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My new toys (I’m spoiled)

My dear husband decided to get me a wedding gift, also known as the “zero anniversary” gift. Apparently this is a thing men are encouraged to do (by whom? One wedding book I read and his co-workers). I told him it was completely unnecessary but he insisted (barely). He gave me the choice between an iPad2 and a DSLR (Or camera of my choosing).

I agonized for weeks. I ended up picking the camera, feeling it would be the better investment. Normally it takes me months to deliberate but this time I decided to choose quickly. I ended up going for the Panasonic Lumix DMC-G2 which is a micro 4/3rds camera. That is basically a purely digital ‘slr’ like camera with no mirror. They’re smaller and less expensive which was great since I hadn’t participated in my so-called hobby in years. And because my child-sized hands.

How else was I going to get a picture of the camera?

The day after I ordered this, Panasonic announced the next model. This was agonizing, but since it wouldn’t be released until June I decided to stick with my original decision!  It arrived in the post 2 weeks ago but I’m only posting this now because by pure chance, the iPad2 dear husband decided to surprise me with arrived on the same day.

I was surprised, to say the least... and the rest of this blog to say the most

Yeah, that’s right – he made me make the decision and just bought the one I didn’t choose. He spoils me!

Both of the toys arrived 2 Wednesday’s ago and I’ve obviously given the iPad so much more love. I’ve been reading so much more news and magazines than ever before, and also playing a few games (Nano Panda!). I do have a few gripes with it, and I can see how it still stands to be improved.  Though it does provide this amazing happy medium between my macBook and my iPhone that I never knew I needed to be provided for.

I have gotten around to playing with the camera and I’m coming around. At first I didn’t like it because it took me more than 20 seconds to figure it out. I’m still having troubles getting good low-light shots. My patience has paid off and here are some pictures taken with it (some by me, some by Baron).

I’ll be sharing some more of my photo adventures and learning as time goes on. For now, you can expect higher quality pictures over at Buntitled!

PS, since you’ve read this far why don’t you suggest some fun things I can attempt to take photos of?

Tags: ipad2, panasonic lumix, tech, toys

We went to the land of the ice and snow

Blue Lagoon

“We come from the land of the ice and snow
from the midnight sun where the hot springs blow”

-Led Zeppelin, from The Immigrant Song

I realize now this song must be about Iceland.  We did not however, experience the midnight sun – that doesn’t happen until June or July. Being there in the end of April, we also missed our chances to see northern lights. It was a big bummer to be between those two natural wonders but there were plenty others.

After taking a red-eye flight, checking in and eating breakfast buffet in our swank hotel and crashed for an entire day.  Even though it was 2 days after the wedding, the collective exhaustion caught up with us.

We stayed at a hotel downtown called Centerhotel Thingholt. It had leather tiles and cowhide chairs… yes. LEATHER. TILES. (They actually felt nice on the feet).

We spent most of our time exploring downtown Reykjavik (Cute!) napping (necessary) and doing a few day tours. We went whale watching, or as I like to call it “try not to puke on the ocean see-saw for 2.5 hours” (I won that game, but barely).

Here are some random thoughts on Iceland:

• Where does everyone go after 5pm in Reykjavik?
• Food is very expensive.
• Whale watching would have been better in the summer when the humpback whales return; Minke whales don’t travel in groups.
• Iceland still whales… the whale watching staff did not like this either
• The hotdogs were touted as being the best – but I still like Toronto Street Meat. (Though they were good).
• Viking stuff is kinda neat. I bought a viking-helmet type toque.
• Icelandic wool is itchy!
• Lot’s of Hamburgers. Fish and Chips were delish!
• The geysirs, waterfalls and Blue Lagoon were absolutely amazing and totally worth the trip.
• Icelanders are friendly and speak English – it’s very easy to be a tourist in Iceland.
• 17 hours of daylight is trippy; I cannot imagine 23!

Here are some select pictures

Tags: honeymoon, iceland, Travel, wedding

Picasa Web Albums Vs. Flickr

VS.

I’ve had a digital camera since November of 2004, and since then have been searching for adequate ways to host my pictures online. I used to host them on my site, or another free service called fotki, but that was too limited. It wasn’t until last year that I tried Flickr. I tried Flickr when I was in India, but the slow connection speed made me give up.

When I got back I installed the picasa software on my PC, and I loved it. Since you could easily upload to picasa web right from the program, it made sense to use that. I did a quickie comparison and chose google. I even looked up other websites (blogs) that had comparisons between the two, and it always just seemed to be a slight user preference… not real advantage or disadvantage to one or the other.

Now I have a mac, and use (and love) iPhoto, with my Picasa Web Album uploader plugin.

I was happy to use it, but didn’t realize that you could embed a Flash Slideshow into a website. With Flickr, I used a 3rd party site to achieve that, but with Picasa, it’s built right in. The only thing is I like the Flickr slideshow better as you can control the speed, and also see all the thumbnails. I don’t know what to choose!

I’ll have to do more extensive testing. For now, you can see examples of both on the Bukit & Chompy Photo Page

Tell me what you think!