For several days I had been experiencing slow performance with Lightroom Classic. I actually noticed it after their latest update. With all the incorporation of AI that Adobe is inserting this undoubtedly has a performance impact. The past few days I noticed that when attempting to apply a mask that has "Select people", Lightroom begins the process but then seems to hang. I let Lightroom sit overnight just to see if it would ever complete but it did not. Task manager was showing low to no CPU utilization by Lightroom. Also, the only way to exit Lightroom was to terminate it in the task manager. However, sometimes this was even a problem as Lightroom would not appear in the Windows task manager. I had to use another application, "Process Lasso", to find Lightroom and terminate it.

The system is healthy and powerful enough consisting of a 6-core Xeon processor (twelve threads), 128GB of RAM, NVMe SSDs, and an Nvidia RTX Quadro 5000 GPU. This is a Lenovo Thnikpad P-73 Laptop Workstation.

Lightroom is set to use the GPU for hardware acceleration. However, this was not helping either. A re-install of Lightroom did not solve the problem and I also confirmed that it has nothing to do with the catalog size by using one of Scott Kelby's catalogs with about seven photos in it---the issue persisted.

Final fix was to go into the Nvidia control panel and switch the GPU from "Dedicated to graphics tasks" to "Use for grahics and compute needs" under "Manage GPU Utilization". With this setting, Lightroom performs as expected and considerably faster. Even the less intensive tasks fly through impressively fast.

The GPU does run hotter (the fan is constantly running faster). Impacts to other applications have yet to be determined definitively but, thus far, it does not seem to cause any issues. Some performance improvements have been observed and even various graphics heavy applications appear to work well, if not better. Some games do seem to struggle at times but this experience is yet to be fully confirmed.

Aside from this change, I will be contacting Adobe and providing this experience to them for analysis and comment.


Sincerely,

C. R. Smith
Angel Star Photography
www.angelstarphotography.com

My favorite to date are the Black Rapid straps. Coupling with the Fusion Plate Mark II that they also sell, provides the added convenience of not having to remove the ring from the camera or lens when I need to shift to a tripod. I have carried around a 5DIV with a 150-600, sometimes with a teleconverter, and have found it very comfortable and convenient. I love their locking slides that hold the camera in place while walking thus minimizing the back and forth swinging that occurs with my stride.

Charles

Reuss,

I am in total agreement with you. My thoughts on including Economics was that it should be inclusive of all those that promote the understanding of complex subjects. It should not be a subject ignored or lightly addressed but take its position along side the sciences, mathematics, etc. It should be considered as a minimum requirement just as the other subjects. This would require some thought into how to evolve such an approach which I would recommend eliminating some electives.

Victor David Hanson is another one of my favorites. I have enjoyed many of his talks as well and particularly liked his talk about Patton. You can find it on YouTube if you haven't seen it, yet. Overall, I have actually enjoyed many of the talks from the Hoover Institute and more recently the Free to Choose Network. Great resources...

Excellent points and my thoughts as well. I work for a major manufacturer that decided we needed to bring in graduates from outside the U.S. The reasoning---we weren't getting the quality of graduates who could understand what we needed and we were in a mode of doing remedial training. That was an interim solution. We also began working with the universities to drive what needed to be taught and how. Yet, if we look around, from where are many of the technological knowledge resources coming?

I couldn't help but smile at your post. I had a somewhat similar experience. When my Dad was transferred to McChord AFB from Gunter AFB in Montgomery, Alabama I was in the middle of my 10 year. My parents were rather busy with other activities trying to get situated here in the Northwest and left my registration and class selections to me. I recall having a long discussion with the school counselor regarding many of the subjects and which ones I should take and the one that I lost out on was Biology. The school had two directions for Biology. There was General Biology and Biology BSCS. The latter was intended for those who planned to go on to pre-med and while that was not my plan, the descriptions of the two told me that I would be better off in the latter. Yet, the counselor stated that my class at Sidney Lanier HS in Montgomery stated it was General Biology and therefore I should go into the same as he was certain I would not be able to handle the Biology BSCS. I tried very hard to convince him that everything they listed in the course description is what I had already studied but he was not going to budge. I guess he wanted at least one win.

As it turned out, starting in the middle of the General Biology class, I was already way ahead and quickly became bored. I became so bored that I asked the teacher for the Biology BSCS if I could participate in his class. He allowed me to participate with the understanding that he had no additional books and thus could not offer me one. If I was willing to attend under those conditions he would welcome me as any other student. Fast forward to the final exams. I took the final exams for both Biology courses. The BSCS teacher said that I didn't need to take the exam as it would not do anything for my grade but I chose to treat the class as though it did. I had aced the General Biology exam but had no idea how I did on the BSCS exam. It wasn't as easy as I thought it would be. Later, the BSCS teacher came over to my teacher and with a stern voice, said to my teacher, "We need to talk about your student." My teacher was a bit stunned as he knew nothing about what I had done and I thought for sure a chastising was forthcoming and I had bombed out. Shockingly, the teacher followed up with, "Your student should have been teaching your class!" He went to explain how I had diligently attended the lectures, had no book, and took the final exam achieving a 97%---higher than any of his students in his class who had books.

