While looking for ways to use my phone with my Nikon D5000 DLSR I came across a very nice bit of software called PhotoIRmote on the Android Market.  This turns your Android phone into DSLR Remote Timer Controller, or an intervalometer. 

Some Screen shots of the app, from the developer:

I had a go at making the Basic IR Emitter on the developers website, however that failed.  Thinking I’d done something wrong I went for the other one he made, same result.  I wasn’t getting anything at all out of the IR LED’s .. not sure if it was my IR’s or what I did more Googling, finally found the problem was, sort of, my Samsung Galaxy S2 phone.  I say sort of because the problem is the output from the headphone jack on the phone isn’t enough to drive the IR’s.  Clearly this was a failing from Samsung for not thinking that crazy fools would want to plug IR LED’s into the headphone jack of their phones so they could control their cameras

 

Anyhow, back to the story.  So, Google turned up that I would need to build an Active IR Emitter box.  So, having read through the page linked just back there, I went and bought the bits to make the box.   Sadly, I didn’t take any photos during the construction, but to be honest there wouldn’t have been much to see.  This is my box, you can see inside as well.

Under the perf board is the 2N3904 Transistor, I’ve just fed the legs up through the perf board so I could do all the soldering on the top  I’ve made one modification to the board from the photos above, the 56 ohm resister has been replaced with a 10 ohm.  I didn’t have my head on when I build this and thanks to my mate Gavin (M1BXF) he let me straight on my error.

So, the parts list used.  This is from Maplin in the UK so you can work this out for yourself, but I’ve linked the parts from their store so you can check the specs.

2 x IR LED Emitters – YH70M – £1.14 (£2.28)

1 x 10 Ohm Resistor (I had this), around £0.30

1 x 2N3904 Transistor – QR40 – £0.29

1 x ABS Plastic Box (50mm x 35mm x 17mm) – SC78K – £2.29

1 x 3 AA Battery Case – YR61R – £1.19

1 x 3.5mm Stereo Plug – HF98G ( I had this already, but it’s £1.79)

A scape of perf board but to be honest it isn’t really needed

So, the total cost for the project was around £5.00 for me as I had some bits, but if you had to buy everything add another £2 to that.

 

In testing it with my Nikon D5000 DSLR I found it to work very well in my living room.  The IR Receiver for this camera is located on the front of the camera and in the handgrip on the right hand side.  Clearly you’ll need a tripod when using this as holding it would block the IR Receiver and, well, rather defeats the purpose for a control timer.  I found this to trigger the camera very nicely from a wide variety of angles both in landscape and portrait mode.  The distances I tested with were only about 3-4 meters, I will do more testing later to see how far I can push it, but I think that’s about all I’m going to be able to expect out of these LED’s.

I hope you’ve found this helpful, and I’d like to give credit where it’s due.   The software was written by some folks over at www.wegroo.com and the design of the Active IR Emitter was from Walther Grube and his blog page again for this is http://wgrube-electronics.blogspot.com/2011/08/active-ir-remote-for.html

Please, feel free to leave any comments / questions you might have about this.  I might have another go making another one but with a couple more LED’s to try and increase the range of it, will update if I get around to doing that.

Happy clicking … and now my phone will click for me

Tags: Android, Electronics, Galaxy S2, Infra-Red, LED, Samsung

I say “lists” because I find I have different needs at different times.  This depends on if I’m using my Android devices for work or play.

 

Essential apps for “play”

Social Network / Chat Apps

 

Facebook

It goes without saying, Facebook is one of the required apps by “most” people these days.  There are many Facebook apps to pick from in the Android Market, but the one I’ve stuck with is Facebook for Android.  This app has been updated quite a bit since the first version I’d seen 2 years ago when I first got my Samsung Galaxy S (I-9000).  The latest versions of the application include access to pretty much every feature on Facebook now, including Facebook Chat.

