One of the newest endeavors from Google is to team up with a variety of space agencies and fight global warming.   By measuring forests around the world from space Google Earth will track deforestation, which in turn will help scientists understand the cause & effect of our changing climate.  According to the director of this initiative, “The only way to measure forests efficiently is from space.”  NASA, the European Space Agency, Japan, Germany, Italy, India, and Brazil have also pledged their support to track global forest sizes.  Finally, a use for Google Earth besides making the globe spin really fast.

Now that “Where the Wild Things Are” and “Spike Jonze” are tearing up the box office, maybe its time to teach your kids to read the original book, and watch TV…

For $20 on Amazon.com you can get the ‘Read With Me System’ complete with ‘Where the Wild Things Are’ DVD-ROM.  Yes, learn to read with your TV.

“Make the most of your toddler’s screen time with this interactive learning system that “reads” a story to him via the family TV set and builds story comprehension and vocabulary skills.”

In the box you get a “child-friendly wireless console,” where kids can choose an interactive version of the story.   Children will learn through being asked comprehension questions about the plot or they can highlight words on the screen to learn their meanings.

“There is also a game-playing mode, which reinforces the storyline through fun games, and a self-reading mode for emerging readers who want to turn off the narration and try tackling the words on their own.”

It comes with three “AA” batteries and costs a little under 20 bucks.  TV and child not included.

“This is the ultimate urban bag. The efficiently cut shape and strategically placed pockets provide maximum convenience and ample storage for your gear.”

If you were perchance born Leonardo or Donatello and happen to have a penchant for sleek gadget carrying devices, then design+function have finally caught up to your needs.  Anyone who sends in a pic wearing this and a bandana with the eyes cut out gets my approval.  Buy it here.

Trail Guru combines everything you can ever want in an GPS app on your iPhone. For any one who has ever ventured out on a trail, this App is for you.

What it does is track time, distance, speed, and elevation of your adventure.  When you’re done you can post the results to the trail guru website, which will track and monitor the results over time. It also will display your actual route on a map. You can also take pictures through the app, and they will be posted with the update. Once upon a time for someone like me, who likes to walk and listen to music, I would have to take a GPS device, a Cell Phone, a Camera, and a CD player to match the functionality of Trail Guru running on the iPhone (and yes, my pockets were full). Over the past year, I’ve logged about 60 miles walking, and for this I salute you Trail Guru. And oh yeah, its free.

HDR is basically a process that takes different exposures of the same picture and merges them together.  An HDR photo is recognized by its color range and textures, where due to the over and under exposed of the base photos, the end result will yield both the darkest and brightest colors possible (depending on contrast).

1. The first thing you need is a digital camera that allows you to control the exposure level.  On some of the newer models it is the meter that reads something like:  [5, -4. -3, -2. -1, 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

2. Next choose something you want to take a picture of.  For your first HDR photo I suggest choosing a still target to eliminate ghosting, and using a tripod.

3. Now take three consecutive photos, one at -5 exp, one at 0 exp, and the last at 5 exp.

4.  If you have photoshop CS4, good news, you already have HDR software, go to file > Automate > Merge to HDR…  But, if you don’t, there is an alternative, which I actually prefer: Photomatix Pro.

5. After installing the software, first Click “Generate HDR Image.” Then add each of your photos, which were taken at different exposures into the new window.

6. Next you will be given a bunch of options as to how the pictures should blend and to reduce noise and ghost artifacts, there is no winning combination for every image to produce the best results, so I suggest playing with the options here till you find something that suits your taste.

7.  Ok.  Now you have an unprocessed HDR image, but its not finished yet.  Now you can apply Tone Mapping.  Play around with the levels until again you find the end result that best suits your taste.  If you don’t have the time there are presets, like “Grunge” that are easily applied and which can be easily tweaked.

8.  Don’t forge to save your file. And enjoy.  There is an ever growing population of HDR photographers on the internets, and in places such as flickr.com

Here is an example of an HDR Image, and the source files used. Note that I have posted two different end results to show the range that can be achieved through Tone Mapping.

Follow the link to read more on the Magic of Bacon Jam from the Skillet Street Food team.

“…….we take a big bunch of really really good bacon, and render it down…add a bunch of spices..onions, etc..and let it simmer for about 6 hours…give it a quick puree, and blast chill it…and you have bacon jam..”

This is a rare example, and I wish that more problems would be as easy to fix, but unfortunately with ever increasing complexity comes the loss of tinkering.  How often did you open your PC case, just to check it out, or did you ever open the hood of your car while it was running, with a smile on your face.  Yet, I would never think of opening up my TV in this day and age, well, not until this happened to me.  So next time, something like this happens, which it will, check your options first, maybe you are a born modder or tinkerer just waiting for something to break down.

Here are some before and after shots.

Apple's Magic Mouse

Behold the Magic Mouse, Apple’s new input device. By making it the smartest mouse ever and throwing in a lil’ bit of that Cupertino black magic they have birthed the world’s first multi-touch mouse. This upgrade was a much anticipated event as every user of Apple’s previous Mighty Mouse, will attest to the shoddy reliability of the “nub” scroll wheel.  But is it better?

All together the Magic Mouse looks like a welcome evolution of the mouse, a consumer technology with about thirty years of history behind it. Except they left out one thing. On the Mighty Mouse there were the two main buttons, but there were also two extra programmable and clickable spots (clicking the “nub” and squeezing the sides) which were actually what made the mouse extremely useful (even after the “nub” died). For example I have it set up to access the ‘application switcher’ when I press-in the “nub,” and this saves me precious seconds every time I want to change an application – all without taking my hands off the mouse and moving to the keyboard to press ‘command + tab’. The other option I’ve setup is to open up spotlight by squeezing the sides of the mouse. Altogether I use/depend upon these buttons maybe a few hundred times a week.

Yet, in the new Magic Mouse, there seems to be no programmable secondary function buttons. We take one step forward with the advent of multi-touch, and one step back by taking away the real functionality of these buttons. (not to mention that this new ZOOM function (hold control + scroll) that they’re tacking on, is years old). The mutli-touch seems like really smart technology that fixes the “nub” problem, and even improves overall functionality, but in an effort to keep things to Apple’s aesthetic standard, they’ve taken away some of the things that were already working (and broke them).

So if you’re tempted to upgrade, first consider how you use your mouse & what you need to be effecient, maybe check out comparable Logitech options which offer solutions (sans multi-touch). For me. I’m going to light a candle and clean out my “nub” one more time, maybe play some Neil Young too.