The other day a family member mentioned they were trying to fix a photo.  Basically the photo was of a beautiful landscape but there was a huge telephone pole in the middle + 5 dark telephone lines going across the sky, trees, and ocean.  After many attempts I was left with artifacts that only appeared on printing.  I did however find a final solution using the Clone Stamp Tool and the Smudge tool.

I used the tutorial at this site, and after about 5 hours I was done and the printouts look great!  I am not a photoshop guru, but can handle a mouse and follow directions – that is all that is needed for this little effort.

Happy Photoshoping,
James

Anyone who has blogged and used WordPress knows the amazing flexibility of tagging items.  I use it extensively on many non-blog ad-ventures.  I have started several startups using such technology as a core piece, and I must say the applications seem endless.  Given I am tired of filling my notebook with ideas that I won’t have time to convert I wanted to post them, as they come to mind, and see if others would see value in it.

The header describes it pretty succinctly, but think of it this way – I was in Dallas for training at the SPSP.  The trainers were Mike Dahn, Chris Mark, and Heather Mark.  Really fantastic and experts.  I had great conversations with the attendees and we all passed information around.  So, now I have a ton of contacts without context.  Sure I can fill in notes, or use the categories functions of ‘cardscan’ (by the way this company has AWESOME support – I bought a new system and upgraded another due to my experience with them – highly recommend!), but that doesn’t give the flexibility of cross relationships.

So, how about it?  Someone want to build a ‘template’ for wordpress that can be your CMS?  Or perhaps an add-on for some of the other tools out there.

Other ideas, pass them along…

James DeLuccia

* please note, this site has primarily been an online notebook for my adventures – books; techie; and life.  I will try to add unique-ideas here, so feel free to join in!

I recently had to resize 48 images of various types and formats into 20×40 images.  I am not an expert in Photoshop and started manually making changes.  I noticed the Batch action available in the file menu (when saving the 4th file for those curious), and after a quick google search found this GREAT article.

Follow it explicitly (except don’t SAVE the file choose DONE.  Saving the file in the custom action results in every file in the batch being saved as that file – and subsequently rewriting every previous effort).

Enjoy the added efficiency, and like my friend David used to say – get a sandwich while it works…

James

I picked this book up to give my system a jolt after pondering the economic challenges and opportunities as defined by AG. I currently have several ventures in play, and all can be defined as Stage One according to Masterson. The book is a quick read and hits home a very simple message – Just Do It. He says it in a number of different approaches and examples, but the end sum total is – Start. I enjoyed the middle to the end of the book the best and thought the beginning was a bit slow.

A very fast read, as he is very entertaining, but one less academic and practical than other books in this space. I would recommend it for most would-be entrepreneurs given its core messaging.

Best,

James

Seems like a simple task, and the reverse is very simple – RIM has a “Copy all from SIM to address book”, but not the later.  So, given I have a need to place my most important numbers on a SIM to transfer them to another device I did a quick Google search, and found dozens of suggestions on how to do it.  The best is here from an actual RIM support guy.

Nonetheless, when I was trying to copy over to the SIM I discovered I did not always get the menu option to copy the contact over.  After much playing around I discovered that the CURSOR must be on the PHONE NUMBER you want to transfer before you hit the menu key.  Otherwise it will not give you the option.

So that is it…. check out the link, place the cursor on the number you want to COPY and then hit save once it refreshes.  Took a couple of hours to get the whole task done, and I hope this post will save you that fun.

James

This weekend we decided Crown Molding in the first floor bathroom would really enhance its look and feel.  It also made it consistent with the rest of the downstairs.  So, armed with YouTube, a few home improvements sites, a magazine, a Ridgid mitre saw, air gun, an Angle Projector, and two dogs I got the molding cut and up on the wall with no major issues.  Of course measuring and cutting are only half the battle, the real talent comes with chalking and painting to make two generally flush pieces of wood look like a single clean piece.  Total project time was 5.5 hours.

Overall the only tips I would impart are:

1. Make test pieces!!  These were by far the best validation of the angles needed for each corner
2. When you purchase the wood it will say the angle it is cut for (this will make sense after you read up on this process), and then simply set your mitre saw w/ bevel edge – done
3. Find and mark the studs on the wall and the joists – no fun making extra holes while balancing on a ladder with a 7 foot piece of wood ‘perfectly’ placed on the wall and thumbing around for the trigger on the nail gun.

Here are the sites I referenced that I thought were helpful in this process:

1. Site 1 – good tutorial site, small pics, decent text
2. Site 2 – better pics, but less text
3. Google Video Directory of DIY – watch the spelling and try variants
4. This Old House – helpful video

- James