PigPog

Distance: “about a mile” Steps: 2223 Weather Conditions: Cold, Windy Walker Conditions: Cold, Windy

My first practice walk was about a third of the length of the Holme Pierrepont route, and was really quite hilly in places. It was hard going at first, but I soon got into the swing of it.

Thank you to my lovely fiance for being an understanding, entertaining and downright sexy walking partner.

Next time we’re going to have a go at the Holme Pierrepont route, and then buy cheesecake.

Sponsor me for the Race for Life!

This is for RocketQueen85 on the VR Forum. Unleash your mighty army of Rawk.

Here’s a quick guide to livening up cameraphone pics that are keeping you in the dark, using Adobe Photoshop Elements.

Skill level – It’s so easy, easy. When everybody’s trying to please me ba-by.

[image:1535 size=small]

Here’s a pic of the lovely Mr Hudson. Alas, it’s a cameraphone picture of a magazine picture, not a photo of him ‘in the flesh’. Poor fella’s in the dark. And he’s wearing sunglasses. Here’s how I lightened up his outlook:

• I opened the picture in Photoshop, and via the layers tab on the right of the screen, adjusted the levels. This is done by clicking the first of the 3 icons at the bottom of the layers dropdown, “create a new fill or adjustment layer”, and choosing “levels” from the pop up menu. Slide the levels markers on the right to the left to obtain the brightness you want. I just wanted to make his face more visible. The picture is quite grainy, and although that would make a nice touch, I didn’t want to show too much of it. So play with the levels until you get a level of brightness you’re happy with.

• Then, making sure the layer you’re working on is the background layer (I get caught out with that every time), it’s time to play with the colour in the picture. This shot was just too grainy to work in colour, so I made the pic monochrome by going to the ‘Enhance’ menu and selecting ‘remove colour’. You’ve also got options there to alter colour balance, hue and saturation, lighting and colour variations, so have a play and make friends with CTRL+Z (or edit-undo, or the ‘undo’ button on the toolbar).

• A quick resize to make it suitable for posting on the Velvet Revolver Forum without eating much bandwidth, and this is how it turned out:

[image:1533 size=original]

From dark cameraphone pic to cool monochrome pic. Rock and effin’ roll.

Nathan True has built an impressive musical instrument inspired by those used by the Blue Man Group. He calls it a PVC Instrument, which sounds delightfully kinky to me, especially when I noticed it’s played with paddles. Hey, it’s been a long week and my mind’s heading gutter-ward.

If you’d like to make a PVC Instrument of your own, check out Nathan’s instructions here along with photos of the instrument being built here. Paddles at the ready…

Via the lovely folks at Make:

EDIT – If you’re going to build this for some Blue Man Group-style hi-jinks, you need this hat.

A picture of Slash from a 2004 issue of Q Magazine, photographed with my SPV C550 and fiddled with in Photoshop. Ooh, that hair. Ooh. The caption read “Not quite ready for a weave yet”.

Productivity is obviously the new trend among the big comic strips!

First Dilbert’s Boss does GTD and now Cathy, role model to insecure thirtysomething women everywhere, extols the virtues of the DIY Planner.

• Cathy does DIY Planner

What’s going to be next? Zonker Harris* with a Hipster PDA?

**No relation, though sometimes I wonder*

More quick links for you, including not one, but two references to animals’ rear ends – bargain…

• Baby Animal Butts – cute, yet butts.
• Chocolate Roulette
• Homemade feline exhaust fan – I don’t have a joke here, I just love saying ‘homemade feline exhaust fan’.
• Learn the Toot – it’s a “full-blown” musical instrument. Hmm. ‘Blown’. Heh.
• Water-powered Light-up Shower – changes colour with water temperature. Pretty.

Got a load of books lying around you never read? Thoughtlessly-bought cookbooks? Romance novels that made you want to vomit? Self-help books that sounded like all the other self-help books you’ve bought? Put ‘em to good use by using them to store all those stray CDs and DVDs you have lying around.

CD/DVD Storage ‘Book’ via Make:

Be imaginative with your choices, for example, why not store all those stray Linux CDs in a book about penguins?

UPDATE – The site has been redesigned and relaunched. Check out Rik’s new Art and Photography sections, and leave him a comment.

Rated Art is the website of Rik Leushuis and features beautiful digital art and photography.

“Most of these works are heavily influenced by music. Others are reflections of certain emotions I was feeling at the time I was working with these images. Some of them are inspired by the people I love and/or admire. Because of their kind personalities, their friendship and love, their talent or plain beauty.”

He’s also responsible for the excellent Velvet Revolver site mentioned on my recent blog post here.

• Rated Art