”A crisis doesn’t have to be a negative event. A wedding is a crisis–one ceremony, one day, over and done. All eyes, all attention, all on this moment. That’s why we do it–even though the chronic condition of the marriage itself is always more important.”
Beach daze
The next Apple Event webpage has an AR Easter egg, tap on the Apple logo in the hero image
It’s that time of year agin for me to be that wet paper bag of a man I am and say that Melbourne Cup, horse racing, gambling, and the entire culture in Australia that supports and celebrates the three is embarrassing and sad.
Please continue eating your roast chicken and drinking your wine knowing that I like wine and chicken, but don’t like what gambling or horse racing does.
Nerding out on putting a MagSafe case on an iPhone 12. It’s a peach case and obviously that’s communicated to the phone so it does this cool animation.
Going through old files and I found a 2009 iPhone 3GS rumour mock-up and I thought it would be interesting to see it next to an iPhone 12 rumour infographic
I don’t like to get political on here, but how have we let butterflies be called butterflies for so long when they have nothing to do with butter, it’s just an amalgamation of flutterby and buttorfleoge and boterflye.
Grace
The first two things I saw in the outside world this morning were about Sean Connery. One post was announcing his death. Another was reminding us of his misogynistic past.
It’s a weird thing to reconcile the day after someone dies. To see that they were a person, loved by so many, yet they were flawed and broken in so many ways.
I think Sean Connery needs our grace.
My hope, my prayer, my meditation, my personal goal, the thing I’d ask you to embrace in 2021, is grace.
Grace as a secular concept embodies a courtesy. Goodwill extended to you even though commonly it might not be. The Christian concept extends it further, allowing mercy without merit.
Grace isn’t forgetting, it’s not even forgiving really. It’s not an eraser or coverup. It’s not a cancel and it’s not imagining that nothing happened.
It’s acceptance of what has been, allowing for the consequences of those activities, and building a bridge to the now.
It’s an acknowledgement of humanity, our weaknesses and our insecurities, and an olive branch through them. Not past, or over, or under, but through.
May grace lace my every word in the year ahead.
It’s what I need. It’s what my marriage, family, business, and friendships need. I’m willing to bet it’s what you need. Let’s give it freely.
Grace.
This is why we will never want to stop travelling
“The human condition is designed for travel. Our brains evolved to geotag memories, initially to find or avoid predators, food and mates. When we recall memories of people, songs, dates or events, they are returned with their associated locations. While we normalise our oft-visited locations, it’s the novel locations that remain highlighted along with the travel experiences we had there which re-invigorate our interest in business and recreational travel. This is why we will never want to stop travelling.”
— Captain Richard Champion de Crespigny, aka the Qantas A380 pilot from that Singapore incident, in Traveller
Why did Damon Wayans Jr leave after the pilot of New Girl
Sharing because I feel like I’m not the only person wondering where Damon Wayons Jr went after the pilot episode of New Girl.
the reason behind this change was that Wayans was also part of the cast of Happy Endings, and as he was expecting it to be canceled, he joined New Girl. However, Happy Endings was renewed for a second season, and he had to leave New Girl.
via Screenrant
I wanted to see how much the iPhone camera had changed between the iPhone 6 and iPhone 12, so I took the same nine photos with four different iPhones, and blogged the results
Comparing the cameras on iPhones 6, SE, XS, 11, and 12 Pro
I upgraded my daily carry computer, or what us old people call a phone, to an iPhone 12 Pro this week. Upon clicking the shutter a few times I could see there was a big difference in the new camera, but I wanted to compare photos to former iPhone cameras. So I pulled out all the old iPhones in the house and took the same photo on each one. It worked out pretty good as the four cameras were each mostly two years apart in release dates.
Control notes
All photos were taken on the iPhone with a fresh install, no apps, or settings changed, no iCloud logged in. I simply tapped to focus and expose inside the default camera app, and turned off flash for consistency. All phones were held in a Peak Design Travel Tripod with the phone attachement. I tried to keep the framing consistent, but if it’s not, either the iPhone lens placement changed, or this free blog post doesn’t live up to even my standards. The iPhone SE is the first generation SE, the 12 is a 12 Pro. Taken with default settings including HDR/Smart HDR/HDR 3, on the 1x lens. The only edits made are to the HEIC files taken on cameras which save HEIC, those files have been converted to JPG using MacOS Automator.
You may want to right click on images and open in a new window to see full resolution, and honestly, I’m unsure if micro.blog actually compresses and/or resizes files so if you can still read this line I haven’t edited with original uploads to somewhere else.
Cameras used
- iPhone 6, released September 19, 2014, 8MP f/2.2
- iPhone SE, released March 31, 2016, 12.2 MP f/2.2
- iPhone XS, released September 21, 2018, 12MP ƒ/1.8 lens
- iPhone 11 (for one Night Mode photo), released September 20, 2019, 12MP ƒ/1.8 lens
- iPhone 12 Pro, released October 16, 2020, 12MP ƒ/1.6 lens
Here’s a comparison of the four cameras as Apple sees fit.
