Thursday, May 17, 2007

Blogrolling

Chaoyangmen as taken a couple of weeks back:
Chaoyangmen
Click to view the full image. Panorama created with ArcSoft Panorama Maker 4, by far the best software I've found so far.

The blogroll in the left column has finally been updated to reflect most of my Google Reader content.

The Criteo blogroll to the left is currently underwhelming me with the content that it's providing. As I wrote a few posts back, this tracks which blogs readers of this blog also read, though it can only track blogs with the criteo tracker installed. It's going to take more time and more people to install this for anything useful to come of it and it seems that people are being put off too soon to really see any benefit. I'm going to give it 6 months and see what happens.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Biscuit. Would be good if you have the time if you could give me a quick summary of why you chose the SLR you did. Sounds tedious I know but i'm working on the Sony Alpha and would be interested to know if you looked at any alpha models and why you decided on Canon.
Hurrumph

Unknown said...

Hi Mark, of the three competitors (Sony alpha A100, Nikon D80 and Canon 400D) I spent quite a bit of time reading about them online before choosing to go with the Canon.

One of the main places which persuaded me that I should get the Canon was this review site: http://www.digitalreview.ca/cams
/A100vsD80vsXTi.shtml
It seemed that though the Canon had a few disadvantages over the Sony (especially the built in image-stabilisation) if I were to buy the Canon and not go for the kit lens but a more expensive lens (with IS) then I would make up for most of the advantages that Sony could offer.

I spoke with several people who had the Canon 350D or 400D and they were all very happy with them. I met nobody with the Sony and so only had the web reviews to go on. I have to admit that also as a brand name for cameras, Canon and Nikon simply stand out more for me than Sony.

Having decided pretty much that I would go for the Canon I realised that I have a friend who works for the company and would be able to advise me where to go to get a good deal and good quality.

In the end when I went into the shop and played with the camera and the various lenses I was immediately attracted to the feel and ease of use of the Canon. I spent another week after playing with the camera, reading reviews and speaking with people before deciding to go for it. I have to admit that the Sony wasn't particularly on the cards at any time. The functions, build quality, lens options, price, brand status and personal guarantee all took me towards the Canon.

I hope that's useful but if you would like to know anything more specific then please ask.

All the best,

Jon

Anonymous said...

Thanks very much biscuit. You're bang on with the issues I've got. Mainly price and heritage of brand in camera market. They bought out Minolta or someone similar but that link has kind of got lost.
Very interesting to read your comments though and have enjoyed looking at your superior quality photos. The waterfall one's are awesome. I get given quite a lot of SLR mags, I'll keep hold of them for you as i'm sure you'll want to read all thier hints and tips.
Off to Budapest this weekend for Drew's stag do. Nice.

Anonymous said...

Jonathan,

I'm sorry to hear that you're not impressed with the AutoRoll results at this time, but I can assure you that the quality and quantity of the blogs will improve as more and more people install the widget and stick with it.

Thanks for your patience!

Brandon Watts
Criteo Evangelist

Benjamin said...

Smart picture, J.