A review of the Sony RX100 VII

 

The Sony RX100 Mark VII is an exceptional camera that combines powerful features with compact portability. Its 1-inch Exmor RS CMOS sensor and Zeiss Vario-Sonnar T* lens deliver stunning image quality, capturing details and colors with remarkable clarity. The camera's autofocus system is incredibly fast and accurate, making it ideal for capturing fast-moving subjects or shooting in challenging conditions.

One of the standout features of the RX100 Mark VII is its impressive burst shooting capabilities. With up to 20 frames per second continuous shooting speed, you can easily capture fleeting moments and choose the perfect shot later. The advanced tracking autofocus ensures your subjects stay sharp, even when they're in motion.

The camera also excels in video recording, offering 4K UHD and super slow-motion capabilities. The built-in microphone captures clear audio, and the ability to shoot in high frame rates adds a dynamic element to your videos.

In terms of usability, the RX100 Mark VII features a tilting touchscreen and a pop-up electronic viewfinder, providing flexibility in composing your shots. The menu system is intuitive, and the camera offers customizable controls, allowing you to tailor it to your shooting style.

While the RX100 Mark VII is an exceptional camera, it does come at a premium price. However, if you're a serious enthusiast or professional photographer who values both portability and image quality, this camera is definitely worth considering.

Overall, the Sony RX100 Mark VII combines impressive image quality, advanced autofocus capabilities, and versatile shooting options in a compact package. It's a top choice for those seeking a high-performance camera that can fit in their pocket.

The incoming storm

Black and white photography can be a great way to capture the dramatic essence of an incoming storm. By removing color distractions, it emphasizes the contrast, textures, and mood of the scene. When photographing a storm in black and white, look for strong shapes, striking cloud formations, and play with light and shadow to create a powerful composition. Experiment with different exposure settings and post-processing techniques to enhance the drama and convey the storm's intensity in your photographs. Stay safe while capturing those captivating moments!

Final Cut Pro For the iPad Pro

Final Cut Pro (FCP) is a renowned video editing software developed by Apple Inc. Known for its professional-grade capabilities, FCP has long been a favorite among filmmakers and video editors. While traditionally available only on macOS, Apple has introduced a significant expansion by bringing Final Cut Pro to the iPad, revolutionizing the editing experience for mobile users.

The introduction of Final Cut Pro for the iPad opens up a new world of possibilities for video editors on the go. The iPad’s powerful hardware and touch interface combine seamlessly with Final Cut Pro’s robust feature set, allowing users to create high-quality videos with unparalleled convenience.

One of the key advantages of FCP for the iPad is its familiar user interface. Apple has adapted the software to optimize its functionality on the iPad’s touch screen, ensuring a smooth and intuitive editing experience. Users can take advantage of the iPad’s multi-touch gestures and the Apple Pencil to precisely control their edits, making the process more interactive and engaging.

Despite being a mobile version, Final Cut Pro for the iPad retains most of the features found in its macOS counterpart. Users can access advanced editing tools like multi-camera editing, magnetic timeline, and extensive audio editing capabilities. The software supports a wide range of video formats, including high-resolution and HDR content, ensuring compatibility with professional workflows.

Additionally, Final Cut Pro for the iPad leverages the iPad’s powerful hardware, allowing for real-time playback and rendering of complex video projects. The software takes full advantage of the iPad’s A-series chips and Neural Engine, resulting in impressive performance and responsiveness. This capability eliminates the need for users to transfer projects to a computer for rendering, further streamlining the editing process.

Furthermore, Final Cut Pro for the iPad offers seamless integration with other Apple devices and services. Projects can be easily synced across devices using iCloud, enabling users to continue their work on different platforms seamlessly. Users can also leverage the iPad’s built-in camera to shoot, import, and edit footage directly within Final Cut Pro, enhancing the overall efficiency of the editing workflow.

While Final Cut Pro for the iPad brings a host of benefits, it’s important to note that it might not replace the desktop version entirely. The iPad version may not provide the same level of processing power and screen real estate as a dedicated computer setup, limiting its suitability for complex and resource-intensive projects. Nonetheless, it offers a highly capable and portable editing solution for a wide range of video editing needs.