All through the rest of my high school, I did miss the demands of the schools in Montgomery as well as the attention that was given to the students not only from the academic side but from all sources around. To this, I give another example. I was also in the high school band. In Alabama, the band went where ever the football team went and they were considered just as important. So much so, that when we were traveling to Huntsville for a major game between two of the biggest rivals at that time, Robert E Lee and Sidney Lanier our band director stopped the convoy to make a phone call because we were half way to Huntsville and running very late. We all thought we were going to turn back and it was game over for us. Instead, the highway patrol showed up and gave us a full speed escort into Huntsville complete with flashing lights and sirens! I never saw that here nor did I ever experience the kind of showmanship that was expected of us at Sidney Lanier. Our band director had modeled us after the University of Alabama band and I recall on my very first day for the band which was in the middle of August before school season began, the speech that he gave. Four things I will quote as they have stuck with me through my military life and beyond to this day:

"There are four major rules I expect you to follow if you wish to be a part of this band:
1. The mission comes first.
2. The equipment is second.
3. Your fellow man is third and
4. You ARE last!"

Also differences in how we performed---all music, movements, and positions were memorized. There were no papers, notes, etc. allowed on the field even in practice. You better know your stuff before you get on the field. My experience here in the Northwest was that we had our music on our instruments even during the show. Sidney Lanier shows were constantly flowing, changing, and moving even when the music changed. It was very well choreographed and there were no disruptions in movement across the field as the music changed. Meanwhile, here we formed an initial block, played a piece, reformed into something else, played a piece to its end, reformed, played, etc., etc.

Being a military brat I had the opportunity to have been in 26 cities, states, and one country by the time I made it to McChord AFB. In reflection, there is definitely areas where more attention is given to education of the children than other areas. Some of it due to politics, some of is due to the involvement of the people and the expectations of those people (some prefer the hard knock approach while others prefer the kid glove treatment---I've seen it both ways), and much of it is driven by the motivation, drive, and the principles of the teachers involved. I have seen this even in the Northwest as toured around cities and towns giving lectures and speeches to students. I found that small towns removed from the metropolitan areas were motivated to insure their students had just as much of an opportunity as those in the cities. To that end, they would beg, borrow, negotiate with companies and charity organizations to obtain the materials they needed and they made things happen. When I approached a well-known school here in Tacoma and asked them why they don't try to offer their students the same opportunities, I was told that if the board felt it was necessary, they would provide the funds to do it.

I could go on and on with examples and experiences but I think I have said enough. I am not in academia professionally. I have taught when asked at Highline CC and the University of Phoenix, given talks at DeVry University as well as many other schools, and I have been a judge for the Future Business Leaders of America competitions. There good and bad as with all things; however, the overall whole has not been impressive and it should not be that way. I think on one side we have those who understand the importance and expect quality while on another side we have far too many who have taken things for granted and possibly assume that things will work out in the end.

I have watched this a couple of times over the past month and had thought to post it here partly because of his interest in photography. He is definitely someone worth following and from whom a great wealth of knowledge can be gained. I have many of his books as well as another individual I would recommend, Walter E Williams.

In listening to these two, it is apparent to me that Economics needs to be taught as one of the fundamental courses in high school and earlier if possible. In doing so, not only would students have a better understanding of how the world operates but I think history would be far more interesting as would, possibly, mathematics. I have long thought that economics, finance, and investing needs to be a part of the curriculum as much as basics. If we could instill this knowledge early on, I don't believe many would have the struggles they have in planning their futures and there would be less dependency on the government to fill the gaps.

Charles

Perhaps so, but in the KW-26 they were about that size.

Indeed they keep packing more and more into these devices and you have certainly surfaced some good memories. Your card is just a 32GB SD card. Check this one out, a 1TB microSD:

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1466566-REG/sandisk_sdsqxa1_1t00_an6ma_extreme_microsd_1tb_card.html

I am always fascinated with the microelectronics. My first memory board that I worked on used bi-mag cores in a vacuum tube system using 6197 tubes. It was a piece of Crypto hardware, now declassified, known as the KW-26:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/KW-26

http://jproc.ca/crypto/kw26.html

These were toroidal, ferite cores with wire windings that were pulsed to set the 1 or 0 state, and then continuously pulsed at a lower voltage as a refresh. Reading the core was done in much the same way. The cores, about 3/8 inches in diameter, were sealed, individually, in small black resin squares about three quarter inches square. They would hold one bit of information.

