The Smorgasbord

NPR reports a Stanford University professor has created a “Frankencamera” – which may well turn out to be the next generation of digital cameras. Imagine a camera that (like the iPhone) can have applications downloaded to it and installed (open source of course). Also, imagine a camera that can make the best of bad lighting situations. Take, for example, a shot of children playing in the dark shade of a tree on a very sunny day. Or kids chasing lightning bugs at dusk. The Frankencamera can take 2-3 rapid shots in succession for the different lighting conditions of the shot (foreground, background, etc) – and merge them all together in one final shot (that would be impossible with just one photo take). History will show that open devices that are customizable are not only highly sought after, but in the end more extensible and usable than the proprietary corporate crap that shoved down our throats time and time again.

Check out this YouTube video of the Frankencamera:

Sorry Sony (and Canon, and all the rest) – I want a Linux camera! According to Gartner, the (google backed Linux) Android phone will overtake the iPhone by 2012. This should be yet another sign that people WANT a Linux Digital camera.

I was looking back through some stuff today from some years back and came accross a “Mad Libs” book that I had from years ago. You know, sometimes with all the technical advances and gadgets we forgot how much fun we had with some of the simplest stuff for hours on end! I can remember getting Mad Libs books as a kid and we would sit around filling in the blanks for hours and just roll around on the floor for hours over the crazy stories we made up! It forced you to use your imagination and writing skills – and just made you laugh and laugh and laugh! I did a quick lookup and eBay, and sure enough – there are tons of them for sale either single or in lots!

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This “LCD Monitor Review” shows how much more affordable flat screen displays for your computer have become this year. The big old bulky CRT screens are gone forever it seems, and now the bigger flat display is better. I took my son to college last month, and we walked by the computer lab – and each and every screen was a 22″ dell monitor. I’ve read a few blog posts this week from bloggers about their new 22″ screens arriving in the mail, and I know one person at work that has dual 19″ monitors.

So I started looking around – and LCD screens are much cheaper now for the bigger sizes than I thought they were. What does that mean? You can get a 22″ flat display for your home computer under $200. Much like digital cameras, you get what you pay for. You can get a completely functional 22″ LCD that would work just fine for most people under $200 – like these ones made by Hanns G -

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Like I said – those are great monitors, but here’s the difference between those and a more name brand that’s a little more expensive. The Hanns G monitor has the same resolution (1680 x 1050), but the ‘dynamic contrast ratio’ is only 1000 to 1, and it has a 5ms response time.

Now I’ll show you a very popular LCD monitor – the Samsung T220 22″ LCD display.

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The Samsung has the same 1680 x 1050 resolution, but the dynamic contrast ratio is 20000 to 1, or 20 TIMES MORE than the Hanns G. It also has a 2ms response time, more than twice as fast as the Hanns G. So, when your shopping for a new LCD – don’t pay attention to just the price, if you want a sharper picture – pay attention to the quality specs as well!