Yearly Archives: 2017

I’VE TRASHED MY WINDOWS PHONE

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I’ve been a Windows Phone user for about 4 years but now I’ve decided to trash it, these are my reasons why and what I decided to move to.

It wasn’t an easy choice, it’s an excellent operating system and an absolute joy to develop applications for however Microsoft seems like it’s in self destruct mode with Windows Phone and I don’t consider it a viable player in the mobile marketplace any more. Maybe one day this will change, but that’s a hard thing for Microsoft to achieve now.

You can watch the video below, it’s on my YouTube channel where you can grab a bunch of other tech related content. If you enjoyed this video then please like it and consider subscribing to my channel (it’s free!)

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CHEAP CAMERA LIGHTING

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The internet is full of expensive lighting equipment, some of it good and some of it bad. It’s also full of cheap lighting equipment and if you’re just starting on your photography or video work, in particular YouTube then you won’t want to be spending a fortune on lighting as most of your money should go into a quality lens.

I bought some cheapish led lighting online and did a review for you guys in the hope you might find it useful. I wasn’t expecting much but I certainly got more than I was expecting in the box!

Come and take a look at the video review I’ve put up on my YouTube channel as I unbox and try one out. If you like the video and you want to see more great unboxing and review videos then why not subscribe to my channel.

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LATTEPANDA, WHAT HAVE I DONE?

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I’ve been having a think about what to do with my LattePanda since I got it and a number of options were on the table. A mini server for development purposes, a media controller, you get the picture however I couldn’t really settle on anything.

In some ways I kind of put this down to spending so much time thinking about the case. As you my be aware, I got my LattePanda with the standard acrylic case and whilst it serves a purpose, for me it didn’t really float my boat and I reckon a number of users will have soon ditched that and gone down the custom route.

This is what I decided I was going to do and in the process I was going to do something about the cooling on the board. Whilst the LattePanda is great, it does have one flaw and a significant one at that. The thermals on this are a bit high probably due to the design and layout of certain components however when pushed it does cause the CPU to throttle and throttle it does all the way down to 400mhz!

Whilst deciding on my new case I noticed the LattePanda team had released via DFRobot a new slimline fan for the board and I thought that if I and applied this to the heat spreader of the cpu and added copper sinks to the other side of the board then this would solve the heat problems.

One fan duly ordered along with the touch screen overlay that I should have ordered when I backed the Kickstarter project. A few days passed and everything arrived from China, perfect service!

The fan and heat sinks have brought down the temps significantly and the touch screen works a treat except I still didn’t have the case I wanted.

Now it’s at this point in time I seriously started looking at buying a 3D printer – yes I was going to make a case from scratch, well one I’d found on Thingiverse  at least. I’d pretty much got to the point of deciding which model to go for when for some strange reason I came across 3D Hubs (unfortunately is no more). I’d never heard of this before but basically it’s a group of people and/or companies that will effectively hire out their 3D printer to you and they will print your model for a reasonable fee.

3 days later and my new enclosure arrived, you can see it below in all it’s glory with the LattePanda fixed in place. I’ve used some brass standoffs to give the LattePanda a little room so that the fan does not catch the back of the case but as you can see, it works a treat.

You can see the full sized image by clicking on the thumbs but for a video tour of this then why not check out the video I posted on my Youtube channel and don’t forget to subscribe there so that you get notified when I post more LattePanda videos online.

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THE ULTIMATE DESK TOY?

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Are you looking for the ultimate desk toy or are you tired of the so called executive toys? Well this little beauty could be the thing you’re looking for, yes the Fidget Cube is multiple toys in one and designed to help you take that stress away. I’ve put together this video showing you how it works so why not pop along to my Youtube channel and see it in action.

If you want to see more videos like this then don’t forget to subscribe to my channelFacebooktwitterreddit

CAMERA BAG ESSENTIALS

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If you just throw your camera in your bag when you’re going out for the day then you’re making a big mistake. There are simply some things that you need to take with you and they don’t cost a fortune but you can be sure that having these in your bag will help you avoid missing that amazing shot! So this is my Top 5 Camera Bag Essential Items video, let me know what you think!

If you enjoyed this then do yourself a favour and pop along to my Youtube channel and see my other great photography and tech related videos. If you subscribe to the channel you’ll also get to see all my latest tech and camera related videos.

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RODE DSLR MICROPHONE REVIEW

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So one of the reasons I bought my new Nikon D5300 was so that I could create videos for my Youtube channel and whilst this camera has a built in microphone, one of the great things about it is that it also has a microphone jack for an external mic!