Trillian

That brings me the next app, Trillian (by Cerulean Studios, LLC).  I’ve been using Trillian off and on pretty much since it came out, must be the best part of 10 years now.  This is a great mutli-IM platform with lots of features (a few drawbacks too, but what “all-in-one” tool doesn’t have it’s drawbacks).  When Trillian came out for Android I jumped on it right away.  Some of the features of Trillian that I find useful are the I can now share my chat history between all my devices (Android, PC, Web).  You can debate with yourself if storing your chat history either locally or in the cloud is a good or bad thing.  I’ve been down that road and have found that in general having my chat history has been a good thing.  Searching for shared URL’s or other info has been a time savings for me.

Tweetdeck

Twitter (<- click to get to my twitter ID) is another social network I frequently use. For this I choose to use Tweetdeck.  I also use Tweetdeck on the PC so this works very well when I’m also using it on my Android devices.  My preferences are stored and shared with my various devices that use the app, also making things convenient, just sign in and you’re good to go.

 

Pingchat

The final chat application Pingchat, is a mobile device only application, but it’s cross platform, making it quite useful.  This app should save you loads over using SMS to communicate with your friends, especially International friends.  It works very much like RIM’s BlackBerry Messenger, but it’s not limited to only one platform.  You can send messages, pictures, videos, voice messages, etc.  It’s very similar to another application called WhatsApp Messenger, I also use this, but not as much as Pingchat.

 

Everyday apps

 

Kindle

The Kindle app from Amazon is a very nicely done application for reading.  However, from my personal experience reading on a phone or even an a tablet isn’t nearly as good as using a real Kindle Device.  The screens are just not as nice to read from as that which is offered by the E-Ink technology used by Kindle.  However, it’s still a very good and simple application to use an easy to browse the Kindle Bookstore and purchase new books for immediate delivery to your device.

Dropbox

The Dropbox app is another must have if you want easy document access between devices.  I have been a long time user of JungleDisk, and even though they have decided to completely abandon Android users, but they have got a iPhone/iPad version available and I would still recommend it for PC and the Apple devices, it really is worth the small price.  Anyhow, since i don’t have JungleDisk for Android I’ve been forced to use Dropbox (<- click for my affiliate link, it’ll get you some extra space when you sign up).  I have to stay that Dropbox does work very well but the cost of space beyond the free space is more expensive then Amazon S3 Storage, which JungleDisk uses.

Quickoffice Pro

Quickoffice Pro is my mobile Office application of choice.  It provides all the usual tools for creating, editing, viewing Microsoft Office documents.  It supports Word, Excel, Powerpoint and PDF’s.  When it comes to documents you can use local documents stored on your device (Android, iPhone/iPad) or stored in various cloud storage services such as Dropbox, Google Docs, Box.net, etc.

 

Titanium Backup Pro

Titanium Backup Pro is a fantastic application but it will only worked on rooted devices, which is something I think most people will do to their Android devices, it makes them more usable (in my Opinion).  This application will also allow you to remove some of the  bloatware that comes on some Android devices.   You can not only back up to your local storage on the device but also to Dropbox for all it’s cloudy goodness.

 

Tasker

Tasker is a full automation application for your Android device.  Think CRON for unix, but inject Schwarzenegger levels of steroids into it.  Some of the automation I use on my phone include, keeping my GPS turned off at all times but Tasker will turn it on when I start an application that needs it, then switches it off again when I exit the app.  When my phone connects to my home Wifi network it will switch off Bluetooth and force GPS off since I don’t need at home, also, while at home, between 11pm and 7am if the device is plugged in it will silence the phone so I’m not annoyed at night.  The possibilities are just about endless for this app, and it’s worth every penny.

 

Games

There are so many games available it’s really hard to list the ones I’ve played and liked, but I suppose a short list would have to be:

Angry Birds.  There are different versions and personally, I think they should all be downloaded and played 

• Angry Birds
• Angry Birds Rio
• Angry Birds Seasons

Airport Mania (Free) – You get to control the process of incoming and outgoing air planes.  It’s not as simple as landing them and taking them off though, you need to get to them to the terminals, get them fuelled up, cargo loaded, washed if their dirty and repaired if they need maintenance.  I’m considering buying the paid for version as I’ve completed the free version, it really was quite addictive.

