Shallow Thoughts

Using (or not) an Apple Cinema Display on a non-Apple

Dave and I recently acquired a lovely trinket from a Mac-using friend: an old 20-inch Apple Cinema Display.

I know what you're thinking (if you're not a Mac user): surely Akkana's not lustful of Apple's vastly overpriced monitors when brand-new monitors that size are selling for under $200!

Indeed, I thought that until fairly recently. But there actually is a reason the Apple Cinema displays cost so much more than seemingly equivalent monitors -- and it's not the color and shape of the bezel.

The difference is that Apple cinema displays are a technology called S-IPS, while normal consumer LCD monitors -- those ones you see at Fry's going for around $200 for a 22-inch 1680x1050 -- are a technology called TN. (There's a third technology in between the two called S-PVA, but it's rare.)

The main differences are color range and viewing angle. The TN monitors can't display full color: they're only 6 bits per channel. They simulate colors outside that range by cycling very rapidly between two similar colors (this is called "dithering" but it's not the usual use of the term). Modern TN monitors are astoundingly fast, so they can do this dithering faster than the eye can follow, but many people say they can still see the color difference. S-IPS monitors show a true 8 bits per color channel.

The viewing angle difference is much easier to see. The published numbers are similar, something like 160 degrees for TN monitors versus 180 degrees for S-IPS, but that doesn't begin to tell the story. Align yourself in front of a TN monitor, so the colors look right. Now stand up, if you're sitting down, or squat down if you're standing. See how the image suddenly goes all inverse-video, like a photographic negative only worse? Try that with an S-IPS monitor, and no matter where you stand, all that happens is that the image gets a little less bright.

(For those wanting more background, read TN Film, MVA, PVA and IPS – Which one's for you?, the articles on TFT Central, and the wikipedia article on LCD technology.)

Now, the comparison isn't entirely one-sided. TN monitors have their advantages too. They're outrageously inexpensive. They're blindingly fast -- gamers like them because they don't leave "ghosts" behind fast-moving images. And they're very power efficient (S-IPS monitors, are only a little better than a CRT). But clearly, if you spend a lot of time editing photos and an S-IPS monitor falls into your possession, it's worth at least trying out.

But how? The old Apple Cinema display has a nonstandard connector, called ADC, which provides video, power and USB1 all at once. It turns out the only adaptor from a PC video card with DVI output (forget about using an older card that supports only VGA) to an ADC monitor is the $99 adaptor from the Apple store. It comes with a power brick and USB plug.

Okay, that's a lot for an adaptor, but it's the only game in town, so off I went to the Apple store, and a very short time later I had the monitor plugged in to my machine and showing an image. (On Ubuntu Hardy, simply removing xorg.conf was all I needed, and X automatically detected the correct resolution. But eventually I put back one section from my old xorg.conf, the keyboard section that specifies "XkbOptions" to be "ctrl:nocaps".)

And oh, the image was beautiful. So sharp, clear, bright and colorful. And I got it working so easily!

Of course, things weren't as good as they seemed (they never are, with computers, are they?) Over the next few days I collected a list of things that weren't working quite right:

• The Apple display had no brightness/contrast controls; I got a pretty bad headache the first day sitting in front of that full-brightness screen.
• Suspend didn't work. And here when I'd made so much progress getting suspend to work on my desktop machine!
• While X worked great, the text console didn't.

The brightness problem was the easiest. A little web searching led me to acdcontrol, a commandline program to control brightness on Apple monitors. It turns out that it works via the USB plug of the ADC connector, which I initially hadn't connected (having not much use for another USB 1.1 hub). Naturally, Ubuntu's udev/hal setup created the device in a nonstandard place and with permissions that only worked for root, so I had to figure out that I needed to edit /etc/udev/rules.d/20-names.rules and change the hiddev line to read:

KERNEL=="hiddev[0-9]*", NAME="usb/%k", GROUP="video", MODE="0660"

That did the trick, and after that acdcontrol worked beautifully.

On the second problem, I never did figure out why suspending with the Apple monitor always locked up the machine, either during suspend or resume. I guess I could live without suspend on a desktop, though I sure like having it.

The third problem was the killer. Big deal, who needs text consoles, right? Well, I use them for debugging, but what was more important, also broken were the grub screen (I could no longer choose kernels or boot options) and the BIOS screen (not something I need very often, but when you need it you really need it).

