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Staying in 2015 with another photo, let’s move to France with this one, to Paris. This is the Passerelle Debilly pedestrian bridge, not that far from the Eiffel Tower, as it’s quite easy to see. I quite like the look of it, and its being white contrast nicely with the yellow Eiffel Tower in the background. Especially in blue-hour shots.
This photo is blended from three exposures, and edited in Photoshop.
Have you ever been cruising on a cruise ship? I have many times. On a river cruise ship, never been on an ocean one. Due to working for a cruise ship company in the past, I have been on many of them, even on the one in this photo. It’s really an enjoyable time. You can get a drink, sit on the deck, and enjoy all the castles and beautiful nature surrounding the Danube River. And almost every time you wake up in the morning, you are in a different country.
So let’s stay in sunny Austria for one more day. Especially in the beautiful Wachau Valley. You can check my recommended spots to visit there in the Top photography spots – Wachau Valley list. This photo was taken from one of the spots mentioned there, from the top of the Aggstein Castle ruin. The ruin is high up over the lake, but you can get to it by car, so no walking is required. But to get a shot like this, you will need a longer lens. I did use the 70-200mm here.
This is a single exposure, edited in Photoshop.
Back to editing photos from my archive today. This time, it’s one I took already 8 years ago, at the Maria-Theresien-Platz in Vienna. As you can see it was a really nice sunny day, with a lot of people walking around the area. And as for other photos I posted recently, that was the reason I never edited this photo. But again, Generative Fill really helped here.
This is a blend of 3 exposures, done in Photoshop. I did not remove the highlights here, as I really wanted to preserve a bright look, with the white statue almost glowing in the midday sun.
I thought about doing something different for today, so how about a tour of my desk setup? What I use, what I work on, plus a few things here and there. I shared similar photos a few years back and looking at it, I changed almost everything I use. It was probably because I worked from home office during the quarantine years, and I had too much time to think about what I use on a daily basis and how my desk setup should be. Actually, the SmartDool, that decorates my table since I got it in 2015, is the thing I kept for the longest (I have been following the creator of SmartDool, Danny Choo for years, and I got one right when he started to sell them).
Here are the older photos. The first one is my desk from 2014, right before I got an ultrawide monitor. Not missing that setup, but I really like the Nokia Lumia 1520 I had then. Such a great phone. The second is my gaming setup from 2018, and the last is my work setup from 2018. I really used to have a lot of consoles.
You will also notice that I switched to Apple products almost completely. I will write about that in a separate post, but the main reason was M1 and that with it you can have a completely silent setup. The other things just followed after it.
I tend to update things mostly after 3 years of use when I gift them to my family or friends or sell them second-hand. I am careful how I use them, so usually they look like new. All have happy new owners :). I find 3 years to be a sweet spot, where the old stuff still has enough value to be worth it for sale, and the new stuff brings a big enough change to warrant an upgrade.
What do you think? Do you keep your things longer?
So what do I use now? Let’s go through all the things I use, in no particular order.
This is currently my most used PC, not really much visible in the photo, as it’s hiding behind the Ipad. It is the lowest configuration with the M1, 8 GB RAM, and 256 GB SSD. I don’t use it for editing, but it has two main uses. I use it for web surfing, writing, or other work that just does not need that much RAM on a daily basis. But mainly it works as an always-on server. I attached a drive array to it, and it’s always on, so it’s a host for all my photos and other media files. I then just connect to it from my other systems. Works well, even though MacOS implementation of network sharing is often really slow.
As with other M1 systems, one just has to love how totally quiet it is. You don’t even know it’s there. When I was changing my setup, this was one of my main requirements, making it completely silent all the time. And it works.
Currently my main editing machine. With the M1 chip, 16 GB RAM, and 512 GB SSD. It’s fast, totally quiet, battery life is great, and I can easily use it at home and also on the road. And surprisingly, also like the touch bar, even though I mostly use it for volume and brightness changes. Still, I get more use from it than from the F keys.
I was looking at one of the new 14-inch ones, but since I don’t do video, I just don’t need the extra memory or CPU power. The M1 is still powerful enough even when editing big panoramas. I also don’t need any of the extra ports. For years now I have been trying to move completely to USB-C and except for a few Lightning devices, I’m almost completely done.
One of my latest additions is the Dell U3223QE monitor. It’s a 32-inch, 4K, 60hz, IPS black monitor, with support for USB-C. A really nice monitor for work, with higher contrast (2000:1), higher brightness (400cd/m2), and a huge amount of ports. It’s so great to just connect the MacBook using one USB-C cable, and you have everything in the monitor. Charging, LAN network, legacy USB ports, audio. I have not used the charger from my MacBook once while I am at home.
