It’s all over the interwebs already, but in case you haven’t heard, Dell made a pretty big –and colorful – splash today with the launch of Studio—a sleek, colorful and nicely loaded new product line designed to unleash the blogger/poet/novelist/artist/scrapbooker/YouTuber/Annie Leibovitz in all of us.

The first tranche of systems in the new line is two laptops – Studio 15 (15.4”) and Studio 17 (17”). John Biggs at the New York Times notes, “It’s summer, so why shouldn’t one’s laptop match one’s hot-pink bikini?… Optional Blu-ray or DVD recording drives ensure you can watch a movie under your beach umbrella, while built-in Wi-Fi, cellular broadband and Bluetooth keep things connected.”

For a quick overview of these systems take a look at this video with John New from Dell’s notebook team:

Of all the color options (seven different solid lids, plus four graphite with color insets), pink seems to be the most popular callout. The fashionable gearheads at GQ made note of the pink option, but were also impressed with Dell Dock, a simple, customizable task bar that replaces multiple icons on the desktop and sorts applications by category, that’s premiering with Studio. Wilson Rothman’s overview and very nice slide show on Gizmodo even hit the front page of Techmeme. To answer your question, Wilson, you can move the dock around.

For more on the Dell Dock, take a look at this vlog:

After backing in to a compliment about Studio’s “mouth watering colors” and “a few tasty extras, Charlie Sorrel at Wired also gives Dell Dock props and suggests that “The Studio is looking like a nice alternative to the MacBook.” Note to Charlie: Not exactly the way we’d put it, but thanks!

If you think beyond the box when buying a computer – read: if you accessorize whenever you can – don’t miss the color-matched Designed for Dell line of bags, mice/mouses, portable hard drives and other personalization options.

Lots of interesting ground to cover, so look for more on Studio, Dell Dock and Designed for Dell over the next few days.

This week, Dell launched three new Photo Inkjet All-in-One printers, the V105, V305, and the V305w. The V105 is a low-cost, ultra-simplified full color scanner, copier, and printer. The V305 offers a more flexible all-in-one printing solution and the V305w includes the option to connect the printer to your home office network wirelessly.

  V105 

V305

But one of the most exciting new features on these printers, from my perspective, is a powerful new piece of software that comes with them. It is called the Dell Imaging Toolbox and it not only offers basic print handling and maintenance features, it opens up a world of powerful tools to use with your digital photos.

The Dell Imaging Toolbox gives you extensive tools for editing the size, brightness, contrast, color balance, saturation and a host of other variables in your digital photos.  Easy-to-use scaling tools provide a simple way to make your pictures look exactly the way you want them to look.

There are also some fun photo sharing tools built right into the software. For example you can create multi-page posters at the click of a button or two and turn your favorite shot into a wall-sized display.

There are also 89 different templates for the creation of customized greeting cards. The card templates match virtually any occasion and allow you to attach your own message in whatever color, font, and type size you prefer. It even has an e-mailing tool to let you send the cards in a variety of file sizes to all the important people in your life.

The V105 and both versions of the V305 are capable of supporting 6-color photo printing with the installation of the optional Dell Photo Ink Cartridge and the use of Dell Premium Photo paper.

I have more than a decade of experience with digital photography and I’ve used the top of the line in photo editing software, Adobe® Photoshop®, since 1996. Obviously, there are tons of things in Photoshop that you will never find in the Dell Imaging Toolbox. But if you want to quickly re-size, crop, and retouch your photos and either print them or distribute them to friends and family, I think you will be impressed with the easy-to-use software that comes with the latest Dell Photo Inkjet printers.

For more detailed information on the Dell Imaging Toolbox, you can find my how-to article in the Dell Solutions Network.

I was recently reading Thomas Hawke’s blog called “The Digital Connection.”  If you are interested in photography and all things related to digital photo and the Web, Hawkes’s blog is a must read.  He also writes about the digital home and I find every aspect of his blog insightful and helpful for the fun things in life (ok and some of the work things, like Friend Feed, too)

Thomas recently noted he had been playing with PicLens.  He said “if you haven’t installed PicLens yet for browsing photos on the Web you are missing one of the most beautiful ways to view photography on the Internet yet” linking to this Firefox add-on.  It even supports YouTube, which I have not yet tried.  Check it out.

