This is awesome ! Sony again

This comes right from my mobile to my main blog :-) love it !

Voila ! Sony rocks

My first blog entry right from my sony k800i.

The lord of forest - A trip to the great SABAREESAN

I post this with great satisaction and pain.....:) Satisfaction for my inner self and pain for my body :)

Work...work....work :(

Missed all the previous months postings...was really into some hefty schedules and want to continue this passion forward ;) Not in a mood for a pretty lengthy post now....but yes will be back shortly after a small hibernation ;)

Knowing CSS based Javascript dropdown more closer than before

Hi all, It took me so long to write this piece of blog. Busy with some personal issues and official work, this month is turning out to be a pretty hectic and troublesome for me. But there are also something to be happy about. The gud thing is that ive been learning some new things and they are really gonna be handy for me in the future. Of those i would be sharing a professional experience here now :) Pretty lately im involved in a project that demands me of some site development profile and that too in a language that i hated the most once upon a time in my beginning of career - oh yeah im talking about the scripting language JS :) Javascript is the talk of the town for me for the last couple of weeks... Now coming to the technical point, a CSS based javascript dropdown is the topic of the day. Have been researching on the various options and got zeroed into a dropdown suggested by a senior fellow designer. The script is from 'Suckerfish' and this was pretty much we were luking for. Now the implementation of this one is the challenge placed before me and right now im in the process of implementing it into the application interface of our project. This menu is basically based on a UL LI css list menu and the javascript makes use of the same to display it as a dropdown menu using the ID and by attaching relevant events to the page while loading. There is an important thing that needs to be kept in mind, while using such dropdowns in extensive projects with numerous menu items. Sicne these sort of menus make use of the cpu memory by attaching the events, using such menus in projects with lots of menu items may prove fatal some times. The more the menu items the more will be the cpu usage while loading. So, going with scripts that attaches very less no. of events are preferable. Suckerfish is such a menu component that can come handy for such situations. Will post more technical details once im done with this task of implementing this menu in my application interface.

My WP down for the moment :(

With some hectic work and frequent visit to my home, i was kept at bay from the blogging phobia for almost a month now. Wordpress blog of mine is down at the moment as i there are some server maintenance going on. Hoping to return with a loads of new informative and interesting stuff :) Hang on my friends !

Moving from blogger to Wordpress !

Having setup my wordpress account, now it is time to transfer all the posts here in blogger to WP. Thats wat im after all these days. After googling the topic i found out some interesting topics and im sharing them here... Backing up blogger posts

• Backup Your Posts - Bloggers Blogsend allows each of my blog posts to be automatically sent to my email address. So I have a back up of all my posts as individual emails. You can further create folders in your email account (as in Yahoo Mail) or apply labels (in Gmail), and create filters such that such emails can be collected in one place.
• Back up your entire blogger blog - Bloggers provides detailed instructions to create a single file with all your posts which you may publish and then copy to your own computer for use as desired. Remember to save a copy of your existing template in a file on your computer as you will need to have it at hand after this process is completed. This is good for a one time backup, but is cumbersome to do if you back up very frequently. Also you might mess up some setting and disbale your blog is not done right.
• Try third party back up tools - like the HTTrack Web site copier for Windows users and Webgrabber for Mac users. Each of these applications will create a fully working, interlinked local copy of your blog for browsing offline and easily allow you to back up. Remember it will take considerable time and internet bandwidth if you have a huge blog.

Transferring content from blogger to WP Settings in Blogger I just ensured that some settings were inspired from different feedbacks I read elsewhere. Before doing anything, back up your Blogger blog first.

Click Formatting and change the Timestamp Format to be mm/dd/yyyy hh:mm:ss AM/PM (the first choice in the dropdown menu). Click Archiving and set Archive Frequency to ‘monthly’ These settings are already set in Blogger by default. I already had these settings in my blog anyway, so effectively I made no change my Blogger settings.

Settings in WP Login into Wordpress. Go to Import. Click on Blogger - “Import posts and comments from a Blogger account”. Fill in your blogger username and password.

It will list all your blogger blogs as you see on the Blogger dashboard. Click on the blog you want to move to Wordpress. And the Import will start automatically. Time taken will depend on how large your blog is. It took me a 2-3 minutes for a 1000 posts.

