Weekly Meeting May 28 2014

Speaker: Ken Joyce
Subject: Online photo sites

Summary:

Picasa - Google photos mostly public, can be private
Flickr 1tb - private, albums, allows editing, a bit complicated
iCloud - photo stream sharing with family
Facebook - owns photos


Next time we should look at Search engines such as:
Yahoo
Google
Duckduckgo
Etc


We'll miss you Ken, enjoy Bellingen.

Weekly Meeting May 21 2014

Topic: DropBox to secure your files and photos

Speaker: John Tuffs

Summary:

Dropbox is a cloud computing application. What is Cloud Computing?

Why do you need Cloud Computing? 

Your computer crashes, you accidentally reset your computer, your computer is stolen!

You need to get the photos off your smart phone or tablet (iPad).

What Cloud Computing options do I have? 

• DropBox - works with Apple, Windows, Android
• iCloud (Apple) - usually for iPhones and iPads
• OneDrive (SkyDrive) - usually for Windows 8 computers and tablets
• Google Drive - with GMail account
• many more .....
  

DropBox Solution

www.dropbox.com 
Create an account
Download application on all your devices: laptop, smartphone, tablet

DropBox Help Centre

How do I use Camera Upload?

With Camera Upload, the photos and videos you take with your camera, phone, or tablet will upload automatically to Dropbox—meaning they'll be safely backed up and viewable anywhere.

Take advantage of Camera Upload in two ways:

• Upload wirelessly from your phone or tablet using the iOS or Android app.
• Upload by connecting your camera, phone, or tablet to your computer and using the Mac or Windows desktop app.

How do I sync files between computers?

Syncing your files between all of your computers, smartphones, and tablets is what Dropbox is all about. All you have to do is install the Dropbox desktop application and sign in using the same login on all your devices.

If you've already installed Dropbox, simply adding files to your Dropbox folder will automatically sync the file to your Dropbox, which means you can open it from any other computer, smartphone, or tablet that also has Dropbox installed.

See The DropBox Tour

Get More Space by inviting your friends.......

Weekly Meeting May 14 2014

Guest Speaker: Richard Miller

Topic: Digital Photography

Notes:

Most important thing with digital cameras is to edit the photos in the camera before you download. Delete all of the dud shots.
Next you must get a card reader instead of connecting the camera. This eliminates a lot of problems you will have.

Then get a simple photo editing software program. Use the KISS principle.

When you get your new camera play with it a lot, first on automatic, then switch to manual. It doesn't cost anything if you make a mistake with a digital camera, like it used to with a film camera.

If you have problems with your Apple iPad or Mac they have a great help service via the telephone.

Invest in an external hard drive. Burned CDs and DVDs have a shelf life and should not be relied on for more than a year or two. A USB thumb drive is good but also not reliable.

If going on an overseas trip, make sure you have a very good memory card for your camera. Cheap cards can be very slow. Also don't just rely on one card and only use a card of a maximum 8 Gb.

Also your camera has a setting for the quality of the photo. The higher you set the quality the less photos will fit on a camera card.

Try using RAW format instead of JPEG which will enable you to do more manipulation and print much better quality.

What digital camera should you buy? Canon have led the market for a very long time. Megapixels are not the most important thing in a camera, the sensor is the key to the best quality. For example an iPhone 5 has a good camera, 5 to 8 megapixels, but it has a tiny sensor so the quality is not as good as a good SLR camera. Some are as big as a bazooka like a Nikon with a huge lens, or some good ones are quite small like a Luminex. Check the specifications on the box.

A new breed of camera called the Three Quarter is a really good one to get, e.g. Fuji and Canon.

Look at the reviews and magazines and compare the advantages.

Tips for taking photos:

Light is the most important thing in photography. Try to avoid very bright harsh sunlight.

A prime lens, i.e not a zoom, has the best light processing quality.
A zoom lens loses quality on full zoom, so try to move closer to the subject if possible.

Look at the surroundings before framing your shot. Make sure there isn't a tree growing out of someone's head.

The aperture is also very important. The lower the number the better it is and able to be used in low light. You can also change the ISO, say 100 for a bright outdoor shot, and 800 for indoors. However a higher ISO will increase the 'noise' or 'grain' in the photo.

Using the Auto setting will give you great results most of the time. For special situations like Lions on safari you could get a better shot by using some manual settings. Practice on your pets before meeting a lion.

For getting portrait shots with the subject only in focus you can change the aperture to a very low setting.

Finally, staying automatic is fine but Richard recommends using manual settings and play for more interesting shots.

Weekly Meeting May 7 2014

Topic: Converting a YouTube Video to MP3 music

Speaker: Andy

Notes:
You can use YouTube to find practically any music you want.
Find the music video and check that it is a good one.
Copy the URL (www.... Etc) and then go to www.youtube-mp3.org and paste the URL into the box above Convert Video
Click Convert Video.
Then click Download

Songs can only be a maximum of 20 minutes.

Reminder:
May 14 Special Guest Speaker Richard Miller on Digital Photography

Weekly Meeting April 30 2014

Topic: Q&A

Facilitator: Andy

---

Question:  
How do you print from an email?
 
Answer: 
Browser Menu / Print or click print icon

---

Question: 
How do you send an email to multiple people?
 
Answer: 
Start an email, in To: field you can enter 1st email, click after the last name and type another email address.
You can make up an email mailing list for groups.

---

Question: How do you capture an image (screenshot)?

Answer:
Use Snipping tool. In Windows 8 type "snipping" and select.
Right click and "Pin to task bar"
Drag mouse around photo and then save the result as a JPG.