28JAN2022 – More Friday Foolishness

What today was really about was installing the latest upgrade of Capture One’s photo post processing software.  And I have to say, they have the world’s worst website.  Or at least my antiquated desktop system (Windows 10 and some ancient version of Microsoft Internet Explorer) refused to interact with Capture One’s persnickety interface.  It literally took me six hours to upgrade my browser, get instructions from Capture One’s crack support staff and get the upgrade installed and running.  And now the computer has slowed down so badly that at times I’m not sure if it’s actually running or not.  Suffice it to say a day of reckoning with my version of HAL 9000 can’t be too far in the future.  I’m waiting for those fateful words, “I’m sorry photog, but I can’t allow you to access that metadata.  You’ll need to get permission from Jeff Bezos and Bill Gates personally.  Why don’t you take a stress pill and step away from that power strip?”

In the larger world, Dementia Joe is letting it be known that, by golly, he’ll appoint a black woman to the Supreme Court.  But is that good enough?  Shouldn’t it be a black, trans, differently abled, vision impaired, neuroatypical, lesbian meth-head?  Why skimp?  Honestly, is there anyone in the country who cares what kind of leftist we get stuck with on the Supreme Court as long as its someone who will agree with those other two boobs Sotomayor and Kagan.  I’ll make a point of not wailing and gnashing my teeth when a younger Marxist replaces an older one on the Supreme Court.

I finally got the pictures from the armory museum processed and I’ll start to add them into the daily photo list.  I’ll start off by posting one here.

And all the rest of the collapse of western civilization continues apace.  Every day there are more police murdered, Asian woman thrown under NYC subway trains, murderers released without bail and major retailers fleeing from urban centers.  George Soros continues to feed hundreds of millions of dollars into election funds for anarchists, the ADL continues to label as antisemites anyone who notices what Soros is doing and more components of the Democrat coalition shift toward the Republicans.

And on the COVID front the narrative continues to collapse while Karen adds another booster and another mask to her rosary of devotion to the cult.  I think it will be a photo finish to see what gives out first the supply of people willing to be jabbed or the appetite of the Biden administration to keep alienating the American populace with the sham.

And speaking of alienation I’m starting to think that Biden’s approval numbers might have a chance of cracking 35%.  And I had thought that was virtually impossible because 30% of the country are progressives.  But you know what?  I think he might do it.  He might reach 34%.  And I’m talking about the average, the RCP average.  I think that would be a special achievement for Dopey Joe.

So, stay tuned, something big is sure to break soon.  The way things are deteriorating maybe I’ll get that cannibalism story I’ve been waiting for.

Replacing Adobe Lightroom Revisited

So last time I was debating what to replace Lightroom with.  I was incensed at the idea of paying monthly for “the cloud.”  I installed Capture 1 last weekend.  So far all I can say is that after cataloguing my old photos in Capture 1 they look a lot nicer than in Lightroom.  Now maybe this is just the jpeg settings in the program but it was really striking how nice everything looks.  Other than that I can’t say much.  I don’t even know how to modify the photos yet.  But so far Capture 1 is not making me angry.  In your face Lightroom!

 

A Question for Photographers Among OCF Readers – What Software Can Replace Adobe Lightroom?

I have been using Lightroom for my raw photo cataloguing and adjustment for a number of years.  The good people at Adobe in their infinite wisdom have decided that Lightroom needs to be a cloud based, subscription only software product.  Very good then.  I am not a cloud based kinda guy.  So, I’m looking for an alternative.  An initial search has identified the following products:

  • Alien Skin Exposure X2
  • Phase One’s Capture One Pro
  • Corel AfterShot Pro 3

I’m currently leaning toward Phase One’s Capture One Pro but would very much like to get some feedback from people who have experience with these products (especially as they compare to Lightroom).  So, here’s your chance to speak your mind.  I’m all ears.  You can leave your thoughts in the comments here or in the forum (I’m setting up a topic here, so if you want to attach photos to explain something there’ll be more room).