Evanston: EMPIRE RISING; noisy weather; technology overload
Evanston: EMPIRE RISING; noisy weather; technology overload
EMPIRE RISING is an interesting novel in several ways. New York City in 1930. The beginning of the Depression. Prohibition. Historical figures, including FDR, Al Smith, James Walker, Babe Ruth, Jack Dempsey, and Judge Crater, whose disappearance was one of the great mysteries of the first half of the Twentieth Century. I remember hearing it still being discussed when I was a child. Political corruption. Organized crime. The construction of the Empire State Building.
The two main characters are both recent immigrates from Ireland. A woman artist who lives on a houseboat on the Brooklyn side of the East River and is the mistress of a high ranking member of the corrupt Tammany Hall political machine. A man still active in the IRA, who as a cover works as a steelworker on the Empire State Building.
They meet, fall in love, complications ensue with sufficient suspense so that I did not know how it was going to turn out until four pages from the end.
Recommended by one of Carol’s business associates, EMPIRE RISING was an unexpected and unalloyed pleasure.
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Chicago is having another perfect day, which I have come to realize is noisy weather.
We live on a wide, quiet, tree-lined street of mostly four-story brick condos and apartments. There isn’t much through traffic in front; but there is on South Boulevard only a building away to the south. And the CTA and Metra trains run on parallel tracks a block to the west. Add to this remodeling of a small park nearby. Lawn mowers. Other inevitable noises in what is the 25th biggest metropolitan area of the world.
When it is colder or hotter, the windows and doors to the balconies are closed and sound reduced to the unobtrusive. But at the moment it is perfect and everything is open.
I choose my music accordingly. No Schubert piano sonatas. I turn up the volume of da Falla’s THE THREE CORNERED HAT.
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Doubtlessly you noticed the superior quality of the photo of the cover of EMPIRE RISING.
I bought a new camera, a Nikon D80. 10 megapixels. And, with a couple of lenses, enough to pay for a power windlass. But I’m not certain I want a power windlass, so I got the camera.
I have mixed feelings about it.
It is my first Digital SLR, although at various times I had excellent film Nikon and Canon SLRs. All devoured by the sea.
My comment about noticing the quality of the photo is not serious. At the size I reduce images to upload them and the resolution of computer screens, there is no difference between this and my 5 and 7 megabyte pocket cameras.
However the Nikon has much greater versatility, from extreme wide angle to telephoto, and its images will no doubt please photo editors at various publications. I am particularly impressed by the anti-shake feature, which Nikon calls Vibration Reduction. It really works and makes possible handheld telephoto and low light shots that never were before.
My reservations don’t have to do with quality, but size and portability. Two or three pounds depending on lens. It won’t do me any good to be able to get great shots if I don’t have the thing with me. I will be experimenting with various straps and harnesses. There is a lot to be said for just being able to stick a pretty good camera in your shirt pocket.
The technology overload comes not from the camera, which isn’t that much different from a film SLR and which I find pretty intuitive, but with the image processing software.
For the past year I have used Apple’s iPhoto. Now I am confronted with deciding which of several of more advanced programs I should use, if any.
I downloaded free trials of three: Apple’s Aperture; Nikon’s Capture NX; and Bibble’s eponymous Bibble Pro.
These all do more than iPhoto and they all do more or less the same things, but in very different ways. And all have users manuals several hundred pages long. Even Apple’s own Aperture confronts the user with complicated decisions that at least initially require repeated reference to online manuals or tutorials. Apple provides more than an hour and a half of such video tutorials.
Not yet having had an hour and a half to watch them all, I reverted to good old iPhoto to import, adjust, and export the above photo. Given time one of the more advanced programs may prove its worth; but trying to learn them has re-enforced what a well-designed piece of software iPhoto is. I may not need more.
Wednesday, June 20, 2007