In fact, the text console itself wasn't a problem. It turns out the problem is that the Apple display won't take a 640x480 signal. I tried building a kernel with framebuffer enabled, and indeed, that gave me back my boot messages and text consoles (at 1280x1024), but still no grub or BIOS screens. It might be possible to hack a grub that could display at 1280x1024. But never being able to change BIOS parameters would be a drag.

The problems were mounting up. Some had solutions; some required further hacking; some didn't have solutions at all. Was this monitor worth the hassle? But the display was so beautiful ...

That was when Dave discovered TFT Central's search page -- and we learned that the Dell 2005FPW uses the exact same Philips tube as the Apple, and there are lots of them for sale used,. That sealed it -- Dave took the Apple monitor (he has a Mac, though he'll need a solution for his Linux box too) and I bought a Dell. Its image is just as beautiful as the Apple (and the bezel is nicer) and it works with DVI or VGA, works at resolutions down to 640x480 and even has a powered speaker bar attached.

Maybe it's possible to make an old Apple Cinema display work on a Mac. But it's way too much work. On a PC, the Dell is a much better bet.

Tags: linux, tech, photo, graphics, monitor, S-IPS, TN, ADC, DVI
[ 20:57 Nov 15, 2008    More tech | permalink to this entry ]

DSLR Camera Foo

I thought it would never happen ... I've finally joined the Digital SLR world.

Why would it never happen? I enjoyed film SLRs for years ... from the Olympus OM-1 (great little manual camera) I had as a teenager to the Nikkormat EL and Nikon FG I used a decade ago. I only stopped because processing and scanning slides was such a hassle compared to the ease of uploading digital images. So why not a DSLR?

The problem was that when Nikon went digital, they orphaned all their old manual-focus lenses. They're still physically compatible (they'll screw on to the DSLR body), but peeved Nikon DSLR owners inform me (and camera store clerks agree) that the Nikon cameras won't meter with the old lens attached.

I don't mind doing my own focusing (manual focusing is one of the prime advantages of an SLR, not a disadvantage) but having to guess at the exposure setting too? "Oh, just carry a light meter," people say. On a camera that costs over $600? That bothers me.

So I was peeved at Nikon and not about to buy anything from them ... but meanwhile I had all these lenses, and hated to buy some other brand where the lenses wouldn't even screw on. So, no DSLR for me ...

Until I was pouring out my lens-mount frustrations during a camera discussion one night on #gimp and one of the regulars (thanks, Liam!) said "Well then, why don't you just get an adaptor that lets you use Nikon MF lenses on a Canon?"

A what? said I.

Sure enough, there are lots of them on Ebay ... search for canon nikon adaptor or look at Gadget Infinity's "lens adaptor" section. You can even (for a little more money) get a "confirm" lens that lights up the autofocus-confirm points in the viewfinder to tell you when the camera thinks you're in focus.

A few months passed (too busy to do camera research) but eventually I found the time and budget ... and now I have a 5-day-old Canon Rebel Xsi, which indeed takes excellent photos (correctly metered) through my old Nikon AI-mount Sigma 70-300 APO zoom macro. And the 18-55 kit lens (the equivalent of a 29-88 in a 35mm camera) isn't bad either -- a little slow (f/3.5 at the widest) but decently wide at the wide end (in the years of using pocket digicams I'd forgotten how much nicer it is to have a true wide-angle lens) and with a nice close focus for macros at the long end.

Even the autofocus isn't bad -- there are still plenty of times when I need manual, but the Rebel's autofocus is much faster and more accurate than any I'd seen on earlier cameras.

It's such a great feeling to use an SLR again. The morning after the camera arrived, I looked up and saw goldfinches at the feeder just outside the window. I picked up the camera, switched it on, pointed, zoomed, focused and snapped. No worries about whether the camera might have decided to focus on the window, or the window frame, or the tree, or the bush -- just focus and shoot. What a pleasure!

And the best part: this must be a camera made by geeks, because when it has the Nikon lens attached ... it says F00!

Tags: photo
[ 19:59 Sep 02, 2008    More photo | permalink to this entry ]

Dowitcher Photo Published!

I was contacted months ago regarding a photo on my web site asking whether it could be used along with an article on molting patterns in Dowitchers in Birding magazine.

Months went by (print magazines are slow) and I wondered if the plan had been dropped, but last week I heard from the author, Caleb Putnam, and the article is in the current (July/August) issue! Yesterday I received a copy of the magazine and a modest payment. Cool!

Even cooler, the photo is the frontispiece of the article. The author says he's received many comments about how great a shot it is for illustrating molt gaps. That's a pull quote if I ever heard one: "Great shot for illustrating molt gaps."

