Random Comments/Stream of Consciousness Thread

[herbertwest]

We have two postmen here (one for letters, one for packages), but i never see them. I guess that it's easier in the countryside... but thanks for the advice.

[thegreattim]

On three of the skins (Vbulletin default, Take Five 4.0.8, and Take Five Alpha ) the banner is designed to fit the screen of the viewer, the wider your screen, (higher your resolution), the more of the scenery you see left and right.
The other 5 skins have a non-fluid image placed in the upper left. One of the skins-Folio Green, has an entirely different image.

Ah, that makes sense (as I have a tiny monitor on my tablet)! Thanks for the information.

[Yeah Sure Whatever]

My postman does my headin!

He lives notes when he shouldnt (he doesnt always ring the bell... so when my girlfriend is at home, the evening we see that there is a paper saying that we have to go to the post office the day after, from 5pm to collect it...) AND he doesnt leave a not when he should. Sometimes live items on top of the mailbox, in the hall where anybody could pick it up... or like last thursday, he leave the package to strangers.
I have a note to collect it from the post office, with a number on the back. I called the number a few times, the mobile is always off. I do not know who it is, but i think that it's the company on the ground floor. But still : he SHOULDNT DO THAT.

He gives it to stranger, but then, he doesnt want to give it to my girlfriend if her name is not on the package too. Same : the post office doesnt want to give it to her if her name is not on it, or if i didnt sign to allow her to collect it (with my ID).

Well, it's a pain.

Oh , and i am sure that the package whose note have a number is the french proof that i cant wait to recieve. (111€). I should have recieved long ago, but there was a bank holiday on a thursday (so friday off), bla bla bla....

Thats bullshit

[WeDealInLead]

My mailman will most times leave a notice saying 'no answer'. I'm home, you jerk, I have a buzzer and I'll be down in 19 seconds.

[Mr. Rabbit Trick]

and I'll be down in 19 seconds.

You have too many stairs

[Mr. Rabbit Trick]

Who saw the Simpsons last night?

Montgomery Burns had an idea he got from a Stephen King novel. To cover Springfield with a dome. Brilliant.

[thegreattim]

Meta-Simpsons is Meta

[Ricky]

Who saw the Simpsons last night?

Montgomery Burns had an idea he got from a Stephen King novel. To cover Springfield with a dome. Brilliant.

Was this before or after Springfield was actually covered with a dome?

[thegreattim]

Was this before or after Springfield was actually covered with a dome?

After

[Patrick]

That's awesome!

[thegreattim]

Hey, does anyone know any threads with suggestions on how to take decent photographs of your books? I want to start a collection thread, but all my photos are either flashed out by the Brodart on the dustjacket or too dark and grainy when I turn off the flash. I tried a couple of searches but did not see anything relevant. I'm working with a relatively cheap Cannon PowerShot SD790.

Thanks in advance.

[biomieg]

Place the book on a neutral background and make sure that 1) the book doesn't fill the whole field-of-view of your camera when you take a pic and 2) the flash glare ends up somewhere around the book and not on the book itself (this probably sounds awkward but you can guess what I mean, I think - English is not my first language and I don't know how to explain it any better ). The point is that the flash will still generate enough ambient light to get a sharp picture of the book even though you don't focus directly on the book.

Upload the picture to your computer and crop it to get rid of the part of the pic that contains the glare. That's it! I do this with all my pics and they look like this:

[Randall Flagg]

I started a How To: Photograph your books thread in the Collecting Tutorials thread. Feel free to post tips there. Thanks.

[ELazansky]

With direct flash from a point and shoot, you always run the risk of having a flash dot on the picture. Biomieg makes a good point of stepping out a little bit to get that flash dot to be outside the books, then you can zoom and crop on your PC to get rid of it. For me, I bounce my flash to the right so I don't get the flash glare. Then I zoom and crop.

[thegreattim]

Bio & Eric: Thanks so much for the tips! I appreciate them. I'll have to go experiment soon.
Flagg: Cool! Even better yet! I like it. Thanks.

[Randall Flagg]

Light Box photo (no flash):

[Ricky]

Can anyone that has a Blu-Ray player tell me how it truly differs from DVD in terms of quality?

[Randall Flagg]

2 Million pixels Vs. 307,000. Standard DVD is 640 pixels x 480 Pixels. A High definition broadcast -and High def DVD is 1920 pixels x 1080 pixels. There are other factors like 1080P (all 1080 lines refreshed 30 times per second vs. 1080I -every other line refreshed 60 times per second).

[e_taylor]

Brice - you need to clear out some of your private messages!

[Tito_Villa]

Ricky Blu-Ray is sooooo much better, i was very skeptical untill i first saw HD!

[haunted.lunchbox]

Can anyone that has a Blu-Ray player tell me how it truly differs from DVD in terms of quality?

Blu-Ray is better quality, but for most movies it isn't worth it so I still buy regular. Take for example a movie we all know, The Shawshank Redemption. I'm sure they offer a Blu-Ray version, but I would settle for my DVD version because it's significantly cheaper and it could improve the quality to the point where you can actually notice imperfections. Many movies out there don't have the effects or the type of shooting needed for it to be Blu-Ray.

[Patrick]

Happy Thanksgiving, U.S. collectors!

[Randall Flagg]

Beer and turkey-perfect combination.

[Ari_Racing]

Happy Thanksgiving!! Very nice holiday that I wish we had.

[wizardsrainbow]

Very nice day yesterday. As we are a vegetarian household, we had two pans of stuffed shells, "greek" potatoes, home-made applesauce, green beans, carrots with pecans, wine, apple pie, pumpkin pie, and ice cream. Then we all exploded.