog signals/infrastructure.
Hope this helps.
I like your post; I think it hits the nail fairly squarely on the head. I'll add my slight spin on things....
I went to Camelback High School (Boo, Carl Hayden!) and then MIT. I was valedictorian of my high school but, like many, only a member of the rank and file at MIT. My point is, like Dirty Harry once said, "A man's got to know his limitations." I certainly learned mine at MIT; I wonder if I would have at ASU.
Continuing in that direction, I'll recall the firehose analogy. Getting an education at MIT has been described as being like drinking from a firehose (I'm sure this has been used at other schools, too). One can drink as much from a water fountain, I suppose, but with a firehose, you can't help but get wet in the process. I think "getting wet", in an academic sense, can be counted as a plus. For better or for worse, you certainly walk away feeling impacted.
My MIT experience was my own, and I am reluctant to assume that anyone else's was at all similar; we each get different things out of such circumstances. I think parents would be wise to counsel their kids on what to expect from their college experiences, but I wonder how many really do. My overall experience was 60/40 good/bad, but I'm glad I went, anyway.
To each his own.
If you're interested in purchasing a Mac, I suggest you look at Apple's web site... there is a lot of information there on the PowerPC G5 (the CPU), the Power Mac G5 (the whole computer), Mac OS X, development, etc.
I don't know if a third party monitor will work with an Apple-approved video card; this is probably something to ask your local Apple dealer. The Apple web site does describe the ATI and nvidia video card options for each model of G5, and the prices for them. As for software, if you look in the "Store" you'll find a tab that lists various software available for purchase directly from Apple, including games. I believe WoW is available, along with Doom 3. Finally, Apple includes Xcode as an optional install with OS X. This is Apple's IDE for C, C++, Objective-C, Objective-C++, and Java development. These languages can target the Cocoa, Carbon, and Java frameworks. And, of course, you'll have gcc and the various Unix APIs available to you.
I'm on a buildup to purchasing a new G5. There are several reasons for this, but a lot of it has to do with Mac OS X. Of course, it is fairly well known that OS X offers a pretty good "user experience," but in looking at the upcoming Tiger stuff, I'm just blown away at how refined it's getting.
I plan to use my G5 for video capture/editing, DVD authoring, digital image manipulation using Photoshop, and professional audio/music production,as well as for general use (email, web browsing, etc.). I'll still keep a PC for games and those few applications where the PC is still king. A GNU/linux box for Oracle and an OpenBSD box for infrastructure and I'll be all set.
What a nice time we live in, as far as computing options go....
I've been thinking about my response and, having just seen a picture of Cassini, I decided to amend my answer a little to hopefully sharpen things up a bit.
If a spacecraft's high gain antenna is fixed to the structure, i.e., it is not gimballed as I talked about earlier, then the entire spacecraft must be reoriented in order to orient the antenna towards Earth. Minor attitude corrections would probably be required to maintain this pointing over time.
And, in case you were wondering how one could command a spacecraft whose high gain antenna was not yet Earth-pointing, the answer is a low gain antenna. Low data rate commands can be received by the low gain (i.e., essential omni) antenna regardless of the spacecraft's orientation.
Hope this helps.
I'm impressed; you've managed, in a single post, to throw insults at almost every person who might read it. :-) While almost every joke has an element of truth in it, I will take issue with your last comment: "... with a Boeing/Military relationship, the 'study' phase alone is going to cost more than a truely inspired private company would spend putting the entire constellation into orbit."
It is certainly true that large organizational efforts, especially ones that involve the government, have their inefficiencies and attendant financial overhead. That said, your comment trivializes the efforts of the study teams in a most insulting way. I am willing to assume you know very little about what it takes to architect, design, develop, and implement a system as complex as the transformational satellite system, or, for that matter, any modern multi-role, multi-service, secure, and robust global military communication system.
I wonder if your hypothetical private enterprise's CEOs would be willing to put themselves in wartime situations with their systems as their communication lifelines. The rules change when billions of dollars and thousands of lives are at stake.
One final analogy: If you were a fighter pilot flying your F-whatever into combat, how much engineering/testing/support is enough?
Thanks for your reply.
No, I'm not saying there haven't been more than 2000 satellites launched. Your original comment was: "After a few thousand birds at many millions a pop the industry is quite savvy about avoiding these." I find this comment funny because it implies two things: (1) that there is a lot of information sharing between everyone who builds those satellites, and (2) that there are no other issues that creep in to complicate the problem.
To illustrate point #1, I ask you how much information sharing you think occurred between Soviet and Chinese satellite development and their Western counterparts? For that matter, how much information sharing do you think occurs between European contractors and U.S. contractors? The answer is not as much as we'd like. In fact, information sharing between rival U.S. contractors is controlled to safeguard competitive advantages. As a result, most organizations are left to discover, explore, and remedy most of their problems in relative isolation. This greatly slows progress against the unknown. Further exacerbating the problem is the fact that many problems are design issues that only come to the surface on a design-by-design basis; this further reduces opportunities for discovery.
Regarding point #2, even if you become aware of a problem on a given satellite program, discovering the full reach across to all your other programs and implementing corrective action is non-trivial. Often, hardware is already on-orbit and can't be fixed. Many times, hardware is so far into the pipeline that the costs of reworking force a judgement call. Here, risk mitigation techniques are used to attempt to quantify the risk associated with various candidate courses of action and the final determination may be to fly as-is. Sometimes, this comes back to bite you in the ass.
So, in conclusion, your comment made me laugh because it reminds me of what many tin-benders who now control the space business seem to believe about what we do: In many folks's opinions, it seems they think that we can declare our technologies and processes mature and focus on "cranking out" hardware as if it was 727s. What we do is inherently specialized, even tweaky. Every design presents myriad challenges that test our understanding of the technology, the space and launch environments, and our manufacturing processes. Nothing can be taken for granted.
But back to the current subject.... Yes, tin whiskers is a relatively understood phenomenon today. But back in 1997, when the subject satellite was launched, and even moreso earlier, when it was designed and manufactured, this cannot be assumed to be the case.
"Lucas, Prince of Darkness."
:-)
I was told this joke when purchasing a 1976 Triumph Spitfire from a private party years ago. It's stuck ever since.
Thanks for the reminder.