# The one thing Apple understands is photography



## CaiLeDao (Sep 1, 2015)

Read an interesting article at petapixel with the title above.

http://petapixel.com/2015/08/31/the-one-thing-apple-understands-is-photography/

As a long time Mac user I have also been a long time Aperture user - yes the photography App Apple downgraded with Photo's. So was interested in the sentiment of the article, which is actually very good and gives an interesting strategic view of the frustrating (to me) decision they made.

I probably like many forum members, produce photobooks, as a means of sharing images with friends an family. The image attached is the from and back cover of my last tour book from China. One cover image was shot on a ESO 5D mark 3 the other on an iPhone 5S. The workflow to produce the images is similar except of course I had to increase the size to print 10 by 13 landscape at 300 dpi from the 8MP iPhone image. (On One - perfect resize)

To me this is rapidly becoming the challenge to the traditional DSLR market, if I can shoot like this on a camera phone, share them, with friends and family across the world, and then publish surprisingly good A4 prints, why do I need the bulk of my kit. The back page shows how I travel, not that frequently with the camera slung on the tripod, but you get a sense of size and weight I travel with.

Yes I have GAS, yes I bought a 50mP beast, which is fantastic for a niche I really enjoy, but for more candid captures on the journey maybe a camera phone is becoming credible and could become my go to choice. So the RX100 probably bites the dust, today I wont stop taking a dslr but I do wish I could easily share sunrise photo's with friends in China via We chat (social Media) whilst using the niche features I am invested in - the filters, tripod and manual shutter releases for longer exposures working hard to get the best image I can in Camera. My UK friends will still be in bed.

How much longer will dlsr's remain above embracing integration with mobile phones, the social media world and the apps that make so many things easier to find, do or calculate. I think I need qualify that I don't shoot selfies. period.

The Manfrotto Digital Director seems, at a premium, to do most of this, but why can't Canon produce something which bridges the gap before Apple, et al, finish of killing the photography market to the point of extinction. I don't believe I am the only person hoping that this gets resolved before the dlsr camera market becomes an even more expensive niche.


----------



## Pookie (Sep 1, 2015)

With the example of the images your showing... stick with a camera phone it suits your photography. You really don't need a DSLR for images like that.


----------



## LDS (Sep 1, 2015)

If you mean Apple understood smartphones and social sharing are the modern equivalent of the evenings spent being forced to watch relatives or friends holidays photos, yes, you're right. It was and it is a huge market, true.
Apple could be the new consumer Kodak, true, like the Brownie, smartphones brought (digital) photography to the masses, and with better quality - but at a far higher price.

Just, then and now, there are many photographers with different aims and needs.


----------



## Mt Spokane Photography (Sep 2, 2015)

I bought a new Iphone 6+, but the photo app that came with it was pretty bad. I purchased camera + and its better. If the Iphone camera app is a indication of Apple's expertise, we are in trouble.

Every time I take my 5D MK III and Iphone to a event, and shoot both, the iphone photos look pretty sad by comparison.

The iphone is great since you always have it with you, but I hate to post or publish photos taken with it except in small size with a apology note for the quality.

Its a matter of expectations, I expected more based on what some have posted.


----------



## bholliman (Sep 2, 2015)

I agree that camera phones can take decent pictures these days in good light and sometimes usable pictures in less than good light. I use my camera phone for the occasions when I don't have a DSLR or EOS-M along and I've kept some of those images since they capture a memorable event or occasion that I would have no other pictures of otherwise.

But, I'll always use my DSLR or compact camera if possible, and I try to have one of them with me for most occasions when I expect to take pictures. For me the quality of current phone camera's still has a long way to go. And the limited controls are difficult to adjust to after using a higher end DSLR like the 5D Mk3.

To each their own. Personally, I can't see myself ever going totally with a phone camera, even if they continue to make significant strides in image quality and usability.


----------



## gsealy (Sep 2, 2015)

I would say that photography is one thing that Apple knows the least about. And that is not to disparage Apple by any means. It's just that Apple knows a heck of lot about many things including making tons of money.


----------



## distant.star (Sep 2, 2015)

gsealy said:


> I would say that photography is one thing that Apple knows the least about. And that is not to disparage Apple by any means. It's just that Apple knows a heck of lot about many things including making tons of money.



This was the first thing that came to mind for me. I know companies that understand photography and companies that care about photography. Apple is neither.


----------



## wtlloyd (Sep 2, 2015)

There's a hint in something you said - shoot with the camera you enjoy using. It's not just about the results; or did I mis-understand - someone is paying you fat bucks for your images? 
I don't enjoy shooting with my cell phone. And I typically prefer the images I achieve using pro gear. But I will forget about finding the perfect "snapshot" easy carry compact camera, the cell cameras are perfectly adequate nowadays.


----------



## wopbv4 (Sep 2, 2015)

distant.star said:


> gsealy said:
> 
> 
> > I would say that photography is one thing that Apple knows the least about. And that is not to disparage Apple by any means. It's just that Apple knows a heck of lot about many things including making tons of money.
> ...



+100.
Apple has ignored high end photo editors for a long time. The simple fact that OSX only support 8 Bit/colour channel (24 bit) means that for high precision colour work I have to use a PC which does support 10 bit/colour channel (30 bit). It is ridiculous , the entire workflow, DSLR, Photoshop, eizo monitor do support 10bit, the bottleneck is OSX. I am an alpha tester for Apple and I love their products, but I have had many heated discussions with the developers on colour and OSX support for Photoshop


----------



## tomscott (Sep 2, 2015)

Thing is there are ways and means around these problems.

I came up with a solution just before I went traveling, but it did take me a while to figure the best way and it does mean making some sacrifices.

When I was traveling for 5 months earlier in the year I wrote small jpgs to my SD and Raws to my CF on my 5DMKIII. I then carried my iPad and used a SD card reader to transfer all my images. I have a 128gb iPad and I had 25,000 images on it which still didn't fill it. I then used PS express to edit them and post the images. I then backed up my CF with 2 HDDs for piece of mind. The small jpegs are still better quality than the iPhone pics just struggle if you go in for a tight crop.

The work flow is not difficult and if you want an even quicker workflow buy an eyefi card and have the images wirelessly transferred automatically to your device. Its really not difficult. These "extra" technologies like wifi are useful but gimmicky, they destroy battery usage and there are other just as easy ways around the problems. The cameras imo just aren't the right tools for posting to social media.

The problem is your iPhone or iPad is geared up to social media and quick posting and they are great tools. The interface is great its easy to use and there are a plethora of apps that allow you to make amazing things quickly. The problem for me is that the phone camera is no better for me than for just a snapshot showing a overall view, casual usage, I used my iPhone on my travels but the quality of the pictures are just disappointing, for anything but screen even then its pushing it.

So this brings me to my next point, even if the major manufactures did make cameras like phones (which samsung already have and they were complete flops) the form factor of a camera just don't lead to a good experience in terms of image editing or posting images to fb or instagram. The cameras are big and it handling is specific for camera control making it awkward to use like you would a phone. I can't see any of the manufactures coming together to allow the same type of apps there will be new ecosystems across all brands as they all fight for their corner which is just frustrating!!

So the simple solution to me… All of us photographers love our gear… we always have it with us in some way shape or form and you always have your phone/tablet so why not use them both together its just as simple with only one step extra and these modern computers are geared up to this kind of usage with universal apps from companies actually in the trade like Adobe etc. To me this miniaturisation of cameras has its pros and cons, I'm a photographer I like fast glass and they are inherently heavy, what ever you do to the camera fast glass needs glass and its heavy physics isn't going to change soon! Also if you put heavy glass on a small camera the handling just isn't fun I would rater carry and extra 4-500g of camera than have sore hands from front heavy glass. As a traveler I like all aspects and a lot of the time I like wildlife and small cameras don't bode well with even medium sized telephotos like 70-300mm and in most cases these lenses don't exist in the full frame mirrorless market and the 70-200mm F4s are about the same size, on a camera much lighter with a weaker lens mount.

The only problem I have is that colour rendition on the iPad/iPhone isn't brilliant the colours are out which you will see a little on the examples below but again if you have any sort of colour correction software then you will have no problem sorting it. 

Here are a couple of images examples I edited using photoshop express on my iPad while traveling earlier in the year.



Untitled by Tom Scott, on Flickr



Untitled by Tom Scott, on Flickr



Paraty, Brazil by Tom Scott, on Flickr



Untitled by Tom Scott, on Flickr



San Pedro de Atacama, Valley de la Luna, valley of the moon, Chile sunset by Tom Scott, on Flickr



Manhattan skyline from Brooklyn park, Brooklyn bridge and Empire State Building by Tom Scott, on Flickr



The view from the top of Old Rag, Shenandoah National Park by Tom Scott, on Flickr



Today we braved snow storm Linus to see the Michigan Central Station, Detroit. Beautiful building such a shame. The unfortunate story of motor city by Tom Scott, on Flickr



Cloud Gate, Millennium Park, Chicago.Braved -15deg in a deserted Chicago to get some nightshots of the city, my water and beard were frozen! by Tom Scott, on Flickr



Mardi Gras, New Orleans by Tom Scott, on Flickr



Monument Valley, Navajo Tribal Park, Arizona by Tom Scott, on Flickr



Monument Valley, Navajo Tribal Park, Arizona by Tom Scott, on Flickr



Canyonlands National Park, Utah by Tom Scott, on Flickr



Mesa Arch, Canyonlands, Utah by Tom Scott, on Flickr



Grand Canyon west, Hualapai Nation, Arizona by Tom Scott, on Flickr












As you can see in a couple of the pics the colour is a bit off like the Mesa Arch the sky blue is very intense also the oranges seem to overcook too unfortunately that wasn't what the iPad showed but it was more than good enough to post to social media along the way.

I would post a lot more but there are too many lol!


----------



## gregorywood (Sep 2, 2015)

I have a rather simplistic view, and I'm sure it's been said before elsewhere, but Apple has become a different company over the last many years. Gone is the focus on superior products (especially in the area of "pro" software). As an Apple user for the last 5 years (I bought my first Mac solely for the purpose of using Aperture), and having converted completely at home to an Apple ecosystem, it's been a struggle to feel some of the pain of recent with the seeming lackluster zeal around the quality of software releases/bug fixes/features and the decision to shelve Aperture.

However, one has to remember that first and foremost Apple must remain profitable to the shareholders. Somewhere at Apple, they've determined that the best way to stay profitable in the photography segment is to appeal to the masses. The masses have iPhones and secondarily (if at all), P&S cameras. We as the "Pro" and "Enthusiast" DSLR crowd are the minority.

I still hold out a shred of hope that Photos will evolve into something close to or perhaps even better than what Aperture was. In the meantime, I've jumped to Lightroom and learned the curve as quickly as possible as to keep doing what I love, shooting and creating. It's not an awful tool, it's just different.

For what it's worth, those are my two cents.

Greg


----------



## TheJock (Sep 2, 2015)

So this, below; was my question, but Tom has answered it and given me the direction. Thanks Tom 

_My 70D had WiFi and I can connect it to my iPhone 6+ via the EOS Remote and upload my photo’s to my phone. Is there a way to connect the 5DIII to the iPhone so I can do the same? Will the standard lightning charger cable enable me to copy images over to the phone with no problems or is there an app anyone can recommend for this job??_


----------



## Don Haines (Sep 2, 2015)

The one thing Apple understands is marketing.


----------



## unfocused (Sep 2, 2015)

People aren't getting the point.

Camera manufacturers have utterly failed their customers. 

Why is it that the _*only*_ person at a wedding who cannot take a picture of the bride feeding the groom the first slice of wedding cake and have the picture on the bride's Facebook page within a few minutes is the same person *who is being paid *to take pictures?

And, if the paid photographer did try to do that, he or she would need a Rube Goldberg combination of devices, media and interfaces. 

Photographers should be able to take a picture, review it on the back of their camera, make a few simple adjustments (cropping, exposure, color correction) and hit a "send" button to get that photo to the client or directly to social media or a website.

The fact that no manufacturer offers that capability today shows just how miserably camera manufacturers have failed their customers. 

That's what this article and the much better Mayflower Concepts Presentation (that the article links to and which has been previously discussed here) are talking about.

Tom Scott's work around only underscores this. There is no reason photographers should settle for such work arounds. It ought to be right there on the camera. And, if you need a larger screen, it ought to migrate to your iPad or laptop automatically, without having to use cables or complicated interfaces. It should just work. 

That's what Apple understands. 

The interesting thing is that while this may be mostly an inconvenience for enthusiasts, it is a complete fail for the professional market.

I can't tell you how frustrating it is to cover an event for a client, go home to start processing pictures and see on the client's Facebook page a couple dozen horrible pictures from the same event that some fool with an iPhone posted while I was uploading images to my computer. Think about virtually every breaking news event of the last several years -- the first pictures and video usually comes from an iPhone, not from a professional photojournalist covering the event.

The inability to instantly get pictures from the camera to the internet creates lost opportunities and those lost opportunities ultimately mean lost revenue and a more difficult struggle to retain the few remaining jobs for professional photographers. (When I go to a press conference, the Chicago Tribune reporter will be tweeting the event with pictures using her iPhone, while the poor AP photographer has to wait until he gets back to the bureau before he can send any pictures. Is it any wonder that fewer and fewer news organizations are employing photographers?)

This is what Canon, Nikon and all the other manufacturers have missed and it's hurting photographers in very concrete ways.


----------



## Random Orbits (Sep 2, 2015)

unfocused said:


> People aren't getting the point.
> 
> Camera manufacturers have utterly failed their customers.
> 
> ...



Don't disagree with much of what you wrote, but it seems like the market is not yet there in making cameras like phones. Cell phones are getting close to 1000 in price and many people replace them every 1-2 years, which is a lot more than most people spend on cameras.

Personally, I'm not willing to spend an additional 20/month to get cell access for my camera, and I'm not willing to spend however much to get additional data. My wife and I have two smart phones with 3 GB of data, and it costs more than 100/month when all the taxes/fees are added on. 3 GB of data for pics/video will be used in less than a day. Until the data rates fall a lot, it's just not practical for most people.


----------



## AcutancePhotography (Sep 2, 2015)

unfocused said:


> I can't tell you how frustrating it is to cover an event for a client, go home to start processing pictures and see on the client's Facebook page a couple dozen horrible pictures from the same event that some fool with an iPhone posted while I was uploading images to my computer.



I am not sure I understand why this would be frustrating. What you are doing and what the cell phone users are doing are two different things... or they should be.

I don't know of too many brides who would hire a professional photographer for near-real time publishing of snapshots. That's what her friends are. What the bride is hiring a professional photographer for is to take more traditional quality type shots of the wedding and create products other than a disk o' snappies. 

Speed is a quality in itself, but it is not the only quality in photography.

There will be clients for whom speed is the primary quality they are looking for. Your following example of the news service is an excellent example. The bestest photograph two days from now is not worth as much to a news editor as a lower quality photograph now. 

In that case, a professional photographer should be versatile enough to ditch the DSLR and use their cell phone to get the speed. It would be the skill of the photographer in using the cell phone what should convince the editor to pay for these shots. 

Proper tool for the proper job.

I don't think it will ever be possible for a photographer to take, process, package, and transmit a higher quality "professional" type photograph faster than it will take for an amateur to take a snappy and hit send on their cell phone. 

Why? Because there is so much more involved in taking the planned and processed photograph than the snapshot. The only way a DSLR or similar type traditional camera could keep up with the speed of a cell phone camera is to have the more traditional style camera automatically process the image.... which is probably the last thing a serious photographer wants as it eliminates the artistic influence of the photographer in the final product.

I think a good quality cell phone camera should be part of a professional photographer's tool kit.. for those times when speed of transmission becomes the primary goal.


----------



## distant.star (Sep 2, 2015)

.
Probably it's more a semantics issue for me.

I think Apple knows about photography the same way McDonalds knows about culinary art.