Jewellust is another must have game.  Spring for the paid for version, you won’t be disappointed.  The kids also love playing this game.

 

Essential apps for “work” (or geeks)

These are a few apps that I feel are a must off for work or just geeking about on the Internet

ConnectBot

ConnectBot is a must for SSH.  It not only supports SSH Keys but also port tunnelling.  This is very useful to get access to internal destinations on a network that allows you to SSH into.

LogMeIn Ignition

LogMeIn Ignition isn’t a cheap app, and it’s about the only thing people complain the most about, the price.  But, if you have a load of machines setup to use LogMeIn you will not regret paying the price for the application.  I have 5 or 6 PC’s configured with LogMeIn (Free) and I find this tool simply awesome.  I can access my PC’s with the phone (or tablet) over pretty much any sort of connection and it just works.  GPRS is a bit slow but it does work, which is impressive.

Wyse PocketCloud (Pro)

This is the best RDP/VNC client I’ve used on Android, it also supports VMWare View if your company uses this.  I’ve not actually tried this function myself, but the VNC and RDP are very good, couple this with ConnectBot and you can tunnel your way into a network and access RDP over the SSH tunnels.

Wifi Analyzer

This is a great tool for doing Wifi surveys with, you will need an additional installed app to use it.  Check out the screen shots of it on the Market, it really does a very nice job.

 

A few others I must also mention are:

Shark for Root – Wireshark network sniffer (also get Shark Reader to read the output on the Android Device)

Net Scan – Scan your local network for devices and open ports

Root Explorer (for rooted devices) – Poke through everything on your Android and mount areas Read/Write so you can modify system files – Danger Will Robinson, Danger

 

I hope you find this helpful, and I’d love to hear what apps you MUST have on your Android, and tell us why.

Well, I’ve had my Android phone for just over 1 month now and I can only describe my feelings for the device as “growing stronger each day”.  Which, if you’d been reading my blog a year ago when I got my Nokia N97, is the complete opposite.

The more I use the device, the more I love it.  Sure there are dislikes I have for device…

– its hard for me to get use to the on screen keyboard. I’ve always had physical keyboards so still find myself making loads od mistakes, but getting much better.

– the battery life ia really bad, but then again this really is the power of your average netbook in your pocket. I’ve not actually run it with Wifi, Bluetooth and gas fully disabled for a day to see how it does.

– the final dislike ia nothing to do with device or android but with Samsung and the appalling failure that is the Samsung Kies software, which is required for doing update to the phone firmware. Simply but it doesn’t work for most people, and my experience is no different.

My likes about the device? I think its easier ro simply say… With only the above exceptions, all you can do is love this thing.  It fast, has an amazing screen, awesome graphics, great audio, a phenomenal selection of apps available and simply gets better every day.

If you want to see what I run on my android then CLICK HERE to see.  The list is a live update of the apps I have installed.  If you have an Android and don’t use Appbrain and Fast Web Installer app then you are seriously missing out on what I consider one of the most powerful apps on the Android Platform!!!

I’ve written this post 100% from the device this time using the WordPress app.  No apps were harmed in the production of this posting and I had some green text on my screen so it means its friendly on the environment as well.

The day finally came this past week when I was finally released from Nokia based hell on Earth.

On Tuesday September, 14th was the day of my release. I can only liken the feeling to the one a convict whose just served 40 years in a Turkish prison. Ok perhaps that’s a bit dramatic, but it’s really not far off.

Read the rest of this entry »

On Friday I left work at 1pm to meet up with my pal Dave (M0VMC) to head up to the Peak District to do some walking.  On our way we’d stopped off to check out a huge hole in the ground that was left as a result of about 3500 tons of stockpiled explosives all going off at one time.  It’s known as the Fauld Crater, located next to Hanbury, Staffs.