Here is a snipping tool pic of some of my photos in the tool…but trust me this doesn’t do PicLens justice.  Read Thomas and visit the PicLens site.

Ever since I started to teach myself photography just a bit more than 10 years ago, I loved the high contrast and surreal dreamy feeling of black and white infrared photographs.  In fact, most of work has been usually done as black and white infrared.  The first time I developed one in the darkroom, I was blown away and fell in love forever.

Without getting into all the details, infrared film captures a part of the light spectrum (wavelengths) that are not visible to the human eye.  This is not about seeing in the dark with military-issue infrared goggles or some such thing.  I suspect somehow they are related but I am no scientist to understand. For information check out the Infrared FAQ.

As you might guess, if our eyes cannot see infrared light, the camera cannot meter it.  But film can capture it.  With some work and a lot of bracketing you get photos like the one on the left below (sort of a bad scan of a print, but you get the drift).  The picture beside it is a normal black and white film print scan of the same location/same day.

I became familiar with the film, how it worked, and with a camera loaded in complete darkness, and a red filter I was off to shoot like a mad man, many a time…and able to catch a good shot almost every time, with bracketing.

Then along came digital photography!  The camera manufacturers put an infra filter in the digital sensors to remove infrared light rays because it causes noise for digital photos.  This was looking complicated and you can read more about digital infrared here or follow items in this Google search.

There were software conversion programs, often called “Faux Infrared” because they could not exactly duplicate what the eye cannot see anyway;  I tried special infrared filters and recalibrating white balances, but this extended exposure times, meaning I had to use a tripod….I shoot photos more freely than a tripod.  Previous to this latest edition of Photoshop, I played with various formulas in channels and everything else…but I was not getting where I wanted.  By the way, the current version of Photoshop (CS3) has the expanded black and white conversion tool that does include a set of conversions for infrared…they are not bad.

I really didn’t want to give up the black and white infrared and as such remained a film buff as the digital revolution proceeded. 

Then I found Lifepixel.com and they have been my savior!  I took an old digital SLR, sent it off to them and for a couple hundred dollars, I am back to shooting what I consider to be real and challenging black and white infrared images.  For the adventuresome, Lifepixel also offers a do-it-yourself instruction page. 

If you want to see some of this work, drop by and say hi on Flickr.

School is out and summer is almost here! From vacation plans to relaxing at home, almost every chic geek looks forward to the fun and long days that summer brings. It’s a time to kick up our heels and enjoy the weather, water and family.

One of the things we love to hate about the summer is the heat. Of Zen and Computing put together a great list of tips for Keeping Your Electronics Cool for the Summer. There are some good reminders in this list, regardless of the time of year, including keeping your vents clear and not stacking multiple electronics on top of each other.  Last but not least is my favorite: In Case of Emergency, Shut Down. Well that sounds appealing! Let’s shut down, disconnect and hit the beach!

There are many ways to go chic geek sur la plage this year. Here are seven recommendations for getting there:

(1) Hermés Printed Beach Towel (2) Hermés matching Beach bag (3) Cole Haan AIR BRIA STITCH THONG (4) Amazon Kindle (5) Burt’s Bee’s Wax Super Shiny Lip Gloss (6) Fendi Squared Frame B. Mix Sunglasses (7) Panasonic Lumix DMC-LZ10K Black 10.1 MP 5X Zoom Digital Camera

A balanced mix of style and technology will be key to complement the beach experience. Hermés towel with matching beach bag, Cole Haan Thong Sandals and Fendi Sunglasses will keep the chicest of chic’s style in check. Burt’s bee’s Wax Super Shiny Lip Gloss is a must to keep those lips moist and color applied. The Panasonic Lumix camera is a great addition to any vacation day, taking shots of your summer memories.

Most importantly, summer isn’t summer without a great novel. The Amazon Kindle promises to take summer reading to a whole new level. Whether you’re on the beach, a plane or relaxing at home, you can download your choice of more than 125,000 books in less than a minute! And no more huge newspaper to unfold and fold and unfold and fold, while you are eating your bagels and coffee on the beach as you await the heat of the day. This 10.3-ounce technology gem downloads national and international newspapers from around the world, right at your fingertips!