----------



## wtlloyd (Sep 2, 2015)

This! Really, you feel you are competing with the half-drunk guest who posted crooked blurred cell photos while the event is still underway?
Maybe you need to choose a different line of work!





AcutancePhotography said:


> unfocused said:
> 
> 
> > I can't tell you how frustrating it is to cover an event for a client, go home to start processing pictures and see on the client's Facebook page a couple dozen horrible pictures from the same event that some fool with an iPhone posted while I was uploading images to my computer.
> ...


----------



## unfocused (Sep 2, 2015)

AcutancePhotography said:


> unfocused said:
> 
> 
> > I can't tell you how frustrating it is to cover an event for a client, go home to start processing pictures and see on the client's Facebook page a couple dozen horrible pictures from the same event that some fool with an iPhone posted while I was uploading images to my computer.
> ...



Facebook and other social media have become an integral part of marketing for many businesses and institutions. This is one way they connect to their customers. 

News (and we need to treat social media like a news outlet) is a very perishable commodity. It used to be that if people saw something in the newspaper the next day, that was good enough. Now, people expect to see it on Facebook later that same day. 

When the professional photographer cannot accomplish that, it diminishes the value of his or her services. Clients will still pay for the skills and vision of the professional (sometimes) but as I said, there is an opportunity cost associated with not being able to produce images immediately for the web and social media. And, we are paying a premium for equipment that is costing us these lost opportunities. I want to be the one deciding whether or not to give them something immediately for their social media, not having the manufacturers doing it for me.



AcutancePhotography said:


> I don't know of too many brides who would hire a professional photographer for near-real time publishing of snapshots. That's what her friends are. What the bride is hiring a professional photographer for is to take more traditional quality type shots of the wedding and create products other than a disk o' snappies.



I'm not a wedding photographer, but I strongly suspect that a professional photographer who can produce the quality images the bride wants *and* deliver a couple of memorable pictures to her Facebook page that same day, would have a competitive advantage over a photographer who cannot do both.



AcutancePhotography said:


> ...a professional photographer should be versatile enough to ditch the DSLR and use their cell phone to get the speed. It would be the skill of the photographer in using the cell phone what should convince the editor to pay for these shots.



Why should the photographer be forced to juggle two devices? Shouldn't we demand that the manufacturers produce a single camera that we can use for that purpose? If it can be done with a cell phone, it certainly can and should be done with a $2,500 camera.



AcutancePhotography said:


> I don't think it will ever be possible for a photographer to take, process, package, and transmit a higher quality "professional" type photograph faster than it will take for an amateur to take a snappy and hit send on their cell phone.



No, but that should be because we choose to take the time, not because our tools are stopping us. And, it certainly should be possible to scroll through the images, pick out three or four strong shots that don't need much post processing, tweak those and post them. 

It's nice to tell ourselves that clients are paying for our superior skills. But, if you want to stay in business, it's also a good idea to be as competitive as possible against *all* the competition. It is beyond me my anyone thinks its a good idea to settle for half-baked tools that can't do these simple tasks. At least then you've got the choice to use them or not.


----------



## mkabi (Sep 2, 2015)

unfocused said:


> People aren't getting the point.
> 
> Camera manufacturers have utterly failed their customers.
> 
> ...



Lets just say, tomorrow Samsung did that... lets just say with the introduction of the NX2.
Those "simple adjustments" is going to take up time no? Not to mention, selecting a picture from the multitude of pictures, checking for focus etc.

Can you afford to waste time at an event where micro-moments may happen? Your uncle tom, who is not being paid, has a crappy camera, can waste all the time he wants posting on facebook (or other social network).


----------



## Don Haines (Sep 3, 2015)

mkabi said:


> unfocused said:
> 
> 
> > People aren't getting the point.
> ...


You are a wedding photographer.... you are under contract to produce a wedding album and a number of stills of important moments, and you have a negotiated delivery date. That is your job, not producing facebook updates. If your client wants social media updates, add it into the contract and even hire a second (or third) shooter just for that task. As a pro, you deliver the goods, no mater what they are.....


----------



## AcutancePhotography (Sep 3, 2015)

Don Haines said:


> hire a second (or third) shooter just for that task.



That's an interesting strategy. Do any wedding photographers do this:

-Have one shooter doing the more traditional types of shots for the album, prints and such
-Have one shooter doing the JPEG-upload in real time to facebook/Social media?

I am not sure a bride will pay extra for the second, but you never know what a bride will want to pay for... or for someone else to pay for.


----------



## LonelyBoy (Sep 3, 2015)

Apple understands nothing except marketing.

I was born in '83, and I didn't get into photography until recently, so I'm genuinely curious: in past decades, were wedding photographers freaking out that drunk uncle Buck could take a blurry Polaroid of the bride walking down the aisle and hold it up (probably still shaking it) before she reached the altar?

If yes, then history would suggest that brides preferred then, and probably prefer now, to have a high-quality album later instead of, or in addition to, the instant snapshots.

if no, why not?

And, if I'm wrong and brides suddenly do prefer to have web-rez jpegs uploaded in instants with no careful cropping, color balance, sharpening, or other manual edits performed carefully on a calibrated monitor with adequate time, don't look to a hypothetical 80D (or whatever) with a nano-SIM slot and an app store to "save" wedding photographers; the job is dead anyway. If that happens, the couple will know someone with an 80D/ 5D5/ A7Riii/ whatever who's willing to shoot and upload as a favor in exchange for not having to sit in a chair throughout the ceremony. I know I would, and trust me, I can't compete with anyone on this forum in photography skills. If I'm good enough, the game is over.


----------



## Don Haines (Sep 3, 2015)

AcutancePhotography said:


> Don Haines said:
> 
> 
> > hire a second (or third) shooter just for that task.
> ...


It happens all the time with stills and video.... social media should be no different, but I have never heard of someone who wanted crappy pictures quickly uploaded to the web so bad that they wanted to pay extra for them..... but hey, the customer is always right. If someone wants to pay you for it, go for it!


----------



## unfocused (Sep 3, 2015)

AcutancePhotography said:


> Don Haines said:
> 
> 
> > hire a second (or third) shooter just for that task.
> ...



Let's try this again. 

The point is very simple: In a world where connectivity is ubiquitous, ALL camera manufacturers have failed miserably in integrating connectivity to their devices. And, in doing so, they have placed professional photographers as a competitive disadvantage. 

Yeah, there are workarounds. You can hire someone to take your filled cards and process a few images on a laptop while you shoot. But, the point is, you shouldn't *have* to rely on work arounds. 

There is no legitimate reason why cameras should not connect as easily to the internet as phones do. There is no reason at all that cameras should not have better tools for editing and adjusting images in-camera with an interface that is not just as good as a smart phone, but better. 

No reason at all, except that the manufacturers have been lazy, cheap and clueless about the marketplace.

I presume that every photographer wants to build their business. Acutance, can you honestly tell me that at a wedding with 300 guests, you see absolutely no marketing value in being able to quickly find just five pictures you've shot, do sufficient editing to make them look good on the web, add your logo and upload those pictures to the bride's Facebook/Instagram/Twitter Feed before the end of the reception, so that there is a wave of people at the reception "liking" and sharing the photos and commenting on how great the bride looks? Guests sharing the pictures with their friends and relatives who are planning to get married? -- all before they leave for the night? 

I presume that most wedding work comes from referrals from happy customers. Those five pictures are going to be seen by hundreds more people than will ever see the bride's wedding album. Is there no value to you to be able to have access to the potential customers that night, while they are all excited and their sales resistance has been lowered by the free bar? Those potential customers will have no trouble remembering who you are or finding you that night, because you are that guy with the good camera who has been shooting pictures all day. 

I'm not just talking about wedding photography. As I said, photojournalists are handicapped by this lack of connectivity. Sports photographers (unless they shoot for the professional teams and can both afford expensive, complicated work arounds and also lock out amateur competition through restricted access) would also benefit from being able to send or post a few pictures during halftime without needing anything but their camera and maybe a personal hotspot from their phone. There are many others as well.

Yeah, as I said before, it's more of a benefit to professionals than amateurs who aren't under any time constraint to deliver a product. But, Canon, Nikon and Sony all claim to cater to the professional market, when they clearly have failed in this regard. 

That's the point that the article and linked video are making.

And frankly, it's a heck of a lot more important that 1/4 stop of dynamic range that gets obsessed over constantly.


----------



## tomscott (Sep 4, 2015)

I understand the comments but don't nessasarily agree with them.

My main income is wedding photography. The brides that I work with have never asked for images instantly. I wouldnt want to work that way shooting a wedding is no short task it is heavily involved and extreamly tiring. Shooting for 8-10 hours and then delivering the images? Too much and from my experience that isn't the expectation of the bride.

I would also hate to deliver images in that style, I want to add my style of editing not only is the style of shooting a trade mark but also so is the way you deliver the final product. I couldn't do what I do and deliver the quality of images I would be happy giving a client with a few clicks and sending it to Facebook the images that I posted from my travels prove that even with half decent software doesn't produce professional results.

I shot a wedding at the weekend it was two hours away, they paid me to be there from 8am until 9pm so I set off at 6am and shot for 13 hours and then drove two hours home. 17 hour day, just isn't feasible. The wedding was also in the country and there wasn't any 3G for miles anyway.

I have also found It generally is the case that the bride is very picky with what images she wants to share on social media its very personal and you shouldn't be making that decision it's not professional. These images are forever and making a half arsed edit just to post your work as quick as possible seems backward to me and doesn't show your work to its best and when your paying $1-4000 dollars for a wedding photographer it's not what I would expect either.

I don't think there is any problem with sitting down the next day and editing 3-4 images and sending them to the bride along with a sentiment explaining thank you for allowing me to be apart of your wonderful day feel free to post etc etc

99% of bride go on their honeymoon the next day so I don't understand the rush, take your time ensure the images are lifetime memories!! It's a nice break for them after 12+ months of organising the day and the last thing they want is to be bothered on their honeymoon. Something to look forward to when they get home.

I would agree if you were talking about a time sensitive event then Ye they need to get out as fast as possible but I don't think the majority of the points apply to weddings. If you already have the contract how is it going to be detrimental.

When the images are ready and are posted I find I get a huge response as in the contract I ask the bride to tag my name in any social media, so I tend to get a wave of interest. Weddings are planned years in advance generally and aren't as time sensitive. I also seem to get more referrals from the couples word of mouth, Facebook is great and it's a great resource for business but if someone is looking for a photographer and your active in posting as a wedding photographer there will be plenty of material on the page.

The points you have made are valid but seems to me a bit of a forced self promotion if your images are good people will come. That's worked for me and I don't worry, but when I first started, getting work out was important but it was never higher on the agenda than producing great work which is still my main argument that what ever mobile software and outlet Weill never be as good as a well retouched professional looking image.


----------



## unfocused (Sep 4, 2015)

tomscott said:


> I understand the comments but don't nessasarily agree with them...



Thanks Tom. I appreciate the thoughtful response. I certainly wouldn't want to suggest that is the only or even the best approach. 

As I said, my issue is that camera manufacturers are so behind the times when it comes to connectivity that no one, professional or amateur, has a choice. Different people have different styles and needs, I simply find it frustrating that in these times, a tool that we all pay dearly for cannot perform some basic functions that are otherwise ubiquitous.

To go back to the original premise of this thread: _The one thing Apple understands is photography_, this lack of connectivity and difficulty of doing simple things that every phone can do was the point of the original story and the linked video (which was discussed quite extensively in the past).

I often feel like this forum is dedicated to a bunch of buggy-whip connoisseurs debating the best model for their carriage (dynamic range being a prime example) and meanwhile, the automobiles are zipping right past our noses. 

Expectations, permissions, protocol, timing and priorities are all things that need to be worked out between client and photographer. But, we shouldn't settle for tools that preclude us from even discussing this with a client.


----------



## Don Haines (Sep 4, 2015)

tomscott said:


> I understand the comments but don't nessasarily agree with them.
> 
> My main income is wedding photography. The brides that I work with have never asked for images instantly. I wouldnt want to work that way shooting a wedding is no short task it is heavily involved and extreamly tiring. Shooting for 8-10 hours and then delivering the images? Too much and from my experience that isn't the expectation of the bride.
> 
> ...


well said!


----------



## Hillsilly (Sep 4, 2015)

I would have liked to have tried Aperture. But, like 95% of people, I'm a Windows user. If Apple really understood photography, they would have made a Windows version, kept it current and be making a fortune as viable Adobe alternative. 

If their only photography trumpcard is the iPhone, well....

I understand that the premise of this post is more about the connectivity benefits. But most camera manufacturers are developing reasonable WiFi camera integration and control. I haven't used Canon ones, but the Fuji ones which I'm familiar with are ok. There aren't many things I can think of that are lacking. And given that Android apps at least equal, if not exceed Apple Apps, I don't know how much of this is Apple driven vs camera manufacturer driven. 

Re The comment above about a sports photographer easily sending a few photos at half time - most cameras already do that right now.

For those seeking to do more, I'm curious what kinds of mobile phone plans people must have around the world. Here in overpriced Australia, once you start going over about 10gb/mth for 3G/4G data, the plans start getting very expensive. You'd have to have a very good business case to be streaming all of your photos as you shoot them. Is it different elsewhere?


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Sep 4, 2015)

distant.star said:


> gsealy said:
> 
> 
> > I would say that photography is one thing that Apple knows the least about. And that is not to disparage Apple by any means. It's just that Apple knows a heck of lot about many things including making tons of money.
> ...



As I've said before, Apple is (and always has been) in the business of making money, filing lawsuits and marketing whatever they come up with as being the most innovative and wonderful items ever to grace the earth. They are NOT in the business of anything else and are NOT photography experts. They are sales and innovation experts at any and all methods/costs. And they have understood better than most all others that if you make something simple, elegant and attractive that operates in a basic and intuitive way you will attract a lot of buyers at twice the price. Create a sense of grassroots struggle in your company history and you'll attract a lot of loyal sympathizers.

I think the Futurama "Attack of the Killer App" ("eyePhone") episode should be required watching for everyone... (LOL).


----------



## expatinasia (Sep 4, 2015)

RustyTheGeek said:


> distant.star said:
> 
> 
> > gsealy said:
> ...



I agree completely. It is amazing what they have done from a marketing and sales perspective. Almost completely brainwashed millions.

Only apple I will ever buy grows on a tree.


----------



## tomscott (Sep 4, 2015)

unfocused said:


> tomscott said:
> 
> 
> > I understand the comments but don't nessasarily agree with them...
> ...



I generally think your right in the fact there is room for innovation to produce a product that is a more rounded tool. I just think one of the reasons it hasn't is that there are so many good tools for the job. I think it would almost be like bloatware for a lot of people and if it was available I think most serious pros would still use industry standard software like lightroom and PS to output.

I think what would be an improvement if nothing is a more intelligent way of sending those images as you go. Say you do actually use that useless rate button on the 5DMKIII all the 5 stars could be sent instantly across to your device so it removes the workaround and speeds up workflow so it could actually be possible instead of at the end of the day trawling through thousands of images to find those few you have in your minds eyes.

Or another way like sony is doing, make a decent SDK to allow developers to actually produce good apps and if people buy them and there is money to be made then it would be great for everyone.

A lot of these companies do need their heads banging together, lightroom mobile could be a very useful tool if it was more fully fledged and worked the same way lightroom desktop works. So you could import images straight to the mobile device and then creates smart previews uploads Raws to the server to sync so you could edit the odd raw file. Ive edited raw files on my iPad before but it just takes forever to render the changes so atm jpeg is still the way to go.

Your right about the forum in many ways its populated with more tech enthusiast than photographers but then it is a gear forum not an image forum. I find it amazing that in the image threads there is barely any discussion with actual images yet there are hundreds and hundreds of pages on dynamic range, how crap canon is doing etc etc and the many circle of trolls and anti trolls that the forum holds in such high regard and argue with or against never ever post images. Think that says a lot tbh. I probably post both in similar quantity because I like both but I won't let the tech undermine the main reason I started the profession in the first place. Many of the times I don't find the issues 'issues' as there is always a way round it but like you said sometimes they are less than satisfactory.