The article is interesting as well -- I didn't know that molt patterns could identify the two species of dowitcher. Telling long-billed and short-billed dowitchers apart has been beyond my modest birding skills, but perhaps I'll have better luck now. I'll be heading out to Baylands today at lunch to see what the dowitchers are doing ...

Tags: photo
[ 10:49 Aug 25, 2005    More photo | permalink to this entry ]

Freeway Fire

Some jerk decided it would be funny to throw a lit firecracker into the dry brush beside the freeway a few blocks away from where I live, with predictable results.

Fortunately the fire department responded incredibly quickly (must have been less than five minutes from when I heard the bang to when the fire truck arrived) and they were able to put the fire out before it spread far.

I hope someone saw whoever threw the firecracker, and got a license plate.

Tags: photo
[ 22:12 Jun 28, 2005    More misc | permalink to this entry ]

Musings on photo workshops and classes

Dan's party was last night, including an group which was giving an informal workshop on night photography.

The presentation was a little disappointing, just people showing slides of recent photographs. No discussion of techniques or interesting ideas for night photography, things to try out that night.

It was mildly fun for the couple of us who were Linux users to watch the Windows people fumble with their JASC slideshow program trying to get it to present photos at a reasonable size. Whenever I wonder why I bother to keep maintaining pho, I look at what Windows and Mac people have to go through to look at photos and am amazed all over again.

But strangely, before heading off to Marin yesterday, I did some searching for other linux image viewing programs, to see if they'd solved the window manager problems I've been wrestling with for pho. Amazingly, I couldn't find a single free program in Debian that did what pho does (namely, view a list of images serially, at full size or screen resolution). I had to search for xv source (not in Debian, probably licensing issues), which requires a couple of tweaks to get it to build on linux, and which has the same window management issues pho has. I guess I'll keep maintaining it after all!

After dark we trooped up the hill to photograph lights (Richmond and the Richmond-San Rafael bridge were visible, along with parts of Marin) and wait for moonrise. I took an SLR and the Minolta, and wish I'd taken the Olympus -- nearly everyone else had digital SLRs (Canon) and I wished for something with a decent zoom which would still give me exposure feedback. It's not as if bay area skies can support long star-trail exposures anyway. Moonrise was lovely, a sliver of moon emerging above a thick cloudbank centered over the San Rafael bridge, and growing into a full-sized moon. I hope some of the film photos (on old expired PJM multispeed film!) come out.

Most of the photographers there knew each other from previous classes (I wasn't clear how many are students versus instructors) and most of the group spent the hour before moonrise clustered together taking turns taking the same shot, a person silhouetted against the lights of Richmond while someone else fired a flash from behind the person, back toward the camera, giving an "aura" effect around the silhouette and lighting the nearby grass a bit. Not really knowing anyone, I hung back and instead worked on photos of the various photographers silhouetted against the sky (which may or may not come out; I was shooting from 10 sec to about 3 min, betting on the Marin sky being too bright for longer star trails, but we'll see. One of the other solo shooters was shooting 10 minute exposures and people kept walking into her frame.) Dave shot a few Canon digicam images before the sunset light was completely gone, then the wind got to him and he went back to the house and didn't wait for moonrise.

I'd wondered about maybe taking one of their regular workshops, but this outing was a bit like the couple of other photo workshops I've done: no real instruction or sharing of ideas, basically just a bunch of people wandering around taking photos. If you have specific questions or know the instructors already you might be able to get questions answered, but as a person new to the group, I felt like I'd probably do just as well just going somewhere on my own and taking a lot of photos.

It may be that their multi-day pay workshops involve more instruction, and more feedback the next day on images taken at the workshop. I'm curious about that; the few photo seminars and classes I've taken have also promised feedback afterward, but haven't had much, if any.

Sometimes I think that the ideal format for a photo workshop is an online class: give assignments, then people post their photos a few days or a week later, and everyone discusses them, then you go off to the next assignment with what you learned based on the feedback. The important parts are the discussion and the feedback, not being in the same physical place during the shooting (since not much instruction seems to take place then, for most participants, and if it does it seems to be of the type "everybody line up and take exactly the same photo"). It's hard to do feedback in a several-day workshop at a place like Death Valley when people are shooting film and you can't get it developed quickly enough; a digital camera might be a prerequisite to getting much out of that sort of workshop.

Tags: photo
[ 10:00 Jul 04, 2004    More photo | permalink to this entry ]