In conclusion, Final Cut Pro’s expansion to the iPad is a significant development for video editors and content creators. By combining the power and portability of the iPad with Final Cut Pro’s professional-grade editing tools, Apple has opened up new avenues for on-the-go editing. Whether editing on location, during travel, or simply desiring a more flexible editing experience, Final Cut Pro for the iPad empowers users to unleash their creativity with convenience and efficiency.

Leica Q2 Monochrom at night

The camera can essentially see at night.  The above shot is taken at ISO 6400.  It’s a 15 second exposure shot about half an hour after sunset.  Shot at ISO 6400, f5.6, 15 second exposure.  You can see the Canadian government buildings on the left with the Ottawa river in front.  In the middle is downtown Ottawa and on the right is the Museum of Canadian History.  I was out for maybe an hour with the Leica Q2 Monochrom.  I know I took a few shots at f16, about a 74 second exposure.  I want to see if I get the starbursts from the lights in the buildings and the lights on the ground.

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YouTube

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My problems with ADD and ADHD

 

I seriously need to take control of my ADD and ADHD.  My mind is just all over the place.  I just can’t keep concentrating on anything for more than a couple of seconds.  I have so many ideas, so many options.  For example, I’m typing this on my Dell XPS 17” 9700 laptop.  I keep wishing I had brought by 2022 iPad Pro 12.9” instead.  But if I brought in the iPad, I’d wish I brought in the Windows 11 laptop.  I can’t win either way.  I use both of the devices for very different things but they’re all the same.  I could do everything on my laptop and I could do everything on my iPad.  The thing is, is that I have both of them.  I wish I had just one device so I could do everything just on that one device.  I could be using Adobe Lightroom Classic on my laptop along with Davinci Resolve to edit my videos.

Last fall, I purchased the Leica Q2 Monochrom.  Fantastic camera.  Amazing piece of equipment.  It’s the only camera I use.  Yet I still have two Canon G7X Mark III’s at home along with a Sony RX100 Mark VII.  I could use these for video as well.  But I have a Sony FDR AX700 B at home for 4K video.  I have way too many options.  I think when I start doing the nomad life just living in my life, I will just use one camera for the video and one camera for the photos.  I think I’ll be using the Leica for just the photography and the Sony FDR AX700B for video.  I’m going to have to learn how to use Affinity Photo ver. 2 on the iPad Pro and I’ll have to keep learning and using Lumafusion for video editing.

I keep using the iPad Pro for 99.9999% of the work that I do.  Lumafusion and Davinci Resolve both run on the iPad Pro like a dream along with Affinity Photo ver. 2.  The problem with the iPad Pro is it’s only 12.9” large and it isn’t 4K.  My Dell XPS 9700 has a 17” 4K monitor and it’s amazingly gorgeous.  The problem with the iPad is the lousy operating system and the lack of Final Cut Pro on the machine.  Multitasking on the iPad Pro is also a bit problematic.  It’s not true or real multitasking.  If Apple just ported the real Mac operating system onto the iPad, it’d be a fantastic device.

What the iPad line is missing a real operating system and some more pro apps such as Final Cut Pro.  The Apple office suite seems to need more of an update as well.  Since I’m going to be the nomad / living out of my car thing, I can only have so many devices with me.  All I really want is one photo camera, one camcorder and one device to edit all these things on. 

The benefits of a laptop is true multitasking, storage and the versatility of a laptop.  The downsides of a laptop, especially my Dell, is the portability and storage along with power consumption.  I could sit in a coffee shop for hours on end but I don’t want to be doing that.

The benefits of an iPad Pro is the size and weight.  I barely notice it while carrying the iPad Pro around with me.  Another benefit is the Apple ecosystem.  I have several Apple devices including the iPhone, the Apple watch and the iPad Pro.  I also have 2 Toshiba T5 SSD hard drives which are small and light. They’re both 2TB in storage size.