Theres a perfect example of this in this thread.

http://www.canonrumors.com/forum/index.php?topic=27237.0

Good read. 

Thanks for your comments unfocused, it is always difficult voicing an opinion that is not the way of the many, its how ideas are developed and how innovation begins. The purists often fight to the death to keep something they have done for so long alive. Probably sums up Canon at the moment.


----------



## Deleted member 375103 (Sep 4, 2015)

Apple definitely understands photography. Just look at the prototype mode dial for their upcoming Iphone camera, it's revolutionary! :


----------



## Don Haines (Sep 4, 2015)

tomscott said:


> A lot of these companies do need their heads banging together, lightroom mobile could be a very useful tool if it was more fully fledged and worked the same way lightroom desktop works. So you could import images straight to the mobile device and then creates smart previews uploads Raws to the server to sync so you could edit the odd raw file. Ive edited raw files on my iPad before but it just takes forever to render the changes so atm jpeg is still the way to go.
> 
> Your right about the forum in many ways its populated with more tech enthusiast than photographers but then it is a gear forum not an image forum. I find it amazing that in the image threads there is barely any discussion with actual images yet there are hundreds and hundreds of pages on dynamic range, how crap canon is doing etc etc and the many circle of trolls and anti trolls that the forum holds in such high regard and argue with or against never ever post images. Think that says a lot tbh. I probably post both in similar quantity because I like both but I won't let the tech undermine the main reason I started the profession in the first place. Many of the times I don't find the issues 'issues' as there is always a way round it but like you said sometimes they are less than satisfactory.
> 
> ...


I agree about editing on an iPad... it seems clumsy and slow to me. In my opinion, it's the weakest link with iPhotography.... and importing files from my Canon or Olympus is PAINFUL!!!!! 

As to the gear geeks, this forum is the perfect place for them so it is no wonder they abound in great numbers. Yes, we all want more out of our cameras.... but I think that many of us realize just how good ANY modern DSLR is and although many of us won't admit it publicly, the biggest limitation is ourselves. That said, better tools will move us forward regardless of the skill level.

I started digital photography with an Apple Quicktake... 320x240 pixels... that's 0.077 megapixels, and it stored as 8 bit jpegs. I thought it was revolutionary and at that point in time Apple really was cutting edge photography.. (picture 000)

A number of p/s cameras followed, all more powerful than the last. Once they reached the 1Mpixel mark they started to produce usable images like picture 001, from a 1.3Mpixel Olympus P/S

The rest of the images are from an Olympus E400.... a 10Megapixel camera with 10 stops of DR and ISO up to 1600, although 800 and above was unusable...... To my mind, this was the point where DSLRs eclipsed film SLRs. The image quality was better and digital editing took off about the same time. From this point on, any DSLR you bought was a great camera....

Image 002, hand held sharpness in a dimly lit room....

Image 003, you could shoot by campfire!

Image 004, you could shoot at sunset!

Image 005, you could capture deep blacks and bright green in the same exposure!

Yes, you can do better now, but these are 12+ year old technology.....


----------



## LDS (Sep 4, 2015)

unfocused said:


> Why is it that the _*only*_ person at a wedding who cannot take a picture of the bride feeding the groom the first slice of wedding cake and have the picture on the bride's Facebook page within a few minutes is the same person *who is being paid *to take pictures?



Because he or she is expected to keep on shooting instead of messing with his or her small camera screen in the attempt to fix a photo and upload it to Facebook? What if doing it he or she misses some other important shot? Other guests are free to ignore what's going on while updating Facebook pages, is the paid photographer allowed to do so?



unfocused said:


> And, if the paid photographer did try to do that, he or she would need a Rube Goldberg combination of devices, media and interfaces.



Letting aside it's not so complex, what's wrong with that? You're a pro, so you're expected to have the right gear for the task. If you're expected to upload photos as an event evolves, you need the proper personnel and gear to ensure those images are uploaded properly, even if something fails temporarily. Have you see how many people man a cinema camera? Hey, why don't they get away with AF, auto exposure and later fixes on the camera screen?



unfocused said:


> Photographers should be able to take a picture, review it on the back of their camera, make a few simple adjustments (cropping, exposure, color correction) and hit a "send" button to get that photo to the client or directly to social media or a website.



If you wait for the proper moment to do that, it changes little if you had uploaded them wirelessly to a laptop or whatever and use it for the final steps, which may be also quicker. If you need to do it on camera, it means you're doing it in the wrong moment, and you are just distracted instead of performing what you are being paid for, shooting the event.



unfocused said:


> The fact that no manufacturer offers that capability today shows just how miserably camera manufacturers have failed their customers.



Will you give a photographer access to your personal pages so you can upload photos for you? Your personal phone may contain credentials for your personal services, what about a "stranger"?



unfocused said:


> And, if you need a larger screen, it ought to migrate to your iPad or laptop automatically, without having to use cables or complicated interfaces. It should just work.



It's exactly what Canon WiFi adapters do (at an absurd price, I agree). You shoot, and photos are uploaded via FTP. FTP is good, very good. It's a full standard protocol that run across very different devices and networks. It doesn't rely on a single "app" that may work today on a given phone OS, and no longer work tomorrow.

If you like, it's not difficult to have them "professionally" processed automatically as they come in, and upload them then whenever you want. Sure, maybe if you're not an IT expert you need to hire one to help you, why shouldn't you? Today, just you may need to hire a makeup expert, a professional hairdresser, or whatever, for a truly professional work you may also need someone expert in IT.

A colleague of mine did exactly this but the WiFi part (too expensive for him), it shoots mountain bike events, he plugs the CF into its laptop, images are downloaded, automatically processed, and uploaded so events participants can look at them and decided which to buy (unless the organization already paid for them). Meanwhile, he keeps shooting with another card - his camera is not busy while trying to process and upload anything. He wrote the software, I had already told him he should sell it...



unfocused said:


> That's what Apple understands.



No, Apple understand if it can lock you in in every of its products, it's a lot of money coming.



unfocused said:


> Think about virtually every breaking news event of the last several years -- the first pictures and video usually comes from an iPhone, not from a professional photojournalist covering the event.



That's just because most people have a smartphone in their pocket, not a pro DSLR. Once they would have had no photo at all, but someone being lucky.

But which pictures have a better chance of becoming "iconic" for an event?




unfocused said:


> When I go to a press conference



Here, you're right, there's even no need for a pro DSLR to take the usual useless media filler picture that comes from press conferences, a smartphone is usually enough.


----------



## tomscott (Sep 4, 2015)

Some great examples there Don. 

This is the things we are so used to such big increases that now its all about fine tuning learning the skill everything else is just noise really.


----------



## LetTheRightLensIn (Sep 5, 2015)

tomscott said:


> Your right about the forum in many ways its populated with more tech enthusiast than photographers but then it is a gear forum not an image forum. I find it amazing that in the image threads there is barely any discussion with actual images yet there are hundreds and hundreds of pages on dynamic range, how crap canon is doing etc etc and the many circle of trolls and anti trolls that the forum holds in such high regard and argue with or against never ever post images. Think that says a lot tbh.



I don't think it says much at all. This forum is very recent as forums go and doesn't have a long history or image sharing and discussion and many leave that stuff to other places. Many also don't want to mix up the fanboy and anti-fanboy arguing and nonsense with their photography.

This is mostly just a rumor forum and what rumors deal with is the hardware.


----------



## privatebydesign (Sep 5, 2015)

LetTheRightLensIn said:


> tomscott said:
> 
> 
> > Your right about the forum in many ways its populated with more tech enthusiast than photographers but then it is a gear forum not an image forum. I find it amazing that in the image threads there is barely any discussion with actual images yet there are hundreds and hundreds of pages on dynamic range, how crap canon is doing etc etc and the many circle of trolls and anti trolls that the forum holds in such high regard and argue with or against never ever post images. Think that says a lot tbh.
> ...



1 of 588 http://www.canonrumors.com/forum/index.php?topic=1280.0
1 of 169 http://www.canonrumors.com/forum/index.php?topic=19270.0
1 of 149 http://www.canonrumors.com/forum/index.php?topic=295.0
1 of 100 http://www.canonrumors.com/forum/index.php?topic=12203.0
1 of 34 http://www.canonrumors.com/forum/index.php?topic=11988.0
1 of 62 http://www.canonrumors.com/forum/index.php?topic=8105.0


----------



## LetTheRightLensIn (Sep 5, 2015)

privatebydesign said:


> LetTheRightLensIn said:
> 
> 
> > tomscott said:
> ...



It has some image sharing but it doesn't have the long history of general photo talk and image sharing all the same as many much older photo forums.


----------



## privatebydesign (Sep 5, 2015)

LetTheRightLensIn said:


> privatebydesign said:
> 
> 
> > LetTheRightLensIn said:
> ...



Not saying the forum has the history, merely illustrating that there are image threads with hundreds of pages and 10'000's of views. Considering its age, and the name Canon Rumors, I think the image threads are pretty strongly represented, it isn't and never will be Canon Images, or Canon 500px/Canon Flikr etc, but for a tech centric forum there are a lot of image posters which rather flies in the face of tomscott's comment.


----------



## psolberg (Sep 17, 2015)

many companies have done the photo play. HTC, nokia, now apple. At this point that ship has sailed. There is no longer a bad camera and all it matters is software, which is not apple dependent as android has basically taken over as the world's most widely use computing platform on earth. larger than windows, OSX, and iOS combined.

so in many ways, apple is simply reacting to what already took place.


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Sep 17, 2015)

psolberg said:


> so in many ways, apple is simply reacting to what already took place.



For the most part, that is what Apple has always done. They just market things (already done before) in their elegant cases as their own cool innovations. Then they sue everyone else if they can. It has been a constant spectacle to me as to how Apple achieves this. Release a phone over and over with less features and advantages as the competition and still become a huge product that everyone pays double price for and waits for days in line to buy. Then beat up customers and developers with autocratic restrictions and bullying. And they come back over and over. Astounding.


----------



## Click (Sep 17, 2015)

Don Haines said:


> The one thing Apple understands is marketing.



+1


----------



## Brand B (Sep 28, 2015)

RustyTheGeek said:


> It has been a constant spectacle to me as to how Apple achieves this.



It's almost as if you're missing some relevant detail.


----------



## Tugela (Oct 18, 2015)

CaiLeDao said:


> Read an interesting article at petapixel with the title above.
> 
> http://petapixel.com/2015/08/31/the-one-thing-apple-understands-is-photography/
> 
> ...



Fortunately, most us don't need to share pictures with friends in China the moment we take them, so this is not an issue for us (or 99.999% of other real photographers).

Your phone takes pictures. Good for you. You were the market Instamatics catered for. However, it will never ever be able to compete with a proper camera when it comes to IQ and control of the image. It just physically can't.


----------



## ChristopherMarkPerez (Oct 18, 2015)

Precisely!

I don't care what technical hurdles Canon faces (ie: running the non-network-able, and even harder to build meaningful apps for, VxWorks OS in their DLSRs). They could quickly overcome them if they understood that the image making world has changed. Past tense.

Alas, I'm left feeling that Canon is milking a dying cow.

Sure, the "pro" photographer is getting paid and some of their images in absolute IQ terms beats the pants of mobile phones/tablets... but... after you reach Facebook/Tumblr/Instagram/500PX/Flickr/etc... who cares? Serious question: Who cares?

No one makes prints these days, do they? 

And if you happen to make books of your "pro" shot oh-so-damned sacred family/social/dance-club/beer-drinking events I can guarantee you that a 5mpixel tablet photo is hard/impossible to distinguish from images made using your much vaunted and dearly loved hugely expensive DSLR.

I strongly agree that camera manufacturers have hutterly failed their customers. It's sad to watch as I'm as much a gear-head as the next geek, but traditional camera companies will be a fraction of their current size in just a few years (for those who are left standing, that is).



unfocused said:


> People aren't getting the point.
> 
> Camera manufacturers have utterly failed their customers.
> 
> Why is it that the _*only*_ person at a wedding who cannot take a picture of the bride feeding the groom the first slice of wedding cake and have the picture on the bride's Facebook page within a few minutes is the same person *who is being paid *to take pictures?...


----------



## melbournite (Oct 18, 2015)

gregorywood said:


> I have a rather simplistic view, and I'm sure it's been said before elsewhere, but Apple has become a different company over the last many years. Gone is the focus on superior products (especially in the area of "pro" software). As an Apple user for the last 5 years (I bought my first Mac solely for the purpose of using Aperture), and having converted completely at home to an Apple ecosystem, it's been a struggle to feel some of the pain of recent with the seeming lackluster zeal around the quality of software releases/bug fixes/features and the decision to shelve Aperture.
> 
> However, one has to remember that first and foremost Apple must remain profitable to the shareholders. Somewhere at Apple, they've determined that the best way to stay profitable in the photography segment is to appeal to the masses. The masses have iPhones and secondarily (if at all), P&S cameras. We as the "Pro" and "Enthusiast" DSLR crowd are the minority.
> 
> ...



Hi Greg, I've done the same as you but I'm still using Aperture along side Lightroom and will continue to as long as possible. I have been disappointed in Apple's decision to discontinue Aperture where 100's of thousand of professional and personal images reside with adjustments (sigh). I agree that Apple must remain profitable to the shareholders but alienating professionals who buy their expensive hardware is not going to be profitable forever, is it? After all, it was professionals who they built their target market on. If I can use Lightroom on a PC for half the price, I might be tempted to switch from Mac at some point.

I too hold a shred of hope that Photos will become powerful like Aperture one day - maybe with their new update allowing third party plugins. How long can we wait and what does Apple expect professionals to do in the meantime - I think they just gave me the middle finger!?


----------



## martti (Oct 19, 2015)

unfocused said:


> People aren't getting the point.
> 
> Camera manufacturers have utterly failed their customers.



You pretty much summed it up. I do not know what kind of equipment you'd need to get professional quality live coverage from the event directly to the social media but I imagine it would involve a van with a satellite disk and friends in high places. Apple saw the niche and did what it could with the communication infra that is available.
They did see something that others didn't. The world of photography will never be the same again.

Apple does understand photography better than the snotty pixelpeepers of the cyberspace.
Who put a totally usable digital camera on your smartphone? How did they do it?
Could one (any one) of the pixelpeepers achieve a similar feat?

Apple understands photography and they changed it according to their views.
They changed the world on the side as well.


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 19, 2015)

martti said:


> unfocused said:
> 
> 
> > People aren't getting the point.
> ...



I don't want to start a squabble here but I don't quite understand how Apple gets the credit you lavish on them in the last post. Over the years it has become tiring listening to Apple fans heap undeserving praise on Apple that Apple simply doesn't merit. The only instance where Apple cares about photography is in the few seconds of their advertisements and marketing where they mention the camera as a feature. Where are the photography events, accessories, enthusiast web pages or books? How exactly does Apple demonstrate how they "get" or understand photography or photographers with their smartphone camera? How does Apple use their understanding of photography to help the photographer protect their digital rights to their images?

All Apple does is make products that contain an average decent quality tiny camera.

- Apple didn't invent or revolutionize photography with the smartphone camera. Smartphone cameras were around for years before the iPhone.
- I don't think 'snotty pixelpeepers', whoever they may be, are in the business of smartphone development nor am I or are you. So I think the 'snotty pixelpeepers doing better' statement is unnecessary. How does it reinforce your point? 'Snotty pixelpeepers' tend to criticize/discuss a lot of things about photography, do they not?

Apple didn't change the world with a smartphone camera. Apple's iPhone camera lagged behind other smartphone cameras in the beginning. And the iPhone camera app was criticized for a long time as well. The Apple _iPod_ however did lay waste to all other music players on the market and then the iPod Touch laid the groundwork for the iPhone. But the iPhone itself simply served to shake up the phone market by accelerating the adoption of the previously lackluster touch phone interface.

