PhotoShop CS5's Content Aware Fill

Like I took this photo at a wedding and cut someone off because they where outside the frame and I don't know who they are, can you fill them in?

Adobe PhotoShop CS5's Content Aware fill just might.

Random Scifi Idea

I was just thinking the other day how cool it would be to have some photo editing software that would change the season, or time of day a photograph was taken.

So you would for example load in a photograph taken in the summer and then you could change the season to winter. It would adjust the lighting, put snow on flat surfaces, even change the cloths people where wearing in the photograph to make it look like winter.

Also if you took a photo and didn't like the time of day it was taken, it would figure out where the sun is and then change all the lighting and shadows to make it look like a different time of day.

I don't have the time or money to make this software, but if I patent it then maybe my grandkids can sue whoever makes it after I am dead.

Earth Hour

Just a reminder that this Saturday from 8:30pm to 9:30pm is Earth Hour.

Failure Is Always An Option

Adam Savage who you might have seen on Mythbusters gave a talk at Makers Fair about times in his life where he has failed.



[Direct Link]

EVE Online's Dr Eyjolfur Gudmundsson

The BBC of all places did An Interesting Article about Dr Eyjolfur Gudmundsson and the role of economy in EVE Online.

If you didn't know, Dr Gudmundsson was an Academic Economist who joined CCP to help the staff with the in game economy and produce quarterly economic reports.
As the game is player driven, and all items in the game are the result of in-game crafting. So keeping the system fluid and fair is key to keeping EVE a fun place to trade. Hiring an economist seems then like a logical decision, but I know of no other MMO that has one; despite how everybody seems to realise or Write About how important a stable economy is.

And if you are so interested, you can download EVE's 2009 Fourth Quarterly economy report from Here.

During the BBC's video interview, Dr Gudmundsson talks about how pressures in real our world economy could be lessened if like EVE it was transparent and allowed people to make their own choices. But I think Jon Stewart Has Proved That Will Never Happen.

Happy National No Smoking Day

Penny Arcade's The Tester

This is just me trying to get you to watch the Penny Arcade WebTV series so if you already watch it, you don't need to read this.


Sony put together a show called The Tester which is a reality show about a group of people playing silly games in order to win the show prize of becoming a video games tester. See trailer:



Working in the video games industry is though and sucks the life blood out of many unfortunate souls. But the lowest position is that of a tester. If you work in other industries Quality Assurance can have some respect, but not in the video games industry. If the company misses a milestone payment from the publisher, before management will give-up their quilted toilet paper, some testers are going to go.

Penny Arcade captured this competition and the crushing reality of the prize in a strip titled Here's Your Reality Program.

Now the reason for this post. Jerry and Mike have a reality show of their own and last week their documentary team (2PlayerProductions) released a Video Of Them Creating That Strip.

STEAM Lies

It is post midnight and I am waiting for Supreme Commander 2 to unlock. All I have to look at is the pre-load screen and that keeps telling me that when the game is released I will be able to play it immediately. I am not sure about Valve's definition of immediately, but clearly we have a disagreement in this matter.

Identify Unknown Fonts

There is a website called Identifont that has an Identify Fonts By Appearance feature. Kind of cool since I already used it productively at work to identify a font we used as a company a long, time ago.

Home Music Systems

For a few years now I have been thinking how cool it would be if all the speaker systems in my home could sync up and play the same track simultaneously and then remain in sync. There is ShoutCast which is a free WinAmp Plug-in that will allow you to connect to an audio stream and then there are other plug-ins you can use to remotly controle winamp like iAmpRemote, but this all needs setting up.

But there is a company called Sonos that does room speaker systems that sync themselves and has a load of remote control options that are all really cool. However I don't think a lot of traditional consumers of music are going to be into Sonos because it is more tuned to the digital age.

