Wishlist for My Ultimate Photo Management + Editing Tool

Now that my project schedule is freeing up again (and most importantly, I'm finally free of my various university contracts / commitments over the past few years, with the rather onerous IP provisions those came with), my attention has again been turning towards what sorts of projects I may want to start working on in my free time going forwards.

 

The key operative principle though for any such projects I now take on is this:

From now on, any passion-projects I dedicate my free time to (and with full force) will necessarily only be ones that I fully control + own. Unfortunately, experience and hindsight have taught me that merely having something be open source (but still part of someone else's platform / hosted by some other funding org) is ultimately not the answer I once believed it to be.

Note: This is also NOT a firm commitment to actually embarking on building all of these things. But rather, just some open-air brainstorming, hoping that someone will build it all for me (and then not put it behind a hideous subscription-based paywall). Heck, maybe the mere act of brainstorming these designs then releasing them as blueprints to hopefully inspire a whole ecosystem of interfaces should be the actual project!

Enough framing boilerplate. Let's get down to the original topic for today's ramblings:

What my ideal "next-gen" photo management + editing tool solution should look like, were I to go through the effort to set one up.

[Trip Report] Sydney 2024

This is an abridged version of a more detailed post I'd been preparing (and subsequently never got around to finishing). As with the Wellington one, I might come back to attach some photos to it at some point, but the aim is to just get quick and dirty up so I have some notes on it. So without further ado, here is the "abridged" version

So back in July this year, we headed over to Sydney for a week - mainly to attend a cousin's wedding, but also to do some sightseeing. Oh, and it was our first overseas trip in 5 years (i.e. the previous was pre-pandemic in June 2019, and as it happens, was also for a family gathering in Sydney).

 

~~~ 

BTW, Crowdstrike happened while we were there, which made for an interesting experience.

  * It was surreal walking around the bustling waterfront at twilight:

          * Just before leaving the hotel after a nap, I'd seen the headlines, and started hearing all the bad news filtering in... But then, out the window I'd seen the stunning sunset, so wanted to dash outside to photograph it from the waterfront (knowing that I wouldn't get another chance to do so during the rest of my stay). So, there I was at the waterfront, wondering how things were going to pan out (i.e. it was still a developing story at that point, with lots of doom and gloom news spooling up at that point in time).  

          * It was quite a spectacular sunset (though sadly missed the best part of it by the time I'd gotten outside after waiting for the slow lifts), with a piano-busker playing "The Pachelbell  (AKA RIP Cellists)" (funny/timely since we were going to a wedding the next day), while watching the crowds of people (a mix of tourists + locals) just going about their business blissfully unaware/ignorant of all that chaos unfolding around the world, while also looking up at all those office towers with lights on feeling for all the IT guys there (and also back home) who now had a terrible fire on their hands

   * It's funny that only days earlier (Tuesday to be precise), I'd only just learned about the existence of Crowdstrike. And that was because my office workstation was running slow that day (and had been for a few days), when launching any new processes, prompting me to investigate what was happening (i..e I thought was only MsPaint, but it soon turned out to be everything, including opening new tabs!). 

         * At the time, I'd chalked it up to me not applying some Windows updates yet, which I assumed would get applied while I was away. But since I was heading away the next day, I decided to leave it alone. Little did I know.... the first time I'm out of the country in a few years, this thing then proceeds to knock out everyone's IT systems. 

         * Who knows... could I have helped the world avert this thing if I'd sounded the alarm that it was acting weird at few days earlier???

[Trip Report] Wellington 2024

At the start of this month, we headed up to Wellington for our semi-annual pilgrimage up north to check out the World of Wearable Arts show, get our coconut buns fix (since we don't have *any* dim sum places offering them here in Christchurch), and fit in another tour of the usual sights (i.e. Te Papa, waterfront, Lambton Quay, Old Bank Arcade, etc.)

In the interests of getting this post up (since heck, it's nearly the end of the month now, and also I haven't even finished working through my Sydney ones, or the MtCook ones from earlier in the year), I will likely end up making separate posts for some of the highlights below if/when I ever get around to finishing editing the photos (almost done, but not for some sets), uploading them, and curating them in a blog-post. Otherwise, I may just link to the relevant albums, since that's easier...

 

NOTE: This post will likely be updated with images in due course as I get them processed + uploaded. But the text comes first, so I can tick this off my personal todo-list (not that posting these really matters)