In fact, most of Apple's achievements are in making huge profits ($720B Net Worth) with impressive marketing (1984) and utilizing a stellar understanding of tapping into customers' desires for technology with unique devices and easy to grasp interfaces that they copied/acquired/etc. Their products are elegant, pretty, smooth to the touch and, amazingly, people line up to pay twice what they're actually worth over and over.

But none of that has anything to do with photography. If Apple was serious about photography, they would have likely partnered with a company like Canon/Nikon/Pentax long ago to build on that understanding and see it grow. They would have a division devoted to photography and various programs to foster photography and support photographers. That hasn't happened.

Apple has always been about selling fancy elegant overpriced devices running within a closed system that promotes buying a lot of expensive online content. That is the true achievement of Apple, becoming a huge company worth hundreds of billions of dollars by selling a ton of expensive items/content and using their wealth and power to acquire and sue for even more wealth and power. And they've been like that since almost the beginning.

Do some research and discover when/where the first smartphone emerged (Simon). And cameraphone (JPhone). In fact, the more you dig, the more you will discover that Apple typically has taken technology that already existed, successful or not, and refined it then marketed it in a more appealing and useful way. And that is to be applauded. But rarely has Apple done the actual invention of most of their "innovations".

Photography to Apple is just another feature used to sell iPhones. Period.


----------



## Don Haines (Oct 19, 2015)

RustyTheGeek said:


> martti said:
> 
> 
> > unfocused said:
> ...


+1!


----------



## Chuck Alaimo (Oct 19, 2015)

unfocused said:


> AcutancePhotography said:
> 
> 
> > Don Haines said:
> ...



Ok, feeling the need to chime in here. I shoot weddings and have had 2 bride's request unplugged ceremonies. This isn't the norm, but, it is a trend that is growing in popularity. Afterall, the guest at a wedding is there to have fun, not document the day. Many bride's do want their guests involved in the moment, not documenting it behind a camera.


As to instant uploads, and the deluge of blurry cell phone shots - this doesn't bother me one bit. I actually giggle when I see them because I know my shots are so much better that it isn't a contest. 

More times than not the bride doesn't even have her phone with her for the day, she leaves it at the hotel. The groom does, but, many grooms of mine either aren't on facebook, or, use it so rarely that it they don't see it. Many bride's and grooms have their privacy settings set so tagged shots don't even appear on their page, they have to manually allow it to appear, something they aren't doing on their wedding day.

I do own a 6 as a backup, and how many times have I rushed to do the WiFi connect to upload a shot? 0 times. 

As others have pointed out, not many bride's out there ask for instant uploads. They spent a ton of money on good photography and understand that it takes time. The only big rush I get from bride's is if they want a few images for thank you cards, and those are usually specific shots that are easy to find, or, even set up for that (ex: bride and groom holding a thank you sign). 

S, for wedding shooters, im pretty sure i speak for most of us in saying connectivety on camera doesn't even make the wish list of features we want. AF, good glass, sturdy and dependable, decent ISO range, off camera flash capabilities, IQ, and yes DR -- these are the things that make or break a camera system for us. 

As to one of the specific references - the cake cutting/feeding, at that stage of the day you've been shooting for what, 4-7 hours already. The cake gets cut then your rushing to cover the speaches, after that it's dinner time. At that point are you thinking, quick gotta find something to upload, or, are you more likely thinking my hand needs a break, my legs need a break and my body needs fuel aka food.


----------



## Don Haines (Oct 19, 2015)

If Apple understood photography:

The standard camera ap would have a manual mode.....

A decent editor would be included as standard......

The files would not be stored under such heavy compression....


----------



## unfocused (Oct 19, 2015)

martti said:


> unfocused said:
> 
> 
> > People aren't getting the point.
> ...





ChristopherMarkPerez said:


> I don't care what technical hurdles Canon faces (ie: running the non-network-able, and even harder to build meaningful apps for, VxWorks OS in their DLSRs). They could quickly overcome them if they understood that the image making world has changed. Past tense.
> 
> Alas, I'm left feeling that Canon is milking a dying cow.
> 
> ...



I'm honestly surprised at the resistance to this simple and self-evident fact. 

Imagine what the amateur point and shoot market would look like today if Canon, Nikon, etc., had awoken from their deep sleep when smartphones first surfaced and started immediately perfecting and producing small point and shoots that offered simple, easy connectivity, editing and sharing? 

The conventional wisdom says that camera phones killed the point and shoot market because people always carry their phones with them. But, we will never know what might have happened if consumers had had access to a small point and shoot that had the same or better functionality and connectivity than their phones. People act as though consumers were satisfied with the poor picture quality of early smart phones, but clearly that wasn't the case, as the quality has improved dramatically in the last few years. Why? Because phone manufacturers found that improved picture quality sold phones. 

Unfortunately, none of the major camera manufacturers figured out the corresponding corollary – that connectivity would sell cameras. 

I respect the professionals who say their customers aren't asking for pictures to be immediately posted on social media. On the other hand, they may not be asking for it because they can't find a photographer who offers it. It's hard to request something that you can't have. I get why photographers are resistant to the idea. It's a pain in the rear. But, it's a pain in the rear largely because camera manufacturers have refused to make it simple.

The truth is, the world is changing and if the demand isn't there today, it will be there tomorrow. I strongly suspect that five years from now, the same people who say their customers don't want this will either be routinely offering this service or be out of business. 

The rumor is that the next model of the 1Dx will have internet connectivity. I certainly hope it does. That will be a small sign that the lazy, backward industry is finally waking up to the realities of the 21st century.


----------



## Chuck Alaimo (Oct 19, 2015)

unfocused said:


> martti said:
> 
> 
> > unfocused said:
> ...


 
I partially agree with you at the consumer level, for point and shoot basic connectivity to WiFi would help sales, somewhat. It's the. I convenience factor that cell phones provide though, unless you commit to having a full sized camera as your phone though I don't see the market demanding full cell phone capabilities simply because it's still redundant. Why carry 2 devices when 1 can cover most of the bases for most people. So while WiFi in point & shoots may help sales, it won't stop their demise. 

I still disagree on the pro/semi pro level, at least in the wedding world, maybe not in totality but for enough bride's quality is valued over speed of sharing. Think teachers, there are a lot of them and the morality clauses in there contract isn't going away. Teachers mostly are either not on social media at all, or are very private, so for that whole class of people alone instant sharing on the wedding day isn't wanted or desired. Either way, there are enough bride's out there with varied tastes and needs that I really don't see it as an issue.


----------



## cayenne (Oct 19, 2015)

unfocused said:


> martti said:
> 
> 
> > unfocused said:
> ...



And...maybe social media, isn't the end all / be all of most people over the age of 14yrs?


cayenne


----------



## unfocused (Oct 19, 2015)

cayenne said:


> And...maybe social media, isn't the end all / be all of most people over the age of 14yrs?
> 
> 
> cayenne



Pretty funny coming from a guy who posts cooking videos on You Tube.


----------



## unfocused (Oct 19, 2015)

Chuck Alaimo said:


> I still disagree on the pro/semi pro level, at least in the wedding world, maybe not in totality but for enough bride's quality is valued over speed of sharing...Either way, there are enough bride's out there with varied tastes and needs that I really don't see it as an issue.



I get what you are saying and I respect that you know the business far better than I do. (I think I would sooner shoot myself than go into wedding photography.)

I've probably beat the dead horse sufficiently. I still feel that camera manufacturers (not just Canon) have really blown it as far as connectivity to the internet goes. Most of the arguments against this point of view seem driven by anti-social media bias and a lot of sticking heads in the sand. (not necessarily you.) "It's only for 14 year olds...the pictures are all crappy...camera phones are worthless...etc. etc."

I simply find it ridiculous that in this day and age we can spend $1,000, $2,000 or even $6,000 on a camera and it can't readily connect to the internet or at least wirelessly connect to an internet enabled device. I think that closes off options for photographers and has a much more significant impact on the ability of photographers who do this for a living, than a half-stop of dynamic range ever will.


----------



## Don Haines (Oct 19, 2015)

At the top of the pro level, things like WiFi streaming of pictures is great.... When you are shooting at the Olympics, the pictures can be streamed as you take them back to the control room where the team of photo editors can manipulate them and send them off to the appropriate media....

The thing is, very very very few people have that team behind them. Yes, a wedding shooter can stream the pictures off into the cloud as they shoot, but there they sit until the wedding is over, they drive home, collapse Saturday night into bed, wake up the next morning, go shoot the Sunday wedding, get back home and collapse again, wake up Monday morning, have breakfast, and then go tackle the editing....

Off I go on my canoe trip into Algonquin Park.... I shoot a couple thousand pictures.... IF! (and it is very unlikely) I have connectivity to the internet and if I can stream my pictures out as I shoot them, Who is going to edit them or post them? Fluffy? 

Yes, you can take a phone, shoot pictures, and post them onto the internet is a matter of seconds..... but WITHOUT EDITING!!!! The editing is an integral part of real photography and no 5 inch display is going to take the place of a couple of quality monitors and good software. We are talking apples and oranges here..... Phones and DSLRs are both cameras, but they are used for different purposes with different requirements. When you need to dump something out fast without editing, use your phone.... When you need to process it, do it right on a decent computer... A real pro will use the right tool for the task at hand.


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 19, 2015)

For everyone saying that the camera industry is way behind and should offer connectivity from DSLRs to the cloud...

*Eye-Fi*
http://www.eyefi.com/

Eye-Fi has been around for years (among other similar implementations). It works in just about any camera. And many cameras have supported Eye-Fi cards directly right in their camera menus for years. It's right there, ready to connect to the Internet, Cloud, Social Media or just a nearby phone, tablet or computer. So how many photographers ever use it??

And why would Canon (et al.) re-invent the wheel? The problem is solved with less expense that a dedicated OEM Canon solution that is still waiting to be updated. So they added Eye-Fi support to the camera and thought everyone was happy. Am I missing something?

I've owned an Eye-Fi myself for years and while I use it here in the office from time to time to go directly to my network and server, I have never posted directly to social media for a multitude of reasons but mostly because of what Don says... I want to sort, cull and edit the images before the whole world sees what a terrible photographer I am until I fix all my screw ups!


----------



## unfocused (Oct 20, 2015)

RustyTheGeek said:


> For everyone saying that the camera industry is way behind and should offer connectivity from DSLRs to the cloud...
> 
> *Eye-Fi*
> http://www.eyefi.com/



Yes. How foolish of me. I shouldn't expect camera manufacturers to actually make connectivity easy. I should just buy an overpriced, clunky third-party product.

Better yet, why do we even need these stupid digital cameras? Instead we should just shoot film and send the film in to have it developed and scanned. And, autofocus. That's for amateurs. You can't be a real photographer if you don't focus your lenses manually. 

I see the light now. I shouldn't expect camera manufacturers to actually make their products easier to use. 

I'm just an ingrate who doesn't appreciate that Canon and Nikon have better things to do than bring their cameras into the 21st century.



Don Haines said:


> The thing is, very very very few people have that team behind them...
> 
> ...The editing is an integral part of real photography and no 5 inch display is going to take the place of a couple of quality monitors and good software...A real pro will use the right tool for the task at hand.



You are actually making my point for me Don. The problem is that you do have to have a full team behind you today...because manufacturers refuse to make it easy, even though the technology is readily available.

As far as editing goes...

http://www.adobe.com/products/lightroom-mobile.html

So, the solution might not be in-camera editing. Maybe its near-field communication to transfer selected files to a tablet where you can access Lightroom or Photoshop to edit images on the go.

Sorry, I just don't get the resistance to technology that people are expressing on this geek forum.


----------



## Don Haines (Oct 20, 2015)

unfocused said:


> Don Haines said:
> 
> 
> > The thing is, very very very few people have that team behind them...
> ...


When I am in the field and need to get the image out, my DSLR workflow is shoot images, go somewhere I can sit down, transfer card to laptop, copy files, edit images, send images. Usually though, images that require DSLR quality and lenses are processed and edited after I get back to the office.

Yes, wireless transfer, be it Eye-Fi, cannon wireless, or whatever, will save me from moving the card from the camera to the laptop (or tablet), but it really does not change the workflow appreciably.

When I am in the field and need to get an image out that is suitable for phone photography, I snap the picture, open up email, attach, and send. It is a FAR!!!!! simpler workflow than with the DSLR, but it is only suitable for low quality pictures for quick verification or info. 

To me, they are two different functions. For one the DSLR is by far the preferred tool, for the other, the phone is the best tool. Things that make sense for one do not make sense for the other....


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 20, 2015)

unfocused said:


> RustyTheGeek said:
> 
> 
> > For everyone saying that the camera industry is way behind and should offer connectivity from DSLRs to the cloud...
> ...



I share Don's points about DSLR vs Phone images and their respective workflows and value. Each has strengths and weaknesses that don't/can't match the other.

As for wireless connectivity, I think you are simplifying a very complex and ever-evolving challenge for camera manufacturers. Many things have to work right and be supported as they change. What you are asking and apparently think is a no-brainer feature is very difficult for a camera manufacturer to achieve. Camera companies are not phone, computer, network or wireless manufacturers. It's just not in their wheelhouse. And once they start down that path of adding those features, they are required to do it right and support it or it will tarnish their reputation for the entire camera and/or market. As we have seen in most forums, Canon/Nikon etc are lambasted for even the smallest issues after folks pay thousands of dollars for cameras they expect to be perfect for that price. Most people don't understand that once a feature is added to a product, it must be supported for years and that means more training for sales, support staff, technical manuals, etc.

I get why you want this feature and with wireless being added to everything including even water heaters, I see how it looks easy. And on the surface it is, just add a WiFi chipset and you're done. But I think there are many more things to consider when you are trying to add a radio frequency emitter/receiver to a complex electronic device like a DSLR that has a ultra sensitive light frequency collector and also fires a high power light frequency emitter. Look at all the problems Pocket Wizard has faced. I think Canon has probably researched this quite a bit and found it to be a big enough challenge to get right to decide to put it off until it can be done better.

My point about Eye-Fi is that they took a working and mature 3rd party product that didn't have to R&D/Support themselves and they embraced it for the small percentage of photographers that *might* use it. Because wireless connectivity for most of the serious DSLR market is not going to sell more cameras and in fact it might even hinder sales. Canon is slowly adding wireless connectivity to several cameras that are either P&S or consumer oriented where the demand is stronger. But once that wireless feature is integrated, it is there to stay. The Eye-Fi product can be moved from camera to camera and it can be changed as technology changes. Wireless technology changes much faster than DSLR or most camera technology. WiFi is finicky and hard to configure and troubleshoot in some environments and many times it's not the device that's the problem.

Back to camera phones... how often do most people change their phones? Some folks change their phone several times each year! That technology and feature set changes very quickly and the market is driven by change. Contrast that with the DSLR market where any given serious DSLR ramps every 3-4 years. Completely different markets, consumers and needs/expectations.

So please cut Canon and the other major camera companies a break. They didn't invent the current wireless technology. They can't 'make it easy' because that is beyond their control, it's not their technology. I don't think it's a conspiracy that they choose to avoid wireless features in DSLRs, it's just a reasonable business decision on where they focus their energy and efforts in order to produce quality cameras for their perceived market and make a profit in the process.

Oh, and if Canon + Eye-Fi isn't good enough for you...

go buy a *Samsung Galaxy Camera*
http://www.samsung.com/us/photography/galaxy-camera

Now you have a camera hybrid complete with touch screen and wireless connectivity.