Remember, do not stop, reload or restart while the process is going on. It seems at times that the importing process is stuck, but it is continuing in the background. After all is done, it will tell you it is done and you can ‘Move on”…

If for some reason things get stuck, you can “reset the importer”. View your new Wordpress blog manage and see all your posts and comments are imported.

If you install Wordpress in a subdirectory instead of the root of your domain, read all about hosting Wordpress in an alternative directory.

Time to move on to WORDPRESS...bye bye blogspot ;)

Im moving...........hurray!! Im moving from blogspot shortly. Having setup my wordpress blog in my own domain, im moving from blogspot and nowon lets meet all in my own world in wordpress :) Btw, i plan to hang around here for some time, till i completely set my blog up. Wait for a post announcing mysticpixels' bradn new blog up and running ! Cheers!

Its recharge time !

Its time for a recharge, and no other time suits other than this weekend ! Now posting this blog from chennai, im under recharge mode :) Here for a period of 3 days with my friends, im all ready for a complete recharge. Time spent enjoying the beautiful things around me, its a different experience. This being my first trip to this city adds to the joy. Looking forward to post some snaps that ill be taking along the way into my flickr account shortly. Learning to cope up with the pressure and maintain the work-life balance slowly. A long way to go in my career, this will be a good launch pad to withstand hard times to come. Cmon.....lets chill out pals ;)

Street Photography - Tips

Have been peeping into some photography tips and forums related to photography and came across this pretty interesting thread about photographing street scenes. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Courtesy - Andy, from Dgrin forum for photography ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- street photography tips

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there's a lot that goes into successful street photography. i'll try to open up a few subjects, and let's discuss... awareness/focus i'm in a zone when i street shoot. i'm looking for slices of life, expressive moments, odd juxtapositions, funny scenes, interesting people. i'm totally focused on the scene, i'm part of it as i'm walking through it. constantly watching, looking, peering, seeing. imo you cannot "street shoot" in 15 minutes. for me, it takes me a while to get in the zone, and then once there, i hope for the best - i've said it before that we make our own luck by being there. others have said "f/8 and be there!" -- same concept. so when i'm in the zone, i hope that i find some of the above criteria met - and i usually do, but some days i have to look harder than others. make mental note as you ply your streets... i have posted here before that there's a shot i'd been wanting for months, but i was never near this "standpipe" when someone was sitting on it... well, patience paid off and i got this: what makes this shot for me, is the indifference of the subject (hey, i'm just sittin' here, reading my newspaper...), his reflection, and the reflection of the cab. and of course, the irony of the "sitting" on the "stand" pipe.... people in context people shots are great, and i live for my street portraits. i really try to put people in context. so, rather than tight up to the cab driver, i waited weeks to find the right cabby (facial and other "attitude" character), the right light, and the right scene (again, i had this shot in my mental inventory before i even took it: what works for me here is the fairly wide angle view of the street, the cab and the waldorf-astoria... and the absolute cooperation of the subject. i simply told him "hey, you look great, may i take your photograph? this was a one-shot-shoot, i popped in a little fill flash to get some twinkle, chatted him up a bit, asked him his name (henri), shot, smiled, thanked him, gave him my card and was on my way all in less than a minute. more "in context" and one of my favorite street portraits, is the "suit seller" who actually approached me first trying to lure me inside the men's store to buy a suit... i stopped, did a button-hook, and went right up to him... "hey, you look great here, in front of your store like this, may i take your photograph?" again, what works for me here is the absolute clarity of subject/environment, it's clear that he's in front of men's clothes for sale. i adore his expression, and his eyes. this shot is on my wall. in this gallery you'll find many more examples of people in context. take a look at the chess players, for an example of some street people that i spent quite a bit of time with, they became comfortable with me, and i shot them up without disturbing their games. confidence street shooting requires confidence.. *you* are doing nothing wrong, so don't sneak around! put away that tele, and stick a fifty or thirty-five on your dslr, or set your digicam's zoom to the wider end of things, and see the scene "normally," up close and personaly. this may be strange for some of you, but i assure you it gets easier after your initial trepidation wears off. the worst that can happen is people say "no, i don't want my photo taken," and so you smile and move on! the wider angles offer so much more to the viewer imo, that they're worth the extra effort in becoming more comfortable ... readiness learn your camera's controls, shoot in a way that let's you shoot quickly! i'm always pre-set for the most part (choice of iso, aperture) and i typically shoot in aperture priority mode. i also learn the hyperfocal distances of my lenses, so that i can shoot comfortable within a distance range. watch the lighting, which can change by 8 or 9 stops just by turning a corner! it's really important to have all your senses focused on the job at hand. maybe that's why i have to stop for food and starbucks so much attitude if you have a confident attitude, learn your camera inside and out, focus on the lighting, the scenes, have a mental inventory of shots you want, put people in context, show an interest in your subjects, and work swiftly and politely, you'll be rewarded with good people shots and street photos. enjoy (street) photography,

