Roseblade Photography Blog

I’ve been looking forward to the release of CS5 for some time now. One of the new features I wanted to try out was the new painting engine in Photoshop. This new tool allows you to easily blend colour like never before. This ‘painting’ was created from a photo and done in about half an hour. It’s so easy, download a trial of CS5 and have a go.

I’m not entirely sure what commercial use this tool has for me just yet. For me Painting (a hobby) and Photography (a living) have never really blended together that well. I love both, and I love creating ‘visual art’ in my photography but with so many digital tools at once fingertips these days it’s so easy to ruin a perfectly good photo with filters and airbrushing.

For now I’ll enjoy making art in Photoshop in my spare time but keep the brush well away from the photo paper for now.

This looks like a realistic method for creating next generation interactive 3D gaming. You can check out Microsoft Natal for the xBox 360 on YouTube to see an advert that seems a bit far fetched. I’ve not embedded it here because it’s just too cheesy.

So, everyone has an opinion of Apple, one way or another.

Apparently Apple have changed their rules on what sexual content is permitted in the App Store. There will clearly be people arguing against these rules. Already people are moaning about the inability to install whatever you want onto the iPad. Check out TUAW to read more.

There’s an interesting question here. Do we really know what we want and what is best for us?

At present you can’t just install anything on an iPhone. Would it be better if you could? Is it best for us to be able to ram our computers full of applications, content and viruses. Then complain when they don’t work properly. Does that freedom actually bring us anything constructive?

On the other hand, who has the right to tell me what I can and can’t view?

If we are given complete freedom to flood our senses with unending explicit images, movies, innuendo and profanity, are we better off? Do we even have a right to such material? Do we even really want to view it?

It could be argued that part of Apple’s success has been created through taking an executive decision on what we can and can’t do with our phones and ‘pads’. Maybe they are doing us all a favour by creating genuinely good products that work well in the ways they are intended to at the expense of restricting our capabilities.

Freedom of information – an interesting topic. Comments appreciated.