Category: Photography

iPhoto revived

by Jason Alley

ironpigsOn Friday we returned from a great night of watching the Iron Pigs, the Phillies AAA affiliate, when to my disappointment iPhoto decided to stop opening.

After many hours of research I found no answers. Most everything I found said to delete the plist file in my Library. That didn’t work. I moved the iPhoto library to another account on the computer and it still crashed each time I opened it. I really thought I was doomed to extract the 60GB worth of photos in the library when I finally found an Apple discussion forum that explained how to reset and rebuild the iPhoto library. I held down the alt/option key with the command key,  opened iPhoto, and then saw a screen with many reset options. I checked them all, so I’m not sure which one or ones actually resolved my crashing issue, but frankly, I don’t care. I’m just happy I can go about my photo import process normally.

In my waning hours of losing I hope I did download Picasa for the Mac though thankfully that can wait for now.

New name. New header. For now.

by Jason Alley
Photo by mawel from Flickr
Photo by mawel from Flickr

I’ve been changing my blog name and header almost as frequently as I change my underwear. Well, almost as frequently. Seriously though, in the last two weeks I haven’t stopped trying to think of a clever name or even something remotely more clever than “Blog” or any of the other ridiculous names I’ve used recently (“Boss Blog” comes to mind immediately). Thankfully, on the drive down to Williamsburg this past Sunday, “The Alley Way” just kind of popped into my head. It’s no “Boss Blog,” but it’s simple and I like it’s double meaning since this site is about the way I see and interpret things. Plus, there is actually something called an alleyway.

However, I really enjoy finding appropriate header images for these blog names. I simply can’t get enough of Flickr.com’s advanced search feature that allows me to search anyone’s images that are marked with a modify, adapt, and attribution Creative Commons license. Couple it with Cooliris (formerly PicLens) and finding the right picture is a snap.

Anyway, a shout out to mawel from Flickr for taking such a great shot of this alley in Malcesine, Italy and for allowing anyone to use it with proper attribution. I especially like the “Internet Cafe” shingle hanging on the right. Very appropriate.

No worries Kodak. I have Flickr.

by Jason Alley
Flickr logo, © 2009 Yahoo! Inc.
Flickr logo, © 2009 Yahoo! Inc.

I received a message from KodakGallery yesterday informing me that their terms of service changed, which now requires their customers purchase a minimum amount annually in order to retain their images on the KodakGallery site. The minimum amount is based on a sliding scale depending on how much storage a customer uses. I’m at 2.5 GB since I’ve been using it ever since AbC was born in early 2004, but at that time their terms of service simply required customers to purchase something for each 12 month period.

Looks like those days are behind us. Now I have to be sure I buy at least $20 worth of KodakGallery products each year. This shouldn’t be too much of a problem since one calendar will cover that. Regardless, I’m not too worried. I have Flickr and I can post to my hearts content as long as I continue to pay the $25 annual renewal fee, which is worth every penny. And here’s why. Unlike KodakGallery:

  • Anyone can have access to the high resolution file
  • I can tag photos
  • I can add notes to photos
  • People can leave comments
  • I can more easily organize my sets
  • I can add photos to a number of Flickr groups that are of interest to me
  • Oh, and anyone can subscribe to an RSS feed of my photos or from a certain tag

The lack of these features in KodakGallery has always bugged me because it makes KodakGallery a very closed system, which is good for keeping things private. However, Flickr still allows me to make photos private while also allowing me to make the system much more wide open and available to anyone.

I suppose I’ll hang onto the KodakGallery account because it’s a whole lot easier to make purchases through it, but hopefully Flickr will make that process easier while including more delivery locations (e.g., CVS, Walgreens).