This is definitely my hot pick and must have for the summer. Looking forward to hearing what your favorite beach accessories are for the summer chic geek! 

One of the great banes of blogging is the toil it takes to come up with just the right image, and not to sweat the legal issues. Well, help is here in the form of Compfight, a Web app that lets anyone who can type a keyword quickly and easily search a wealth of Flickr images.

Check out Corvida’s informative review over at ReadWriteWeb.  Anyone else have a pic tip to share?   

When you see the word “photo” in the description of a color inkjet printer, it is natural to assume that printer is going to give you some high quality photo printouts. So you may be surprised when the quality of what they print on the first try is somewhat lacking. With that in mind, here are a few tips to help you get the best photographic quality out of your color inkjet printer.

Number 1: Paper matters.  Most people realize that plain bond paper doesn’t really produce great photo quality. The colors do tend to bleed a bit into the fibers of the paper, resulting in a softer and sometimes muddy image. Printing on glossy photo paper will always result in a sharper and more distinct photograph.

Number 2: Ink also matters. Dell photo printers have two cartridge carriers that hold a color and a black and white ink cartridge. But when you’re printing your photos on glossy photo paper, you will want to replace the black cartridge with a photo cartridge. The photo cartridge adds a wider range of color to the finished print.

Number 3: Size really matters. That doesn’t necessarily mean you have to print all your images in the largest possible size. Far from it! Each image contains a total number of pixels and the more pixels you have, the more information there is for the printer to use in printing your photo. So a 5X7 with 300 pixels per inch is going to have more detail and better sharpness than one with 72 pixels per inch. Keep that resolution fairly high to get the best results from your printer.

Number 4: Check the settings on the printer. When you set up a printing job, it pays to go in and manually select the image quality and paper type. Most printers have default settings that are designed to produce a standard document on normal bond paper. Using those default settings, photos will look washed out with noticeable banding. Changing to photo quality setting on photo/glossy paper can make a world of difference as you can see in the scanned images below:

The left side, above, was printed on default settings. The right side was printed with the photo quality setting and with photo/glossy paper selected.

Number 5: Edit those images before printing. Getting the light balance right is more than just a matter of setting the camera on auto and pointing it. Sometimes you have to open the image in software and adjust the brightness and contrast or even the color balance to get it right. Printers often produce a slightly darker image than what you see on the camera LCD. It pays to practice a little and get used to the differences between your camera’s display and what comes out of your printer.

More tips for printing photos on inkjet printers can be found in Robin Raskin’s post over at Yahoo! Tech.

In the months ahead, Dell will be releasing some new printers with an exciting new piece of software called the Dell Imaging Toolbox, a program that offers easy one-touch photo editing for those in a hurry as well as detailed editing tools for those who sweat the details. This software also provides some creative and fun options for making the most of your digital photos online. Watch for it on our upcoming printer releases!

Underwater photography is easier and less expensive than ever today, thanks to digital camera technology. Even beginning divers can get photographs good enough for framing or just to amaze their friends and family. Only a few years ago, underwater photography required expensive cameras and housings. And, since the results were unknown until the film was developed, there were lots of wasted shots (and film).

Today, inexpensive point-and-shoot digital cameras provide immediate gratification and confirmation of the shot. Camera manufacturers like Canon, Nikon, Sony and Olympus offer inexpensive plastic housings that can safely take cameras to 100 feet deep. The built-in flash is adequate for close-ups, and photographers can get stunning photos of tiny marine animals by switching to the Macro setting on their cameras. Check a camera manufacturer’s Web site to see what housings are available for specific cameras. Digital camera models change quickly, so buy the housing when you buy the camera.

Photographers can still spend thousands on expensive digital SLR cameras, specialized metal housings and underwater flash units, but $500 will easily get you a good point-and-shoot model AND housing. And you still use the camera for topside shots.

A few standard pointers:

1. The cleaner/clearer the water, the cleaner/clearer the photos.
2. Get close to the subject and try to fill the frame.
3. Underwater, try to shoot subjects at an upward angle for a better background.
4. Be patient and keep taking pictures until you get the shot you want. Remember, with digital cameras, you can review each shot immediately.

