Tag: trends

The best time in history

This post is intended to counteract the funk that I was feeling (and generated) when I made my previous post. Things aren’t quite as dire as I made them out to be. Yes, there is much room for improvement, both locally and globally, but this is statistically the best time in the history of humanity, so far. And the trends show that things are getting better, overall. See Hans Rosling’s excellent TED presentation, where he backs this up with some powerful statistical animations (and even sword swallowing).

He does end his presentation on a sombre note – all of this progress comes at the cost of increased CO2 emissions. We need to figure out ways to improve the economic foundation of all countries, without roasting the planet.

Trends in Higher Education?

I’ve been asked to contribute to a series of short briefing papers for use by administration, in identifying and planning for trends in higher education. There are some obvious trends (social software – go to them, instead of making them come to us; open content; remix culture; personal publishing and the PLE; etc…) but I’m wondering about any non-obvious trends that people might be seeing. Anything surprising happening on other campuses? Are things like mobile access really starting to take off (esp. in Canada, where mobile internet charges are so unbelievably expensive)?

Why I love digital photography

I was poking around in my Aperture library after importing the latest batch of game photos from Evan’s U5 soccer team today, and I realized that I’ve kept 2345 photos so far this year (on pace to keep well over 6000 in 2007). At the average ratio of keeps-per-deletes, that means I’ve shot well over 10,000 photos so far this year – and the year’s not even half over yet – I might conceivably shoot over 30K photos in 2007.

Prompted by this realization, I wondered about what trend might be shown in the number of photographs I’ve kept over the last few years. I mined my Aperture library for the numbers, and threw them into Keynote to make a pretty graph. It’s pretty obvious what happened when I switched from film to digital.

Photographs kept per year, as of 2007

As soon as I stopped worrying about film (what ASA is in the camera? how many shots left? how much is this going to cost me?) the number of photos I took shot up exponentially. It’s a little depressing to think of the awesome shots I missed out on from our wedding and honeymoon back in 1997, and the vacations and family stuff before the switch to digital. Even the first digital camera, although very low quality by 2007 standards, was a boon because it meant I could experiment and take more photos.

With that said, I’ve had my Canon EOS XT for almost a year now (got it for Father’s Day 2006) and am still having a blast with it. I’d be willing to bet that this graph will begin to plateau. It’s not feasible to be taking too many more photos while maintaining a day job and still seeing the family…

The last time I got all retrospective about my photographing habits was back in November 2006, when I realized that the number of “starred” images per month was rising dramatically, hinting that I’m becoming more happy with the shots I’m taking, or that I’m perceiving that I’m taking better photos, or that I’m taking so many more photos that I can delete most and be left with only good stuff.

Update: I added an estimated value for photos taken per year, as well as the number of photos “starred” per year and regenerated the graph.

Photographs taken, kept and starred per year, as of 2007

Photography Trends in my iPhoto Library

I was just messing around with smart albums in iPhoto, and found that I can create albums based on camera model. So, I created a set of smart albums showing all photos taken with each of the 3 digital cameras I’ve owned. I then created additional smart albums to show just photos taken with a particular camera that have been rated 1 star or more (which I add to any photo that’s worth showing anyone else). The results were a bit surprising (and completely unscientific).

Camera Model # months using camera # photos taken # photos / month # starred photos % Starred
Olympus C200 36 3715 103 301 8.1 %
Fujifilm e510 17 2909 171 497 17.1 %
Canon Digital Rebel XT 5 1115 223 386 34.6 %

What does that suggest? Well, much of the story isn’t in these numbers. According to my Canon Digital Rebel XT’s internal computer, I’ve taken 4932 photos with it. A few hundred were added to Aperture on my work desktop, so approximately 3000-3500 photos have been deleted in camera, meaning I’m taking a LOT more photos with the XT (986 / month!), and performing a LOT more selection before dumping photos onto a computer (~500/month deleted in camera). I’ve also been doing a lot of experimentation, where I fill the card with a hundred shots at a time, and nuke them all.

I’m guessing there are a few things at play here.

  1. if you take more pictures, you get more pictures you’re happy with. I’m a firm believer that the best photo is the one you take, meaning if you don’t pull the trigger, you can’t get a good shot. And if you don’t pull the trigger enough, it’s harder to get good shots.
  2. As you get more control over the camera’s settings, and get comfortable with that control, you take better pictures. The Olympus had essentially no manual controls. The Fujifilm had plenty, but the interface sucked (all through menus, etc…). The XT has awesome manual control, great priority modes, etc… so I play more. And get some really cool shots (and some stinkers, which get deleted)
  3. It’s unclear if the increasing ratio of “good” photos is related to the camera, or just more experience over time. Would I have wound up with similar results by just sticking with the Olympus and using it more?
  4. The Olympus was purchased for the birth of Evan, so it got a LOT of specific use. Hundreds of baby photos. Birthdays, holidays, etc… Even with that emotional loading, I keep more than twice as many photos with the XT than I did with the Olympus. Hmmmm…
  5. I’m not sure if I’m being more thoughtful in taking shots with the XT (hence the higher star ratio), or if it’s the in-camera deletion causing that. Stuff that sucks gets nuked before touching the computer…

I was just messing around with smart albums in iPhoto, and found that I can create albums based on camera model. So, I created a set of smart albums showing all photos taken with each of the 3 digital cameras I’ve owned. I then created additional smart albums to show just photos taken with a particular camera that have been rated 1 star or more (which I add to any photo that’s worth showing anyone else). The results were a bit surprising (and completely unscientific).

Camera Model # months using camera # photos taken # photos / month # starred photos % Starred
Olympus C200 36 3715 103 301 8.1 %
Fujifilm e510 17 2909 171 497 17.1 %
Canon Digital Rebel XT 5 1115 223 386 34.6 %

What does that suggest? Well, much of the story isn’t in these numbers. According to my Canon Digital Rebel XT’s internal computer, I’ve taken 4932 photos with it. A few hundred were added to Aperture on my work desktop, so approximately 3000-3500 photos have been deleted in camera, meaning I’m taking a LOT more photos with the XT (986 / month!), and performing a LOT more selection before dumping photos onto a computer (~500/month deleted in camera). I’ve also been doing a lot of experimentation, where I fill the card with a hundred shots at a time, and nuke them all.

I’m guessing there are a few things at play here.

  1. if you take more pictures, you get more pictures you’re happy with. I’m a firm believer that the best photo is the one you take, meaning if you don’t pull the trigger, you can’t get a good shot. And if you don’t pull the trigger enough, it’s harder to get good shots.
  2. As you get more control over the camera’s settings, and get comfortable with that control, you take better pictures. The Olympus had essentially no manual controls. The Fujifilm had plenty, but the interface sucked (all through menus, etc…). The XT has awesome manual control, great priority modes, etc… so I play more. And get some really cool shots (and some stinkers, which get deleted)
  3. It’s unclear if the increasing ratio of “good” photos is related to the camera, or just more experience over time. Would I have wound up with similar results by just sticking with the Olympus and using it more?
  4. The Olympus was purchased for the birth of Evan, so it got a LOT of specific use. Hundreds of baby photos. Birthdays, holidays, etc… Even with that emotional loading, I keep more than twice as many photos with the XT than I did with the Olympus. Hmmmm…
  5. I’m not sure if I’m being more thoughtful in taking shots with the XT (hence the higher star ratio), or if it’s the in-camera deletion causing that. Stuff that sucks gets nuked before touching the computer…