Like "Bliss"

This morning, while my mother and I were out walking on the local fields, I photographed this view:

The field, with its hill and cloudy blue sky, I think resembles the iconic "Bliss" desktop background picture from Microsoft Windows XP.

I used the HDR filter of the app SnapSeed to enhance the image.

Surprise game win

On my phone, I play a game called Designer City. In a nutshell, it is a city-building game for mobile devices; thanks to SimCity 2000 years ago, I do enjoy playing city-building games and Designer City is one that I've found that has an easy interface and isn't time-consuming, which is ideal for a touchscreen.

In the past day or so, the developers - Sphere Game Studios - released an update to the game, which included an "Easter Egg" that consisted of a hidden "mini-game" within the game, as a part of an extra activity for the holiday season. The mini-game was also a competition, in which the first person to finish it and post a screenshot to the developer's Facebook page or e-mail address would result in an in-game reward.

I found the mini-game and played it without any expectations. To my surprise, I not only completed it but my score of 503 became the highest on the leaderboard (and it still is, as of this writing). I photographed the score and sent it to Sphere Game Studios in case I might have won; shortly afterwards, I received a reply, which stated that while someone else had already come ahead of me, I was second place and would still receive an in-game reward for my achievement.

I am happy about this result. I played the mini-game without the intent to win anything but when I completed it, which was a surprise in itself, I thought it might be early enough to e-mail the developer and see what would happen. Second place in a competition where theoretically anyone in the world with an Android or Apple device could play is an achievement, even if it's only in a computer game.

Clouds and blue above houses (2)

Here are the Snapseed-enhanced versions of yesterday's image:

The usual - HDR mode! Just strengthens all of the colours.

Drama mode gives more shine to all the content; I rarely use this filter in favour of HDR.

An old favourite, Retrolux.

Here is the picture in Black-and-white.

Noir is another mode that I rarely use, instead favouring Black-and-white. This is the first time I've been satisfied with both filters on one picture.

My Android versions

Seeing that I have written about Android on four occasions so far (here, here, here and here), I thought it was time to write about which versions of the mobile software I've used since owning smartphones.

My first smartphone, the one I purchased in late 2012, runs on 2.3.6 Gingerbread. The second, which is the one my Hong Kong uncle gave me, uses 4.1.2 Jelly Bean while my current phone features 5.0.1 Lollipop. I have never owned a pre-Gingerbread or Honeycomb (3.0–3.2.6) phone and while I haven't used 4.0–4.0.4 Ice Cream Sandwich or 4.4–4.4.4 KitKat, my gift phone and current phone were on those versions, respectively.

The next version is currently using the working name of "Android M"; the proper dessert name will most likely be revealed when Google releases it later this year. My phone model was released last year and it is possible that it will receive an update to Android M.

The clouds and the house

I recently photographed this cloud formation over a house, during which the Sun was hiding but its rays were visible:

 This is the picture in its normal - albeit cropped - form.

Now this is it through an HDR filter. The rays are much more visible through the filter.

The Retrolux filter provides the image with an "aged" feel; however, it's fairly neutral with regards to what emotions it evokes.

By contrast, the black-and-white filter shrouds the picture with a menacing quality.

Do you have a favourite?

White flowers in bushes (2)

The Snapseed-enhanced HDR and Retrolux variants of yesterday's picture:

Which do you prefer? These, yesterday's, a combination or all?

Blue sky and clouds June 2015

I recall saying long ago that blue sky and clouds is one of my favourite types of sky. This is mainly clouds with some blue sky but it's still worthwhile; regular picture and Snapseed HDR:

Nottingham when shopping

Here is a picture of Nottingham's city centre when I shopped on Friday:

 And here is that same picture modified using the Retrolux filter of the Snapseed app:

Gives it the appearance of a photograph that was taken decades ago!

Homemade memes

Just to follow up on yesterday's post about the meme-generating app I discovered, here are some pictures that I "memed". I really like how the app allows you to add your own text to images:

I'm not the only one who thinks that my stapler features a resemblance to the Alien from the Alien movie series.

Feel free to interpret the phrase in any way you wish!

Obviously, I didn't take the picture, as it's Boromir from The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. I have, however, hiked to Hucknall!

This is a quote stated many years ago by an online friend of mine. Ever since they first wrote it I thought it was an excellent statement.

I won't go into meme overload; otherwise, something that's fun and creative will end up turning into something boring and annoying, which is not what I want. I hope you enjoyed these pictures!

"Started out as a lemon tart" (2)

I found a meme generator app. Remember my recent blog post about the lemon tart? Here's another modified image of it:

I made a few memes out of pictures of family - myself included. Oh, I am going to have so much fun putting meme captions to my captures!

"Started out as a lemon tart"

It's a lemon tart!

Here is the original and unedited picture of the lemon tart I ate yesterday afternoon.

Here is the HDR version of the lemon tart...

 ...and here is the retrolux version. Which of the three pictures do you like best?

As for the title of this blog post, remember the song I featured in this post? It's because of that song why I photographed this lemon tart.

Oh, and the lemon tart was delicious.

HDR city centre

Nearly a week ago, I photographed the city centre in the early and cloudy evening:

Afterwards, I put the image through the Snapseed phone app and added an HDR filter. What do you think? I have not shrunk this image so it can be opened and zoomed.

Bizarre blog bug

Due to some unexplained bug, my post from yesterday (25th November 2014), "Songs for blog during December? (2)", is gone. I have absolutely no idea what happened to it; I know that I didn't delete it.

