InnerOptics.net

New Zealand

Mon, 31 Dec 2012 19:15:00 EST

Australia

Sun, 09 Dec 2012 04:23:00 EST

A photography collection focusing on the environment & wildlife of australia

Thoughts on Australia

Mon, 26 Nov 2012 04:04:00 EST

So i just finished up a tour through Australia, about to fly down to New Zealand for the second leg of my trip. I had an absolute blast. It was my first trip back down here since i was 8, which i barely remember, so it was almost like visiting a new country.

As a half-kiwi myself, Australia holds significance due to the close connection with New Zealand. A lot of New Zealanders end up living here, including a few of my old mates from Tauranga, attracted here by it's warmer/dryer weather and opportunities while still being a quick hop back home. Relocating here is a thought I've even entertained myself, although I could say the same of a number of countries. Culturally Australia and New Zealand have a lot in common, like the British heritage, a love of rugby, a no worries attitude on life... feels good to be back down. I've found during my travels that larger cities, with their influx of foreign brands and immigrants, tend to be more diluted culturally. Sydney and Brisbane are no exception, having a more international feel, diverse people, particularly from Asia & the U.K., with lots of choices in food that you'd expect from such worldly cities. The smaller towns have more of a distinct Australian flavor, where the accents are a little sharper, the slang a little thicker, and people are a little more brash than what i've come to know in New Zealand.

Politically Australia is a contrast from the dysfunctional current gridlock of Washington D.C. Countrary to the libertarian's claims from America's right wing media, Australia is no model of anarcho-capitalism. It should serve as a model nonetheless. Like all governments there are ways in which it overreaches, places where reform is needed, but for the most part it seems to be doing a good job of balancing the concerns of it's people, with moderate policies, supporting the mining and export of natural resources while also putting in place good environmental regulations & protected areas, providing universal healthcare coverage to its citizens and decent investment in infrastructure & transit. To me it was evidence that governments can work for the benefit of their people provided there's the will to do so.

What really sets Australia apart from any other place is its ecosystems and it's unique native wildlife. Being an isolated island continent, it's one of the most interesting places on the planet in terms of witnessing the unfolding of evolution. Throughout this trip I've made an effort to document the natural environment, mostly within some of the country's well preserved national parks. The wilderness seems relatively pristine compared to most countries I've seen, with tons of great unexpected photographic opportunities. I'm really happy with the work i came away with, managing to make a lot of progress in capturing images of wildlife. It looks like it's going to be a collection of images that gives a broad overview of a couple of distinct ecosystems, particularly the gum forests and the rain forest. But with a country of this size, about equal to the entire lower 48 of the united states, a few weeks of shooting isn't going to do it justice. So I'm already looking forward to returning, to continue learning the story of Australia, particularly within the red center, Darwin, and Tasmania.

The Remarkable Rocks, Flinders Chase

Tips for Photographing Wildlife

Sun, 25 Nov 2012 07:05:00 EST

For years after I started photography I struggled with getting quality wildlife shots. But after about a decade of shooting it's starting to click. The wildlife photography tips below serve as both future reminders to myself and as tips for others delving into this challenging branch of photography.

For years I was trying to photograph wildlife with the slow film which happened to be loaded in my camera, which was great for landscapes but it wasn't fast enough for movement of animals. Many species only become active on edges of daylight or the underneath dark forest canopy. With so little light it was hard to get a fast enough shutter speed to freeze their movement. Things improved some after i begun to carry around a second body loaded with faster provia 400. The advent vr lenses has allowed for stable shots with a handheld telephoto, and the ability of digital camera to quick crank up to super high iso has really helped sharpness issues, although there's still a tension there with getting better quality images with less noise, so it's good to shoot with as low an iso as the scene will allow.

For the best shots you normally want to get as close as they animal feels comfortable, enough to fill the frame while still letting them relax into natural behavior. Ive been having good luck with a 70-300vr since it allows me to typically frame the shot faster without a clumbsy tripod. For all but the most habituated creatures, getting too close will cause them to flee. Once that flight happens your unlikely to get any more good shots since it'll be of their backside. Get a clean shot as quickly as possible before this happens, and then really dedicate as much time as the subject will allow to delve deeper, waiting for unique moments to occur.

A good understanding of animal psychology is key. Watch their body language carefully and be wary of your own. Evolution has wired them for survival, and they're wary of anything unfamiliar that might be a threat. If they've become habituated to an area frequented by humans then this may not be a concern. Otherwise the key is to not present yourself as a predator, but rather just another part of the ecosystem. Don't make excessive eye contact, because they'll feel pursued. Most animals see more in terms of sillohettes, so crouch or crawl so you look smaller and are not easily recognized as human. And most importantly, if they seem timid approach them slowly, inching forward a few feet at a time. Lowering your body down to eye level with them will also tend to be a better shot, seeing the world from their vantage point better able to see the face, while minimizing your apparent size.