----------



## martti (Oct 20, 2015)

There are alternatives now. 
You can tether wirelessly the Sony A6000 (I have tried) with an Android camera aquipped with the Sony sofware. What this means that you can place your camera and actually get the view of the viewfinder on your smartphone.
You can adjust and focus, change ISO and mode.
The pictures you take, stgay on your camera's storage, whether fixed or removable untli the camerq finds a WiFi connection and sends the picture to Fluffy or whoever is in charge of mailing and marketing. Probably there will be fluffies to serve a number of photographers at the same time. That could be a business idea.


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 21, 2015)

martti said:


> There are alternatives now.
> You can tether wirelessly the Sony A6000 (I have tried) with an Android camera aquipped with the Sony sofware. What this means that you can place your camera and actually get the view of the viewfinder on your smartphone.
> You can adjust and focus, change ISO and mode.
> The pictures you take, stgay on your camera's storage, whether fixed or removable untli the camerq finds a WiFi connection and sends the picture to Fluffy or whoever is in charge of mailing and marketing. Probably there will be fluffies to serve a number of photographers at the same time. That could be a business idea.



*You mean like on the Canon 6D using EOS Remote on your smartphone?*


----------



## martti (Oct 21, 2015)

RustyTheGeek said:


> martti said:
> 
> 
> > There are alternatives now.
> ...



That I have not tried.


----------



## LDS (Oct 21, 2015)

RustyTheGeek said:


> As for wireless connectivity, I think you are simplifying a very complex and ever-evolving challenge for camera manufacturers. Many things have to work right and be supported as they change.



You're right, especially when it comes to a professional workflow and quick obsolescence of some components. The wireless technology is just a building block. You can't rely on a specific app running only on a specific mobile OS and maybe only on a specific version, unless it's properly updated - the risk otehrwise is it won't work anymore in a couple of years.

IMHO it's good, for example, that Canon WFT-E7A (its price is truly absurd today, I agree...) can use a standard, non proprietary, protocol like FTP for image transfers. It means you can "plug" it into any workflow using any tool you may need to use - not only EOS Utility - at the price of a slightly more complex setup. The day it uses a proprietary "cloud" service and a proprietary app to access it, as soon as the service or the app are no longer maintained/available, you have an expensive gimmick no longer working. Some cameras are designed to last several years, I'd be careful to tie them too much to "features" changing much more quickly.

If someone believe it can't happen, it already happend for example to some SmartTV models - their apps are no longer updated for some streaming services which thereby cannot be longer used directly - making them simple TVs no longer "smart" at all.


----------



## ChristopherMarkPerez (Oct 21, 2015)

I can attest to the value of your suggested NFC solution. It's precisely the one I've used for a good long while now with a Sony A6000 and 7inch HD tablet. My clients, models, MUAs, and stylists all love being able to see what's going on as it happens. We make scene/costume/lighting/posture adjustments quickly and easily and sometimes/manytimes the out of camera lightly tablet processed results are good enough to post/distribute live during the shoot.

I wonder if resistance to technology is related in any way to a realization that one's images might fail to stand up to scrutiny? Talk is cheap and requires no proof of claim, right?



unfocused said:


> ... So, the solution might not be in-camera editing. Maybe its near-field communication to transfer selected files to a tablet where you can access Lightroom or Photoshop to edit images on the go.
> 
> Sorry, I just don't get the resistance to technology that people are expressing on this geek forum.


----------



## LDS (Oct 21, 2015)

ChristopherMarkPerez said:


> I wonder if resistance to technology is related in any way to a realization that one's images might fail to stand up to scrutiny? Talk is cheap and requires no proof of claim, right?



Or people have been doin tethered and wireless shooting for years, also showing images on better devices than 6" or 7" screens, and have no need to babble about some new buzzwords just to look cool? NFC top speed is 424kb/s, not much to transfer large RAW files...


----------



## Tugela (Oct 22, 2015)

Don Haines said:


> At the top of the pro level, things like WiFi streaming of pictures is great.... When you are shooting at the Olympics, the pictures can be streamed as you take them back to the control room where the team of photo editors can manipulate them and send them off to the appropriate media....
> 
> The thing is, very very very few people have that team behind them. Yes, a wedding shooter can stream the pictures off into the cloud as they shoot, but there they sit until the wedding is over, they drive home, collapse Saturday night into bed, wake up the next morning, go shoot the Sunday wedding, get back home and collapse again, wake up Monday morning, have breakfast, and then go tackle the editing....
> 
> ...



Don't disrespect Fluffy. He has sharp teeth and claws. Something you will discover when he finds out your post


----------



## Ozarker (Oct 22, 2015)

Yup. And I can't imagine editing images on a tablet, but I'm getting old and need the big screen.


----------



## LDS (Oct 22, 2015)

CanonFanBoy said:


> Yup. And I can't imagine editing images on a tablet, but I'm getting old and need the big screen.



That's why even Apple had to deliver a 13" tablet and add a pen... still, you may need a color calbrated display.


----------



## Chuck Alaimo (Oct 23, 2015)

unfocused said:


> RustyTheGeek said:
> 
> 
> > For everyone saying that the camera industry is way behind and should offer connectivity from DSLRs to the cloud...
> ...



I think to a certain extent your mistaking existence resistance to WiFi with the priority of wifi. When I think of absolute needs in a camera body wifi isn't one of them. Nice to have, but, I can think of many other things that are a higher priority.


----------



## unfocused (Oct 23, 2015)

Chuck Alaimo said:


> I think to a certain extent your mistaking existence resistance to WiFi with the priority of wifi. When I think of absolute needs in a camera body wifi isn't one of them. Nice to have, but, I can think of many other things that are a higher priority.



I don't think so. Perhaps we all just have to agree to disagree. But, before we do, let’s beat this poor horse one more time.

This is not and never has been about what I or anyone else personally view as a priority. It's about how the camera industry failed to recognize a truly disruptive change in technology and the price they have already paid for that – the near total annihilation of the market for casual consumer cameras – and the fact that despite the high cost of their failure, they continue to cling to old habits, which limits the options available to their customers and handicaps them across all categories, from beginner to professional.

Everywhere you turn today, you read that the future will be an “Internet of Things.” Soon, everything in our lives will be connected. This is already happening and available on several fronts – home thermostats, kitchen appliances, automobiles, our bank and credit cards, etc. etc. Now, it really doesn’t matter if people like it or not, it’s already here and growing daily.

So, if heating and air conditioning people and kitchen appliance makers and banks can figure it out and see the value in connecting to the internet, I ask a very simple question – what’s wrong with camera manufacturers?

Someone wrote that I don’t understand how difficult it would be to make cameras connect to the internet. Really??? Sorry, but I don't buy the argument that the engineering teams of Canon, Nikon, Fuji and Sony are comprised of idiots. 

The point of the original article, which was actually just a rewrite of a previous story covering a technology presentation, is that camera manufacturers were woefully slow in adapting to the internet. And, due to their inability to adapt, they left themselves vulnerable to competition that has swallowed up much of their market.

And…even in the face of those market-destroying changes, they continue to lag behind the rest of the world.

To say it is just something nice to have, but isn't a priority, might be a legitimate criticism. Except that it's hard to gauge priorities when something isn't readily available and easy to use. Auto exposure and auto focus were not priorities until they became readily available and easy to use. Digital cameras weren't a priority until they became readily available and affordable. When video was first added to DSLRs it was just a minor add on that no one expected to be important. There was no one demanding that DSLR's offer video. Yet now it is considered an essential feature. 

I am confident that eventually the industry will get a clue and when they finally do, the very people who insist they don't need this, will be using it daily, demanding improvements with each new camera release and threatening to switch to another brand because Canon's connectivity is "behind" XYZ's. 

Canon is continuously excoriated here for silly things like dynamic range. Yet the entire industry totally misread and apparently continues to misread what is probably the single most obvious and important trend in society today and it mystifies me why anyone feels compelled to defend them in the face of obvious evidence to the contrary.

The industry screwed up. They are paying for it. We are paying for it twice – our cameras lack features and flexibility that every smart phone has and as consumers the collapse of a large portion of the market will inevitably force price increases and cost-cutting for the cameras we want to buy.


----------



## martti (Oct 23, 2015)

Now entering my third week with iPhone and having some extra time (at the ophtalmologistäs waiting room) I installed the Athentec Lucid app and the Camera Plus app on my iPhone. The Athentec is basically the Perfectly Clear engine with a nice logo and some quirks but more importantly, it delivers pictures that look good on a smartphone screen. I am so glad Ken Rockwell told me about this software developer! 8)

The CameraPlus looks like the iPhone camera but there is a little + sign next to the button. You can click it to choose macro, what crop you want to use, stabilizer, timer and burst. That would be totally undoable on a pocket camera or why has it not been seen as yet? I can point the autofocus with the touch screen and the camera adjusts exposure accordingly. Which is pretty neat. After taking a picture I can tweak and crop and share it to my friends on social media. 
Click-click-click. 

I confess, I like it very much when people send postcards, when they do, if they do.
How Apple revolutionized photography, however, gives us something much more powerful, flexible and reactive to communicate with people far-far-far away. It is something you really appreciate when you are the one there.
It is all very fine to have artists and reporters and professional event photographers. All of them have their own idea about what the 'real photography' should be defined. Apple understood photography for the masses and gave it to them. Maybe Apple did not invent camera phone or the business of social networking. But the way it knitted the two together on a single device that you can use for thousands for other functions as well, was a unique flash of genius.

Like it or not, use it or not but if you look around you, you cannot neglect it.


----------



## LDS (Oct 23, 2015)

unfocused said:


> So, if heating and air conditioning people and kitchen appliance makers and banks can figure it out and see the value in connecting to the internet, I ask a very simple question – what’s wrong with camera manufacturers?



Did you understand what's the driver behind that? They figured it out only because they want to collect data about everything you do. It's not to make your life better - it's to be able to collect data. Also, it opens a whole can of worm of privacy and security risks which are not addressed because the data gathering lobby doesn't want to talk about them.



unfocused said:


> Someone wrote that I don’t understand how difficult it would be to make cameras connect to the internet. Really??? Sorry, but I don't buy the argument that the engineering teams of Canon, Nikon, Fuji and Sony are comprised of idiots.



The Internet is bidirectional. Once your camera is connected to the Internet, the Internet is connected to your camera. Sure, casual shooters are not interesting targets, but maybe their "private" photos. Other professional photographers could become soon very interesting targets if their "always connected" cameras are vulnerable. Stolen or deleted images = big business issue. 

Smartphones are a risk. They can be compromised and information exfiltrated. Do you feel fine with any device directly connected to the Internet without proper protection, and storing valuable data? I don't. Connect to the Internet, and you're also traceable. Maybe not an issue for you, for others may be (you have to get rid of mobile phones too, true).



unfocused said:


> that camera manufacturers were woefully slow in adapting to the internet.



Or did they make a cost/benefit analysis and found a different answer? I don't believe Internet connected cameras have any chances against smartphones for casual photographers, while dedicated photographers won't use a phone just because of Internet connectivity. The low-end P&S is dead, and no injection of connectivity will resurrect it. It's dead like typewriters, music//video tapes (and even CD/DVD), fax machines and other technologies for which a multi-functional device works better. 



unfocused said:


> And…even in the face of those market-destroying changes, they continue to lag behind the rest of the world.



Beware of the "rest of the world", especially if that "rest" is Google, Facebook & Friends - which only aims at your data to monetize them as much as they can.


----------



## chauncey (Oct 23, 2015)

I have never, and will never own, an Apple product...period!
Over-hyped and over-priced products all!


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 23, 2015)

martti said:


> Now entering my third week with iPhone and having some extra time (at the ophtalmologistäs waiting room) I installed the Athentec Lucid app and the Camera Plus app on my iPhone. The Athentec is basically the Perfectly Clear engine with a nice logo and some quirks but more importantly, it delivers pictures that look good on a smartphone screen. I am so glad Ken Rockwell told me about this software developer! 8)
> 
> The CameraPlus looks like the iPhone camera but there is a little + sign next to the button. You can click it to choose macro, what crop you want to use, stabilizer, timer and burst. That would be totally undoable on a pocket camera or why has it not been seen as yet? I can point the autofocus with the touch screen and the camera adjusts exposure accordingly. Which is pretty neat. After taking a picture I can tweak and crop and share it to my friends on social media.
> Click-click-click.
> ...



That's all great *martti*, thanks for the great info about some good phone camera apps. But I fail to see how Apple should get credit for understanding photography based on those points. It sounds like it's the 3rd party apps that impressed you and those apps are available for android and other phones as well. Having a camera in a phone and a phone being multi-functional is pretty standard and it was standard before Apple even started making phones.


----------



## neuroanatomist (Oct 23, 2015)

chauncey said:


> I have never, and will never own, an Apple product...period!
> Over-hyped and over-priced products all!




Shhhhh...don't tell IBM. They're switching more and more of their employee base over to Macs. It seems only 5% of their Mac users need help from IT, whereas 40% of their PC user base needs frequent tech support. Plus, Macs have a longer useful service life. Overall, IBM expects to realize substantial savings from switching to Apple's 'overhyped and overpriced' products because they're easier to use and cheaper in the long run.


----------



## martti (Oct 23, 2015)

RustyTheGeek said:


> That's all great *martti*, thanks for the great info about some good phone camera apps. But I fail to see how Apple should get credit for understanding photography based on those points. It sounds like it's the 3rd party apps that impressed you and those apps are available for android and other phones as well. Having a camera in a phone and a phone being multi-functional is pretty standard and it was standard before Apple even started making phones.



Without Apple there would be no Android. These apps would not exist if not for the market created by Apple's devices. Yeah "pretty standard"...sure. Whatever. Apple might lose their market share but the camera makers already did lose the point and shoot market to the smartphones. Do you actually remember how the Palm devices failed when they tried to accomodate cellular phone in their personal data manager? Do you remember how the Blackberry lost their game...how Ericsson went out of business and got sold to Sony like Nokia got sold to Microsoft?

Samsung stole industrial secrets and bought people from Apple and that's how they got Android going with their brain power and Google's money. But well, what's the point. It is more fruitful to discuss the size of Allah with Sunni extremists than devices with the fanboys and the nonfanboys. 
Keep your opinions. Dogs bark, caravan advances.


----------



## takesome1 (Oct 23, 2015)

Shooting eagles a few weeks back, a gal with an iphone using her binoculars as a telephoto lens was also there.
It occurred to me that I could have saved a huge amount of cash by using her technique. I already have Zeiss binoculars with IS. 

But really I would rather see Canon incorporate a phone into its camera bodies. Just the ability to play Candy Crush on the camera's LCD would help with the monotony of sitting in a hunting blind.


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 23, 2015)

neuroanatomist said:


> chauncey said:
> 
> 
> > I have never, and will never own, an Apple product...period!
> ...



I've been in the IT business for a long time. Since the '80's. Every company or individual I have seen that has switched to macs for business switched back within a couple years. It was a train wreck every time. Macs are just harder to support in a enterprise environment.

Also, Macs don't last longer than PCs. That's a myth. Enterprise level PCs last for as long as you want to run them. I have clients still running hardware that is 8-10 years old. Macs do sell for more used but they were more expensive to buy in the first place so the ROI isn't any better.

The Apple-IBM thing is an experiment. I think the IBM+Apple thing has been evolving since 2007. It began with IBM allowing/supporting each employee to BYOD with their Apple devices and it grew from there. Apple and IBM arranged a partnership so Apple could learn more about Enterprise. They expanded it this year. If IBM can pull off Macs in the office, good for them, they have the resources and a very comfy agreement with Apple that gives them an advantage. But user support calls is only one part of the much bigger IT picture. My experience has been that using Macs in a work environment was not successful. There were too many adjustments, caveats and compromises. Apple however, has begun to address this in the past couple years as the Enterprise market is very lucrative and not averse to expensive hardware. (Enterprise level hardware is expensive compared to retail hardware and frankly much better than Apple products.) Apple Macs are essentially PCs now anyway except for a bit of firmware that the Mac OS looks for.