Philip Greenspun has a pretty good primer over at Photo.net.

Once you’ve got those amazing shots, transfer them to your PC, upload them to a Web album and invite everyone to have a look.

PCs, digital cameras and Web 2.0 tools like blogs can make the average Joe a citizen publisher.  But not many writers are plucked out of the blogosphere for big-buck book deals and my guess is the odds are probably slimmer for amateur photographers to hit the big time.

But what about you and your recognized – or even supersecret, unexpected – talent?

Enter BLURB – a self-publishing book service and brainchild of Eileen Gittens, a former Kodak employee and photographer.

Here’s a recent interview with Ms. Gittens that includes the ins and outs of the service:

Also check out Blurb’s blog – Blurberati – for tips and other interesting reading in the literary and photography arena.

Blurb books might make great gifts, portfolios and memory books showcasing your work (or the kiddos’ masterpieces) and it also offers an online bookstore to send your audience.

Like me, some of you photo and movie editing fans may have added Adobe’s Photoshop Elements 6.0 or Premiere Elements package to your recent PC purchase. Heck, maybe you got both – I did with my new XPS M1330. With so many photo editing programs available, some of which seem to require a PhD to operate, I held reservations of my own about what I was getting in to. Look, I’m just like any other average Joe … I’m so lazy that instruction manuals meet the trash at introduction. In my book everything needs to be as simple as the George Forman grill, but turn out as one of Emeril Lagasse’s own wonderful creations.

Don’t get me wrong…there’s a slight learning curve to these programs, but be patient. For the most part once you grasp the basics you’ll find yourself creating a portfolio of friends and family your peers will adore. Adobe’s helpful Learning Reference page is a must have bookmark if you own either of these programs. They’ve created very brief easy-to-follow tips, tricks, videos, etc…All perfect for a guy like me that has the attention span of a first grader.

I haven’t dug in to Premiere Elements yet, so no home movie tips to share right now…If that’s more your speed check out their instructional podcast page. I’ll get there eventually, but I’ve been busy enough just having fun editing photos of friends, family and objects.

I’m not a big camera buff, but for those who are you should keep tabs on a cool blog by David Pogue at the New York Times called Pogue’s Post. He reviews the latest and greatest camera hardware on a regular basis.

Below check out a few things:

1. Adobe Learning Resource site
2. Adobe’s SEE HOW movies
3. Quick steps to:
   a. Converting images to Black and White
   b. Changing the color of particular objects within a photo

I’ve attempted to outline a few basic steps I used to tweak a few fun photos. And yes, the little girl shown further below is my niece so I’m biased in saying she’s possibly the cutest kid ever!

So, get started and come back and tell us if this was helpful. Again, best place to begin is to check out the Adobe Learning Resource page.

Scroll roughly half way down until you come to “SEE HOW” movies
(Snippet shown below). From here select an instructional video that most interests you.

Here are two fairly quick steps I’ll list for you just to get started…One’s to alter a color image to black and white, and the second is changing colors of particular objects in a picture.

Converting color photos to black and white is incredibly simple!

Check out an image I altered of my beautiful niece in just a few short steps:

First, check out the color to black and white conversion instructional video.

From here it’s just a few quick steps:

• Open your Adobe Elements Photoshop 6.0 application
• Click file, then choose a photo from where your images are housed
• Once open, click the Enhance tab
• Select Convert to Black and White
• Here you have a couple options. If you like the black and white contrast Adobe has defaulted to then, voila, you’re done. If Picasso is in your veins feel free to experiment with the Intensity adjustment tabs, or even select different picture profiles on the left.

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Altering Image Object Colors

Next, check out how I altered the color of the flower’s petals. Again, first check out the instructional video.

Quick steps:

• Open your Adobe Elements Photoshop 6.0 application
• Click file, then choose a photo from where your images are housed
• Once open, click the Edit (highlighted in Orange) on the Right hand side of the page, then select Quick. Snippet shown here:

• Click on the Selection Tool on the left side of your screen, shown here:

• Drag the selection tool around the desired area in the photo you want altered. You’ll see dashed lines in motion. From here, you’re ready to tweak the colors any way you like using these easy adjustment tools

BEFORE:

AFTER: