When I first saw an article about the release of the BlueSLR, I thought that it was a totally cool idea, and more then I was actually looking, the remote shutter and intervalometer were just bonus, when all I wanted was the geotagging pulling the data from my iPhone… The initially announcement was that the device was compatible with both my D90 as well as my D7000, but that was to change due to a unforeseen change in the connector on the D7000, and I’m ok with that…

I told my wife about this great little gadget, and she decided to get it for me as a Christmas present, totally cool, but reality being reality, the unit did not show up until 3 weeks after Christmas (why does it take so long to get stuff shipped from Canada), and as luck would have it, it got here while I was on a business trip…

I get the unit mounted to my D90, and I am not really impressed with how the BlueSLR unit hangs off the camera, not a real deal killer, but not the greatest looking set up. With the device mounted I’m ready to go, fire up the camera, go to pair the BlueSLR device with the iPhone, it rejects the pairing a couple of times but eventually it pairs all is happy, and on to the BlueSLR app. Yes it technically does what  it says it does, it fires the shutter and I think autofocus worked once or twice, but not consistently, the intervalometer worked as far as I could tell. As I was playing with the app, trying the different features, I noticed that the time stamp is not changing, its static, I hit the GPS button, and the time started updating, but the GPS data stopped updating and then the app says the  GPS disconnected  I go to the bluetooth section of the iPhone settings and it says it is disconnected, then it connects as I’m looking at it, I go back to the BlueSLR app says its connected, I fire off a picture and then it says it’s disconnected again. This is the point where I l0ok again at how far the unit hangs off the camera and I think maybe its not all the way in, so I go to remove the device in an effort to reseat it and maybe resolve the bluetooth dropping issue, but as I pull the device out of the socket the unit comes out but the metal shield around the connector stays in the camera. This is the point where I am no longer a happy camper, and after spending a bunch of time pulling the metal shield out of my camera, making sure I didn’t do any damage to my camera. This is the point where the BlueSLR device went back in the box, and will be on its way back to canada early next week.

I really wanted the BlueSLR to work, and I was really planning on getting one for the D7000 when they worked out their issues with the inverted connector, but I think I’ll wait a lot longer and read a few more reviews before pulling the trigger on another.

The idea is really good, but the implementation is where things go wrong…

I guess for the time being I’ll continue to carry my GPS, and tag my pictures with PhotoLinker from Early Innovations…

The San Diego Chargers lost what is essentially their final game of the season, Unless you count the pathetic bowl at Mile high next Sunday.
The Chargers special teams, have plagued the chargers all season, if there is a bright spot in Sundays loss, was that it was not special teams, this weeks failure was a team effort.
The level of play on Sunday was pathetic, and I’m guessing that in the coming post season, the wholesale changes that need to happen in special teams won’t happen.
I am amazed that the special teams coaches survived week 4, but they did, as for the players ther should also be a significant shake up there as well, the punting unit failed their punter Scifres almost every week, by making sure he abused by the opposing return unit, I’m amazed that he didn’t just quit the team around week 4…
The Chargers have tremendous talent, going into the future, and I hope that next year is better.

One thing that doesn’t make you feel real good to hear your dentist say, while your hanging practically upside down in a dentist chair.

“I need to stand up, because I need more leverage”

I heard those very words today while at the dentist, didn’t make me feel real good. I had a broken tooth that had to be yanked.

I’ve been listening to since he came to San Diego, with a short hiatus when I relocated to the Hampton Roads area of Virginia, until he became available on satellite. I have really enjoyed all these years, but it is becoming increasingly hard to put up with the increasingly formulaic show.

Lately I have noticed more and more that Howard has become a huge hypocrite, and doesn’t use the same standards on himself as he uses on other… For example On December 6th he talks on how great the whole full disclosure campaign that wikileaks is imposing on the worlds governments and corporations, and how the people have the right to know what goes on in confidence, but when the CFO of Sirius discusses what may or may not happen with Howard’s contract negotiations, the CFO is vilified for an hour. What I want to know is why is Howard’s confidentiality is more sacred then everyone else’s. I would also like to know what happened to the shows of the first couple years that would go on for 5+ hours, now it’s 3 very structured blocks of roughly an hour, followed by roughly an hour of robins news and out the door right around 10:30, and let’s not forget about the commercials… Didn’t we used to hear that the show wasn’t dependent on commercials, but it seems we hear a lot more “we have to go to commercial”, which is 10 minutes every hour, including bumpers…

When the time comes in January to renew my annual contract with Sirius, I’m probably going to pass on another year of price increases… The programming on the music channels is sounding more and more like the terrestrial garbage, that I came to satellite to get away from… Then there’s all those “promises” that were made during the merger, unified receivers with unified programming, and MLB on Sirius and NFL on XM, which also doesn’t seem to be happening, since sirius recently renewed the contract with the NFL but nothing has been said about it’s availability on the XM receivers.

I think I’m just done with them, and I’ll go with iTunes content…

Same seat different plane…
Well at least this tome I’ll be getting off in San Diego!!!!!