In that post, I said that I would continue my tradition of posting Christmas songs from modern artists every fifth day of December. My friend and fellow blogger Jessica left a positive comment as a response to my post.

I am annoyed that the post is gone. Rather than have a gap in my blog, I have set this post's publishing time to yesterday, even though it has been posted today.

The next Android

The next Android version name has been announced: Android 5.0 is to be called "Android Lollipop", which keeps the name consistent with the dessert/candy theme of Android titles:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-29632084

In early 2013, I wrote a list of potential Android names; for "L", I suggested the name "Lemon Meringue". When I wrote that post, the expected name for the "K" version was supposed to be "Key Lime Pie" but it ultimately turned out to be "KitKat".

I am glad that Google is sticking to this theme; there had been speculation that the next version would be called "Android L" but I think that "Android Lollipop" sounds better.

GIF creator

When my father got his new phone last year, one aspect of the device of which I was particularly envious was its camera, as it was far more advanced in its hardware and software than the camera I had on mine. The software feature that fascinated me the most was its ability create GIFs.

Last night, inspired by the Snapseed app that my uncle recommended, I decided to have a look for a GIF-generating app and after less than a minute spent searching, I found one. I created a couple of GIFs of my brother and mother just to test the app out; they worked! I can now create my own GIFs.

I don't need a GIF-generating app but it's one of those things that's nice to have. An app or camera feature that would be incredibly useful is one that lets you know when you're about to take a slanted picture and can straighten it for you...

On a related note, I've always pronounced GIF with a hard G, like the word grass, rather than with a soft G like the word gym. I was surprised when I heard that there is a significant minority of people who pronounce it as "jif", which has caused a dispute over the pronunciation. Of all the things to argue about!

Android Easter egg

If you own an Android phone running version Gingerbread (2.3) or above, there is an Easter egg present in the software. If you go into your phone's settings, select "About phone", scroll down to "Android version", and then press multiple times on the version number, the Easter egg will appear, although what egg appears depends on which version you have.

On Gingerbread, the phone comes up with a zombie scene; on Honeycomb (3.0), a bee appears, which will display a bee sound in a text box if you press it; on Ice Cream Sandwich (4.0), the Android robot appears dressed in an ice cream sandwich and if you long-press him, an abundance of robots dressed in ice cream sandwiches will swim across the screen. Finally, on Jelly Bean (4.1), a jelly bean will appear in the middle of screen; long-pressing the bean will replace it with smaller beans, which can be flicked off the screen.

I love Easter eggs in software and it's neat that there is at least one in Android. To my knowledge, this works on any Android phone provided it's version 2.3/Gingerbread or above; I am not aware of any restrictions by region or carrier.

Potential Android names

Following up on my my post about the creativity of Android version names, I decided to come up with a list of potential names for future versions, continuing the dessert-theme. Bolded names are existing versions, the italicised name is the expected successor to the current version of Android (Jelly Bean) and the remaining names are what I came up with for this post:

C: Cupcake

D: Donut

E: Eclair

F: Froyo

G: Gingerbread

H: Honeycomb

I: Ice Cream Sandwich

J: Jelly Bean

K: Key Lime Pie

L: Lemon Meringue

M: Marzipan / Mud Pie

N: Nougat

O: Oatmeal Cookie

P. Peach Cobbler / Peppermint / Petit Four / Profiterole

Q: Quince Tart

R: Rice Pudding

S: Strawberry Trifle

T: Toffee

U: Upside-down Cake

V: Vanilla Sundae

W: Walnut Brownie

X: ?

Y: Yam Flan

Z: Zucchini Bread (I've only known this food as a dessert.)

My brother thought of O, I had to cheat for U through to Y, and I couldn't come up with anything for X! I don't know if there are any desserts that begin with the letter X. P was remarkably easy, to the point where I chose four desserts with the best-sounding names.

"Everything at Once" - Lenka

A piece of music for today's post; it's "Everything at Once" by Lenka, an Australian singer. I saw her a few times in a commercial when I was in Suffolk:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tfy5CBfjZ8s

I had not heard of Lenka prior to seeing the advert, and I had to Google the song's lyrics to find out. I like both the sound of "Everything at Once" and Lenka's pronunciation of certain words in the track. Both her albums are available on Amazon UK.

The irony here is that the advert wasn't for her: it was for Windows 8!

Android version names

I've recently been researching Android, as it's something I've heard about for a long time but wasn't exactly sure what it was; I now know it's a phone operating system developed by Google. The most fascinating aspect of the software was the name of each major version release, as each one is named after a dessert:

Cupcake, Donut, Eclair, Froyo, Gingerbread, Honeycomb, Ice Cream Sandwich, and Jelly Bean are the current names of each version of Android. I think they're very imaginative...and tasty! During our last year in the United States I heard radio adverts for phones highlighting "Android Cupcake" and "Android Donut", but not having my own phone I never thought to look the terms up (my current phone is a feature phone, and uses a basic touchscreen proprietary software developed by Samsung).

I'm now looking forward to one day hearing names such as "Android Marzipan" or "Android Strawberry Trifle", and I'm certainly interested in what dessert will be used for "Z".

The new interface

For the past few months I have been using the old Blogger interface rather than the updated one, but now my dashboard is telling me that it will be removed in the coming days. A shame, because I like the old interface for how easy it is to navigate and use. Still, I accept the retirement of the old look, and think that it will be both fun and a minor challenge to finally learn how the new interface works.