The problem is that Apple's culture is closed and it doesn't have experience in Enterprise or understand the needs of Enterprise. Apple is very bad at support and they don't move very fast. Apple does what Apple wants on their own timeline. Apple is good at selling & producing things but their answer for support is to make you buy another unit. Much like we say about Canon understanding the bigger photography "system" in contrast with Sony with all the support, lenses, long term camera life cycles, etc. That is why they connected up with IBM. Because they are clueless about Enterprise. The major PC makers (DELL, HP/Compaq, IBM/Lenovo) have Enterprise divisions that have evolved and matured for over 30-60 years. It is a very tough business and there is a huge amount of work involved in supporting Enterprise IT. It's incredibly complex. Which is why Apple sucks at it. Apple can barely support individuals. Enterprise has never been a comfort zone for Apple. IBM is one of the best.

So don't read too much into the Macs running at IBM thing. It's a drop in the proverbial bucket in the Enterprise IT world and frankly, the IBM world as well.


----------



## takesome1 (Oct 23, 2015)

RustyTheGeek said:


> neuroanatomist said:
> 
> 
> > chauncey said:
> ...



At the workplace we use an IT company, the owner of the IT company has always told us if we switched to Apple he wouldn't service us. We all agree that is probably because we wouldn't need service.

But, what you posted is spoken like every IT guy I have met. From experience much of what you say is not based in what I have found to be actual fact. I have both systems, at home everything is MAC. At work it is windows. The system at home is just as sophisticated as what I have at work, simple to set up and in the last 7 years I have never once had to contact support. The Mac's I started with are still running, I have never had to replace one machine. Contrast that with work my Dell laptops I am on my second and it is failing. There is a reason to go with PC's, and that is software. From what I have found none of the other reasons you gave matter, after 25 years of listening to IT guys eventually you figure out the truth.


----------



## tcmatthews (Oct 23, 2015)

RustyTheGeek said:


> neuroanatomist said:
> 
> 
> > chauncey said:
> ...



In truth it depends on what you mean by Enterprise IT. I am sure that IBM will be running on their own Enterprise software. Which means they will likely be running Unix/Linux. No Microsoft to integrate against until you get to desktop. It would be very easy to integrate a Mac OS X (BSD) because it is basically Unix. So it is likely easier to integrate 

I think the primary drivers for PC in the workspace is the number of software tools Engineering etc. that basically run only on Windows that have no Mac OS equivalent and the reluctance of IT to support Mac OS. (This is changing as some have started supporting OS other than Windows such as RedHat but all support Windows.) It is not that Macs are harder to maintain it is that you cannot get rid of all of the PC and end up supporting both. 

If Apple was serious about Enterprise they would not have killed their server products and would still sell expandable upgradeable Laptops. They no longer sell any consumer level PCs. Lets face it they sell a bunch of thin pretty un-upgradeable smart appliances. And, the Mac Pro a High end PC workstation built out of server parts that is really more powerful and expensive than almost anyone needs. 

Enterned on my pretty un-upgradeable smart appliance MacBook pro.


----------



## CSD (Oct 23, 2015)

Two markets I'll address, if anyone know's mobile photography it was Nokia. Sure the Windows Phone didn't have all the hipster apps for photography but what it did have is the ability to appeal to professionals with full RAW output and the tools to take those shots the 808, Lumia 920, and the Lumia 1020 was ground breaking at the time in that they introduced new features that's still not fully used by the competition. The Lumia 950 promises to be another phone that will likely set the standard for mobile images, that is if the preview images released are to be believed. One aspect of the PureView systems is the optical image stabilisation which comes into it's own under low-light. 

I've used the 920 and the 930 and edited the DNGs in Photoshop, some images from the 930 was used for a publication because they was the only camera I had to hand.

The other problem is desktop/laptop. Apple just doesn't get the professional photographer. Their AiO's are designed for the consumer and notoriously too bright to calibrate and have glossy screens which over-saturate the colours. Same with laptops as they've reduced the amount of laptops that have IPS/matte screens. Almost all their displays are 6 or 8 bit which is pretty much a no go for professional video or photographic editing, ideally you'll want a 10bit display. Yet neither their OS or displays have never supported that. Under Windows you have to buy a professional card like a FireGL or Quadro and have a suitable display but it works. Apple hardware is very limited in how and what you can upgrade them with and their Apple Pro is a joke against professional PC workstations but it does look pretty.

Compare this to Microsoft who at present is probably producing the best tablet that's designed for the creative industry; Surface Pro. Is it perfect? No, but it's probably the best tool just now that's ideal for photography if you're looking at a tablet. They are actively listening and responding to criticism about their devices, and hopefully they'll address the lack of customisation for buttons on their pen and scaling issues. However with the Dock you can easily edit on a 4K display if you wish or dual displays.


----------



## CSD (Oct 23, 2015)

tcmatthews said:


> In truth it depends on what you mean by Enterprise IT. I am sure that IBM will be running on their own Enterprise software. Which means they will likely be running Unix/Linux. No Microsoft to integrate against until you get to desktop. It would be very easy to integrate a Mac OS X (BSD) because it is basically Unix. So it is likely easier to integrate
> 
> I think the primary drivers for PC in the workspace is the number of software tools Engineering etc. that basically run only on Windows that have no Mac OS equivalent and the reluctance of IT to support Mac OS. (This is changing as some have started supporting OS other than Windows such as RedHat but all support Windows.) It is not that Macs are harder to maintain it is that you cannot get rid of all of the PC and end up supporting both.
> 
> ...



Reasons why Enterprise use Windows? Simple really, mass deployment and system/software management tools with SCCM. User, network and hardware security though Active Directory making life easier to administer thousands of users quickly and easily. Basically MS understands Enterprise, how it works, operates and it's requirements. Apple lacks the breadth of tools and experience to even make a dent in it. It also has the widest software base and compatibly that goes back decades.

IBM prefers in-house tools, even to the point of forcing you to use Lotus Notes and Lotus Symphony, at least when I worked for them. Compared to Office and Outlook they are awful time wasters, which often led to a lot of frustrating calls to tech support to fix something that 'broke' often for no reason. It didn't even handle Office documents properly. More often than not we ended up borrowing client laptops to get things done properly. IBM is notoriously anti-MS and PC for a lot of reasons.


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 23, 2015)

martti said:


> RustyTheGeek said:
> 
> 
> > That's all great *martti*, thanks for the great info about some good phone camera apps. But I fail to see how Apple should get credit for understanding photography based on those points. It sounds like it's the 3rd party apps that impressed you and those apps are available for android and other phones as well. Having a camera in a phone and a phone being multi-functional is pretty standard and it was standard before Apple even started making phones.
> ...



I think you are reading more into my comment than it deserves. I'm not saying Apple didn't shake up the smartphone market. And I'm not saying iPhones suck. Far from it! I'm just commenting on the topic of this thread which is that Apple doesn't "understand photography" or is doing anything other than selling a lot of expensive products that happen to contain a camera device because that is what is required to be competitive.

I repeat, Apple definitely made a huge impact on the phone market with their iPhone. At that time, other companies ruled that market. And FWIW, my Blackberry from that time was the best phone I ever owned. Built like a tank and it worked flawlessly for what I needed which as to be productive. (Not play games and watch movies.) But the industry saw the iPhone's success as a sign that they needed to abandon everything else and chase the iPhone which I think was a mistake. Now we have a gillion products that are essentially the same. What I wouldn't give for a decent physical key phone again that hasn't become a niche product. Oh well!


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 23, 2015)

takesome1 said:


> At the workplace we use an IT company, the owner of the IT company has always told us if we switched to Apple he wouldn't service us. We all agree that is probably because we wouldn't need service.
> 
> But, what you posted is spoken like every IT guy I have met. From experience much of what you say is not based in what I have found to be actual fact. I have both systems, at home everything is MAC. At work it is windows. The system at home is just as sophisticated as what I have at work, simple to set up and in the last 7 years I have never once had to contact support. The Mac's I started with are still running, I have never had to replace one machine. Contrast that with work my Dell laptops I am on my second and it is failing. There is a reason to go with PC's, and that is software. From what I have found none of the other reasons you gave matter, after 25 years of listening to IT guys eventually you figure out the truth.



Comparing what you do at home with Enterprise IT is not a valid comparison. There is so much more to IT than the individual PC or the software. More than I can explain here.

The reason your IT Service won't support Macs is because Apple doesn't support Macs. It's hard to support something when the vendor won't provide the tools necessary to make it feasible. The Apple KB resources are pathetic. Their response time is pathetic. Often they won't even acknowledge a problem exists or simply say that the problem isn't a problem. For Apple, even simple problems are PR issues instead of technical issues. It's very frustrating. So IT folks don't want to mess with it because it's not profitable and it makes the service provider look bad.


----------



## Chuck Alaimo (Oct 23, 2015)

unfocused said:


> Chuck Alaimo said:
> 
> 
> > I think to a certain extent your mistaking existence resistance to WiFi with the priority of wifi. When I think of absolute needs in a camera body wifi isn't one of them. Nice to have, but, I can think of many other things that are a higher priority.
> ...



The flaw in this line of logic is assuming wifi cameras would save that segment of the market, which I highly doubt it would. It's again the factor of ease. One device that does it all vs having to carry 2 devices. I just don't see the addition of wifi breaking that trend, unless, you go full on and have your point and shoot be your phone, which would be awkward. That's your mass market, and I really have a hard time seeing this go down any differently, because unless they turned P&S cameras into phones with full browser and app capabilities then it goes back to 2 devices vs 1 device, 2 data plans vs 1 data plan (let's be real, wifi is nice but to do what a phone does it needs 4G coverage too).

And back to the dead horse, then you get into DSLR's. And, for entry level wifi makes sense. But as you scale up the ladder into the pro/semi - pro segment wifi is a neat add on that's largely un-necessary unless you are in a niche that needs instant access. That's where you end up in priority land. Improved IQ at base ISO or wifi? Better af or wifi? Battery life or wifi? Improved high ISO performance or wifi? Dual card slots or wifi? DR or wifi? FPS or wifi? Built in flash RT or wifi

Now with that said, some kind of nice for semi/pro gear would be great. I'd love to have it be easier to sync the time on my cameras. But, even if Canon did that, what if my second shooter is on a nikon? Back to manual sync.


----------



## chauncey (Oct 23, 2015)

> we all just have to agree to disagree.


NOooo...lets just get the torches and pitchforks. ;D


----------



## takesome1 (Oct 23, 2015)

RustyTheGeek said:


> takesome1 said:
> 
> 
> > At the workplace we use an IT company, the owner of the IT company has always told us if we switched to Apple he wouldn't service us. We all agree that is probably because we wouldn't need service.
> ...



What I have at home is comparable for a small business, seven machines all synced and operating together.
You are right, it would be unprofitable. In 7 years I had to take one machine in for service. It reminds me of the old maytag repairman commercials.
For large business I agree there would be no comparison.


----------



## neuroanatomist (Oct 23, 2015)

takesome1 said:


> But, what you posted is spoken like every IT guy I have met. From experience much of what you say is not based in what I have found to be actual fact. I have both systems, at home everything is MAC. At work it is windows. The system at home is just as sophisticated as what I have at work, simple to set up and in the last 7 years I have never once had to contact support. The Mac's I started with are still running, I have never had to replace one machine. Contrast that with work my Dell laptops I am on my second and it is failing. There is a reason to go with PC's, and that is software. From what I have found none of the other reasons you gave matter, after 25 years of listening to IT guys eventually you figure out the truth.



+1

My previous company, I had 9 computers over a 10 year period - 8 PC laptops for the first 7 years (2 end of life, 6 died), and one Mac for the last 3 years, still going strong when I left last year. 

But for some applications, e.g. Spotfire for data visualization, there's no Mac version so I need to run a VM. My current work Mac is as powerful as the higher-end corporate laptops, much smaller/lighter, and I feel sorry for all my colleagues always hunting for a place to plug in as I cruise along with 8-9 house of battery life.


----------



## martti (Oct 23, 2015)

RustyTheGeek said:


> martti said:
> 
> 
> > RustyTheGeek said:
> ...


----------



## takesome1 (Oct 23, 2015)

neuroanatomist said:


> takesome1 said:
> 
> 
> > But, what you posted is spoken like every IT guy I have met. From experience much of what you say is not based in what I have found to be actual fact. I have both systems, at home everything is MAC. At work it is windows. The system at home is just as sophisticated as what I have at work, simple to set up and in the last 7 years I have never once had to contact support. The Mac's I started with are still running, I have never had to replace one machine. Contrast that with work my Dell laptops I am on my second and it is failing. There is a reason to go with PC's, and that is software. From what I have found none of the other reasons you gave matter, after 25 years of listening to IT guys eventually you figure out the truth.
> ...



Like the movie "Bettlejuice" I just said (or typed) the word IT one to many times today. I just now wasted 20 minutes of my life dealing with the IT guys about an issue with my PC at work. Unlike fishing where it is said you gain time to your life while you are doing it, I am pretty sure I not only lost that 20 minutes but may even die sooner because of the stress of dealing with IT.


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 23, 2015)

neuroanatomist said:


> takesome1 said:
> 
> 
> > But, what you posted is spoken like every IT guy I have met. From experience much of what you say is not based in what I have found to be actual fact. I have both systems, at home everything is MAC. At work it is windows. The system at home is just as sophisticated as what I have at work, simple to set up and in the last 7 years I have never once had to contact support. The Mac's I started with are still running, I have never had to replace one machine. Contrast that with work my Dell laptops I am on my second and it is failing. There is a reason to go with PC's, and that is software. From what I have found none of the other reasons you gave matter, after 25 years of listening to IT guys eventually you figure out the truth.
> ...



I'm sorry but a small office 9 computer environment or a home environment with a few networked computers is NOT an Enterprise environment. It's no wonder you think Macs are sufficient. And Macs are literally the exact same Intel CPU, memory, chipsets, etc as a PC so the Mac is NOT more powerful. That is simply your perception. Most all _quality_ laptops (usually enterprise level) for the last 2-3 years have exceptional performance, battery life and reliability... actually better than a Mac laptop. In fact, they are probably all made in the same factories in China.

I'm not saying PCs, Windows or current Enterprise solutions are perfect. Far from it. I'm just saying that Apple and Macs are in a totally different universe and they are not a good fit to sweep in and replace current Enterprise IT solutions. PCs are not perfect but neither are Macs. Macs suffer from many of the same problems as PCs. I've supported both. I didn't see that much of an overall difference after a given period of time. Except that people that used Macs tended to ignore and forgive the problems more with their beloved Macs and complain quicker with their cursed PCs. It's mostly a perception issue. And I have several clients that switched back to PCs after they felt like their Apple experience was a waste of their time and money. I'm not making this up.


----------



## Don Haines (Oct 23, 2015)

RustyTheGeek said:


> neuroanatomist said:
> 
> 
> > takesome1 said:
> ...



We have about 400 laptops.... average age about 3 or 4 years old.... about 99 percent PC... very few ever die, they just get obsolete and replaced. Batteries are a different thing, they only last about 5 years....

We have about 600 PCs and perhaps 20 Macs. They all run until they are obsolete.... very few ever die. With the exception of fans wearing out, very few hardware problems. I just tossed a trio of 30 year old 8086's that were still functional... I still have a WORKING TRS-80....


----------



## takesome1 (Oct 23, 2015)

RustyTheGeek said:


> And Macs are literally the exact same Intel CPU, memory, chipsets, etc as a PC so the Mac is NOT more powerful. That is simply your perception. Most all _quality_ laptops (usually enterprise level) for the last 2-3 years have exceptional performance, battery life and reliability... actually better than a Mac laptop. In fact, they are probably all made in the same factories in China.



This statement is off. While PC's may have the same chipset, they may also have cheaper or better. They are not the same. The Dell laptop at work is crap IMO, and it is a workhorse that we paid over $3K for. It had all the good hardware with it as well. I have a very low opinion of Dell that comes from years of experience using them. PC manufactures are not all equal, even with the high end models.


