Taking Pictures Indoors Without a Flash

Posted on Oct 15, 2007 in Digital Cameras, Digital Photos | 1 Comment

I have taken many pictures indoors with a flash and without the use of a flash. I find that pictures taken without a flash always turn out better than when I have used the flash. I find that when I use a flash I get harsh shadows that contribute to a black background. A flash can also wash out much of the detail if the subject is too close.

In this post I will explain how to take pictures indoors without the use of a flash. I’m not a professional photographer by any means, but I have learned a few things that I’m sure will help you.


Shutter Speed and Aperture

Before explaining how to take indoor pictures, it is important to determine what affects the camera brightness. As I explained in the post title How Digital Cameras Work I noted that a digital camera takes black and white pictures using the brightness of an image. There are two things that affect the brightness of a picture: the shutter and aperture.

The shutter within your digital camera rapidly opens and closes. When a picture is taken, the shutter opens for a specific amount of time and then closes. When it opens, light enters the camera and is registered by the sensor. The speed of the shutter determines how much light is registered. Fast shutter speeds such as 1/250th and 1/500th of a second doesn’t let in as much light as slow shutter speeds such as 1/30th and 1 second.

In order to get a bright enough picture at faster shutter speeds, the camera must have a larger opening to let light in. This opening is called the aperture. When you use a faster shutter speed, the opening is larger to let more light in, then when you use a slower shutter speed. Aperture size is measure in f-stops. You camera may show the aperture as 2.7, 4 or 8. The larger the number the smaller the aperture, so an aperture of 2.7 lets in more light than an aperture of 8.

Keep this in mind as we will be explaining how this is used in the next section.

Lights, Camera, Take Picture

As mentioned above both shutter speed and aperture determine the amount of light that enters your camera. How do we use this information when taking indoor pictures?

The first thing to keep in mind is that it can be difficult to hold a camera steady with a slower shutter speed than 1/30th of a second. If your camera shows a slower shutter speed than 1/30th of a second, try to allow more light into the room. This can be done by simply opening the curtains or turning on a light. If you still can’t get a faster shutter speed, then open up the aperture.

When you zoom in the aperture closes down, so to increase your aperture simply zoom all the way out. If you need to zoom, then move closer to your subject. This will allow you to keep a larger opening while filling your frame with your subject.

What happens if you still can’t get a faster shutter speed? There is one more thing to try.

Increasing the ISO

Film comes in various ISO numbers such as ISO 100, ISO 400 and ISO 800. The larger the ISO number the more sensitive the film is to light. Even though digital cameras don’t use film, you can still change the ISO number within your camera. This has the same effect as film.

Find out how to change the ISO number on your digital camera and increase it to the next number. Try to take the picture again and check to see if the shutter speed is fast enough for you to take the picture. If it is, then you can keep it at that number. If it isn’t, then increase the number again. Most digital cameras can allow you to go up to ISO 800, while many of the DSLR cameras allow you to go as high as ISO 3200 or even ISO 6400.

There is, however, one thing to point out when increasing the ISO number. There is a trade off between allowing you to take pictures in darker conditions and picture clarity. When you increase the ISO on your digital camera, you sill start to see noise in your pictures. The noise looks like little coloured pixels. If you only print photos at 4×6, then the noise won’t be as noticeable then if your were to print a 8×10. It’s up to you on whether the noise matters to you.

Summary

In this post I have provided a quick explanation on shutter speed and aperture settings. I have provided tips on taking indoor pictures without a flash including keeping the aperture open and increasing the ISO within your digital camera.

Introduction to HTML

Posted on Oct 12, 2007 in Web Site, Web Site - Design | No Comments

I recently wrote two posts regarding designing Web sites: Designing Web Pages: Tables or CSS and Introduction to Cascading Stylesheets (CSS). The information presented in both of those articles may be advanced for those just starting out with creating Web pages.

I decided to create this post to provide an introduction to HTML and create a Web page. This post will create a very simple Web page that you can then display in a Web browser.


What is HTML?

Everyone who is online has heard of HTML, but may not know exactly what it is or how it is used on the Internet. HTML is an acronym for HyperText Markup Language. It is the primary language of Web pages. It is not a programming language, such as C or Visual Basic, as it is not compiled into a program. It is simply a markup language.

A markup language is used to display text and other information about the text. The other information about the text can include anything from size, font to weight and position. For examples of the different ways the text can be changed simply look at this blog and you’ll notice how the text can be changed.

