Scared of losing years of Photos? Here's the perfect backup solution

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Two things can easily happen to your computer: HDD failure or get stolen. Of course, you can always put in a new HDD or buy a new computer and install the OS and all the programs you use. It's time consuming but not the end of the world. But then the thought comes - when was the last time I backed up???

Oh no, THE foto and video collection. The one you have been archiving since your first digital camera or your friends' first digital camera. Probably older files are on some external drive, but you haven't updated it in the last 9 or 12 months, almost a year of memories lost.

This already happened to me once, and ever since I've been looking for a solution. Enter the Synology NAS server - it sounds and looks geeky, but WOW, it solved my backup problem in several ways and added tons of extra functionalities like torrent managing, media server, internet server for pictures / streaming video and home camera surveillance.
What is a NAS server? Basically a hard disk plugged into your home network - a shared drive that any device on your home WIFI can access. Synology took the concept one step further and included RAID and a processor that can do things with the information on the hard disk such as uploading them to online storage or creating an online webpage for your pictures that you can access anywhere in the world. I'll talk about this in an upcoming post, for now backup.
I wanted something that could:
- Take care of automatic backups from my Mac / PC
- protect itself from failure of it's own HDD
- upload pictures / videos to the cheapest online backup. Reason being that if someone steals my house and my computer and the synology, the backups on it are not very useful....
The device I found that ticked all these boxes and was "cheap" is the Synology DS212j. Nowadays they've launched an upgraded version - the DS214 which adds more internal RAM memory and an improved processor. Functionalities are the same. Besides the device, you need to buy separately the HDDs to put inside. To have RAID ( explained in a second ) you should have two same sizes HDDs, I got 2 x Western Digital's Red 3TB HDDs. The Red family are made to work on NAS servers, prioritizing longetivity and low heat generation over speed - which you don't need as much Ina. NAS server vs a computer. These disks are designed to be on 24/7, just like your synology.

Why the Synology?
- Take care of automatic backups from my Mac / PC:
For Mac it has time machine functionality, a software included in the Mac by Apple that backs up all your computer content automatically to a time machine device. It also can handle automatically complete restore of your information in case of issues with the Mac.
For windows it has software that can automate backups, although if haven't used it yet (only use macs for now...)
- protect itself from failure of it's own HDD
With 2 hard disks installed, it mirrors all information automatically in between them. Meaning that if one HDD fails, all info is stored on the other one. Synology handles this without any involvement from you - you only see one shared drive and once the info.
- upload pictures / videos to the cheapest online backup. Reason being that if someone steals my house and my computer and the synology, the backups on it are not very useful. Synology can upload to several online storage sites p, but for me the mist interesting is Amazon glacier. It's real cheap, I think I have approx 300Gbs put there and I pay approx 4USD per month. With Dropbox a 200Gb plan is 19.99USD and 500Gb a whopping 49.99USD. I save 400 to 500$ per year. The catch? It isn't like Dropbox that you always have access to your files. With glacier you request a file and it is only available 4 hours later.
To be honest, none of these files I need in a rush - they are always local on my Synology. Amazon glacier is online backup just in case the Synology is stolen.... And probably I can wait a little while to download them when my house has been burglarized - they are not priority #1. Amazon even has a service where you can send an external HDD and they record all files there.
Set-up posts coming up!

Canon 70D: charging the battery

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All Canon DSLRs normally have extremely long battery times. My old Canon 400Ds battery would last weeks without charging. I was slightly concerned that with the upgrade to the 70D and all the features it has I might need a second battery, but it seems to have a long battery life as well. The only feature that really consumes battery is filming, and even so I got a good 2 to 3 hours out of it.

The source of all this power is the proprietary Canon battery pack. The charger is also Canon, supplied with the camera. It's been slightly upgraded vs, the 400D one, with a LED feature to show how charged the battery is during the charge cycle. Below a video on those modes...

 

 

 

Aerial video stabilization: DJI phantom, Gopro and a Zenmuse gimbal

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I had an interesting weekend mounting a gimbal to the DJI Phantom. DJI calls the upgrade plug and play, however their concept of plug and play involves completely dismantling the quadcopter to a point that replacing (soldiering included) the main electronics board is part of the process.

For those who don't know what a gimbal is ( I didn't either before I tried to mount one ), it's a device that keeps the camera stable no matter what happens to what is holding it. It is used a lot in video shooting, but given the prices it was mainly high end productions - ie Hollywood. Nowadays with technology getting cheaper a small gimbal for a Gopro can cost from 100€ upwards. The idea behind is that you have a type of gyroscope sensor and some servos.p - the gyro tells the servers to move to the opposite direction of the movement.

For a demonstration see this video:

 

I'll add a how-to video of how I mounted it to the copter eventually, but for now here's the fun part - flying and recording. Before getting to the video, a quick review of the gimbal.

I got a DJI Zenmuse H3-2D, mainly because... There was a guy selling a second hand one cheap. It was new in the box, never used - he says he changed hobby so never got around to using it. Good luck for me as I had investigated this gimbal for a while however it was waaayyy to expensive for my "hobby" budget - it costs almost as much as the whole quadcopter.

