With the iPad you need to use MPMoviePlayerViewController instead of MPMoviePlayerController.  However, our Multimodal Rummy application uses a landscape layout for most of the views, in particular the view that provides the link to the tutorial video.  Since the MPMoviePlayer traditionally displays the content in portrait layout I had to create a simple MPMoviePlayerViewController subclass that contained the shouldAutorotateToInterfaceOrientation method and returns YES for UIInterfaceOrientationLandscapeLeft and UIInterfaceOrientationLandscapeRight.

Then simply call [self presentMoviePlayerViewControllerAnimated:self.moviePlayer]; to start the movie and then call [self dismissMoviePlayerViewControllerAnimated]; in your custom MPMoviePlayerPlaybackDidFinishNotification listener to remove the video.

I put together a collection of my favorite images from my first year of photography over on my Flickr site. It’s crazy to think I’ve only been doing this for a little over a year, but it has become one of my favorite things to do; I just need more time to do it. Brandon and I went to a Joe McNally lighting seminar in Houston; it was awsome! I’ve read Joe’s blog all year and his books are a must read for any photographer, so to see him in person was by far the highlight of my year. The only problem is I left the seminar regretting the fact that I own Canon equipment; Joe does everything with Nikon equipment and it doesn’t take him long to show you why Nikon is kicking Canon’s butt in flash photography.

Since it’s now 2010 I know I should make a new year resolution, but I think setting out some goals would be a better idea.

Goal 1: Take More Photos

As a beginning photographer you can never take enough photos. I’m a bit of an equipment junky, I see a shot and immediately want to purchase equipment so I can take that type of photo. In 2010 I want to start pushing the limits of what I can do with all the equipment I currently own (and it’s more than enough to make some damn good shots). I want to buy the Canon 5D mark III next year because my 40D is dead from taking too many photos not because it’s the hot new camera; like how I snuck a purchase into the goal, lol

Goal 2: Be Healthy and Happy

With juggling work and school my health tends to take a low priority and my quality of life tends to be nil. I want to focus more on making sure I’m around in 10 years so I can actually use my degree.

Goal 3: Put the Toys Away

I’ve lived the bachelor life for quite awhile, and looking back I’ve have had no shortage of toys, trips, and fun. I want to try and go a year without buying everything I want and try to limit it to what I need. I know several of you are laughing you ass off right now, but you’re the people I expect to help me stick to this

Well, that’s enough writing for me. See you in another six months….

Goal 4: Update This Website

…… 3 out of 4 ain’t bad

I’ve heard several complaints that the front page for codygreen.com takes a long time to load. While the web site is image heavy the pages are optimized as much as they can be. The problem was largely due to the service provider, Lunar Pages, which took forever to pull content off their servers. I was working on a process to try and use JQuery to load the first image and then pull the remaining images on the front page down once the page had loaded when Lunar Pages started having hosting problems for almost two days. I finally had enough and I’ve moved everything to GoDaddy.com. I’ve used GoDaddy for several consulting projects so I figured I would give them a shot with my personal web site. So far I’m very happy with the speed of the servers and the site loads 2/3′s faster than before. I had to upgrade my account to get everything working but I’m not too worried about that; now I can host my Python webapps here.

Well as the new semester begins I hope to start blogging again and my plan is to do more reviews and technical articles about things I use or problems I run into at work. So if you don’t see a new post every few days feel free to post a comment and tell me to get my shit in gear

When we arrived at 8PM it was over a 100°F, but luckily there was a strong breeze and the temperature quickly dropped to the mid 90s. There were several events for families and kids and various performers on stage. The Brazos Valley Symphony was the last to perform and did an outstanding job. For a small community the fireworks show was pretty good and lasted for almost 10 minutes.

Check out the slide show and leave some comments on my Flickr pages. Below are a few of my favorite shots from the night and photography comments.

Fireworks 1

Fireworks 2

Fireworks 3

Fireworks 4

For those interested in the photography details continue reading… I had read several blogs yesterday morning that talked about photographing fireworks and most of them suggested using at least a 200mm lens. So Jeremy was nice and let me borrow his Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8; which by the way is one of the best pieces of glass I’ve ever used. The only drawback of having this glass on your camera is the fact it is HUGE. You really draw attention which is something you don’t want as a photographer. After walking around for a bit Megan and I returned to our chairs out in a field next to the parking lot about 100 yards from the main stage. After I set up my tripod and fired off a few test shots we waited for the fireworks to begin. At about 10PM the show started and I was very surprised to realize that 70mm was not wide enough to get most of the fireworks in the frame. I was going to switch over to my 50mm glass but I figured I would miss too many fireworks in the process. In the end I’m kind of glad I stuck with the 70mm focal distance because it helped frame the shots and give the fireworks character versus every shot simply capturing the full firework. I shot all the fireworks at f/11, although the Flickr metadata says f/10, and I kept my shutter on bulb and used my Canon remote switch to trigger the shutter and customize the exposure time.

I created a mockup of the site using Pixelmator. It’s a nice product developed for the mac that uses the GPU instead of the CPU for rendering. This allows you to see effects in real time. If you have a mac I highly recommend that you try it out; there’s a 30 day demo. I have to say it is much easier to create a mockup in an image editor and make changes versus doing the mockup in code. Being a programmer I prefer to just sit down and code, but in the end I usually end up not getting the look I want and scrapping the entire concept. As for the results, I like the new design but I think it needs some work. Keep in mind I am not a graphic designer, so if you think it sucks please keep it to yourself .

As for the home page, this was a concept I took from a JQuery tutorial and I modified it to work with WordPress. While I like the concept I need to rewrite the JQuery from scratch and change how pictures are loaded. I’ve had several people tell me that the images take too long to load. So I would like to have the page load and then use JQuery to pull the remaining 5 images (1 image per featured post). This way, if someone clicks on a post and the image has not loaded yet they’ll get a loading bar versus the entire page taking 30 seconds or more to load. There are a few problems I have with the limitations of some WordPress function calls. At the moment I’m trying not to modify the WordPress code base, this would be bad for future upgrades, but I need to find a better way to better customize the WordPress output. An example is the “[..]” for each except on the home page. You can’t remove this and you can’t make that a link to the full article without modifying the WordPress code. Oh well, sometimes you have to just deal with the lemons you’re given.

Luckenbach Post Office

Bar Behind Luckenbach Post Office

The car show pretty much allowed anything with four wheels to enter. So there were some cars that were crap but I was surprised with some of the cars I did see; 3 Shelby Cobras. Below are some images of my favorite car at the show.

Shelby Cobra

Shelby Cobra

There were a few new model Mustangs, Camaros, and Challengers. The Camaro below looked really sharp and some kid kept saying “look, it’s bumblebee”.

2010 Camaro

Overall the car show was pretty cool, although I would not recommend going to one in the middle of the day during summer; we should have gone first thing that morning. Check out my Flickr set to see more photos of the show.

• Luckenbach Rod & Custom Car Show
• Fredericksburg Vacation

The photos are still uploading so it might be an hour or so before everything is done.
When I get some time I’ll blog a bit about the trip; It was a blast!

Not sure if I’ll be able to fix it this week but I will get to it.