Other elements can also be included in a HTML document such as images, sounds, and videos. For the purpose of this post, we’ll keep it simple and focus on the text of a Web page.

How can you control the look of the text on a Web page? Through the use of what are known as tags.

HTML Tags

HTML uses tags to define areas of a Web page. Tags usually come in pairs: an opening and closing tag. The tags change anything that is placed between them. There are many standard tags that make up the HTML language, and as you make Web pages you will begin to known and understand each tag.

As mentioned, a tag pairing contains both an opening and closing tag. For example, to apply bold to text you will use the tag pair: <b> </b>. You will notice that the closing tag contains a / (slash) character. This is standard for all closing tags. Any text placed between those two bold tags will appear bold within a Web browser.

The bold tag is just one of many standard tags used to create a HTML Web page. It is beyond the scope of this post to list them all, but you will see other tags in the example below.

Create a Simple Web Page

Now that you have a basic understanding of what HTML is, it is time now for an example. For this example you will need a simple text editor, such as Windows Notepad. The editor doesn’t matter, so use whatever you are comfortable with.

  1. Create new directory somewhere on your hard drive called htmlex. We will save the HTML file in this directory.
  2. Open up your text editor.
  3. Copy (or type) the following into the editor:
    <html>
    <head>
    </head>
    <body>
    <p>Hello world!</p>
    </body>
    </html>
  4. Save the file to the directory created in step 1. Name the new file test1.htm.
  5. Open up Windows Explorer and navigate to the directory contain your HTML file.
  6. Double-click the test1.htm file to open it up in your preferred Web browser.

    7. You should now see the message Hello world! in your browser. Congratulations! You just created a Web page.

What exactly are the tags in your HTML document? Lets take a look at what comprises the Web page.

Elements of the Web Page

In the example above you will notice a series of tags. The first tag in the Web page is the html tag. This tells the browser that the markup language is HTML and your entire Web page will be located within this tag.

The next tag is the head tag. In our example, the head tag is empty (nothing between the opening and closing tag), but for most of Web pages such things as stylesheets, the title and meta tags are located here.

The body tag is next and contains the actual body of your Web page. What you see displayed in your Web browser is located within this tag.

The final tag in our example is the p tag, or paragraph tag. This identifies a paragraph of text. If you wish to bold the text in our example, then include the b tag pair between the p tag pair as such:

<p> <b>Hello world! </b></p>

If you do the above, save your file and refresh your Web browser window, you will now notice that the text is now bold. If you were to move the closing b tag between Hello and world you will now only see the word Hello in bold. Remember that the tags change anything that are between its opening and closing tags.

Summary

Creating Web pages using HTML is very easy too do and requires nothing more than a text editor. The HTML markup language may seem complex at first, but the more you create Web pages, the more your will learn. HTML is meant to be easy to learn and use and it can be used to apply any look to your Web site. There are many more tags you can use to create great looking Web pages than those shown in this post.

E-mail Frauds and Scams

Posted on Oct 10, 2007 in Security | No Comments

For many years now security experts have been warning others about fraudulent e-mails and scams. Even after the warnings, there are still people who are taken in by these frauds and scam artists. The cost to those who are taken in can be hundreds of thousands of dollars or even their entire identity.

In this post I will discuss the types of scams and frauds that are mostly used in e-mails and ways to avoid them.


Phishing

In the past you may have received e-mails from a trustworthy institution asking to confirm some details about yourself. These details can include everything from a user ID, password to your account or PIN number. These e-mails are sent by scammers looking to steal important information from you. This is known as phishing.

Phishing has been around for many years, but has now entered the security spotlight as more users get caught in the scams.

Usually someone will receive an e-mail from a reputable company asking the user to confirm some important information about themselves. The e-mail usually contains a link that directs the user to a form on a Web page. The Web page is designed to look exactly like the company that they are pretending to be. The form, however, is located on a server the scammer uses and can control.

Once the user fills in the information on the form and submits it, the scammer can then use that information as they please. This is a major cause of identity theft as the scammer can now assume the identity of the user.

Prevention

There are many ways to prevent losing important information to a scammer. The most important method is common sense. I don’t know of any financial institution, or any company for that matter, that will ask for personal information through e-mail. If you receive an e-mail such as this, and are unsure, then call up the company and let them know. Many times they will then take action to stop those who are sending the e-mails.

A clue to determining if an e-mail is legit is to look at the spelling and grammar. Many times the spelling and grammar will be extremely poor, which indicates that a company did not send out the e-mail.