I’ve done a lot of research on the different microphones available and the Rode microphones tend to come out the most favourable however I didn’t want something that looked like I was part of a major movie production crew so I opted for the Video Micro, a smaller but just as powerful microphone. I’ve put up a video review of this great little microphone on my Youtube channel so you can see an unboxing and what it looks like.

The videos I’ve created since unboxing this microphone have all used the external mic, so if you want to hear what the quality is like then why not subscribe to my channel.Facebooktwitterreddit

RGB YOUR SETUP FOR £10

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Nowadays you’ll find most setups have some form of LED lighting in them, especially if you’ve got a perspex panel on your case, but what about your desk setup? Yes you heard it right LED lights don’t have to the be sole domain of the gaming rig! I went out and bought a set of RGB LED lights for my desk after previously putting a set on the back of my monitor and I captured the whole thing in this video on my Youtube channel.

If you liked this video then why not subscribe my channel? I’ve got loads more tech related videos there and I’m adding new stuff every week – see you there!Facebooktwitterreddit

WHY I CHANGED MY CAMERA

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Having the right camera for your needs is a bit ying and yang for me. I was convinced to go the Nikon route by a colleague a number of years ago after progressing from a somewhat high-end point and shoot. I don’t regret this decision and this isn’t what this blog post is about, it was a sound argument and since switching I’ve invested in more lenses and indeed more cameras all the way up to a used D300.

Over time however I’ve found my use of all this kit to be reducing, I put this down to the many other projects I have on the go complete with a regular day job resulting in me not really having the time to enjoy photography any more unless I’m on holiday. Being honest with myself here I don’t really want to be lumping around a great big heavy camera, perhaps I’m missing the benefits of a point of shoot?

One of the projects I’ve started getting into is having a corresponding YouTube channel to go with this blog, you can check it out here if you’d like to see some of the animated versions of the blog entries 🙂 With this comes the obvious requirement to have some kind of video camera, something again I’ve dabbled with in the past that due to poor quality has been confined to the cupboard of crap.

So it’s with this focus that I’ve gone searching and reading about what is the best vlogging camera to buy. Why vlogging I here you ask? Well simply put, these are going to be generally the masters of all needs, aaannnnd into the pit of despair I landed. You see, some people like portable vlogging cameras and some people like tripod mounted vlogging cameras and it seems both camps seem to like the Canon range for one good reason or another.

If you’ve already invested in one brand do you switch to another and hope you get some what most of your money back? After all I went with Nikon on the basis of producing still photographs, just because I want to now do video doesn’t mean I have to stay with them, right? So you’ve guessed it, yes I started looking at the Canon range and in particular the mirror-less EOS M3 model which by all accounts fits the bill nicely.

It’s a small form-factor mirror-less camera, produces quality pictures, records video and has a microphone jack on it, flip up screen so you can see yourself for framing, cheap at just about £350 and it’s got a great an appalling battery life, oh ffs! Why? Why Canon? Well it seems mirror-less cameras are just like that, they just drain the battery as the screen is always on it would seem. Oh and that flip up screen? Well when you put an external mic on the camera you can’t see the screen so you have to fashion some other way of mounting that sucker!

So back to the drawing board I go and again I start chatting with my camera colleague (yes that’s his new nick!). We talk about why the EOS M3 was such a good option, why Nikon doesn’t really have anything else that competes at the moment, why anyone else really doesn’t have anything else that competes at the moment – yes I know Sony have the A6000 range but seriously, have you seen the price?

Welcome to the new addition to the family, the Nikon D5300. What? You bought an old camera? Well it’s not that old, yes there are a couple of upgraded models since but they add very little to the original in my books and are almost twice the price.

No it’s not as compact as the EOS M3 but it’s just as versatile and I can use all of my existing lenses and it’s got amazing battering life and it does 1080 60FPS and the screen flips out to the side – you see where I’m going here?

This picture was taken with my Nikon D40X and by buying the D5300 I can replace both the D40X and the D300 selling them on and effectively getting this bad boy for free! Oh and this is lighter than the D40X as well, fantastic!

Word of warning when buying this model, make sure you get the one with the AF-P lens – it’s super quick and silent, a must when shooting video!

This isn’t meant to be some kind of camera review  but I can tell you this model is superb. Whilst I’ve only really used the video side of things at the moment, the quality is A1, I really can’t wait to get back into taking some decent photographs as well – it really does have some amazing features that I’ll hopefully share with you guys going forward.

I bought mine from John Lewis in the UK however Amazon have it listed as well, just make sure you get the AF-P version and not the AF-S version 🙂Facebooktwitterreddit