----------



## neuroanatomist (Oct 23, 2015)

RustyTheGeek said:


> neuroanatomist said:
> 
> 
> > My previous company, I had 9 computers over a 10 year period - 8 PC laptops for the first 7 years (2 end of life, 6 died), and one Mac for the last 3 years, still going strong when I left last year.
> ...



Small office 9 computer environment? LOL. My previous company is a Fortune 100 global company with 75,000 employees and a $150B market cap. Hopefully you'd agree that's an Enterprise environment. I was part of a pilot group of Mac users there, the pilot was deemed a success and more Macs are being deployed. My current company has 135,000 employees globally and a $225B market cap (even more Enterprise, right?) and on my first day I was offered a choice between PC and Mac. The stock Macs have more RAM than the Enterprise PC builds, many corporate laptops have HDDs vs. the stock SSDs in a Macs, etc. 

Sometimes it's the little things - I held an offsite meeting for my department last week in Germany, nice hotel on the Rhine but limited power outlets in the meeting room, which meant power cords snaking everywhere in a very EH&S non-compliant manner. Unsurprisingly, two of those power cords were tripped over, mine and one of my PC-using team members. The MagSafe plug on my Mac's power cord pulled easily free as designed, and I plugged it back in at the next break. My team member's PC laptop was pulled off the table by its standard plug connection, cracking the case and the display. On its way off the table it knocked over her water glass, which spilled into the keyboard of the person next to her. My Mac laptop cost the company more than one PC laptop...but far less than four of them.


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 23, 2015)

takesome1 said:


> RustyTheGeek said:
> 
> 
> > And Macs are literally the exact same Intel CPU, memory, chipsets, etc as a PC so the Mac is NOT more powerful. That is simply your perception. Most all _quality_ laptops (usually enterprise level) for the last 2-3 years have exceptional performance, battery life and reliability... actually better than a Mac laptop. In fact, they are probably all made in the same factories in China.
> ...



Not all laptops are equal, PC or Mac. Some makes/models are better, some are not. There are hundreds of variations every year of multiple makes/models. Every vendor has good years and bad years depending on a multitude of factors, not the least of which is Intel's ups and downs.

My statement didn't address the obvious variables that any product in any market faces. I simply said that the hardware is essentially the same and so the performance is essentially the same between Mac and PC. Each vendor can either improve or diminish the end product design as they see fit resulting in a good or bad review. I'm sorry your DELL is an expensive lemon for you but there are millions of other PC based laptops that provide solid and reliable service for millions of users all over the globe.

And I might add that some of that success is due to the talented IT dept that set it up correctly in the first place. Or, unfortunately, the reverse can be true as well. Any good system can also be compromised by poor IT staff. There are several key factors to the equation, it's not just the hardware.


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 24, 2015)

neuroanatomist said:


> RustyTheGeek said:
> 
> 
> > neuroanatomist said:
> ...



Well, first let me say that there was no way for me to interpret that you work in such a large enterprise environment from your post. Yes, the environment you just described is obviously an Enterprise environment. What part of the IT dept do you work in?

Second, the hardware/feature configuration (SSDs, hard drive, display, etc) is determined by the buyer. All enterprise laptops have had SSD options available for years. Apple doesn't have any kind of advantage on that.

Please keep in mind that when I refer to Enterprise IT, I'm not just talking about buying laptops or desktop computers. That is a small part of the bigger picture. Buying mac laptops doesn't affect the infrastructure that much. It's simply another host on the network.

And FWIW, I have always considered the "MagSafe" power connection a great innovation. And some PC vendors have adopted it on a few models as well. IMO, I think it should be on everything. But Apple seems to have adopted it first. So I suspect that part of the reason it hasn't happened on PC laptops very quickly is due to the fact that it would cost too much to 1) pay royalties to Apple or 2) defend all the lawsuits Apple would file for stealing their MagSafe power connection idea. They tend to do that a lot you know.


----------



## neuroanatomist (Oct 24, 2015)

RustyTheGeek said:


> What part of the IT dept do you work in?



With all due respect to my IT colleagues and the necessary jobs they do...I think I'd shoot myself first.


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 24, 2015)

Here is something else to consider...

For Enterprise, compare a broken/damaged Mac laptop with a Thinkpad.

The Thinkpad is built to mil-spec durability standards. You can pour coffee on the keyboard and keep typing while it drains through to the bottom. If you break something on it, it can be disassembled in a few minutes by a trained IT staffer and repaired within the hour if the parts are on hand. (I changed a broken screen on a T420 in about 20 minutes for a client.) Everything is accessible and replaceable.

Contrast that with a mac. Nothing can be upgraded or repaired on a mac, not even the battery. It can't be opened easily and opening it will void its warranty and there are no parts available anyway. Even if repair is possible it will have to be sent off for however long it takes.

How does a mac benefit Enterprise if Apple's answer for repair is to just buy another one? What happens to the configuration? Software? Data? What is the ROI when a broken mac gets replaced several times due to a sales rep that travels 200+ days a year? Thinkpads are built to handle that type of abuse. I'm sorry but macs are not. Please don't tell me that they are.


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 24, 2015)

neuroanatomist said:


> RustyTheGeek said:
> 
> 
> > What part of the IT dept do you work in?
> ...



I often wonder how Tax Accountants feel. How could anyone be a tax accountant !?! (_Or Wedding Photographers_ !!) Then I realize that they probably feel the same way about IT guys.


----------



## neuroanatomist (Oct 24, 2015)

RustyTheGeek said:


> neuroanatomist said:
> 
> 
> > RustyTheGeek said:
> ...



I think if I were a tax accountant, a bullet would not suffice. I'd delve into nuclear physics as a hobby so I could devise a way to blow myself to component atoms.


----------



## Don Haines (Oct 24, 2015)

A large number of our computers at work are lab computers. Personally, I have built up about 300 of them.... The reasons why they are not apple are:

1) Rackmount. game over!
2) Space for a couple of DSP cards..... GAME OVER!
3) heavy duty power supply to power DSP cards....
4) space inside chassis to mount extra components....
5) several 120mm fans for cooling....
6) hot swappable hard drives....
7) RAID arrays
8 ) Some machines require dual high end video cards for GPU processing.....
9) multiple gigabit (or 10G) interfaces
10) custom and/or specialized hardware
11 ) some are data loggers..... and I defy you to fit 8 4TB hard drives into your MacBook Air.....

and with the exception of replacing a few fans and a couple dozen hard drives, NONE of the machines I have built have failed. Because of the RAID arrays, no hard drive crashes have brought down a machine..... 

So as well as not understanding photography, they do not understand computing. What they do understand is marketing to consumers at the low to middle user range and are woefully inadequate for high end users...


----------



## martti (Oct 24, 2015)

So it was all about who has the biggest computer?


----------



## sanj (Oct 24, 2015)

Don Haines said:


> A large number of our computers at work are lab computers. Personally, I have built up about 300 of them.... The reasons why they are not apple are:
> 
> 1) Rackmount. game over!
> 2) Space for a couple of DSP cards..... GAME OVER!
> ...



All sounds good except for who would ever want to put 8 4 TB HD into a Macbook AIR!! Does not make sense to me.


----------



## StudentOfLight (Oct 24, 2015)

martti said:


> RustyTheGeek said:
> 
> 
> > That's all great *martti*, thanks for the great info about some good phone camera apps. But I fail to see how Apple should get credit for understanding photography based on those points. It sounds like it's the 3rd party apps that impressed you and those apps are available for android and other phones as well. Having a camera in a phone and a phone being multi-functional is pretty standard and it was standard before Apple even started making phones.
> ...


I'm pretty sure that Symbian was around before any Apple iOS devices.


----------



## LDS (Oct 24, 2015)

martti said:


> point and shoot market to the smartphones. Do you actually remember how the Palm devices failed when they tried to accomodate cellular phone in their personal data manager?



Actually the Treo line was quite popular in business in the early 2000s. I got a Handspring (later re-merged into Palm) Treo 270 in 2002 running PalmOS and it was one of the firsts true, real smartphones. Most of my friends/colleagues then didn't like it because 1) It was too large (smaller than any actual 5" phones) 2) Too expensive (comparable to an actual iPhone) 3) It wasn't a Nokia (then the you-must-buy-to-feel-good brand) 4) smartphones weren't fashionable yet because there weren't Facebook, Whatsapp and Youtube.
PalmOS did work well, and it had a very large availability of "apps" - just, it was too early, people didn't want expensive smartphones yet. Mostly business users, which later moved to Blackberry, until Apple became the new fashion.
Palm also make the mistake of making a lot of confusion, first making devices with both PalmOS and Windows Mobile, then introducing a new OS ill named WebOS - killing the app market and making users wonder if it worked only with an Internet connection.


----------



## martti (Oct 24, 2015)

From what I read, Treo was not very reliable. I never had one. For work, in my opinion the PalmV was the best concept ever. I have tried to match its functionality ever since with things like the Nokia 9300 and N81, not succeeding. The French had sabotaged the 9300 with an AZERTY-keyboard which requires that you push 'shift' at the same time as you tap the numbers. Pretty useless for spread sheets and stuff. It needed some German-made plugins to sync with Mac. The Sony-Ericsson touch screen phone was not reliable. I think it was a Symbian with touch-screen extras. The three examples I tried were totally uselesss for somebody who needs to be reachable 24/24.

Whatever, when I got my first iPhone, I realized that the times have changed. Instead of having my music on iPod I had everything on the iPhone. At that time I did not think much of the camera which took a big step forward only in version 4S. The most important point with the iPhone had running for it against the rest was that it was pretty, it was entertaining (games, gizmos) and it had a very high snob factor. People needed PalmV but they _wanted_ the iPhone. The market exploded. Apple had problems delivering enough phones to the consumers and did not know what to do with all the money so they just kept it.

After a negative incident with the local Apple repair shop, I switched to Galaxy. Again, the French had sabotaged the OS with their particular sauces so it had to be flashed (Odin) to a more recent Android. This worked fine, only that the phone thought it was in China...it took a bit of tweaking which I found interesting. There is a community of fanatics who love to share.

The Galaxy did not shine as a camera. Then it started to heat and emptied its battery in a few minutes...well...after warranty expired, of course. I got a Sony and it bricked one week before the warranty expired. Sony is bad with interfaces, also. The camera was clearly inferior to iPhone 4S. After it bricked for the third time after 'repair' I got an HTC which is a solid thing but the camera has a bad problem with highlights.

Which took me back to iPhone again for the fourth time. I could have picked Galaxy 6 as well. From what I've read its camera is better and loading music is not as complicated as it is in the Apple world. My iPhone 6+ probably needs a Jailbreak. Maybe.

What about iPad? No self-respecting expert thought it would sell when it was introduced. I tried to replace my laptop with it but failed. At the time things like printing and loading data were complicated issues. Now I have a friend who navigates his boat with an iPad connected to his autopilot. In health care systems iPads can be connected to patient monitoring. With a little extra gadget I can take my ECG and send it to a specialist for analysis...a nice thing to have if you live somewhere in the country with your coronary disease.

And finally, we have Lightroom for iOS, we have applications for time-lapse photography, for astrophotography, for finding the perfect time and spot for your sunsets and full moons...you have wireless tethering and picture transfer through Wi-Fi and remote control through Bluetooth. There is Eye-Fi...just take your pictures in small .jpg also because the transfer is kind of slow.


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 24, 2015)

Wow *martti*, looks like you've been around the block a few times! Thanks for the detailed account. I salute, appreciate, relate to, sympathize and respect your long path of experience. This is pretty familiar to me as well. I went through a similar experience multiple times with various clients and friends. (I'm usually either the 'paid consultant' or the 'tech-geek buddy expert'.) There are few of these productivity tools I haven't seen at some point. They all had their strong points and problems. Complicated and difficult to get the promised benefits from in one way or another. And add some of the other pieces that you may have missed like making sure the Palm phone device works correctly with various Real Estate apps and services. For quite a while, eSync required the Palm device to sync with another device in order for the realtor to get codes or unlock house key boxes. When that didn't work right, that was fun! (Sort of a mission critical thing for realtors, being able to unlock a house for a potential buyer.)

Add in a little Windows Phone and a lot of Blackberry and we have similar paths. My thing is that I experienced a lot of the same things you did except I thought the iPhone was a very expensive toy in the beginning with the 3G. It lacked almost all of the features of other phones, it cost a lot and when people tried to jailbreak it to get many of the features it lacked, Apple + ATT (with their years long exclusive contract) literally bricked the phones with updates. I was astounded that thousands of buyers tolerated this, actually felt ashamed and went back to the store and bought yet another expensive replacement iPhone instead of rebelling and kissing Apple goodbye by tossing the limited (now bricked) and expensive iPhone in the trash. After all, they just wanted to reclaim functionality that Apple omitted. This is a big reason why I don't buy Apple products. They are not very nice to their customers or the closed ecosystem and app developers that embrace their products. A LOT of iOS app developers lost their shirt when Apple would arbitrarily deny them Apple App Store access (or kick them out with no warning) for literally no reason or explanation. After months of app development on a given app, Apple would put them out of business before they even had a chance. This while other ridiculous FART apps, etc would be on the app store with no problem at all. So honestly, I just didn't want to support that behavior with my dollars.

Besides, I was very happy with my Blackberry. When my wife got the iPhone 4, I watched her for about a year and things seemed to improve with the iPhone and she liked it. Before that, we had both always had the same phone so it was easy to support. So I got an iPhone 4S after my Blackberry finally started giving me trouble (after 3+ years). Wow, what an adjustment. Productivity went down. Email/Messaging went out the window. It became just a read it if I need to but otherwise never use thing. Texting was good as long as I didn't want to attach a picture because iOS still didn't support that. Content consumption was good when I wanted to watch videos, etc which I rarely did/do. Lots of useless game apps was good. Photography was good along with all the app support which was the main reason I decided to try an iPhone. Voice calls were OK but call quality wasn't as good as the Blackberry. I got dropped more.

I was frustrated with a lot of things that Apple simply would not allow to the app developer with iOS. For instance, there was no way to have call alerts anymore if I missed a call. And the iPhone didn't support obscure (sarcasm) media formats like MP3. So all my custom ringtones and music that were in MP3 format were now useless because I didn't want to spend a lot of time converting them to AAC one by one. I also got tired of using the absolutely worst application every made - iTunes - to put files, music or whatever on the phone. Before with the Blackberry (and now Android) all I had to do was connect the Blackberry or just about any other phone to the computer with USB and drag stuff to it like any other external drive. In fact, way after I had moved to Android a couple years later, my wife finally gave up on her iPhone after syncing with iTunes totally wiped her phone of everything and she lost a LOT of important notes, files and other stuff. She was livid. It wasn't the first time I had seen this having supported clients having gone through the same thing with their iPhones. She was amazed at how easy it was to put stuff on her Android phone when she realized iTunes wasn't required anymore.

Most folks that I know or support, after all this time, that either own/use or have moved away from Apple products understand the true nature of Apple's plan. It's about locking you into a closed system that Apple controls for the primary reason of pushing you into buying content and apps from the various Apple stores. The devices are very expensive and Apple makes a LOT of money. Once they see that, regardless if they still use Apple devices, they understand the bigger picture.

I'm not saying Apple devices aren't really pretty, really elegant and don't give a good _experience_ to the user, I'm just saying that I personally think the _experience_ is too expensive and limiting for what Apple charges.

With Apple, it's not just the device, it's the _whole experience_. That's what most people don't understand.


----------



## neuroanatomist (Oct 24, 2015)

Blackberries are great...for jam and fruit tarts. Although my current company of 135K employees offers a choice of Mac or PC for a laptop, the only mobile phone they issue is the current iPhone model.


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 24, 2015)

neuroanatomist said:


> Blackberries are great...for jam and fruit tarts. Although my current company of 135K employees offers a choice of Mac or PC for a laptop, the only mobile phone they issue is the current iPhone model.



