The Online Photographer

Aren't Apple an increasingly delightful company? "Photography not allowed" - why, pray tell us Mr Jobs, are you so paranoid?
(Written from my MacBook Pro - six months old, already on new optical drive). iPad looks neat though.

Uh, Oh, let the flame wars begin!

I was in the Apple Store yesterday and there were a bunch of folks buying iPads. In fact there was an iPad class going on while I was there. I did not have the time to touch an iPad, though. 8^(

Consumerist reports that they are babe magnets:
http://consumerist.com/2010/04/ipad-is-total-babe-magnet.html

Mike -

I got my iPad last Saturday morning, and the first website I went to was T.O.P. If I hadn't been able to get quick access to your site, I would have had to return it.
Now I have a little T.O.P. icon right on my first screen. One touch and I am in photography heaven.

Ed

I don't see the point in this fluffing up s new product. Everyone and his uncle is aware of it. So what's your point? When you got got something to say, say it. Otherwise it's an advert.

Hee hee! I do that all kind of thing whenever I'm in the Apple store; I load up the screens with pages from my photo blogs (although I haven't taken a photo of them). Last time I was there I used Big Ass Message to write "My Mac Mini is good enough!" onto the screen of a 27" iMac.

I'm looking forward to getting an iPad. I HATE Apple's insistence on staying with closed systems, and I hate their manipulations, but their devices are so beautifully designed (both in appearance and in user experience) that I can't help it.

The coming new world of the 1970s, where computers do what the manufacturer lets you do with them, and no more. Hurrah.

Nice, but will it blend?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAl28d6tbko&feature=player_embedded

Yesterday, an out of focus photo of a dog, and a photo of a framed print with severe reflections in the glass. Today, an out of focus photo of an iPad with severe reflections.

I, for one, am weary of all the iPad hype and speculation. Let's all step back, catch our breath, and wait to see what happens.

"How does your website look on an iPhone?"

Pretty poor, actually. If you make it big enough to read you have to scroll around to see everything. I wasn't impressed.

Mike

"Pretty poor, actually. If you make it big enough to read you have to scroll around to see everything. I wasn't impressed."

Took me no time at all to format my WordPress site for the iPhone (using the WPtouch plugin). I now spend more internet time on the iPhone than I do on my pewter. It would be great if TOP could join me there.

Like Ed, I was reading TOP on my iPad by 10am on Sat.

There's a big issue with Flash on the iPad, but everything I've read about that issue is about video, for which there are straightforward alternatives (e.g., new "video" element in HTML5), and sites such as YouTube have already adapted.

But photographers regularly use Flash on their web sites (as do some reviewers) not for video, but for fancy effects, none of which have to do with showing the still photo itself.

Here's hoping all these photographers drop Flash as soon as possible. I always thought it was irritating even when I'm using a computer that supports Flash.

--Marc

I wonder whether they can be color calibrated.

@ Marc

yeah let's just drop 12 years of development and one of the most useful software technology just because some useless gizmo showed up
good idea but very poorly implemented
i can't really see what the hell i should be doing with this ipad thingie. it's like a netbook..only useless.no usb no real flash,no multitasking,looks very fragile

i hope a cheap netbook with a touchscreen shows up soon

Marc:

I prefer using Flash to post my still photos on the web for two reasons:

First, as I understand it, it's quite difficult to download a JPEG file from Flash. Without Flash, a simple right-click allows anyone to steal my photo.

Second, with Flash, the photo will expand or contract to fill the window or the screen.

I would not consider buying any device that cannot accommodate Adobe Flash.

Bill

I believe *all* Apple products are coated in a thin layer of incredibly pure cocaine or a similarly addictive substance.
Otherwise, how can you account for the fact that I went from a hard-core PC enthusiast (I built my own machines and overclocked and tweaked them ad nauseam) to a guy with two Macs, three iPods and an iPhone? It all started innocently enough, with a first generation iPod Nano, and it went downhill from there ...

Anyway, I have no need for an iPad, no viable excuse to buy one, but I do want one.

But, but... what's it /for/?

I like your site on the iPhone. A simple double tap on the main content and the screen is wall to wall text, large enough for comfortable reading. Maybe it's just my young eyes (sorry).

Sam G.,
Never, ever apologize for young eyes! Enjoy, enjoy!

"Sight is the soul's perfect delight." --Pope Somebody-er-Other

Mike

I was in the upper west side NYC apple store (Manhattan has three and Brooklyn has none - boo hiss) and most of the people trying out the iPads were checking out how their websites look. It was amazing to see how many people had hired someone to build them a web site and did not realize that all their menus were in flash.

