Saturday, March 19, 2016

Sarlac

Since moving to our current home, we were finally living someplace long enough to get indoor plants again.

It took a few more years to get a healing aloe to replace the ones we left behind in Manitoba.  Just a little one, found at Walmart.

It's not so little anymore.  In fact, we now affectionately call it The Sarlac.

I know aloes can get pretty big in their natural habitat, but not so much in a pot.  At least not that I've seen.  I'm used to them getting bigger by shooting up lots of babies and crowding the pot.  This one has only had 3, which I have since transplanted.  Instead, it's just getting thicker and fleshier.

And toothier.

Friday, March 4, 2016

Food mode

(edit: I originally wrote this post by email from my phone, however only 1 of the 2 photos I attached made it to the post.  Probably because I wrote it from a parking lot, then started driving while it was uploading and lost wifi connection!  I love technology, but it does have its limits. LOL)

Recently, my Galaxy S4 gave up the ghost.  Among various minor glitches, the first major thing to go was the default camera software. It stopped saving pictures, with either corrupted files or nothing saved at all.

I started using a purchased software and, while still shots worked fine, it corrupted, then lost, some video I took.

When it came time to choose my next phone, I was in a bit of a quandry; do I do what I usually do and get an older phone for cheap?  Or do I get the best new phone for my needs.  You see, I hardly ever use my phone as a phone.  For communication, I am more likely to text. I drive a lot, so even that is limited.

After examining my usage, it was two things that were the deciding factors.  One of those was camera quality.  It was camera quality that lead me to go with the Galaxy S6.  It got really good ratings, and I have been very happy with it.

It has not been until a few days ago that I finally got around to actually looking at the settings and options.  It turns out that there are modes that came with my old phone that are now available as free downloads.  Looking through the various modes available, I found several others I wanted to try, including a "food" mode.

Here are two photos to compare.

One is of a cheap grocery store stir fry meal, just out of the microwave and still in its plastic bowl.  That one was taken in food mode.

The other is of a Soda Jerks build your own burger.  It was taken with default auto mode.

Both were taken in fairly low light.  The burger picture has been cropped, but no other post processing has been done. These are raw photos.

What do you think?  Can you see a difference?

A.