Usage: after the complicated set-up, everyday usage of the gimbal is a breeze except for one point - the first one of adding the GoPro to the copter. It HAS to be a GoPro 3 (not 2 or 3+) without it's protective housing and for mounting DJI supplies you with a bracket and really small hex screws. Not easy to put on or off, and you need to buy a hex tool. With that exception in mind the rest is easy. It is pre-calibrated for the camera so starting is as easy as turning on the camera and plugging in the battery to the quadcopter - it sources it's power from there. It automatically puts the camera in the right position and keeps it there, no matter how fast you swerve the copter. It does this silently so there is no servo noise to add to the video. Really - none. Mount quality is good as we'll, very sturdy.

Results: WOW - I don't know how to write the difference this does to videos. Up to now all my videos with the phantom are shaky due to:

1. The way a quadcopter or helicopter flies. To go forward or backwards or to the side, a quadcopter inclines into the axis it wants to go - i.e. To go forward the rotors on the back of the device speed up slightly to incline the device - it then goes forward. The faster or steeper you incline, the faster it goes in that direction. If you have a fixed camera on the bottom it "sees" all these inclinations making changing directions or going fast a crappy videos, you just see things inclining up or down.
2. Wind / instability: a little gust of wind makes a very shaky video

As to eliminate the two above, up to now I minimized my shots to slow / stable / constant movements. I would position the helicopter, try to glide as much as possible then stop. Editing was a pain as I could only salvage some of the glide and needed a lot of video stabilization processing.

 

The other issue was the jello effect of the GoPro's CMOS sensor with thy quadcopter vibration. As much as I tried to eliminate it via foam, mount changes or propeller changes, it was there.

 

With the gimbal...WOW!!!! My first tests show a stability I would never ever achieve without it. Video is always on a fixed plane, even when a movement starts the gimbal has no latency to adjust. As you can see in the video below I really went at it and nothing!

 

Let's see what I can do with this upgraded flinging platform :-)

 

 

 

Canon 70D: First set-up and usage

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Setting up the Canon 70D to start taking pictures is simple. I'll write a post afterwards on setting up the Canon software on the Mac, I found that slightly more complicated.

Canon included almost everything you need in the box, but there are two things you will need to make sure you have:

 

- a SD memory card

- a Canon compatible lens

 

For the memory card I bought the Sandisk Extreme Pro 64Gbs. Sandisk as to not compromise on reliability, would´t want to loose pictures because of a cheap SD, and extreme pro as to have no slowdown while recording High res video or shooting sports Photography with a high fps rate. I think this cards´ speed is overkill for the 70D, but can´t hurt and the cost difference isn´t that much to the lower tier cards.

 

For the lens if you bought a Canon kit of 70D body and the 18-55mm or 18-135mm it will be in the box. I have the 18-135mm.

 

1) First thing to do is fully charge the Canon battery pack. Insert the supplied power cable into the battery charger and leave it to charge to 100%. First charge took about 1 hour, The light on the charger will turn constant green when it is done

 

2) Add the SD card. If you are looking to the back of the camera ( the LCD ), On the left of the camera is a hinged door, you need to slide the door backwards and it will pop open. Insert the SD card with the label facing the back of the camera, push it in until it clicks. Close the door again.

 

3) Insert the battery into the bottom of the Canon 70D. You need to unlock the latch by sliding and the door will pop open. Insert the battery pack until it clicks and close the door.

 

4) Add the lens to the body.  Remove the supplied sensor plastic cap by unscrewing from the body. When inserting the lens, match the little color spot on the lens (either white or red) to the color spot on the body of the camera.  Turn the lens until the lock clicks.

 

Lens' with a red dot are made for cropped sensor cameras such as the Canon 70D or the entry range (550D / 600D / 650D) and you will have the focal range stated on them I.e. a 40mm will be 40mm) whilst the lens' with a white dot are developed for full frame cameras ( such as the 5D or 1D ) and on a cropped sensor camera will show a different focal length. A 70D has a crop factor of 1.6x, meaning a full sensor 50mm lens will appear 50 x 1.6 = 80mm, an 80mm equivalent on a full sensor camera.

 

 

The order of the above isn't particularly important. Just make sure the camera switch is Off while performing any of the tasks. After the steps above are completed, hinge out the LCD and turn it so it faces you. Turn in the 70D for the first time. A screen appears for you to adjust the time. Use the job dial and buttons inside it to navigate this menu. Set the time, date, if you want automatic daylight saving time and your time zone. Press OK and you are ready to take pictures.

 

For the first picture I just set the camera to fully automatic, turned on automatic focus and image stabilizer on the lens and started shooting away!

 

Below a video!

 

 

 

Canon 70d - unboxing

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I have an "old" DLSR, at least for,today's standards. It's the 400d, bought in 2007. I still use it a lot, solving the only issue I thought it had (low light hand held photography) with the upgrade of the factory supplied 15-85mm lens with a newer canon 15-85mm with image stabilizer technology.

It was OK until I went to a tv ad shooting and saw them use Canon 5D for video. Opened up a whole new world, being able to do professional video with your photography camera. I've been looking into DLSR ever since.

 

I wanted to upgrade from the basic entry Canon models, however not go professional with something like the 5D. I started looking into it two years ago. Filtering by canon models, as I already have canon lenses and I like their camera build quality, that left as a choice the 7D and the 60D. However none of the 2 convinced me, the 7D being too pricey and the 60D too old - not really made for movies. Canon rumors talked about the 70D being launched "soon".

The baseline is...I've waited a long time for the 70D.

Here's a video of the unboxing, reviews and how-tos to come!