Since then, I have grown with the technology through transistors, circuit packs (transistor cicuits with specific functions sealed in a resin module), to microcircuits and chips. Even the circuit boards these days are very complex with multiple layers of traces compared to the wired circuit boards, then single-sided and double-sided trace circuit boards.

As for PCs, I had my share of repairing and programming systems such as the IMSAI 8080 (S-100 bus system---did bit level machine programming using the dip switches), TRS-80, Apple (using the Motorola 6502 processor), and more while studying for my BSEE.

Charles

Works great for those BIFs, too! I have found it (BBF) very convenient especially when tracking such birds as the Blue Angels, the B-1B, C-130, and more. On the Canon, at least on the 5DIV, it feels as though the grip and the press of the AF-ON button is as natural as simply holding the camera. I don't have any Nikon experience; thus, I cannot comment on the feel with a Nikon.

Charles

I use a Manfrotto Pro Lite Bumblebee 230. It packs a lot and very durable. At one time, I carried a Sigma 150-600, a Canon 24-105 f/4L, a 70-200 f2.8L, 5DIV, two flashes (600EX-RT II and 470EX AI), battery packs filled with AA batteries, and a 17-inch laptop. Needless to say it was heavy but still comfortable due to the strap construction, lumbar support, and airflow design of the backing providing cooling on the back.

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1334233-REG/manfrotto_mb_pl_b_230_pro_light_bumblebee_230_camera.html

A couple of videos I watched in the course of my research to find the best fit for me are below:

Durability Field Test
https://youtu.be/RPK4CbKTWJs

Pack Capacity Capability (jump to 7:03 to bypass all the general information and see him unpack the bag)
https://youtu.be/klyQyxQl0tE

Sincerely,

Charles

Edit: I neglected to mention that over time I reduced the equipment I carried to just the essentials based upon the adventure I was pursuing. However, that space was then taken up by such things as a change of clothes, a pocket rocket gas stove, a mess kit, and food. The laptop was replaced with a Camelbak 3-liter bladder from my cycling backpack.

Very well done and I certainly like the sharpness found in the eyes. I agree with Chg_Canon in that you shouldn't really need more than 1/2000 for the shutter speed. I will sometimes drop to 1/1600 or 1/1250 just to drive my ISO down a bit. I use auto-ISO with a range set for 100-3200. I have found, too, after a lot of trial and errors that I prefer single-point focus with sometimes changing over to to a 9-point assist and spot metering. However, these change depending upon the situation or the bird.

BBF has been great and as many have said, once you try it and develop the habits needed you won't turn back. I do use AI Servo on my camera (Canon). If you haven't already, I also recommend setting up custom settings that are specific for your birds in flight shots. That way you don't need to spend as much time dialing in the settings.

Answers inline with the quote...

Wishing everyone a very Happy New Year for 2021! Make of it what you can and be content in that you have at least accomplished something, small or big, whether it be technical, educational, spiritual, or touched a heart somewhere.

Thank you. I just updated my post with some additional details.

Thought I would share this one with everyone. This was a test shot trying to push the limits and experimenting with settings.

Camera: Canon 5D Mark IV
Lens: Sigma 150-600mm, f/5-6.3, Contemporary coupled with the Sigma TC-1401 1.4x
Focal Length: 840mm
Aperture: f/18
Shutter speed: 1/2000
ISO: 2000
AF Selection: Expand AF Surround, 9-point AF
First shot auto-focus parameters: First shot with focus lock, second shot less stringent but lean still more towards focus lock
Tracking Sensitivity: 0
Accel/Decel tracking: 0
AF Point Auto Switching: 0
Handheld

Lens calibrated to the camera using Fo-Cal software. Calibration was performed with the lens alone and then with the lens plus the tele-converter. Settings were saved for both the 150mm and 600mm positions of the lens in both cases.

The image is cropped about 500%. Distance to the eagle is estimated to be 1,500+ ft based on measurements from Google Maps. The eagle was flying around over the waters of Little Beef Harbor. It is a great location for photographing Bald Eagles, Great Blue Herons, occasionally a Caspian Tern, and more. I counted about twenty Bald Eagles one day, a mix of adults and juveniles.

(Download)

Been there, done that on multiple situations such as having set the auto-focus limiter to not go beyond 10m only wonder why the camera isn't focusing on that distant tree anymore or adjusting the diopter setting on the viewfinder because I using glasses instead of contacts and then at a later time thinking my camera is messed up because things weren't in focus even though it said it was. The latter went through several tests with different lenses before I remembered the diopter setting. I was just about to send the camera off for repair.