It was a short walk (check out the GPS log – 2.9km /1.8mi ) across a couple of fields to get to the craters edge.  It’s quite the hole, and must have been one hell of a bang back in the day when it up, then apparently came back down, all over Staffordshire.

After that it was off to Nottingham for the night before heading off to Bakewell, Derbyshire.

We’d got a bit of a late start on Saturday so it was pretty long day.  We’d started our walk at about 1130am, should really have been about 930am haha but meh it’s Saturday after all.

I’d parked at the Bakewell Bridge car park.  It was only £4.00 for the entire day (Midnight to Midnight).  Check out the walk and GPS log here (21km / 13.1mi).

In the above photos you could see the sun was shining nicely, well that didn’t last too long.  Shortly after walking past the old train station we’d got into rain and took shelter under a tree for about 15 or 20 mins not wanting to actually having to dig out our wet weather gear, we’d just wait it out.

We’d stopped at Hobb’s Cafe that has a spectacular view of Monsal Dale and the Viaduct in the valley

Having enjoyed a coffee and a chance to get out of the rain again we’d set off down into the valley below.  We’d actually ended up taking the “wrong” way down, it wasn’t the way down we’d planned to take but it was still just as nice.  We did get a bit worried when we’d approached a place we thought we should have been using to cross the river and were faced with with this…

This was clearly not going to be our way across the river.  We’d figured we might have to head back up the hill and down the other path.  But since we’d come this far we consulted the map more closely and it appeared there should be either a small bridge or more likely some stepping stones to get across a bit further down stream.  We were relieved to find a small bridge.

The rest of this part of the trail until we crossed the A6.  We’d search for another Geocache just on the other side of the A6 and after about 20 mins of chasing the GPS needles we had to admit defeat.  I didn’t bother loading up my phone with the details of the cache so we had no clues to work on and no phone signal to be able to look it up.  So, it was a good time to stop for lunch here.   While looking for the cache we’d found this cave near by.

Having consumed our lunch and had a nice break we set off on what would be the worse part of the route, little did we know it (we should have I suppose, but meh, why bother paying attention to all those brown contour lines on the map).  Well, to be honest it wasn’t so much a bunch of brown contour lines, it was more like big wide brown streak haha

There was quite a significant climb up of about 700 or so feet on a 35-45 degree slope, made extra nice going by the rain we’d had that morning.  All I can say is I’m glad we were going up and not down, that would have been a hell of a ride down over all those rocks.

Looking up the slope

Looking down the slope

The photos don’t really do justice to the actual grade on the hill.

Having finally gotten to the top and totally winded from that we had a pretty uneventful few miles with nothing but just some awesome scenery provided courtesy the Deberyshire countryside.

The rest of the walk back into Bakewell was pleasant except for when we had to pull our out rain gear.  With nothing to shelter under and about 300 meters of open fields to cross before getting to anything that might have helped us, the choices were clear haha.  Typical too, the rain had only lasted about 5 or 6 mins, we’d have been soaked without the rain gear but what can you do.

The last 2 miles or so were a real slog, everything was starting to ache from the pounding we’d been giving our legs and feet.  Interestingly enough though, neither of us were suffering from blisters or anything.  The soles of my feet were 100% fine, which for me was a first after a long walk like this.

We’d arrived back in Bakewell around 7pm and stopped for dinner in a pub in town before heading back to the car park and heading back to Cambridge.  Our total time from leaving the car and getting back to it was 8h 27m, of that included about 1 hour for dinner at the end and about another 90 mins or so of stops and breaks.

We’d arrived back in Cottenham around 1030pm after a very long day.  I had a nice hot bath after getting my pack unloaded and wet gear hung up to dry and dirty clothing into the wash.  Then it was to bed for a very nice sound sleep.

All of the photos from day can be seen HERE

I can’t wait for the next walk….