If you browse around online much, you might have seen people talking about HDR photos, or seen beautiful or weird looking photos that had HDR in the title. If you don’t know about HDR photos or are interested in them, keep reading. If you already know, move on because this will be a brief and simple introduction.

HDR stands for High Dynamic Range, which basically means more dynamic range than we have seen in the past. This is not to be confused with HD (high definition) or more pixels. Dynamic range is the title given to the ‘light levels’ of something a human is capable of seeing. A real world example would be a picture of a sunset. When the human eye looks at the sun for long enough, it hurts your eyes and burn your retinas. When a picture is viewed of the same sunset, no harm can be done since the light levels (dynamic range) are not the same, they are mimicked. Dynamic range can be defined as the ratio between the lightest and darkest element in a scene.

So the potential dynamic range of a piece of paper is nowhere near the real world, which is why pictures look like pictures and nature pictures rarely do the real thing justice. This, combined with technology limitations, is why your camera has to choose what to display when shooting a scene with a large range of lighting - think inside a dark house with a bright window

http://www.cybergrain.com/tech/hdr/

HDR photos now attempt to get closer to the real world by displaying a higher dynamic range. Here are a few examples:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/lynchburgvirginia/407618927/

http://www.cre-aid.nl/2006/06/13/hdr-high- dynamic-range-workshop/

http://bighugelabs.com/flickr/onblack.php?id=455448365&size=Large

You can see that the photos have great color detail, and if you haven’t seen photos like this before they might almost look unreal. When I first saw pictures like this, the longer I looked at them the more they looked real.

Currently, HDR photos have to be produced with software, either from a few different exposures or using a RAW image format. Since there is no standard, the software can change a photo with varying degrees, some realistic and some ridiculous. I would classify the photo below on borderline unrealistic.

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/177/477846714_d4572dad6f_o.jpg

Search online and I am sure you will find most HDR pix are a bit overboard. If you want to read more, here are a few good links that I used:

More in depth articles
http://www.cybergrain.com/tech/hdr/
http://tutorialblog.org/hdr-tutorials-roundup/

How to create a HDR photo
http://www.backingwinds.blogspot.com/2006/10/how-to-create-professional-hdr-images.html

Just when I was starting to knock Google’s track record of innovation they roll out GrandCentral. While it isn’t truly a Google “innovation” what they will be doing with it sure is innovative. I’m not a user of it - yet, but it sounds like an awesome idea and I’m very excited about getting into the application.

If you never heard of GrandCentral, it’s a phone aggregator…. in a nutshell it will allow all your phones and voicemails to be managed under 1 account.

Here are just a few of the features I’m excited about:

• One number, rings everything
• Let people call you from a Web pageClick2call from your keyboard
• Call Record. Yep… record your calls… this will be fun to see the lawyers debate
• Voicemail notifications via SMS
• Mobile Access, similar to the iPhone visual voicemail

I can just hear the telecos whining about this latest invention by Google. But why are they doing this, I’m only guessing at this point but let’s follow the money for some clues.

• Phone based ads using AdWords
• Click to Call, perfect for tracking AdWords conversions over the phone
• Planting the seeds for the Google Phone
• Searchable Voicemail

OK, I’ve drank the juice and I haven’t even used this yet. I encourage you to visit the site and sign-up as well.

We’ve had a bit of discussion in the office recently regarding Steve Balmer’s threatening letter to Yahoo! and MS’s potential acquisition of it.

Balmer makes several strong points in his letter. One, that the current state of the economy today makes the offer even better than it was several months ago. And two, that the board of directors may be potentially ignoring their share holder base and the best monetary outcome for it. After clarifying MS’s position, Balmer said that MS would be forced to go directly to the share holders if Yahoo! didn’t re-consider their offer and start a path of negotiations.

This can be looked at from a couple different points of view. On the one hand, this is a very Microsoft “strong arm” type of move — trying to take what MS thinks is theirs, regardless of the potential obstacles that might lie in the way. On the other hand, MS makes a few good points. A large majority of expert analysis suggested in January that Microsoft’s 62% premium offer over Yahoo!’s stock price was a good deal for share holders. And while many holders may believe in getting the best deal they can, they also don’t want to potentially throw a deal away all together.

Still, what is most interesting about this battle is the publicity of it. Both sides are using the press to their full advantage. Making hostile bids and equally hostile rebuttals. In my opinion it seems that the PR battle occurring on both sides could potentially harm both the perceived outcome of a deal by the public as well as the employees of both companies. Yahoo! and MS have very different cultures and the last thing a sustained group of Yahoo! employees will want is the feeling of being overtaken forcefully by a hostile company.

It seems unlikely that MS won’t get their way at some point. However, the question remains that even if MS is capable of forcing Yahoo! into a buyout, will governments both here in the U.S. and abroad allow it to happen? This process is definitely still in the early stages, but man what firefight it’s been so far.

On July 7, 2007, Asus announced the Eee PC, an ultra-portable, ultra small Linux powered laptop. The Eee PC has been a success, spawning fan and mod sites like Eee User. It’s been especially interesting to Linux fans like myself, and the Linux community has been quick to adopt the device. It’s received raved reviews.

And I want one.

My gut told me to hold off. I didn’t want a first generation device. Even with the great reviews I’ve heard on podcasts and the like I didn’t buy. Now it appears I’ve been rewarded as Asus has announced a new version for later this year with a bigger screen and greater performance. Perhaps when the new version is released I’ll buy. But we all know another, better version will out be soon after.

That’s the catch-22 with all up and coming technology. Waiting is no fun. Once you finally buy your new device (a laptop, an iPhone, a computer processor) the price eventually drops and new sexier models are released. It’s the way it is and the way it will always be. Such is the burden of being interested and enjoying new technology.