The bad weather (mainly strong winds) in Portugal this afternoon started to make some damages... this is just near my house and luckily this happened without anyone inside...

We've been seeing some strange things happening in Portugal. This is one of the most aberrant constructions that we've seen. The National Library expansion is out of someone without his right mind. The lack of respect for the space, the history or the volumes in this 50's building is something that everybody should protest about... but in these dark ages of the portuguese architecture everything is allowed (as long as the money goes into the right pockets).

Walking downtown in portugal we can find some streets closed to the cars. Curiously every time someone starts talking about closing the downtown streets to traffic the commerce protests saying that they'll loose customers. Curiously it's in those streets that are closed to traffic that we see the high profile shops and are always full with people. Can't understand their logic...

Playing around with Aperture 3 I come to the conclusion that it just doesn't make the cut when it comes to speed, usefulness and IQ, to be in my photo editing process:

I have this sensation that Aperture (although a very good software) isn't a product for photographers, but it has been developed to the computer geek that occasionally takes pictures.

It is very slow and after closing the program, my machine seems like it went to an halt.

After using to process 1GB of files I've decided that I'll stick to my line of editing... LR+Photoshop. It's far more productive than all the bells and whistles of Aperture that don't even come close to what I already use. I'm passing this one...

I've added more comments in my blog (in Portuguese! Google Translation)

There's always a way to do things that aren't "usual". Most of the times, those achievements happen in situations of great fear or great adrenaline. I imagine that this was what this cat did when he escaped the one sitting on the car. Fear and adrenaline... he ran up this tree like if his tail was on fire and stayed there until it was safe to come down again. The pursuing cat (whose owner is in the background looking at the scene) ended up being chased away by her owner...

Photographing from the hip isn't easy, but with the G5 it's not that hard either. The swivel screen can help but you'll look very awkward looking down on the camera all the time. This means that most of the time you'll be shooting while you stroll around. Many photos come out tilted or blurred and in the end the keepers are a small fraction but you get some nice ones. when shooting from the hip the only thing I'd like to have would be a radio remote controlled camera. This would mean that I'd keep my hands in my coat pockets and shoot away. Also I found that the G5, although very quiet, doesn't go fully unnoticed, mainly because the lens extends when shooting.

Today we went for a drive of our new car and also to get some sun so we could do some photos... Curiously I've been using my small Canon G5 more and more. The benefits of a compact camera are huge when one wants to go unnoticed. And even if the G5 doesn't hold by todays requirements for a small camera, it still produces great results (but not stellar).

The IQ is good enough for having this fun with photography without worrying about gear, lenses, or what ever. I shoot the G5 in jpeg mode and with in camera BW conversion. I don't really need anything else.

I'll shock some by saying this heretic words, but for what I want to get out of this camera shooting RAW is like having a F1 team of mechanics to change the oil on your comute car. You are just over-thinking the techniques and the gear and not focusing on the photography.

And this resumes something I've been thinking about my own photography. Every time I feel that the DSLR is staying more and more at home. I don't have the time to play with it. It's big, heavy and I do like to be inconspicuous. Probably I'll buy a new compact camera some time down the road. Maybe when the G5 finally dies in my hands. I'f it was today I'd probably buy a Olympys EP-2 with a Pany 20mm or a Canon S90 and shoot with it for several years. They are small cameras with great quality that can give you as a photographer the tool to take the picture at that precise moment. That's all I'd need.

Hm... Could I finance a new camera with the lenses that I have?