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Archive for May, 2010

I actually find this pretty disappointing since Expression Media was originally iView Media Pro which Microsoft bought just a few years back. Of course the big concern was what MS would do with the product once they had it. Ironically, a lot of people (myself included) felt MS would do more harm to the app than good. Arguably, that’s exactly what’s happened. Hopefully it will have a good home now.

Microsoft has sold its Expression Media digital-asset-management application to digital-photography vendor Phase One for an undisclosed amount.

Starting May 25, Phase One is handling customer support and future development for Expression Media. Microsoft will continue to offer support for Expression Media retail customers for the next 90 days, officials said.

Another thing that’s unusual is that Microsoft is still stating they’re making competitor products to Adobe’s photography offerings. Quite some time ago they touted there would be a Photoshop equivalent, which of course never materialized. Now, Microsoft is claiming they will have a Lightroom competitor. I won’t hold my breath waiting for that one to appear.

Let’s see, Microsoft’s JPG killer didn’t take off. They’re PDF killer didn’t take off. They’re Flash killer hasn’t made much of a dent. And now they ditched the last of their photography apps. Microsoft has struck out against Adobe a couple of times and now they’re selling off one photo app with grand plans to launch another? Certainly makes me want to buy what they’re offering! Stable, very stable.

Further, Lightroom is on version 3 and has been incredibly successful from day one. It gained a massive and loyal following while it was still in beta and continues to be incredibly successful. I’m a huge fan of it and considering how well it’s been received and I can’t even conceive of a product Microsoft could offer that would best it in features and usability. I really think Microsoft is barking up the wrong tree here.

Microsoft is continuing to make investments in the professional photography space. Microsoft’s FUSE Labs is working on SmartFlow — a competitor to Adobe Lightroom that will include social-networking hooks.

Microsoft sells off one of its Expression products

Behold the Bacon Explosion!

Some say that merely gazing upon it can cause arteries to harden. Others look at its meaty goodness and weep tears of joy. My compadres and I look upon the Bacon Explosion with reverence and respect and have longed for the day to create it ourselves. That day has finally arrived.

Last year the Death Sausage was created, a nine pound behemoth that still has no equal and has yet to be duplicated (but Father’s Day is just around the corner), however, this time around the real recipe was followed and a Bacon Explosion was brought into the world. My buddy Theo was at the helm and making only slight alterations he handcrafted this meat roll up.

To start, he blended together an herb rub that would go inside and outside the roll.

He also included several cloves of garlic.

Once those two pieces were prepped it was time to make the bacon weave; a true thing of beauty.

There is something almost magical about a woven together slab of bacon. And now that the outer shell was done it was time to add the Italian Sausage. The store Theo went to didn’t have loose sausage so he had to "wring it out" so to speak. This part of the process was a little comical to say the least.

Once out of the casings the sausage is mixed together then laid out on top of the bacon. Bacon and sausage together at last!

Then a layer of garlic to add some flavor. Don’t panic, roasted garlic has a very mild flavor.

Since this is the Bacon Explosion, more bacon is needed for the filling. Using a man sized skillet, Theo preps up the inner bacon and fills the house with the seductive smell of frying bacon. We all took a moment to snack on the bacon.

Theo then cut the bacon and strategically placed it onto the sausage layer for maximum flavor coverage. It was truly watching a master at work.

With all the layers securely in place, it was time to add some sauce. Normally Theo would have made his own, but alas, time did not permit. Sticky Fingers was the sauce of choice to give it a little more BBQ flavor.

Then the moment of truth, the rolling. The sausage is rolled up and pinched together to secure all the ingredients inside. One thing to note, the sausage should actually be cold to make the rolling easier. A little sticking occurred, but nothing major.

And then once the loaf is secured and formed, it’s time to roll it up in bacon. This is the tricky part and we probably needed about another inch, maybe two, of bacon to really cover the sausage portion. It was really close, but could have used just a touch more to make sure everything got tucked in there.

With it all rolled up, it was time to sprinkle it with more of the dry rub and then on to the smoking rack.

The meat thermometer goes in so we know exactly when it’s done. That Theo, he’s a stickler for details.

Then into the smoker for two hours.

To pass the time (because time crawls when you’re waiting for bacon) we played Left for Dead 2, which I have to say is one of the funniest games I’ve ever played. It’s like being in the movie Zomieland! And I know for a fact I work with Coach and Ellis. I also have to admit, I absolutely suck at that game. Not only did I shoot Theo multiple times in the posterior end, but I was of little help in saving his bacon when evil deeds befell him. Lesson learned, I would not survive the zombie invasion. I have the cardio, but the double-tap eludes me.

After repeated checks, the explosion was complete. The internal temperature was 165 and it looked good!

For good measure Theo brushed it down with some more BBQ sauce. This was to add more flavor and spices as well as give it a few minutes to rest.

Then it was off the rack and onto the block. I have to say, at this point, the aroma was almost intoxicating. It had a wonderful smoky aroma, a slight tang of BBQ sauce, the hint of garlic and Italian sausage all mixing together. We all stared in complete admiration as Theo began to slice.

Here it is, sliced and ready to go.

For those of you who like bacon, it’s every bit as delicious as you’d hope. The flavor is excellent and blended together so well. The garlic cloves were a very nice touch and if you don’t like them you can easily pull them out. However, I ate them whole.

I have to say it was a sight to behold and a big thanks to Theo for putting this one together. This was actually a test run since the plan is to do another one for Father’s Day. There will also be a new variation on Death Sausage with a few less ingredients and whole lot more flavor!

The new Paint Shop Pro X3 is actually pretty nice to work with even though for the most part it’s the same as the previous version. There are a couple of things that I’m not really sold on though. First, the new text layer is more awkward than the previous way of doing things. It is a little more desktop publishing like in how you just type onto the image rather than into a dialog box, but selecting and making changes to that text after it’s been written is a little clunky to me. Maybe I’m just doing it wrong, but trying to reselect that text and then edit it again seems to take a bunch of different clicks in a bunch of different places. So far, I like how it used to work.

Second, I’m not sure if it’s a configuration issue or just how PSP does things, but it basically uses the tablet like a mouse. I guess I need to configure the brush variance, but most of the time it just acts like a pointer and doesn’t offer the functionality I would have thought. I did hook it up to a machine with Painter 11 and it behaved in a completely different manner, much more like I would expect. Like I said, maybe it’s a config issue.

The Express Lab looks somewhat interesting, but not sure that’s going to be something I use.

Overall it’s pretty good, but there are still quite a few features I haven’t used yet. The extractor tool is something that looks very interesting. I’m curious to see how it works.