Wednesday, August 29, 2007

Panorama's with Photoshop

Neskowin Panorama

Photoshop has made making Panorama's really easy. Take the photos. Open Photoshop (I'm using CS3, don't know if this is in previous versions). Choose File -> Automate -> Photomerge. Browse to your images and select them all. Leave all the defaults there. Click the OK button and wait. Depending on the size of each photo, how many photos you have and the speed of your computer, this could take awhile.

The above photo is made of six images each about 2MB. It took about 10 minutes on my laptop, but I also have a lot of other things open at the same time and was actually trying to work. Once the merge is done all that's left is to crop it out and you're done!

This is sooooo easy and cool that I'm going to start making more panorama's.

Monday, August 27, 2007

People at the beach

This last weekend we went to the beach for a few days with my parents. My Mom's family owns a little condo-type thing at Neskowin and any of us can use it anytime we want for free. Very nice!

It was a great weekend, almost perfect weather. The only thing that was annoying was some of the people. We're sitting in one spot, kids (and me) were digging in the sand, and some people just HAD to walk right next to us - I mean so close they were accidentally kicking up sand on our blankets. Others had to walk between where we were sitting and the kids were digging, about 10 feet difference. There wasn't anyone around us, they could have easily walked farther away. Another time Riley and I were digging some big holes and stuff, and another family HAD to setup right next to us and let their kids play right where we were digging.

I just don't understand people sometimes. Did these people feel they had to let us know we don't own the beach or some stupid thing like that? Oh well, we did have a great time anyhow. :) I'm uploading photos right now and will post about it on our family blog.

Thursday, August 02, 2007

No free moments for me...

I thought I'd have some free moments tonight because Marci was taking the kids to visit her sister. But when I got home, Maddie was asleep. When Marci left she didn't want to wake Maddie, I agreed. Of course five minutes after she left Maddie woke up. I tried to call Marci but her cell phone wasn't on. D'OH! So it's me, Maddie & the dogs tonight, and she's wide awake. I was going to play our new Guitar Hero, but now I'm just watching The Wiggles with Maddie. It could be worse of course, and I'm enjoying our father-daughter time together. :)

Free moments...

On the wrapper of my little piece of Dove chocolate there is a little message:

Take advantage of every free moment you have.

This got me to thinking - what does it mean to take advantage of a free moment? Most people seem to take this as, "Don't just sit there, go do something! Read a book, enjoy your hobby, go for a walk, ride your bike, get in some quick exercise, etc." However, when you are always busy, sometimes having a free moment can mean doing nothing.

To me, taking advantage of the free moment means doing something you wouldn't be able to do if you didn't have that free moment. Maybe you've been extremely busy all day and you just want a moment to rest, watch something you recorded, listen to some music, not really do anything at all, just rest. You're still taking advantage of that free moment, right?

Tonight I might have a free moment and I've been trying to decide what to do. I could mow the lawn, do some laundry, clean the house, go through boxes we moved when we got our new carpet, or something like playing a game on the computer or Playstation, playing the piano, watching a stupid movie and drinking beer. I'm still not sure what I'll do. All I know is I will be taking advantage of my free moment.

So what does that little saying mean to you? Is doing nothing ok?