Friday, March 28, 2008

Take a stand against torture

In my youth there was a form of torture inflicted on both child and adult. Worse yet, it was perfectly legal.

The torture device plugged into an ordinary power outlet. A humming fan kept a high-watt bulb cool so it can be used for hours against innocent people.

Thankfully, slide projectors are now mostly found in closets and basements. You can thank the digital camera.

But even the digital camera can cause pain and embarrassment. These days, perfectly decent humans — perhaps you’re among them — distribute digital photographs by e-mail. We can’t stop that, but maybe we can reduce the pain inflicted by poor photos.

We’ll limit today’s discussion to the point-and-shoot digital cameras most people use. Owners of high-end digital cameras either understand photography or think they do. They are beyond my reach.

Get the advantage

So let’s look at how the common shooter can use the advantages of digital photography while avoiding its disadvantages.

Advantage: You can take as many pictures of a scene as you like without added expense. And you can immediately look at the results. Many folks who grew up in the film generation have a hard time breaking the habit of shooting one or two frames and hoping it comes out well. So it bears repeating: If it’s a shot you want, take it a bunch of times, at different angles or settings. That also allows for the factor known as dumb luck. The more pictures you take, the more likely you’ll catch an especially nice shot.

Disadvantage: The camera’s tiny viewing screen isn’t big enough to show flaws that will be painfully obvious when the photo is shown on a large computer screen. With digital on a computer screen, you’re showing what amounts to a giant enlargement. Tiny flaws become giant problems. So it’s important to learn how to fix photo flaws, and we’ll deal with that next.

Advantage: In the days of film photography, most amateurs relied on the drugstore or photo shop for processing. That usually involved an automated process that produced barely adequate prints. With digital photography, you have the ability to fix mistakes the drugstore wouldn’t have bothered with.

So get comfortable with photo editing software. You’ll be able to adjust for bad exposure or even do minor surgery. What do I mean by surgery? Imagine that a particularly ugly dog wandered into the frame of little Susy’s outdoor wedding reception. Simply clone a patch of grass and — like a great magician — you’ve made a dog disappear. A great all-purpose program: PhotoShop Elements. It can be found at most computer stores or ordered directly at http://www.adobe.com/products/psprelements/.

Advantage: Even inexpensive digital cameras use a computerized exposure technology that’s beyond what was available to most professionals 15 or 20 years ago. Most cameras have settings that let you take pictures in low light, or when most of the pictured area is in strong sunlight but important parts are shaded.

Disadvantage: It’s easy to lean on those automated controls and forget the old-fashioned techniques that film amateurs used to compensate. For instance, when taking a picture of people in the sun, many cameras will think things are just fine. But using the camera’s built-in strobe (flash) will fill in ugly shadows on a face. I promise your subjects will thank you for this one.

This is just a start. You’ll need to experiment with your camera, and I suggest you do so before that big June wedding or July vacation. Then go forth and shoot it up. When you get home you can show your photos without torture.

Monday, March 24, 2008

Help yourself

I can be fairly helpless at times. I misplace my wallet and car keys, have trouble finding the big yellow mustard container in the refrigerator and had to get my stepdaughter’s help to assemble a radio-controlled airplane I got for Christmas.

So I understand how frustrating it can be to be faced with a problem with an HDTV, computer or other gadget you don’t understand. I try to help with my weekly Q&A column, but I can only take a couple of questions a week.

Today we’ll talk about various ways to ease those high-tech frustrations on your own. Keep in mind that — despite what I tell my buddies — I run into all sorts of tech questions that baffle me. These resources have saved my neck many a time.

Google

Google is like having a tireless research assistant with access to mountains of reference books. It’s a good place to start on almost any question. The trick is to be as exact as you can in your query. Let’s say you have an ATI videocard. You’ve tried to use the software that came with the card to load the driver (the tiny piece of software that communicates between the card and your computer) and failed. Use a search like this:

+driver +“won’t load” +ATI

That tells Google with the + sign that the word must be in the results. If I did the same search without the plus signs, I’d get some pages that contained the word “driver” but that didn’t mention the other terms at all. Next, by putting quote marks around the “won’t load” statement, I’ve told Google that the page must include those words in that order. Using a search engine correctly can make a huge difference in the results you get.

Manufacturers

Often I hear from readers who have spent weeks trying to puzzle out a problem. I’ll ask them if they contacted the manufacturer. Too often, they hadn’t.

Even a tech genius knows less about a gadget than the folks who built it.

If a feature of the gadget, or software, is hard to figure out, they’ve heard about it from customers and often have come up with a better explanation. If something doesn’t work right, they’ve probably heard about it and designed a fix.

Most manufacturers have a Web page that includes a link to answers to support questions that they’ve received. You’ll also find a link to a download section — that’s especially handy when you need to download drivers and other support software. You’ll often find “bug fix” programs that will fix a defect in software.

Web forums

Sometimes called user groups, these are Web pages that are not sponsored by the manufacturer. They draw people who are interested in a specific software program or hardware device.

There are lots of these places. You’ll be able to post a message asking a question of others who are interested in the program or device you own.

The upside? You’ll often hear critical comments that would be off-limits from a manufacturer site. And since these people are enthusiastic enough about the product to gather together to talk about it, there are plenty of experts available.

The downside? I’d guess that at least 70 percent of the posters are coming there to get help, not offer advice. And some of those who offer help will be flat wrong. So if you get a suggested fix, try to check it out with others. If it involves doing anything radical to the device or software — something that could cause more damage — don’t just think twice. Think four or five times.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ll help you when I can. But there’s something really satisfying about figuring out a problem for yourself. And, along the way, you learn more about the product, and that prepares you for the inevitable new problems.