Many of the newer browsers, such as Internet Explorer 7, Firefox 2.0, and Opera all have built-in anti-phishing measures. These browsers will notify you if you access a Web page that has been flagged as a phishing site. If you haven’t already, I suggest you upgrade to one of these browsers.

Advanced Fee Fraud

Have you ever received an e-mail from someone who says they are an official with millions of dollars? You are then to contact them as you are the beneficiary of this so called money? If you have then you know about the scam known as Advanced Fee Fraud also known as the 419 fraud.

These frauds are different than phishing in that they try to get your money and not your information. It is called the 419 fraud after the section of the Nigerian penal code which addresses fraud schemes. Many of these scams deal with traveling to Nigeria, mailing something to Nigeria, or meeting with a Nigerian official.

Many of the e-mails tied to the 419 fraud usually involve some sort of urgency such as a health matter. An individual representing someone else with a vast fortune will contact you stating that you are the beneficiary of the fortune. In the e-mail, you will be instructed on transferring money to the unknown individual for fees and other costs of transferring the millions to you. This is how many of the scammers make their money.

Prevention

Since this scam occurs through e-mail, the biggest method of preventing it is to use your common sense and just delete the e-mail. Most of the time you can spot these e-mails by the extremely poor spelling and grammar. Sometimes the spelling is so bad it becomes comical.

If you want some enjoyment of seeing these 419 fraud scammers getting what they deserver, check out: 419 Eater. What the author of that site does to the scammers is very amusing.

Summary

In this post I have talked about two of the popular methods that scammers use to steal your identity or money. It is important to understand that the best method of protecting yourself is to simply use common sense. I you don’t recognize the sender of the e-mail, just delete it.

Creating MP3 Files from a CD in Media Player

Posted on Oct 5, 2007 in Windows | 1 Comment

For many years now MP3 music files have become mainstream. With the enormous number of MP3 players on the market, it seems everyone owns one. It is hard to walk down the street and not see anyone listening to their MP3 player. There are many people out there who may not know how to create their own MP3 files from their CDs.

In this post I will provide a step-by-step tutorial on creating MP3 files from your CDs using Windows Media Player. I chose this application because it is readily available on any Windows system.


Specify MP3 Options

Before we begin creating MP3 files it is important to first ensure we have set some important settings in Media Player. If you haven’t already done so, please start Windows Media Player.

To set the MP3 options, use the following steps:

  1. Right-click an empty portion of the top toolbar to display a menu.
  2. From the menu select Tools->Options. The Options dialog box should now be displayed.
  3. Click the Rip Music tab.
  4. Under Rip music to this location you can specify the location you want the MP3s to be stored. If you would like to change this directory, then click Change and select a new directory. Click the File Name button to change the file naming convention for your MP3 files.
  5. Under Rip settings, select mp3 from the Format list.
  6. By default the audio quality is set at 128Kbps. I usually choose a higher quality since space is not really an option. If you want better quality, move the Audio Quality slider to the right. I usually select 256Kbps as the quality. The file size will be doubled by the quality will be better.
  7. Click OK to save your changes and close the Options dialog box.

You have now setup your CD ripping settings and are ready to convert your CD tracks to MP3 files. Since these settings are saved, you will not need to specify them when you create MP3 files in the future.

Converting CD Tracks to MP3 Files

Windows Media Player makes converting CD tracks to MP3 files very easy. The process is fairly quick and you can convert multiple tracks from a single CD at the same time. Use the following steps to create MP3 files:

  1. Insert an audio CD into either the CD or DVD ROM in your computer. It doesn’t matter which drive you insert the disc into as both can read CDs.
  2. In the Windows Media Player menu bar at the top, click Rip
  3. Click the CD/DVD-ROM drive from the list on the left.
  4. A list of the audio tracks will now appear with all tracks selected. Click the Start Rip button in the lower right corner if you wish to convert all tracks to MP3 files. If you wish to select only a few of the tracks, then uncheck the checkboxes that you don’t wish to convert, and then click the Start Rip button.
  5. The progress bar will be displayed beside the tracks currently being converted. Once the message Ripped to libraryappears beside the tracks you selected, it means that the MP3 files have been created and are saved in the directory specified in the previous section.

    6. You can repeat the above steps to convert tracks in other audio CDs. The MP3 directories are organized by artist and then album within the directory you specified in the previous section. This allows you to convert many CDs while still maintaining some organization.

    Note: You will also find some JPEGs included with your MP3s. These are images of the album covers if you have downloaded them from the Internet.

