Today I am exploring Zenfolio a bit more than I have in the past. Seems to me a much better solution than Flickr; I can upload larger original file sizes AND have greater access control of my images. It just may fulfill my requirements, but I have yet to thoroughly test it. I can say though that Flickr and Zooomr are a bust for me…they may be easy to use and all, but just don’t have quite the control over my photos that I want to maintain.

Anyone have any comments or experience with Zenfolio they would like to share?

update: came across this excellent point of view, Zenfolio Online Photo Sharing Review. I may be up very, very late tonight.

Today Brandon and I worked from home. I was actually able to take a break for lunch so we decided to try the sushi in restaurant vs take-out. Brandon was happy to see that they put Salmon Nigiri (as well as other nigiri) on the menu. For $8.95 you get 8 pieces of nigiri—- a huge amount. The presentation was great, including the wasabi dab on top, and the food was fresh. The actual piece of salmon was smaller than we get at other restaurants. But, that is how you get so many pieces for that price. I think it was a nice blend of quality and quantity. The miso soup is fantastic—very hearty—if that makes sense for miso. I loved that the wasbi was put right on the soy sauce dish making it very easy to season your sauce. The wasabi was delicious, potent yet manageable.

Overall, I’m thrilled that we have sushi in Forest Grove. I hope it’s a big success. Thank you to The Kim’s for bringing sushi to our town.

Anyway, today Apple has yet again demonstrated how superior customer service works. Today, Aperture 2 was released and I since I have been waiting for this day for months now I wanted to order it immediately. I also had a $100 store credit to use (iPhone rebate), but realized I didn’t have all the store credit info I needed to use it. A quick search on Google pointed me to Apple’s iPhone store credit page where I found an email address. Immediately after sending the email I received an automated response saying that they received my message and I would hear back from them in 48-72 hours. Lovely…the canned delay. However, I was pleasantly surprised when not even 30 minutes later I received a phone call (on my iPhone) from Apple who promptly gave me all the info I needed to use my store credit. Wow…awesome!

If you are someone that merely post your photos online or print small sizes (8x10), then a 3.1 megapixel camera is likely to be just fine…from a pixel perspective. However, just because I never print billboard size photos doesn’t mean I don’t want the best digital camera on the market. And no, not because I can then take small portions of the photo and still print large (as the author points out), but because something even more important to me: the keeper ratio.

What in the world is the keeper ratio? I currently have a Canon 5D and I love it. However, some of my best photos were taken by older cameras like the D30 or 10D. BUT since getting the 5D the percentage of photos that are worthy of keeping have greatly increased (keeper ratio)...not due to megapixels, but due to camera capabilities. Noticed I said capabilities, not features. While going from a consumer to prosumer camera gives you more megapixels, the best thing for me was its ability to awesome photos even if I wasn’t a perfect photographer. I’d notice the same type of jump moving to a pro camera body as well (I’ve used the Canon 1Ds Mark II on a few occasions and was amazed by the photos I got).

So while it’s true that a pro photographer can capture stunning images with nearly any camera…for amateurs like me I’ll take all the help I can from the tools…after all on the rare occasions that I actually get to shoot I want to come back with as many keepers as possible.

Why did I replace my Rancilio Silvia and Rocky Combo?

Typically when someone gets obsessed about something, they learn everything they can, explore, and set higher and higher goals/standards. This happens to me a lot on many different topics, the last being espresso. Without going into painful details, I was ready to arm myself with superior espresso gear on the quest for the God shot.

What I love about my new setup

Below is just a quick list of key features I love about my new setup.

 
• Double boiler
 
• Temperature consistency and control
 
• Pressure control
 
• Grind less clumpy
 
• Far less mess from grinder and espresso machine
 
• Drink making process is much faster
 
• Can whip out drinks as fast as one can (little to no wait time)
 
• The steam is extremely powerful and dry
 
• Both grinder and espresso machine much quieter than past machines
 
• Huge water reservoir and drip tray
 
• Warming tray for cups really works well
 
• and of course, much better output (espresso and milk-based drinks)

Well now that I just wasted a whole minute of your time, please go back to your regularly scheduled program.

Once I get everything dialed in I will try to recruit a camera person to do a more detailed video. Plus, I will post the unboxing video shortly as well.

Types of content I post to the world:

• Semi-pro photos (a gallery), that I share and potentially sell
• Daily photos of our son, Bryce
• A blog that covers my interests: photography, food/wine/espresso (sustenance), and technology
• Videos of Bryce and my other interests (eventually some training on those interests)

Our current site is back to cramming everything together (read: How We Got Here for more background) though I have not yet really posted any semi-pro photos, nor have I done a whole lot with videos yet. Someday I will take the time to port over the years with of content that I have posted previously.

The one topic (and the point of this post) I have not yet reconciled is where to host the content, specifically photos. Due to the size of videos I am convinced that hosting them on a social network site like YouTube or Vimeo is best…and for me that means Vimeo due to its superior quality (I can post HD videos). In addition, blog content makes sense to keep within your blog software (Blogger, WordPress, etc.) or Content Management System (CMS), again I am using ExpressionEngine for this site. However, those pesky little photos are another story.

Currently I am hosting all of our photos within my own site (ExpressionEngine), again mainly for full control. However, the idea of embedding them in my site from a social network like Flickr does intrigue me a great deal. I hope this post will generate some online discussion with folks like Ken who has tried both ways. Let’s take at my initial attempt at some pros and cons. Hopefully this list will grow as some discussions occur.

Pros of Leveraging a Social Network site (like Flickr):

• Photos will get more exposure (though Ken states otherwise in his post, Migrating off Flickr (partially))
• Add metadata to photos only once in software (I use Aperture, but many similar products available)
• Ability to reuse same photos (and metadata) for multiple sites
• Allow people (in my case family and friends) to order prints themselves instead of printing myself and then sending to people
• Provides an additional backup if the multiple backups that I have at home get destroyed

Cons of Leveraging a Social Network site (like Flickr):

• No control over photo sizes (I would have to slightly change the design of this site to allow for larger photos)
• Seems like photos on social network sites are more likely to be used without permission. I do not have scientific proof of this, but I read about more instances of photos being “stolen” from Flickr than personal web sites.
• When viewers want to see a larger version they are taken away from my own site
• Viewers may choose to track my social network presence rather than my web site which sort of defeats the purpose of having a site in the first place.

These photos aren’t great, but I’m racing to get everything setup over lunch so I can have play time tonight! Again, will post more shortly.