Vide-Ohs: Are We Puppets of Social Media?

“The Social Dilemma may finally convince you that we’re being watched, manipulated, and misled by unscrupulous platforms and attention-harvesting algorithms.”

Read more about the documentary HERE

 

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All original content on this blog is copyrighted by Jeffrey B. Ross with ALL Rights Reserved. While reference links back to JBRish.com are appreciated and encouraged #please acquire approval for any reproduction of original content from this website.

©Jeffrey B. Ross 2014 – 2020 – JBRish.com



Harvesting the Web – 20200227

There are some amazing gardening resources to be found on the Internet and most of them are free. Of course viewers have to put up with some “nag” screens and pop-ups, but that is a small price to pay for valuable information. At least that’s my opinion. I decided to write about some of my findings for those who may also be interested in these gardening articles.

I have been gardening and growing plants for more than fifty years and I am currently a Master Gardener in Maricopa County, AZ (Phoenix area. I hope you find something useful among these harvested tidbits.

What to Do With Dried Potting Soil?

Author Katie Jensen, graduate of Arizona State University, points to some interesting hints for those who find that their potting soil is depleted of nutrients or so dry that it cannot absorb the necessary water when potting new plants.

As Master Gardeners, we are well aware of the problem of using peat moss in a potting mix and then having it become hydrophobic when dry. Jensen offers several good pointers at the link above.

NOTE – What has worked for me in the past, if one needs a speedier answer to hydrating soil, is to use very warm water. The warmer the water, the better. Do not use boiling hot water as it may hurt beneficial microorganisms and elements.

When dealing with soil that has the potential of being depleted of nutrients after long-use, I create a new mixture of two-thirds new potting soil and one-third old soil. I then increase the recommended amount of fertilizer by one third (+/-). In the desert, additional applications may be necessary because of increased watering.

Naturally, these procedures have worked in my N. Phoenix area, but your mileage may vary.

More garden-related articles from Hunker:

Garden Basics
Garden and Lawn


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Seven top tips for sustainable living in urban gardens

James and Dick Strawbridge from across the pond, so-to-speak, offer up some hints about urban gardens that focus on the goal of zero-waste. While zero may not be practical, many gardeners can work toward the goal of more sustainable gardening.

One suggestion in the article that some may not have considered before is eating “peelings.” Why not? Restaurants often serve potato skins as an appetizer and that includes the peels. The Strawbridges suggest other peelings that might be just as tasty with a bit of imagination in their preparation.

Another tip that is worthy of some consideration is “creating a wormery.” Worm castings have been demonstrated to be excellent fertilizer. The process in our desert is a bit different than elsewhere, but a visit to the Arizona Worm Farm * will get you started.

Read more about sustainable gardening at the link above.

*Here is the link for the Arizona Worm Farm

Arizona Worm Farm YouTube Videos

The Worm Farm offers very interesting tours of their operation and has vermiculture workshops. For fees and hours visit their website. Even our non-gardening guests have found the AZ Worm Farm an interesting place to visit.




Hardenbergia violacea is sometimes called the Lilac Vine. In the Sonoran Desert, it blooms at the end of January or the beginning of February. It produces fountains of purple flowers against dark green, leathery leaves.

 

That’s all for now, happy gardening!


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All original content on this blog is copyrighted by Jeffrey B. Ross with ALL Rights Reserved. While reference links back to JBRish.com are appreciated and encouraged, please acquire approval for any reproduction of original content from this website.

©Jeffrey B. Ross 2014 – 2020 – JBRish.com



Vide – Ohs: Headis??? Soccer Ball Ping Pong

OK, they got me on this one. I had never heard of this “sport,” but apparently there are enthusiasts around the globe. Headis was founded in 2006 as a combination of table tennis and soccer. The name is derived from a combination of head plus tennis, i.e. Headis. Read more about it HERE!

The video below is less than a minute long, but it will provide viewers with a sense and “thrill” of the game.

Another group from Germany has produced a Headis video with the ten best plays of the …AHEM… Headis World Championship 2015 in Kaiserslautern, Germany.

Who knew? The Internet is really something!

 

More Vide – Ohs

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All original content on this blog is copyrighted by Jeffrey B. Ross with ALL Rights Reserved. While reference links back to JBRish.com are appreciated and encouraged, please acquire approval for any reproduction of original content from this website.

©Jeffrey B. Ross 2014 – 2019 – JBRish.com



Video: Homeless Man Gets A Recording Deal


Homeless Man Gets a Record Deal
Screen capture courtesy of the Facebook video linked below.

Donald Gould was homeless for a numbeer of years and when Sarasota, Florida placed several pianos around town, he sat down and played. What happened next is hard to believe and ALSO shows how fate can intervene to help turn a life around. The Internet and modern communications played a pivotal role.

Watch the inspirational video linked below:

https://www.facebook.com/LADbible/videos/4639349809445506/

 

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All original content on this blog is copyrighted by Jeffrey B. Ross with ALL Rights Reserved. While reference links back to JBRish.com are appreciated and encouraged, please acquire approval for any reproduction of original content from this website.

©Jeffrey B. Ross – 2018 – JBRish.com



Photography: What is Post-Processing?

When it comes to photography, I consider myself a journeyman or apprentice. I work alone with the Internet serving as my mentor and it has provided great benefits to me as a student of photographic skills. I have always been interested in photography and back in the days of “only film,” I had a black and white darkroom.