Summary

Creating MP3 files is really easy with Windows Media Player. After you save your MP3 settings, all you need to do is insert an audio CD and select the tracks you want to convert to MP3 files.

Wireless Security: WEP and WPA

Posted on Oct 3, 2007 in Networking, Security | 2 Comments

I have written several posts with regards to securing your wireless network connection. In many of those posts I have talked about choosing WPA over WEP, and briefly explained why I do that. In a post titled Network Glossary of Terms I provided a simple definition for both security protocols.

I have decided to expand on those definitions by providing a more information post about WEP and WPA. Hopefully, this post will help you better understand how a wireless network is secure.


About Wireless Network Security

Networks have been around for many years, and with the advent of broadband Internet connections, they have also appeared in homes. Many of these networks were simple LANs with probably two computers connected by a cable. All that was really needed was applying security within the operating system, a software and hardware firewall and all was good. Unless someone connected directly into your network using a cable, your network was relatively safe and secure.

For the past many years, however, many of these networks have included a laptop or desktop with a wireless connection. Wireless now allows users to connect to the Internet from anywhere in their home with the need to connect using a cable. One security problem was created: the wireless signals are broadcasted over radio signals that allow anyone with a wireless network adapter to easily connect.

To secure these wireless connections, some security protocols were created to prevent unauthorized users from accessing the network. These security protocols are known today as WEP, WPA and now WPA2.

Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP)

In September 1999 a set of wireless connection standards was ratified and was given the name IEEE 802.11. These standards included the WEP encryption protocol as the means of protecting data over a wireless connection.

Back in 1999, the US Government placed restrictions on the key size for encrypting data. This allowed only 64 bit WEP encryption, which uses a 40 bit key included with a 24 bit initialization vector (IV). Since that time the restrictions have been removed and a 128 bit (140 bit key size) WEP key has been used. This is usually entered as 26 hex characters (4 bits) by the user (26 times 4 bits is 104 bits). Using 128 bit keys is known as WEP2.

WEP works by encrypting each frame of the payload before transmission. WEP concatenates the key supplied by the user with the random-generated 24 bit IV. The IV can be changed for each frame, although it is not required under IEEE 802.11. The resulting "seed" is then inputed into a random number generator to produce a keystream equal to the length of the frame’s payload and a 32 bit integrity check value (ICV).

Before transmitting the data, the keystream and the payload/ICV is combined through a bitwise XOR process to produce cyphertext (encrypted data). The IV is included in the first few bytes of the frame body, and is not encrypted. The client then uses the IV and the shared key to decrypt the payload data.

Security Issues with WEP

You may have heard that there is a security problem with WEP encryption. The first problem with WEP is the relative small size of the IV and keys. Since only 24 bits are used for the IV, WEP can eventually use the same IV for different packets. This can be more of a problem on a busy wireless network. If a hacker were to capture enough of the frames that include the same IV, they can then determine the shared keys that are among the frames. This can then lead to the hacker decrypting the data.

Another problem with WEP is the static shared keys. Administrators can use the same shared keys for weeks, months, and even years at a time. This can give a hacker plenty of time to determine the shared key and then compromise your wireless network.

To solve these issues, a new security protocol was developed called WPA.

Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA/WPA2)

In response to the weaknesses of the WEP security protocol, the Wi-Fi Alliance created Wi-Fi Protected Access or WPA. Based on a draft 3 of the IEEE 802.11i standard, WPA is designed to enable standard-based security on wireless networks for products that pre-date the IEEE 802.11i standard.

There are several differences between WEP and WPA. For one, WEP uses 128 bit keys with 24 bit IV, while WPA uses 128 bit keys with a 48 bit IV. WPA uses the Temporal Key Integrity Protocol (TKIP), which dynamically changes keys as the system is used. The combination of the larger IV and TKIP makes WPA more secure than WEP.

Once the 802.11i standards were released all mandatory elements were implemented in WPA2. This also includes a new algorithm called AES-based (Advanced Encryption Standard) that is considered to be fully secure. Unlike WPA, WPA2 may not be supported by older network devices, but they may be compatible after a device driver update.

For home users the most important aspect to setting up WPA security is to create a passphrase. This passphrase must be entered by every client who wishes to access your wireless network. Unlike passwords, a passphrase must be between 8 and 63 characters in length. The close a passphrase is to 63 characters, the more secure it will be.

Summary

This post provided an overview to WEP and WPA/WPA2. If your wireless router allows you to set WPA then you should choose WPA over WEP. If you don’t have the option to set your router to WPA, then you should choose WEP as some security is better than no security.

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