Microsoft seeks help of flickr user !

Ever imagined where the dazzling wallpapers and cool scenaries in Windows Vista come from. Well i wouldnt have believed it untill i came across this posting in a news site. MS have approached a flickr user Hamad Darwish, for either use of his photos or commissioned to create new images for the desktop backgrounds that are included in the new Windows Vista operating system. Get detailed story from http://dsphotographic.com/index.php/2007/02/...

The pain of rejection...

Its been quite some time ive posted something. Was pretty busy with a design contest. A intranet portal design contest for the company i work for, infact. We worked for a week, inspite of our late start, and managed to come up with a pretty appealing interface with some feasible ideas in it. Expectations...expectations....expectations...I realised that it is the single way to distress :( We expected our design to get through the first round and were waiting for the second round. But to our shock, we couldnt even find a place in the top 9 list :(. Hard luck for the team and the morale was dropping. But, recovering pretty fast from this tragedy, we have some plans and we ll implement it in times to come. Watch out for some hot news from mysticpixels !

Computing is getting too personal - MOJOPAC has arrived :)

Moving around places and missing all the softwares and environments in your PC back home, has been a pain for most of the software professionals. Being a designer ive felt that pain whenever i travel out where i dont have access to the sort of softwares that i have at my PC @ home. There seems to be an end for this trivia. I just came across an interesting software that is offering solutions that enables you to carry around all the softwares and environment as it is in your PC, and work in any other PC with the same set of s/w, without even installing the softwares in the new PC. Im talking about "Mojopac". Get to know this new technology... MOJOPAC

MojoPac is a technology that transforms your iPod or USB Hard Drive or Flash drive into a portable and private PC. Just install MojoPac on any USB 2.0 complaint storage device, upload your applications and files, modify your user settings and environment preferences, and take it with you everywhere.

Every time you plug your MojoPac-enabled device into any Windows XP PC , MojoPac automatically launches your environment on the host PC. Your communications, music, games, applications, and files are all local and accessible. And when you unplug the MojoPac device, no trace is left behind – your information is not cached on the host PC.

Into a new playground - UE

Having decided to dive into the UE arena, im seeing infinite opportunities of improvement and there are lots and lots of new information and skills to be tamed and ive just started my journey towards a UE developer. Moving away from the likes of Visual designing will definitely make a low morale, but the way im moving seems to be more apt and i believe this is what im destined to be in. The starting will definitely be a bitter experience and there wont be any cakewalk..thats sure. As a first step, im trying to learn the basics of AJAX. After the briefing from my Manager, this decision of mine alone can fetch me a good project in my workplace, and this decision will affect my entire career and im prepared for that. This blog can be a place where my experimentations and aspirations in UE Development will find place....and really looking forward for a better UE experience.

The 'Aero' experience

Its all about the new windows vista! Microsoft has put on a great effort in this latest version of windows...to make a hell a lot of new features and a great new look. i would say that this is microsoft's greatest ever release of their new OS version and i am all praises for this sort of an effort from the S/w giant. But like every new products, this version of windows has also got a lot of minuses or shortcomings rather, that the IT gurus all over the world would say. Lets go through the pros and cons of this exciting new version and lets come to know what actually can vista give users... First let me take through the highlights if the OS Vista's single best feature is the graphics subsystem and Aero "Glass" user experience it enables (when your hardware supports it). Direct support for advanced 3-D graphics processors, vector-based graphics and fonts, DPI scaling, reflections, transparencies, 3-D movements and a whole range of visual improvements account for the most profound change to Vista. The new integrated desktop search features, the ability to save searches as dynamic collections, and some new data sorting and visualizing options (including "stacking") make up the next most significant feature set. Have a luk at the mindblowing interface for the Vista start screen 8-)

