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Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Import your pictures,friends to Google+ from Facebook

By now I am sure you must have heard of Google+ social network by Google. If you are a part of the this awesome social network and are finding it boring with your friends and gang online. You know it's time to migrate your digital flock to the playing ground. Any social network is fun only when you have friends and like minded people to hang out with.

Facebook is the most popular  social network for now. Most people active online on a social network are on Facebook. If you are like me you will have many friends and acquaintanceship over time part of your list. Facebook does not make it easy to export your list so that you can join another network. Here is how you can do it.

First take a backup of all your pictures uploaded by you and photos tagged by your friends on Facebook.
For this we will use PICK&ZIP app. Visit http://www.picknzip.com/  use the "Login with Facebook" button and take a backup of your pictures.


Next you need a Yahoo account Email/Flicker/another yahoo service. Login you your Yahoo id and password.  Goto Contacts select import contacts from facebook. When that is done, choose to Export.
This file will be used to import contact to Google+.




Once the contacts are imported you can drag and drop them to the various 'Circles' you want to. It is possible that many are still not on Google+. To tackle this I have a Circle called "Invi" a catch all circle to add/invite people to Google+. Select the new contacts from "Find and invite" under Circles.


Now drag and drop them on "invi" or whatever circle you have made to add new people.


Click on the Big Green that says Invite (number of people) to Google+. An email with the invite will be sent to them. p.s you could always add or remove people from this list ;). Enjoy

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

How to make HDR (High Dynamic Range) Images the quick and easy way

Often while surfing the Internet, Photo Blogs you come across some stunning landscape. You wish you could also capture photos like that. You do some digging around and come to know that the photo is of  HDR type (High Dynamic Range). You search the Internet for more info.. after few hours your head is full of so much technical jargon. You actually forget what you set out to do. 

It does not have to be this way. Today I will show you a step by step way to make your own HDR images. As always we will preffer to use Open Source tools and programs to do so. The program that we will use today is called Luminance HDR 2.0.2 It works under Windows, Linux and Mac OS.

http://qtpfsgui.sourceforge.net/?cat=5   To get the Source Code or Mac OS version

Download and install the version that fits the version of your O.S We will be using the Qt version on Fedora Linux, all the versions should look the same. Before we go on. Making good HDR images takes time and a lot of patience and experimentation. So enjoy and love the learning process. Now launch Luminance HDR 2.0.2 Click on New HDR Image. The HDR Creation Wizard will open.

Click on Next


Now Click on Load Image, you can choose Jpeg, PNG, GIF and even RAW files 
Select a file and choose Open.








Now change the EV value and Click Next.


Don't make any changes on this screen and Click Finish.


Now the Real experimentation begins, change the value of Mapping and see the change.





































Now Click on Tone Map HDR Image (this will save the HDR image to a LDR format like Jpeg). Tone Mapping uses complex math algo to give it the HDR look. At this stage we have to select the size of the Image. You can keep the original size and re-size it. The bigger the size more time and CPU power is needed to make the HDR.Play around with the Operator Drop Down menu. See how the samples are rendered. Click of any one and Use Save As.
















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A Sample HDR Image that I made.This was a quick how to on how to create a HDR image using one file (jpeg/Raw). Remember it's all about the experimentation. Good luck

Tuesday, July 5, 2011

How do I add my friends to Google+ Circles

Hot Google+ tip if your friends have not received the invite that you have sent them. There is a simple way select the circle in which they are, click view stream for this circle .. post something... you will get a prompt that emails will be sent to friends who are not on board yet. Select OK... Enjoy



P.s -- few people are still complaining that they have not been added/invited.
Well the service is still a select group of early adopters Beta. Wait your time will come :) 


Few friends have been asking me what is the big deal with this Google+ is it not just a clone of Facebook... NO it is not I have been maintaining a internal SPAM controlling list of 187 apps that keeps growing every few days.Just to maintain some sort of sanity and control over the things that I see in my feeds. Some days there has been so much "white noise". I even have to revert to blocking my wall.

Few would say oh those were spam bots/worms. Right I agree but it is sheer incompetence if you keep reporting the bot/worm for 3-5 days while it creates havoc in the meantime and nothing is done. 

Google also had such issues in the past at Orkut, but over there at least the mods were able to stop the bot/worm in a day after reporting. Even the anti virus companies have been supportive and forthcoming. FB has not done any such thing. In fact the over active "Auto bug" at FB ended up deleting and banning tens of thousands of genuine app users and developers.

Sneak Peek into Google+

Google+,Circles, Sparks, facebook killer, social network, huddle, VP8 codec, cloud computing, sneak peek, Google+ screenshot, Google+ on Linux, hangouts

Tech bloggers are going crazy all over the world with Google+
By far what I have seen and used is GOOD.
Being super lazy and just sharing a few screen shots .... have a look :D


The system auto detects if software/add-on are missing to make full use of Google+ 


Correct detection of OS and bit type. 


Cute indeed :P :D 


Better privacy options and settings with Google+ makes me a happy end user




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