All of this info to summarize is I want to move out west to Calgary and do the landscape photography full time.  I sell quite a few photographs on the various stock agencies a month but you cannot sustain any lifestyle on the amount of photos I sell.  I thought of selling prints but I don’t know how many people buy photography anymore.  I just need multiple sources of passive income to sustain a photography career.  YouTube is difficult to do.  Currently I have 47 subscribers.  I would need a few thousand to get any real income from that.  I use Fine Art America to sell prints but those are far few and in between. 

I have to make my photography career work.  Photography is my passion.  People say follow your passion and the money will come.  I wish the money would come a little bit faster.  So here is a simple synopsis of my ADHD and ADD.  An article all over the place.  Like my wandering mind.

Huge changes are coming

At the end of March, this will be my new home for a couple of months.  I figure from April 1st to sometime in November, I will be living in my 2023 Jeep Wrangler Sport.  I’ll putting the two back seats down and basically be sleeping in the back of the vehicle.  I foresee a few obstacles that I will run into.  First will be finding a place to park over night while I sleep.  Second obstacle will be finding a place where I can go do my business at night.  I am 47 now and I need to go empty out the bladder multiple times a night.  Sometimes number 2 decides it wants to come out as well.  I’ll still be working for the government department until at least March 12, 2024.  Until then I want to start a content creation/editing business whether it’s photo or video.

I’ve been shooting photos and video for over 10 years now professionally as a side hustle.  I’m actually really bored with my regular day job.  It’s boring and the job is full of red tape.  I can’t even go to the bathroom without asking my manager.  It’s at least getting to that point.  I’ve been with the feds in some form or another since 2001 or so.  22 years.  In that time, I’ve been married, single and dating.  I’ve been single since May 2022 and at this point I just want to be alone.  With the current state of the world and society, there is absolutely no point in me trying to find a girlfriend.  I am just enjoying my time and being by myself.

Considering I’ll be living in a Jeep which has limited space so I’ll be using coffee shops to edit photos and videos in.  I have two options that I can edit on.  My Dell XPS 9700 laptop with a 17” 4K monitor or my 2022 Apple iPad Pro with the 12.9” screen.  For software, I’ll be using Affinity Photo ver. 2 and and/or Adobe Photoshop.  For video, it’ll be Luma-Touches LumaFusion.  Absolutely love that program.  

I’ll be doing a video later on today because 

Time for a change

So, I bought this Jeep Wrangler last weekend.  I am really sick of paying rent to some conglomerate company who doesn’t give a shit about me.  I want to do the nomad life in Ottawa here and I want to go places.  Plus I want to pay off some debt and paying $1,300 a month for rent is just nuts.  Plus you have hydro and internet to pay as well.

I have my 2022 Apple iPad Pro which has cellular capabilities along with my Apple iPhone 13 Pro Max.  I really want to start living the minimal lifestyle.  Just my cameras and my laptop and iPad.  

I’ll have to figure out where to park for the nights and if I’ll have to get hotel rooms for when it’s -40 degrees Celsius.  And of course where am I going to shower.  I’m figuring I’ll find a 24 hour gym with showers.  Actually go to the gym in the mornings before work.  Do a light work out and then shower.  

The next couple of months will be interesting for sure. I’ll be doing a lot more videos and posting them on my YouTube channel as well.

Time for a total change

The last 7-8 years, I’ve had a deep, constant feeling that I need a change.  A life change.  I’ve been doing the regular 9-5 job since finishing school.  It just doesn’t feel right anymore and has felt completely wrong for at least the last 7-8 years.  It just feels like a need to get out of the apartment.  Get out of the cubicle.  I don’t feel free at all.  Just living the daily grind.  Going through the motions.  When I started in the I.T. field I thought I would be in a better paying job doing something completely different.

I absolutely love photography.  I love shooting photos and video.  I love editing the photos and the videos.  I miss being in the mountains.  I miss seeing the stunning lakes in the Canadian Rockies.  I miss the fresh air of the mountains.  I miss seeing the snow capped Rockies.