As you can see, I don’t have separate speakers, I don’t need those in my desk setup, just the SB521A magnetic soundbar from Dell. I almost never listen to music or watch videos directly on the monitor, so this works fine for me. And the way it magnetically attaches to the monitor, it’s just perfect. It’s fine for random youtube videos or such.
I got the Ipad as a replacement for the Surface Pro 4 I had before. But it is just not a full computer and it could not replace it. So that was replaced with the Macbook Pro, and the Ipad stayed more as a media consumption machine. And for that, it works great. Especially the speakers are superb. I also use it a lot when learning Japanese Kanji, with the pen and GoodNotes application. The Magic keyboard while nice, it’s almost useless, as apps are just not made to be used with a cursor.
Here is actually agin a comparison to the Surface Pro I had before. That one I could use completely with the pen, I did not even travel with a mouse. In IpadOS most things don’t even react to the pen. It’s quite frustrating. I was looking at the newer versions, but yet to see a reason to update. Maybe they introduce something interesting next week.
For a while, I have been using the Magic Mouse and Keyboard from Apple. But as I had to also use a Windows PC in my last job, I needed something that I can switch easily between multiple PC. And I’m quite happy with the MX Keys. MX Master 3 is a bit more problematic, as it is prone to problems. Random scrolls, zooming, not working macro buttons, and such. Would have replaced it by now, but I’m waiting until there is a MX Master 4 or I find something better. I used to have a Wacom Tablet too, but I sold that one. I’m just too used to edit using just the mouse, and in case I need a tablet, I can always just use the Ipad.
I have not had a phone with a 3.5mm audio jack for years now, so long ago I completely switched to all wireless. First I got the Airpods Pro, which surprisingly I could use. I tried many (really many) in-ear headphones, but all caused a really horrible pressure in my ears and I was not able to use them for more than a few minutes. I never had this problem with the AirPods Pro. One just has to be really careful when crossing the street with them in one’s ears.
After that, I got the Airpods Max. Yes, the price is horrible, but of course, I did not pay the full price here. With a bit of searching, I got them for much less during Amazon Prime Days sale :). I got them because I really like how songs are in Spatial Audio. Once one gets used to it, it’s hard to go back.
As you can see in one of the older photos, I used to have many consoles. I’ve been a gamer for a very long time, and I also used to create games before, so it’s more than a hobby. But I recently sold almost all of them. I used to have a PS2, PS3, PS4, Xbox, Xbox 360, Xbox One, Xbox One X, Wii, Wii U, 3DS, PSP, PS Vita, Switch, and a gaming PC. That I scaled down a lot, keeping only the Switch and replacing the PC with the Steamdeck. Recently I got the PS5 as a trade for some of the older consoles, but man, is it huge. That’s why it’s hidden so nicely behind the plants. Not that there are many games I want to play right now, but Final Fantasy 16 is here shortly.
Overall I reduced my setup a lot. Also, the number of cables just got smaller, which makes for a much cleaner, more pleasant look. I’m trying to be a bit more minimal, while still keeping what I like and what makes for easy work. But also about that, I will write another day.
What do you use? Do you use a Windows PC or a Mac? What is your desk setup?
It has already been years since I took this photo in the High Note Skybar in the center of Budapest. I looked at it already a few times, but never posted it. The reason was simple. As this is a bar, I had to hurry, as there were people around. And in my hurry, I completely forgot to move my camera backpack. So it was nice and prominently visible in the photo. And it was in a spot where it was just hard to remove. But to be fair to myself, it was in a shadow, and it was already late, so it was not that visible through the viewfinder.
Here is where the new Generative Fill in Photoshop (beta) comes in. With it, it took me seconds to get rid of the backpack. It worked almost like magic. If I wanted to remove it traditionally, with cloning and painting, it would be just too much work to look natural. It’s really lovely how by introducing a new tool, Photoshop can give new life to photos that one would discard previously.
But it’s not without problems. I have been running into an error message often. It says “The generated images were removed because they violate user guidelines.” For instance, in this photo, there was water spilled on the table. Generative Fill would refuse to remove it. I tried different selections but had no luck. I presume that this is a result of the feature being still in Beta, and hopefully, they will resolve it quickly.
This is actually the biggest issue with all the AI tools there. That it can just refuse to work. A crop tool with always crop, the brush will always paint, but the AI can just not work, for no apparent reason, and that’s not good.
This photo is a two-shot vertorma, each shot blended from 3 photos. All done in Photoshop.