Don't approach the animal directly, rather use an angle so they animal thinks you are moving past them. If an animal is already on the move, try to anticipate where it's going and try to be there first.

When animals seem extra edgy and you dont want to spook them with a clicking camera, shoot in quiet mode. Otherwise if they're active & preoccupied, use burst of high speed continuous mode shooting for action, for the best chance of capturing peak moments.

Generally the eyes are the most important part of the shot. They'll express the animals emotions the best. For that reason take care to focus the camera on that point, fine tuning manually if there's time. It can be a struggle finding a clean line of sight if sticks and leaves are between the camera and subject. Manual focus is almost essential if you're shooting through bush, since sticks and leaves between you and the animal can confuse the auto focus. Sometimes you can focus through those onto the subject to get a good shot. Otherwise look for a clearing in the direction the animal is moving.

When positioning yourself, consider quality of light on the subject and the cleanness of the background. In hard light I tend wait for the animal to move into a solid shadow, otherwise when light falls across the head. A powerful fill flash can also alleviate some hard light issues.

Be out when the animals you want to shoot are. To do this you should know the feeding habits of the species you're trying to shoot. Typically most mammals are going to be most active in the mornings and evenings, or through the night requiring a flash. Most will bed down in bad whether or on hot days, while if it's overcast they may stay out a bit longer.

Joshua Tree - Eagle Mountains

Wed, 24 Oct 2012 22:28:00 EDT

The Boulders of Eagle Mountain

Desert Iguana

Tarantula

This weekend was a much needed retreat in the desert of Joshua Tree National Park. It had been a bit of a rough week as I just found out my granddad had passed away. My flight to head back down to New Zealand a few weeks from now to catch up with family had already been booked, so you can imagine it was a bit upsetting to learn that I'd never be able to see him again. Sometimes it can take a while to work though big life events like this, but for me I tend to pull inwards to work through such things. I can think of no better place to do so than within the silence of the desert. Looking forward to catching up with the rest of the family in the coming weeks.

Jobs Board

Tue, 07 Feb 2012 16:03:00 EST

List job openings on your website, and provide an interface for users search, filter, and apply for employment opportunities

Concrete5 SEO Guide

Sat, 04 Feb 2012 16:19:00 EST

Tips to improve how search engines crawl and rank your concrete5 website

Rapid Paging Block Tutorial

Sat, 05 Nov 2011 23:23:00 EDT

Basic Configuration

Here's a short tutorial on how it get the Concrete5 Rapid Ajax Paging block up and running.

1) Add the Rapid Paging block to your page (the page that has the link on it, not the page that will be opened), into an area that is outside of the region that you'll be replacing.

2) Just keep all the default settings. It should say "Based on link: Class Name" and next to it, have the words "ajaxLink" in that field. It also should have "Main" as the area name. This is the area that will be shown in the popup. The "Page Load Target Selector" field should be a css selector path to the element on the page that you want to replace. Setting that element to #body would cause the contents of the <div id="body"> <div> tag to be replaced.

3) Create another page (anywhere on your site), and put some content in the "Main" area. This is the page that will be loaded. In this example, my target page has a url of /my_target_page/. Exit edit mode.

4) Go back to the first page, add/edit the Content block that will have the link to the ajax target page. Select the text that you want to turn into the ajax link, and click the link icon (the chain icon circled below). Add the url of the popup page (the next image below), then click on the advanced tab, and enter the word "ajaxLink" in the Classes field (the third image below). Then click the update button of both edit-dialog windows to save your changes.

5) Take the page out of edit mode. The ajax loading should now be activated for that link.

Advanced Configuration

While this approach works well for individual links, typically you'll want to use the "CSS Selector" instead of the "CSS Class Name" setting, since this will allow you to automatically activate a bunch of links at once. For example, using the "CSS Selector" option, with "#body a", will activate all of the links within the body area.

If there are certain links within an area that you've activate that you'd like to treat as normal links, you can add the css class "ignoreAjaxLink" to that link element or to any parent containing element.

To make setup rapid paging to work across a wide range of pages regardless of the entry page, it's recommended that you add the block to the global scrapbook, and reference it from that locations so that all the pages can include the same instance. If you hardcode the block display, be sure to also hardcode the required javascript and css files within the page.

Javascript within Ajax Loaded Pages

The Rapid Paging block will attempt to execute any javascript being loaded, after loading any external javascript and css files it can detect for each block. However, some block's that rely on javascript won't work correctly when being loaded through the ajax paging. This is typically because the javascript within those blocks is initiated during the pageload event, and by the time they are loaded via ajax, the pageload event has already been fired.