But, but... what's it /for/?

Posted by: RobG

Rob, owning an Apple product (I have an iMac) isn't about utility but Fervour of Ownership. If we can't adequately express our quasi-religious belief outdoors (at a glance, the iPhone can easily be mistaken for its competition) then how else do we bask in the glow of our uber-nerdiness in public? The iPad fills the on-the-move gap between home and that section of some foreign kitchen in which we can corner our unfortunate fellow party-goers.

The sales of Jiff glass-cleaner should go through the roof. Look at all those fingerprints on the screen?

Sorry, but to me this device seems like nothing more than the Large-Print Edition of the iPhone. Without the phone, of course.

Add me to the list of TOP readers using their iPad to view the site. This is the new Crackberry! Only problem now is getting off my butt, setting the iPad down, and picking up my camera to take some photographs.

Copying photos themselves from Flash is a very non-trivial thing for casual pilferers. Not so for photos embedded in pages.

My site won't work on iPad. I use a flash gallery to display the photos, while the rest is simple HTML. (And the photos look more or less as they should.) I don't think I'll change that.

Instead of joining the sect, I think I'll wait to see what Adam or even HP's Slate really offer.

BTW, Roger, how about actually working on a photo? Viewing compressed DNG files from an M9 seems to be quite fast, but note the full zoom behaviour.

Man alive! The iPad can inspire opinions like a Canon-Nikon debate. Maybe inspire isn't the right word.

My wife works with the mother of a graphics designer at Microsoft who says that all the graphic designers there use Apple computers. I find that funny (and please don't take that as an endorsement of either company; I hate all companies. They lack humanity). But it makes me wonder if at the Nikon HQ there are lots of Canon copiers.

Dear Folks,

I mentioned this once before, but it got largely ignored, so I'll mention it again (the definition of insanity?).

The iPad display is very, very good. As in "better than any other portable device or laptop display I've seen" good. As in "better than low cost desk display" good.

I can't tell without running some better tests if it's fully as good as an Apple Cinema or other professional-studio-grade display. It's sufficiently close that I can't tell without running some serious tests.

That's saying something.

People might be wanting to think about what they might do with a portable, self-powered display that can show their photographs so they look *right.*

pax / Ctein

"I have an iPod Touch and I can't find an ap for TOP. Is there one?"

Are you asking me? I can barely operate my el cheapo cellphone....

--Technologically impaired Mike

Dear Roger & Wolfgang,

Real men don't worry about what real men do.

Just sayin'...

pax / Ctein

Copying photos from flash is a breeze, just "printscreen" to copy the screen or "alt-printscreen" to copy the front window. Then a quick New, Paste, Crop Save. It takes me a few seconds (I have to do screen copies from windows all the time in my job).

Anyone who is worrying about "casual pilferers" who are too dumb to know about the printscreen key, is missing the point. . .

BTW, "Flash" is not the web. Get your d*mn photo set on the web using web standards. . .

James McDermott - I have an iPhone, and frankly, it's barely competent at any of the things it does (Sort of like every Mac I've ever used, all the way back to the IIe. And no doubt some of the believers will tell me it's because I'm a PC-using heretic - so be it. :~) ). An old-fashioned paper notepad is faster for taking notes and making sketches, the camera is umm, well, let's be polite and say 'not optimal', my 5 year old Nokia had better telephone quality (and was smaller, with a better camera) and I already had an MP3 player. I seldom play games and, well, you get the message. Somewhere on Youtube there's a video gag about an new Apple product, and one of the characters says something along the lines of "It'll be useless, but it's an Apple, so I just have to have one." That sort of covers my feelings on the matter. For me, I can see no use for this iPad thing; reading the above comments, it seems to be a passive device, which is such a gesture of useless that it beggars belief.

In case you were wondering, the reason I got the iPhone was because I needed to change networks, and the best plan for me was tied up with the iPhone. So now, I'm stuck with it for a while. And it hasn't even helped me score yet, either...

PS. I'll look up the video and post the link, Johnston-san willing. It's a hoot.

Anyone who is worrying about "casual pilferers" who are too dumb to know about the printscreen key, is missing the point. . .

Not exactly. Embedding a 300k photo in a web page is one thing, and taking a 50k screenshot is another. Not to mention higher resolutions and a reasonable amount of scaling.

Besides, updating a Flash gallery with XML file is really a trivial thing. Quite easier than updating an HTML gallery.

Man, I never thought I'd be defending Flash. I hate Flash-only sites with all my heart.