A Different Type Of UK Plug

British plugs are large by international standards. The story goes that in an attempt to save on copper wiring in a post World War 2 Britain each plug was wired through new homes in series. This created the problem of a lot of voltage behind each socket. To help prevent people from being electrocuted the BS 1363 Standard was created. In this each plug was given it's own fuse, an earth, a socket on/off switch and a shutter cover inside the socket so that the socket would only accept compatible plugs. The result of all this is was very large large plug.

After spending my life unfortunately standing on these with their prongs pointing upwards as they tend to do I was delighted to see (by way of Engadget) a slimline British plug design.

And the designer is looking to get it into production, so we might be seeing it soon in Ireland, Sri Lanka, Bahrain, UAE, Qatar, Yemen, Oman, Jordan, Cyprus, Malta, Gibraltar, Botswana, Ghana, Hong Kong, Macau, Brunei, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Kenya, Uganda, Malawi, Nigeria, Mauritius, Iraq, Kuwait, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe (yes I just lifted that from wikipedia).

Restaurant Menu Phycology

I would have bought the fried pickles because I love to try stuff.

William Poundstone has written a book called Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value, it is about how companies manipulate prices to make you spend more. I haven't read it, but it's going on my reading list.

Zoom In On That Reflection, ENHANCE!

If you have a photograph, you can not use special software or an algorithm to zoom in on stuff that doesn't exist in the original image.

This scene from Blade Runner.


Has spawned many copy cats.


Including CSI.


But we all know how silly it is.

Azo The FreeRunner's Dayjob

I love how Azo combines his love of freerunning and animation. I am not sure which came first because I discovered him through his FreeRunning Videos on YouTube. But he has done a video about the combination with a slight plug for his current work project.

How Derren Brown Predicted The National Lottery Numbers

Derren Brown a few months ago supposedly predicted the National Lottery numbers. This was a great event and there has been much speculation as to how he did it, but now an explanation has emerged that I think is rather convincing. I don't feel cheated knowing what the fake is, I actually find this side of magic fascinating.

A good explanation of how. Do you feel cheated? I didn't.

What To Do If Your Accelerator Becomes Stuck

The BBC Has The Answer, put car into neutral and break gradually.

Predictions For 2010 to 2020

I didn't do so bad on my iPad Prediction. I thought it was going to be an eReader device, but turned out to be Apple's entry into the table PC race. But this has given me a taste for predictions, so here are my predictions for the next ten years.

• Telivision as we know it will still be around, but when someone thinks of watching television, it will be over the internet and the idea of scheduled broadcast will seem very old fashioned.


• School pupils will not spend very much time with physical paper, instead they will use an electronic tablet device much like the iPad. The devices will be made by a variety of vendors, but be powered by Google.


• There is will an international summit on plastic pollution. The result of this will be a fund to help countries clean up areas that create this kind of pollution.


• Electric cars will be the only kind of vehicle the average consumer will buy.


• Brain reading lie detection machines used in court to provide circumstantial evidence for the first time to US high profile murder trial, with someone who hasn't killed anybody yet.


• In computing we will be using single chip computers that will be CPU, GPU and BIOS combined.


• Football grounds and other events will be surveillanced with autonomous flying drones.


• Ray traced graphics will have superseded rasterized graphics engines on all platforms.


• The rich will be able to buy a ticket for a flight around the earth and moon.

RIP J. D. Salinger 2010

J. D. Salinger Died On Wednesday and I think the New York Times did a good Article on his death.

My favourite quote from Catcher In The Rye isn't by Salinger, it is a quote that he had a character read on page 169:

The mark of the immature man is that he wants to die nobly for a cause, while the mark of a mature man is that he wants to live humbly for one
- Wilhelm Stekel

In this quote Salinger is trying to save himself from taking a lonely path or one that results in his younger self sacrificing too much for too little. Something he seemed to do many times in his life.

Mustard Does Creep By Radiohead

Mustard sings Creep from Rex Kramer on Vimeo.

Boba Flash Dance

Mandalorian Dance
by PatrickBoivin