If you'd like to try to customize the javascript within your other blocks to work with this package, you can hook into a event that's fired after the page has completed loading:

$(document).bind('rapid_page_load', function(e, data) {
//add your block's javascript initialization code here
});

« Back to the Concrete5 Rapid Ajax Paging Block project page

Kayaking Skookumchuck Tidal Rapids

Tue, 25 Oct 2011 23:46:00 EDT

A kayaker surfs the food at Skookumchuck Tidal Rapids, British Columbia

Redwoods Elk Rut Slideshow

Sun, 02 Oct 2011 19:54:00 EDT

If you happen to visit Redwood National Park during the early autumn you may have a chance to see the seasonal Elk Rut. Within the aptly named Elk Prairie, this impressive bull elk actively defends his harem of up to 20 cows from challengers. In order to maintain his peak position within the heard he quickly chases them off any other males who wander too close. The juvenile bull being pursued in these photos has just reach the age where it's seen as potential mating threat, and is forced away by the alpha male from his mother's protection.

CSS snippet to reduce height of concrete5 edit bar

Sun, 31 Jul 2011 16:10:00 EDT

Tired of the concrete5 edit bar taking too much screen real-estate? Then add this snippet to your CSS to shrink it's height.

Integration with ProPhoto or Image Search blocks

Sat, 30 Jul 2011 13:59:00 EDT

The File/Image Details block was designed to integrate with the ProPhoto & Image Search blocks, allowing you to click through for an enlarged version of an image that displays further details. You can set this up in one of two ways:

1) use only one instance of the File/Image Details block to serve all of your images from one page, grabbing the file id from the url's query string. This approach requires less maintenance than the second option, so I recommend going this route. Edit the file-details block, make sure the "Load with URL Query String" radio is selected, and leave "fID" for the query string variable name. Then edit your ProPhoto block, & on the interface tab check "Link images to another page on your site", and select the page where the File/Image Details block is installed.

2) If you'd rather you can also create a new instance of the File/Image Details block on its own page for each image on your site. In this case, through your dashboard->files->attribute section, you'd create a file attribute (of type "text") with a handle of proPhoto_linkURL, and then for each image edit it's properties and assign a value for that proPhoto_linkURL attribute containing a relative URL path or a cID for the enlarged image page.

Canonical URLs

Thu, 31 Mar 2011 00:36:00 EDT

Duplicate URLs to access the same page can hurt your SEO. Add the new canonical link tag to your header to let the search engines know which is the correct address.

Flamenco & Classical Guitar

Thu, 25 Nov 2010 16:35:00 EST

A collection my favorite flamenco and classical guitar videos, with performances by Paco De Lucia, Andre Segovia, Manolo Sanlúcar, Tomatito, Pepe Romero, & Ana Vidovic

Real-Estate Package Tutorial

Thu, 28 Oct 2010 19:28:00 EDT

A tutorial for the concrete5 real-estate package

Jobs Board Package Tutorial

Thu, 28 Oct 2010 19:28:00 EDT

A tutorial for the concrete5 jobs board package

Link System

Thu, 12 Aug 2010 21:40:00 EDT

Let your users suggest links, and display thumbnails for each.

Rapid Paging

Thu, 12 Aug 2010 00:03:00 EDT

Automatically make links load through AJAX, without a full page refresh

Running a Concrete5 Micro ISV

Wed, 14 Jul 2010 01:12:00 EDT

Sharing some of the lessons I've learned while selling and supporting packages through the concrete5 marketplace.

Custom Statistics Panels

Wed, 16 Jun 2010 23:12:00 EDT

The Concrete5 Traffic & Statistics package, from version 2.12, allows other package and block developers to integrate their own stats display panels directly on the stats page of the dashboard.

Just follow these steps:

1) Create a new folder than will hold you panel's files, like /packages/my_package_name/stats_panel/

2) In that folder create a view.php file and a controller.php file

3) You controller's class must be named according to your panel's directory, and must extend the ParticleTrafficPanel class. So if it's placed within a folder called /my_package_statistics/, then it should have the class named MyPackageStatisticsParticleTrafficPanel. Here's an example:

class MyPackageStatisticsParticleTrafficPanel extends ParticleTrafficPanel {
     protected $title="My Package Stats";
     public function view(){
         //optional - place any initiation logic here
     }
}

4A) Automatic installation:

Just copy your folder into the /packages/tony_stats/panels/ directory, then visit the stats settings page. It will notify you if there are any errors with your package.

4B) Programatic Installation:

To register your new panel with the traffic and stats from within another package or application, add these lines to your code (not in the panel's view or controller) to include the required libraries:

Loader::helper('stats',$packageHandle);
Loader::model('panel',$packageHandle);

…then register the panel by giving it the absolute file path to your panel's directory.

$urlHelper = Loader::helper('concrete/urls');
$packageHandle='my_package_handle';
$statsPkg = Package::getByHandle($packageHandle);
$absoluteFilePath = $urlHelper->getPackageURL($statsPkg).'/stats_panel/';
$result = self::registerPanel( $absoluteFilePath );

The $result['msg'] will contain an error message if it detects any problems with your panel.

5) Your package should now be displayed on the main stats page.