Let’s look at the photos…
Landscape photo
iPhone 6 Landscape photo
iPhone SE Landscape photo
iPhone XS Landscape photo
iPhone 12 Pro Landscape photo
Sunset photo
iPhone 6 Sunset photo
iPhone SE Sunset photo
iPhone XS Sunset photo
iPhone 12 Pro Sunset photo
Self-portrait
iPhone 6 Self-portrait
iPhone SE Self-portrait
iPhone XS Self-portrait
iPhone 12 Pro Self-portrait
Selfie camera
iPhone 6 Selfie camera photo
iPhone SE Selfie camera photo
iPhone XS Selfie camera photo
iPhone 12 Pro Selfie camera photo
A detail photo
iPhone 6 detail photo
iPhone SE detail photo
iPhone XS detail photo
iPhone 12 Pro detail photo
Portrait mode
iPhone 6 Portrait
iPhone SE Portrait
iPhone XS Portrait mode
iPhone 12 Pro Portrait mode
Blue light
iPhone 6 Blue light photo
iPhone SE Blue light photo
iPhone XS Blue light photo
iPhone 12 Pro Blue light photo
Maximum digital zoom in blue light
iPhone 6 zoomed to maximum digital zoom
iPhone SE zoomed to maximum digital zoom
iPhone XS zoomed to maximum digital zoom
iPhone 12 Pro zoomed to maximum digital zoom
Night Mode, or a night photo for cameras without Night Mode
iPhone 6 Night photo
iPhone SE Night photo
iPhone XS Night photo
iPhone 11 (not Pro) Night Mode photo
iPhone 12 Pro Night Mode photo
Video
This really good report from El Pais not only tells you how coronavirus spreads through the air, but thanks to ther interwebs and computers, it shows you. This is a really good and informing read.
What was happening just before the 2016 US election?
2016 really does feel like a lifetime ago. I was in Iceland, having just been to Berlin and we were enroute to Paris, the first time I had ever married anyone in Europe. It was a pretty epic trip. I remember landing in Hong Kong from Paris and everyone got phone service. It was like landing and finding out a national disaster had occured, but Donald Trump had been elected President of the United States of America.
Meanwhile, “Closer,” by the Chainsmokers, was the country’s No. 1 song, as it had been since August. Not to read too much into that or anything, especially considering the duo’s troubling recent history of social distancing violations, but this lyrical snippet is standing out as pretty meaningful to me in 2020: “Four years, no calls/ Now you’re looking pretty in a hotel bar.” What if the thing looking pretty in the hotel bar … was democracy?
How is it allowable and legal for a political party to text message me blatant lies today?
Look, I’m not going to tell you who to vote for, but I’ll happily tell you that dinosaur owner and political party creator, Clive Palmer, is spending a lot of money spreading lies about a death tax that doesn’t exist.
Luckily/sadly their website can’t handle the traffic …
How can lies like this be spread so easily without reprucussions?
Here’s a news piece about the death tax lie.
In their most outrageous form, the ads feature Palmer’s United Australia party candidates (such as his wife) urging electors to “Stop Labor’s 20% Death Tax”. Labor has no policy to reintroduce a tax on bequests, however large the inheritance, anywhere in Australia. The framing, the rising inflection in the speaker’s voice and the faux specificity of the claim are all designed to arouse emotion and credulity, by diverting attention from its factual baselessness.
I’m a guest on the podcast, Book(ish)
I’m a guest on George Dimarelos’s podcast, Book(ish) talking about Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book, Talking To Strangers. So it’s not just about the book, it’s about my life’s experiences that basically leave me an anxious wreck thinking that no-one understands me. It’s pretty much a therapy session recorded for your entertainment.
The official Josh Withers iPhone 12 Pro review after using one for eight hours.
The iPhone 12 Pro in-hand feel is remarkably different to the past six generations of iPhone with the rounded edges. The 90 degree edge of the iPhone 12 makes it feel better in-hand and I could imagine using it case-less.
12 Pro camera quality increase is so noticeable from an iPhone XS, the HDR is borderline “too much” as far as regular photos go, but it’s also representative of what we actually see with our eyes.
MagSafe is but another entry to the lineup of Apple things that “just works” and you’d hope it would.
MagSafe cases and accessories are in low supply this early, but I’m excited to see how vendors innovate, like Peak Design is on Kickstarter.
Considering the rounded bump is no longer pushing out the width, the screen feels more edge to edge, the entire phone just looks beautiful. I’m rocking the new deep blue colour.
Moving from an iPhone XS, the only thing I’m mourning is 3D Touch/Force Touch. I apparently used it a lot more than I could remember. Long touch isn’t quite the same.
If you’re on an iPhone 11, the 12 is a splurge. If you’re moving from an iPhone XS/XR, it’s real nice. From a X or 8, or earlier, you’ll be grateful for the numerous improvements. If you’re on Android, congrats on reading so far into the review!
Seeing as though I’m not an influencer, I don’t get many influencer opportunities, but when I do …
Life hack: sugar.
You know you’ve built a great society when every few years the most civic-minded of the society are forced to publicly beg, cheat, lie, and steal to get a job in management and guidance of the society. A system which eventually eats their souls.