Another what's-new story about Vista concerns bundled applications. Vista adds several new apps, such as Windows Defender, Sidebar, Calendar, Photo Gallery, DVD Maker, Fax and Scan, and BitLocker full-volume encryption. Significantly upgraded bundled apps include Internet Explorer 7+, Windows Mail (Outlook Express), Media Player 11, Movie Maker, Speech Recognition, Windows Meeting Space (Wi-Fi-based peer presentation/file sharing), automatic hard-drive defragmentation and disk backup. There are loads of stuffs that we can add as highlights...but since i have to go to bed and since there is a time constrain...let me make a quick drift towards the cons of the subject.

These are the some of the headaches associated with the Vista users in the future. Well...this can be MS's new strategy to raise the bar and to increase the hardware sales as well, but its for sure that there are some sufferers also. Vista requires 128MB of video memory in order for the up-level Aero Glass features to take effect.

The stratification of PCs based on whether they can display Aero will become a headache for IT managers. This problem is likely to grow over time, as more business-class PCs are equipped with 128MB or more of video memory. Most business people have little use for 128MB of video RAM

Will be back with more information soon...till then its gnite...:)

WINDOWS Vista - Is it worth the wait??

The much hyped release of the Windows Vista is almost around the corner...and the innovative features are being brought to the daylight. In this juncture where the hype has been the highest ever in the history of microsoft...i m just wondering if, this release of the new OS from Microsoft is worth the wait !! Well...im gathering some solid information about this so called 'cool' windows...and lets find out if this is what the tech world was waiting for...watch out for the next few posts from me.....

Web Designers and Developer's Handbook

A great resource for Web Designers and Developers. http://www.alvit.de/handbook/

Crossing the development barrier .....

The last couple of months were very important for my career as a professional trying to make the web a better place. Having been involved in a project that gave me more or less great opportunities to peep into the complexities and the processes of site development, was indeed an invaluable experience added to my career. This has been my first project in which i was working on completely CSS based layouts. The talents around me were always inspiring me to deliver the best and there was a sense of competition in the air. This is what ive been dreaming of for the last years in my career and this exactly is what i needed to build a robust basement to my professinal career as a Creative Designer. But there are some downfalls...some compromises rather... Now i have started to understand, how important it is to concentrate in development technologies that are essential for a Creative. Having worked on visual designing and more into graphic and flash animations...this was my first exposure to a more development oriented project and it really helped to find out a way or rather identify my real vision as a designer. So here is a small thought for all those designers sticking to visual designing(Of course who are willing to undergo changes and want to have a broader and out there in the blue....guys...if you really want to come up in your career with a broader perspective of the web, rather than wanting to stick onto visual designing...go and try out the latest technologies that are taking the web with a storm. There are hell a lot of technologies out there and you cant just master them in a fortnight...So make up your mind and try to learn some of them which really can make a difference in you and which would give u an edge over others... Im all set to dive into the development arena and am gonna cross the development barrier as a designer...:)..wait for some cool posts in those new technologies...

Yahoo! Bangalore looking for visual designers and Interaction Designers

Hi All....Heard that yahoo is looking for talents in Visual Design and Interaction Designing in India. They have even asked interested Pros to send their version of a future web2.0 Mail inbox interface. Want to know more? bangalore.yahoo.com/design Well give it a try and be a part of the company leading the next generation Interactive web :)

Caught between the Google and Yahoo wave...

The WWW is undergoing some serious transformations these days. Thanks to the revolutionary competition between the 2 giants Yahoo and Google. There have been some news or the other these days from that are leading a much aggressive revolution in the web. I think the recent news that has stuck me was the agreeing of Google to acquire YouTube.com, a consumer media company for people to watch and share original videos worldwide through a Web experience. This increases the strength of the search engine giant to many more folds and makes it a better competent for Yahoo as far as web video is concerned. Get the facts from http://www.google.com/press/pressrel/google_youtube.html The good news is that there are tonnes of news to follow that would leave us with some good thoughts to pass on and this certainly will be a healthy ground for aspiring Creatives and Interaction designers. Watch out for the cool stuffs.....