I'm not up on current Enterprise phone preferences and policies. In general, Enterprise IT gravitates toward what is easiest to support for a larger user base and protects the company's assets. For years iPhones were not only incompatible but they were insecure and Apple even got busted for lying about the security they did support. That is now in the past and I can only assume that Apple is a better player and so has gained more acceptance. In addition, the BYOD movement has taken its toll on Enterprise IT and they have caved to a certain degree to reduce the battles they have to fight.

Blackberry was a solid, reliable and secure platform built from the ground up to support Enterprise and enhance productivity and provide real data security that was ahead of its time. It was hard to see it lose market share.


----------



## martti (Oct 25, 2015)

*Re: The one thing Apple understands is territory*

*Rusty the Geek:* _With Apple, it's not just the device, it's the whole experience. That's what most people don't understand._

There is the Jailbreak cat-and-mouse game...I find it totally idiotic from Apple's part. I mean, the customer has already given his money so why be a pain? I jailbroke two iPhones, one because the 'home'-button had ceased to work and with the hack you just moved its function to the shake sensor. This was before I got the scredrivers from iFixit to change the dead battery. The other one I jailbroke because a friend of mine had received an iPhone as a gift but locked. There was no other way he could use it. What a trouble with the Apple accounts...At that time I was already with Android, the one who thought it was in China. 

The most infuriating thing is that you have all the software and hardware there and firmware between the two to make everything work smoothly and seamlessly but you have the territorialim there to sabotage the simplest and most logical solutions. All the phone manufacturers want to put their sauces and dressings on the totally functional Android OS, they make you sign in to accounts and make you remember passwords. Apple is the worst, no question about it. The people behind the monster they call iTunes should have something bad happening to them.

I had my son put all my CD:s in my iTunes library once. I could not get them on my new iPhone until I reinitialized the phone. There was no way. I even tried with a hack app but no. After having an Android with an extra memory card this was a totally unexpected 'user experience'.

I sort of expected that once Steve Jobs (may he rest in peace) was out of Apple, they'd start cutting open the Gordion's knots he was so fond of. This was the expectation I had when I got the iPhone 6+. Unjustified, as it is starting to look. What surprises me is that they do allow Deezer and Spotify on the phone even though they have their own Apple Music that they are pushing down our throats with monkey's rage.

Knowing that the latest Samsung's camera is better than the one on iPhone, I still enjoy the ease of both the native camera and the augmented CameraPlus. Probably an Adnroid would have been a more informed choice but –as you rightly pointed out– there is something with Apple that makes their clients forgive stuff that nobody else in the marketplace would ever even try. Well, Samsung...I already have a Samsung microwave, fridge, vacuum cleaner and slate...they are taking over the world. They are pretty darn good with everything they do and totally ruthless with their methods of acquiring information. I find them scary.


----------



## martti (Oct 25, 2015)

*Re: The one thing Apple understands is seduction*

*Rusty the Geek*:_ Blackberry was a solid, reliable and secure platform built from the ground up to support Enterprise and enhance productivity and provide real data security that was ahead of its time. It was hard to see it lose market share._

The big mistake BB and Nokia both made was not understanding that people want colorful amusing toys to play with. Play games, watch videos, listen to music, chat with your friends. If it just so happens that this gizmo can also adapted to emails, has a .pdf reader and converter, an app to read and modify worksheets and texts and add scanned documents and photos to messages, well there you have it. BB and Nokia were ants whereas iPhone was the cricket with a fiddle and a load of tricks in his hat.


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 25, 2015)

Thanks for the input *martti*! Good points! 

And Android isn't perfect by any means either. Lately, Android has been irritating me with their cursed "Google Play Services has stopped" problem on a phone I'm trying to set up and move over to. Very frustrating! :


----------



## martti (Oct 26, 2015)

*Re: The one thing Apple understands is money*

My GooglePlay gear crankers are:
"This application is not available in your area" and
"This application is not compatible with any of your devices",
Usually you get around by logging in directly on the developer's site or some other site where you can get the .apk file which is not blocked. Or you can use a VPN. 
Certainly iTunes Shop can also do this: "Your iTunes login is for the French iTunes store. This application is not available in France" and there you have no workaround. Or maybe you can create an Apple ID using a VPN with a server in the US. With Apple I haven't tried it yet as I am struggling with my IP to have any connection at all.

Right now I do not know whose connection it is I am using as I lost the DSL and the 3G. 
Cloud services are not for this particular country, that's for sure.


----------



## Hillsilly (Oct 27, 2015)

*Re: The one thing Apple understands is seduction*



RustyTheGeek said:


> And the iPhone didn't support obscure (sarcasm) media formats like MP3. So all my custom ringtones and music that were in MP3 format were now useless because I didn't want to spend a lot of time converting them to AAC one by one. I also got tired of using the absolutely worst application every made - iTunes - to put files, music or whatever on the phone.



So true! I remember when my niece got an iPod and she asked me to put some songs on it. I spent ages trying to drag / copy and paste files onto it before learning that you just can't do that sort of stuff. My initial itunes experience wasn't very favourable. And while I know how it works now, I still can't warm to the cumbersomeness of it all.

Besides, all of my CDs are saved as FLAC files. Apple doesn't support that format, so I don't support Apple.


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 27, 2015)

*Re: The one thing Apple understands is seduction*



Hillsilly said:


> Besides, *all of my CDs are saved as FLAC files*. Apple doesn't support that format, so I don't support Apple.



Ah... another audiophile! Good ole lossless FLAC. Yeah, baby, it's all about the quality! Sort of the RAW file for music, eh? Over my lifetime (and years with eBay) I've collected thousands of CDs. Some of them were lost over time after being sold so I embarked on a project to rip them all to FLAC in 2004 so I wouldn't lose them when they were sold. Since I'm an IT guy, I had a lot of computers laying around at the time so I set them all up to rip to a server. I could rip about 10+ CDs at a time all to FLAC + CD info + album art from the Internet. With Media Monkey I could easily convert FLAC to MP3 at any bitrate I liked plus catalog and database them all too. The project grew as I even borrowed CDs from friends and planned on having a huge database that everyone could (secretly) access over the web together via FTP. I thought I had it all figured out.

Until I later discovered over about a 6 month period that I couldn't connect to an iPod consistently with Media Monkey for more than a few days/weeks before it stopped working. Ugh, more time invested in working the problem only to find out that Apple actively broke/sabotaged/poisoned/blocked/etc any attempts for other music software to connect to the iPod. Every time Apple broke it, Media Monkey had to reverse engineer the problem and issue an update. That could take weeks. So I suspended the project due to other time demands (growing kids, work) and disgust. I honestly didn't want to use other music players and most of my friends didn't either so I just decided to wait and see if things improved over the years. The project was technically a success but could never be easily utilized with an iPod in a simple way because of Apple. Someday I'll consider resurrecting the project I guess when time permits. Online streaming is now making it a bit moot except for the high quality aspect which is why I started it in the first place.

In the end, that project illustrated quite well how, yet again, Apple was all about making money in a closed system they controlled with an iron fist, not serving their customer base.

Oddly, another thing Apple doesn't understand is people's love of their music collection. Instead, Apple understands how to make seductive proprietary player devices that only consume music content easily that they sell. Don't you know that they HATE online competition like Spotify, Pandora, Songza, NetFlix, et al? And I wonder what part of the motivation was for them? Hmm?


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 27, 2015)

*OK, I just noticed that some of you changed your subject line! Priceless! I think the word 'seduction' is very appropriate!*


----------



## Hillsilly (Oct 27, 2015)

I'll have to check out MediaMonkey.

I've got some catching up to do - I've only got about 800 CDs. Currently the files are on a NAS which I access via Volumio on a Raspberry Pi (with a nice little DAC attached). Or Foobar if I'm in a PC mood. I wouldn't call myself an audiophile as I'm too much into DIY speakers, amp, preamp etc. Although it sounds good to me.


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 27, 2015)

Hillsilly said:


> I'll have to check out MediaMonkey.
> 
> I've got some catching up to do - I've only got about 800 CDs. Currently the files are on a NAS which I access via Volumio on a Raspberry Pi (with a nice little DAC attached). Or Foobar if I'm in a PC mood. I wouldn't call myself an audiophile as I'm too much into DIY speakers, amp, preamp etc. Although it sounds good to me.



I've built speakers since I was 16. Still have the 3-Way 6 1/2 towers I built in my main living area. All my friends from that time got a pair of speakers at some point. Some still have theirs as well. Having it all sound good to you is the key and why many folks build their own speakers. Just because a speaker costs a fortune and was built in China doesn't mean it sounds good or is a good investment. And buying speakers is a lot less fun!


----------



## Ian_of_glos (Oct 27, 2015)

Hillsilly said:


> I'll have to check out MediaMonkey.
> 
> I've got some catching up to do - I've only got about 800 CDs. Currently the files are on a NAS which I access via Volumio on a Raspberry Pi (with a nice little DAC attached). Or Foobar if I'm in a PC mood. I wouldn't call myself an audiophile as I'm too much into DIY speakers, amp, preamp etc. Although it sounds good to me.


This is interesting, and I wonder if you would be able to answer my question.
Is there any real advantage to converting your CD collection to FLAC files and storing them on a NAS - other than the obvious space savings of course? Converting CDs has always seemed like a very time consuming process and I can't see why it would be better than simply playing the CDs.


----------



## Hillsilly (Oct 27, 2015)

It's mostly convenience. You can play any song that you want, whenever you want. You can also create playlists, view lyrics etc. Its also easy to convert to other formats, such as MP3s for mp3 players, car stereos etc. There is also the benefit of having a backup, so you don't get too upset if you scratch a CD, lose one or if they get stolen.

But it does take a few minutes per CD to do.


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 27, 2015)

Ian_of_glos said:


> Hillsilly said:
> 
> 
> > I'll have to check out MediaMonkey.
> ...



1st - FLAC doesn't save space, it is a lossless format. It's like RAW image files with all the advantages they offer - avoiding the loss of data that contributes to more full and rich sound.

Ripping CDs can be some work and time consuming depending on how it is done. I set up a system where it was mostly automated so I could just feed discs as they ejected and let everything happen automagically. That took a bit of trial and error and work up front but was well worth it over the long haul.

The big advantage to ripping the CDs is having instant access to them, being able to put a huge selection of music on portable devices, being able to share them easily and having a full backup if the CDs are damaged, lost, stolen or sold. And as time moves forward and we all get older, I think we tend to downsize and the chore of moving, tending and storing all those CDs (and DVD/Blu-Rays) will eventually require getting rid of all that physical stuff.

I'm a bit of a pack rat and I am trying to slowly de-clutter. It's a slow and difficult process sometimes. So much stuff is still useful but I don't really NEED it so I'm trying to move it on to somewhere/someone that can use it.


----------



## cayenne (Oct 27, 2015)

RustyTheGeek said:


> 1st - FLAC doesn't save space, it is a lossless format. It's like RAW image files with all the advantages they offer - avoiding the loss of data that contributes to more full and rich sound.



Well, a FLAC file, while being lossless....*IS* about half the size of the original WAV file you rip it from (or from CD).

cayenne


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 27, 2015)

cayenne said:


> RustyTheGeek said:
> 
> 
> > 1st - FLAC doesn't save space, it is a lossless format. It's like RAW image files with all the advantages they offer - avoiding the loss of data that contributes to more full and rich sound.
> ...



You might be right, it's been a while. Thanks.


----------



## martti (Oct 28, 2015)

*Re: The one thing Apple understands is sales*

*Rusty the Geek:* _Instead, Apple understands how to make seductive proprietary player devices that only consume music content easily that they sell. Don't you know that they HATE online competition like Spotify, Pandora, Songza, NetFlix, et al? And I wonder what part of the motivation was for them? Hmm?_

The long answer is here: http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2015/10/27Apple-Reports-Record-Fourth-Quarter-Results.html

*A resumé:* _October 27, 2015 — Apple® today announced financial results for its fiscal 2015 fourth quarter ended September 26, 2015. The Company posted quarterly revenue of $51.5 billion and quarterly net profit of $11.1 billion, or $1.96 per diluted share. These results compare to revenue of $42.1 billion and net profit of $8.5 billion, or $1.42 per diluted share, in the year-ago quarter. Gross margin was 39.9 percent compared to 38 percent in the year-ago quarter. International sales accounted for 62 percent of the quarter’s revenue._


----------



## Ian_of_glos (Oct 29, 2015)

Hillsilly said:


> It's mostly convenience. You can play any song that you want, whenever you want. You can also create playlists, view lyrics etc. Its also easy to convert to other formats, such as MP3s for mp3 players, car stereos etc. There is also the benefit of having a backup, so you don't get too upset if you scratch a CD, lose one or if they get stolen.
> 
> But it does take a few minutes per CD to do.



Thank you for your reply. 
I still don't really understand why it is more convenient - how can it be easier than taking a CD off the shelf and loading it into the CD player? To me this is the biggest advantage of CDs - they are physical items that you can see and touch, not a file buried in some complicated computer file store.
The point about having a backup is interesting, but as second hand CDs are so inexpensive now I usually just replace any that are damaged or lost.


----------



## LDS (Oct 29, 2015)

RustyTheGeek said:


> having a full backup if the CDs are damaged, lost, stolen or *sold*



Sorry, if you sell them you have to delete all the backups also... or it's a copyright violation. There could be copyright issues even in they are lost or stolen...


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 29, 2015)

LDS said:


> RustyTheGeek said:
> 
> 
> > having a full backup if the CDs are damaged, lost, stolen or *sold*
> ...



Yeah, there is that. : Although in all honesty, I think you are mistaking computer software license agreements with music copyrights. Court cases from the 70's established that personal copies of copyrighted content are legal. I don't recall the rulings stating that the copies must be destroyed if the originals go away. But that is definitely true for most computer software agreements.


----------



## cayenne (Oct 29, 2015)

Ian_of_glos said:


> Thank you for your reply.
> I still don't really understand why it is more convenient - how can it be easier than taking a CD off the shelf and loading it into the CD player? To me this is the biggest advantage of CDs - they are physical items that you can see and touch, not a file buried in some complicated computer file store.
> The point about having a backup is interesting, but as second hand CDs are so inexpensive now I usually just replace any that are damaged or lost.



I generally buy CDs...and rip them to flac immediately and put the CD on the shelf for storage.

I keep the higher fidelity FLAC files on my media computer in the living room, for the "good" stereo...tube amps, Klipsch K-Horn speakers...etc. I like to play from my media computer, makes making playlists easy, etc.

Also with the files coming from a computer, you can avoid some wow/flutter type problems you might have with a cheaper cd player...and with my computer set up, I can set up my own high end DAC before it hits the amps. (That's actually a project I'm working on)...

I also make lower quality mp3's for my portable players...for the gym or car which are some of the worst listening environments on the earth, even if using pretty high end headphones. 

and as for selling and "having to erase" for copyright. I guess I'm old school. I don't buy anything that I'd ever sell again. I guess I'm more of an old school guy in that to me, music isn't disposable.....that might be the reason I don't find much modern music to be worth buying, but that's another thread entirely.



cayenne


----------



## neuroanatomist (Oct 29, 2015)

Ian_of_glos said:


> I still don't really understand why it is more convenient - how can it be easier than taking a CD off the shelf and loading it into the CD player? To me this is the biggest advantage of CDs - they are physical items that you can see and touch, not a file buried in some complicated computer file store.



What's so hard about finding files?







CDs on a shelf are, by definition, on that shelf. Music on my computer is on my phone and tablet and, if I choose, in the cloud. In other words, it's where I am, wherever I am. Hard to listen to that CD on a shelf in Boston when I'm on a train in Switzerland.


----------



## RustyTheGeek (Oct 29, 2015)

cayenne said:


> Ian_of_glos said:
> 
> 
> > Thank you for your reply.
> ...



*cayenne*, someday you and I are going to have to meet.... (very similar interests, etc... old school for sure!). Seriously.


----------

