Brian Pitkin

Just a reminder that the deadline for the BSoUP / DIVER Print Competition 2011, is next Saturday 1st Ocotober. If you haven't already entered, this is your chance to display your work at the Dive Show at the NEC, Birmingham and compete to win one of the great prizes donated by our sponsors Oonastours, Mike's Dive Store, Cameras Underwater, Ocean Leisure Cameras.andf The Wildlife Trusts. For full details of the competition please visit http://www.bsoup.org/BSoUP-DIVER_LIDS/2011/prints.php

I am hoping to dive in Corsica in August, for a few days at the Lavezzi Is and another few days in the Scandola area. Can anyone advise me of good dive centres? I don't seem to be having much luck. I was recommended the Centre de Plongée Atoll ( Bonifacio), but my email bounced back, their website URL does not work, and so I am wondering if this centre no longer operates. Other dive centres in Bonifacio are Barakouda and Cabochard Plongée, but I don't know anything about them. For Scandola I emailed Incantu dive centre 2 weeks ago and I am still waiting for a reply.

From gizmodo. com http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/software/window...data-235461.php Windows Vista Destroys Photo Metadata A bit of bad news about Vista if you're a photographer. Apparently if you tag a photo's metadata in Vista, it destroys other important metadata used by image editing apps such as Photoshop. Microsoft's gotten reports of RAW files generated by Nikon cameras being unreadable after being tagged with Vista or Microsoft's Photo Info tool. What can you do? Well, Microsoft's asking camera vendors to make processing plugins for Vista that don't make images unreadable, but for the mean time we'd just recommend not updating to Vista until everything's fixed. Or just not tagging your stuff in Vista. – Jason Chen Metadata mangling in Windows Vista [News.com via Lifehacker] From c|net.com http://news.com.com/2061-10805_3-6157801.h...5&subj=news Metadata mangling in Windows Vista February 8, 2007 7:04 PM PST del.icio.us Digg this Microsoft wants to make it easy to label photos with metadata--information such as where the picture was taken and who's in it--but you should be careful before you use the company's software for doing so. Windows Vista and the Microsoft Photo Info tool can cause problems with metadata or the image itself. According to one Microsoft Knowledge Base article, "When you edit the properties of a photo to add metadata to that photo in Windows Vista, the software for the digital camera may no longer recognize the metadata that is automatically added to the photo by the digital camera." Another alert regards using Photo Info to change metadata on NEF images--the "raw" photos directly from the cameras' image sensors. "Microsoft has received reports of compatibility issues with Nikon NEF files after installing version 1.0 of Nikon's raw codec posted in January. Tagging the raw files through Windows Vista or the Microsoft Photo Info tool after the codec is installed appears to cause these files to become unreadable in other applications, such as Adobe Photoshop," Microsoft said in a a frequently asked-questions list for the Photo Info software. Microsoft is letting camera manufacturers supply processing software that Vista can employ when users want to open or print raw files. Nikon released its raw-image support in January, and Sony and Olympus followed suit on Wednesday. Vista users can find the raw image software through the operating systems "check for updates" feature built into the Photo Gallery software. Posted by Stephen Shankland

From Microsoft's Knowledge Base Article ID : 927527 Last Review : January 10, 2007 Revision : 1.1 When you edit the properties of a photo to add metadata to that photo in Windows Vista, the software for the digital camera may no longer recognize the metadata that is automatically added to the photo by the digital camera. This metadata is specific to the manufacturer of the camera. This issue occurs when makernote data in the Exchangeable Image File format (EXIF) metadata area of the image is moved to a different location within the metadata region of the image. This change in the location of the makernote data may make the information unreadable. To work around this issue, do not use the Photo Acquisition Wizard to download the photos to the hard disk. Do not use Windows Photo Gallery or Windows Explorer to edit the properties of the image. For more information about the software for a digital camera, Microsoft recommend that you contact the manufacturer of the digital camera.