Nowadays, digital photography makes things easier; at least for me. Post-processing is chemical free and done on a computer where mistakes can often be easily corrected with a few key strokes. If you are new to photography, you might be wondering: “What is post-processing?” Let me try to give you a simple explanation as I understand it.

When a digital photograph is taken on an automatic setting, the camera, which is really a computerized device, gathers all the information about the scene such as how dark it is, what colors go where, what area should be in focus, etc. and then it interprets the data and converts into a digital image. The current camera models are really quite capable and most will produce good to very good results on automatic settings.

There are times however when the camera may become “confused” because the scene is more difficult to analyze. A picture with lots of snow or many dark areas or one with high contrast will often cause problems. With many cameras, the settings can be changed from automatic to compensate for these difficult situations if the user is skilled enough to adjust the settings manually.

There will invariably be times, however, when a picture is less than ideal. Perhaps the photographer made an error in one of the settings. Some times a dial or setting is changed unintentionally and the error is not noticed until several shots later. The good news is that many mistakes can be remedied after the fact, i.e. post-processing.

In order to have the most options to re-work or revise photographs, some formats are better than others for allowing the photographer to compensate for mistakes such as underexposure or faulty composition. The most common form that offers leeway is the RAW image format, but what I am writing about below applies to almost every format including JPEG, PNG and others as well. It is just that RAW offers more latitude than some and is most common so there are many programs to help correct a picture via appropriate software.

In the RAW format, the camera caputers all the data, but doesn’t put it together for the user as it would in automatic mode. The camera offers the user the opportunity to make most of the decisions about how the photograph is to look. It is as though the camera is communicating with the user and saying: “OK, I know there is red in the scene and I know where it goes, but what is the exact hue of red that you want and what should the saturation and vibrance be?” The user can then use software to manipulate the camera’s information to create the scene as they saw it when the shutter was pressed.

The photograph below, for example, was taken at the Tucson Botanical Garden. When I put the image on my computer to view, it was lacking much of the “punch” and interest that encouraged me to take it in the first place.



I didn’t realize it at the time, but there are too many distracting elements in the photograph. The eye is being pulled away from the main group of the yellow daisy-like flowers by the bits of colors in the pansies on the right.

The upper left also has some distracting plant material. My intent was to have viewers focus on the yellow cluster of flowers. Cropping (cutting off) some elements of the picture will help a bit. In the edit below, I removed as much of the pansies (right-side) as possible without cutting off any of the pretty yellow petals.



Once that was done, I used tools in Lightroom and Photoshop to darken the areas around the plant that were distracting. Making the corners and other areas darker helps to lead the eye directly to the flowers. I also enhanced the color to more closely represent the flowers as I remembered them. I tried to be careful to avoid removing the shadows which add an element of interest to the picture. I like the shades of yellow as they are altered by the varying intensities of the light.



I was relatively happy with the result at this point, but I didn’t like the flower on the extreme left. It was on the wane and seemed to be drawing attention away from the main grouping of four. Experts suggest using odd numbers of objects in a photograph as they most often produce a pleasing result, but I wasn’t sure about this specific image.

I decided to remove the flower on the left to see how that looked.



I like the edited picture above the best. What do you think? When you compare the original image to the final image, I think you will agree that post-processing, i..e. modifying the image after it has been taken, has created a more pleasing and artistic picture.

To quote one of America’s most famous photographers, Ansel Adams, “I don’t take photographs I make photographs.” This is what I try to do. I am an average user of post-processing software, but I continue to learn and enjoy making images. It is much fun and offers the photographer a chance to become a photographic artist.

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Metadata

File Name: yellow_flowers_0507-2.CR2
Capture time: 12:21:36 PM
Capture date: April 11, 2014
Exposure: 1/500 sec @ f/8.0
Focal Length: 17.14mm
ISO: 125
Camera: Canon PowerShot SX50 HS
Lens: 4.3-215mm

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JBRish.com originally published this post

See previous Photography Posts HERE

See Jeff’s other photographs on Instagram


All original content on this blog is copyrighted by Jeffrey B. Ross with ALL Rights Reserved. While reference links back to JBRish.com are appreciated and encouraged, please acquire approval for any reproduction of original content from this website.

©Jeffrey B. Ross – 2018 – JBRish.com



Vide_Ohs: Net Neutrality – A Whopper of a Story

If anyone has difficulty understanding the concept of Net Neutrality, Burger King has created a short video which delivers a metaphoric explanation of the idea.

Here are the notes from the YouTube Page:

BURGER KING – Published on Jan 24, 2018

The repeal of Net Neutrality is a hot topic in America, but it can be very difficult to understand. That’s why the BURGER KING® brand created WHOPPER® Neutrality, a social experiment that explains the effects of the repeal of Net Neutrality by putting it in terms anyone can understand: A WHOPPER® sandwich.

This effort aims to help people understand how the repeal of Net Neutrality will impact their lives.

The BURGER KING® brand believes the Internet should be like the WHOPPER® sandwich: the same for everyone.

Help keep Net Neutrality safe by signing the petition at Change.org/SavetheNet

 

More Vide – Ohs

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All original content on this blog is copyrighted by Jeffrey B. Ross with ALL Rights Reserved. While reference links back to JBRish.com are appreciated and encouraged, please acquire approval for any reproduction of original content from this website.

©Jeffrey B. Ross – 2018 – JBRish.com