What really impacted me the most was my trip in 2016 to Arizona and Utah and of course me working in Calgary back in 2017 for 4 months.  I feel like I just can’t do the office job anymore.  I’m 47, turning 48 in 7 months.  I don’t want to finish living my life this way.  I don’t want to work in an office for the next 20 years wasting my life away..

This is all it takes

 

This is all it takes for me to get out of a funk.  Just go do some photography.  Get out into nature with my camera and go for a walk.  It’s January 16, 2023 and I am moving to Calgary in two and a half months.  The apartment is taken care of.  I just have to find a job out there and I’ll be ok.

I belong to a few photography groups and I’m in love with all the photography from the Canadian Rockies or the western United States.  If I had a choice, I’d choose to live in the mountains or the desert.  I cannot stand living the Ottawa valley anymore.  All we have are the Gatineau Hills which are a majestic joke.  Don’t get me wrong, they’re beautiful in the fall and winter but they don’t compare to the Rockies.  I am excited to go out west.  Just need a job out there and all will be good.

This stupid funk

I honestly have to get myself out of this funk that I’ve been in for the last seven months.  I have been so emotionally damaged since May of this year.  I’ve never had my heart broken like this before.  I have my good days but those are really rare.  I get up every morning and go to work.  I come home to an empty place and you h do nothing.  I try and go do some photography after work but it’s dark half an hour after I leave work.  Winters absolutely suck in Canada.  You have really short days and long nights.  The days are cold and the nights are even colder.  My heart is just charcoal.  It’s essentially dead.  Every date I’ve had was essentially a disaster.  The women online that I meet through the dating sites are total and complete unreliable flakes.

The only things that keep me going now are just 2 or 3 friends that I hang out with regularly, my job and my photography.  I have to find a side gig to pay off my crippling debt that the ex girlfriend left me with.  I now have to pay for the whole rent for the apartment.  I have to pay for all my food.  Internet, phone, car insurance, hydro, rent.  All on me.  I get that I’m an adult and I don’t want to be a parasite on someone, let alone society.  I just feel very alone and isolated.  The thing I miss the most is coming home to someone and going to bed alone.  

In the spring of 2023, I’ll be moving myself to Calgary, Alberta.  I just can’t stay here in Ottawa anymore.  I’m just done.  I’m so bored with the city, with everything.  I’m just going to find a room in a house somewhere and pay my $600 a month.  I literally have no one to rely on.  Just myself.  I know I’m not the only one in this situation.  And I know most people have it worse than myself.

I think, from now on, I’m going to spend the rest of my life alone.  That is quite sad to say at the age of 47.  But the way things are going right now with society, with women who want to act like and be men, it’s just not worth dating anymore.  All you have is miserable single mothers who have unbelievably high standards that for most guys are unattainable.  95% of women now go after the 1% of guys who make $100,000, are over 6 feet tall and whatever else.  I hope things change in the coming months.  I’m 47.  I don’t go to clubs, bars.  I spend the majority of my time alone.  

I need to change my location.  I need to change me.  I need to be in the mountains.  I was there in 2017 for 4 months and I was happy.  Driving and seeing the mountains.  Walking in the mountains and breathing the fresh air.  Taking pictures and videos.  That was the best time of my life.  I have to recapture that.

Alberta here I come

 

I'm sitting here at the Tim Horton's on Lancaster Road in Ottawa.  I just finished keywording and naming pictures that I shot from last winter.  Yup, last winter.  The last 10 or so months have been an emotional hell for me.  I was basically physiologically screwed up by my ex.  It's not easy to admit and it's embarrassing to say and admit.  It basically took me six months to basically get back to being myself and being alright with myself again.  

I don't blame my ex as I should have seen the red flags and I should have bailed years ago but I wanted the relationship to work.  I basically didn't want to give up but I should have.  I actually never should have come back to Ottawa back in 2017 when I was in Calgary for 4 months for work.  But it is what it is.  I've learned from another mistake in my life.  

I think another mistake is staying in Ottawa.  April 1, 2023, I will be going to Calgary.  I am 100% sure of this move.  I just miss the mountains, the fresh air, the lakes in the mountains.  Doing photography in the mountains.  I've been single for 6 months and 1 day as of today.  Will I date again?  Possibly.  In Ottawa?  Probably not.  Right now, I just want to focus on me, my photography and my photography business.

Winter is coming up awfully quickly here in Ottawa.  You can smell and feel it in the air.  I'm going to have to find a part time job here in Ottawa for the winter months.  Just something part time in the evenings and weekends.  I'm going to have to squeeze in photography as well.  And look for a job out west.  I don't know how long I can last at DFO for.  Rumor is we're getting our crappy CS4 back.  He hates us and the team hates him.  

This weekend and/or week I want to actually upload pictures to my other website so I can actually start selling them at reasonable prices.  No more of this micro stock agency shit where you get literally 10 cents on the dollar for a high quality, high mega pixel stock photo.  The return on investment is ludicrious.  I could teach photography as well on a one on one basis but it's hard to get your name out there.  Especially now with people having a camera in their pocket 24/7.  

So this afternoon and evening, I will be learning how to setup a Squarespace website.  Hopefully, I'll learn enough to configure at least most of it.  Tomorrow, configure my website and this week look for a job out in Calgary and temp evening job here in Ottawa for the winter.

It’s time for a huge change

I’m staying with my current employer until March 31, 2023.  After that I’m done.  Moving to Calgary.  I just have to.  Everything in my being is telling me I have to move.  For my own sanity, I have to move.  I’ve been in Ottawa for 39 years.  That’s way too long.  I was in Calgary for 4 months back in 2017.  I fell in love with the nature, the ability to be outdoors, in the mountains within 45 minutes.  I just can’t be in the Ottawa valley anymore. There’s nothing more that I can photograph here in Ottawa.  I have the parliament, some of the museum buildings, some other architecture but that’s about it.  I just miss the mountains, the fresh mountain air, the silence, just being alone in the wilderness.  I really miss it.

Back at work after a vacation and surgery

I’m back at work finally for good.  I worked one day in the last two weeks due to weeks worth of vacation and then I had surgery to fix a hernia.  Did a lot of photography but not as much as I wanted.  I fixed up my website as well.  

This was the first time I actually had side effects from some of the meds.  Gonna feel like crap for a few more days I think.  

It’s been 5 months now since the ex decided to pull her shit and I’m pretty much back to normal.  I don’t want to date anymore.  It’s just not worth it.  The women out there now lack the feminine qualities I’m looking for.  I really don’t want to talk about it anymore.  I want to focus on my photography, my career and myself.  I’ve been single 2 of the last 25 or so years so it’s time to concentrate on myself.  I want to work and pay off my debt over the next couple of months.

The above picture is of the waterfalls in Almonte, ON - Canada.  I have this coming Friday off so I think I’ll go to Almonte or Algonquin Park and take pictures of the Fall colours.  

What a vacation

So I got my Leica Q2 Monochrome last week and I’ve been playing around with it for the last couple of days.  It’s a completely different system than what I am used to.  The menu system is very simple and not overly complex.  The simplicity is actually making the camera a little harder to use because you don’t have as many options.  I’ve had a few photos accepted onto Shutterstock.  Yes, I’m back to uploading to Shutterstock for a little bit just to see how things go.

On a side note, I’ve been dealing with a somewhat crazy ex.  She sent her new boyfriend with a couple of his friends to my apartment and threatened to do me harm.  Emails were sent to leave me alone or the police will be called along with her employer.  Everything seems to have stopped for now.  Time will tell.  

Now it’s just time to focus on my photography and myself.  I’ve been single for 5 months to the day now.  I’m getting much better emotionally.  With what happened yesterday, I’m choosing to be very single and not chase the opposite sex.  I’m watching a lot of YouTube videos now and I’m seeing society pretty much crumble.  I wish I had the money to buy one of those class b camper vans and just go live in one of those in the woods so I don’t really have to deal with people.  I’d love to just drive around and do photography.  Post stuff online and stay away from people.