In a year time we are back at O2 Arena. This time it’s a legendary Depeche Mode.

I hate booking tickets 6 months before the event and even more I hate paying extra money for no extra value added at ebay, but hey, these are the rules of the game. At least we did not go buying tickets for Michael Jackson’s show (yes, I was contemplating it).

The show was great. No surprise here. I must admit, I wasn’t a big fan of the band’s latest album, well, apart from a couple of tracks, but hearing the songs live definitely changed my perception of them.

They started with “In Chains”, which actually gave me a bit of shiver:) Then few more songs from the “Sounds of the Universe” followed. “Wrong” was another powerful track, which also ‘looked’ great, accompanied by blood-red flash lights.

Still the warmest audience’s welcome received Depeche Mode’s classics and all time favourites, like “In Your Room”, “I Feel You”, “Enjoy The Silence” etc. I was also very glad “Precious” was on the list.

“Personal Jesus” concluded the night and we were ready to leave, feeling satisfied and pleased we had made it.

“Question everything generally thought to be obvious.” Dieter Rams

Dieter Rams is in town. Well, not exactly him, but there is an exhibition in the London Design Museum with many of his appliances and gadgets on the display.

For those of you who does not know, Dieter Rams was the chief of design at BRAUN (German manufacturer) and was the man behind most innovative and iconic designs of that time.

And if you are not an Apple hater (there could be a number of reasons, I am not judging you), you would definitely appreciate the simplicity and minimalism of the design that inspired Apple’s Jonathan Ive himself a lot.

The exhibition is like a designer’s candy shop. To see those reel and vinyl players, video cameras, radios, lighters etc, is like travelling back in time (well, no surprise here - this is how it is supposed to feel like at museum exhibitions, right). I must admit I am quite fascinated with those times of 70-80s and would not mind to have my own house decorated accordingly and with those kind of gadgets.

Apparently, the biggest ‘problem’ of BRAUN’s design and the reason why it’s not market’s leader anymore, is their design philosophy - to produce products which wouldn’t be out of fashion and will physically serve for a very long time. Sadly, modern approach is to keep producing inferior quality products to make people replace them all the time.

Dieter Rams’ Ten Principles of Good Design:

• innovative
• makes a product useful
• aesthetic
• makes a product understandable
• unobtrusive
• honest
• long-lasting
• thorough down to the last detail
• environmentally friendly
• as little design as possible

Amen to that.

If you are in town, I would highly recommend to see the exhibition while it’s on. Read more about the exhibition and Dieter Rams.

London Design Museum itself is located, as you might know, next to the Tower Bridge. So I also took an opportunity to take a couple of pictures of the London’s icon from a different angle than usual:

Who could have thought that iPhone camera can be of any use? I gave up on it loooooong time ago. It’s not a camera. It’s a joke. Pure frustration. But I used to comfort myself with a thought that it wasn’t that important, in the end even phones with more superior cameras make rather mediocre pictures.

From time to time I came across galleries of ‘cool iPhone photography’, but either shots were made in quite a perfect environment and good lighting, or required quite an extensive editing or were not that awesome at all.

So I just said to myself: don’t bother. And I didn’t. Until the moment a few days ago my work mate introduced me to an app, which changed everything.  It is called ShakeItPhoto and you can get it from the iTunes. It is everything I need for just £0.59 (well, iPhone is not included :).

So what exactly do I need? Ideally it’s a gadget, small enough, so I could carry it around with me at all times, which wouldn’t intimidate anyone if I point with it at them and which would be capable of taking pictures of some artistic value. I don’t need my everyday pictures to be of outstanding quality, but to capture the mood of the moment. Yes, my DSLR can take great photos, but lately I have been even considering taking it with me when going on holidays. Cause it’s BIG and heavy. I also don’t have guts to point it at some stranger’s face. It just gets too much attention. On the other hand, phone is just perfect for this.

One more thing. I have quite a fascination with retro photography with it’s offset colours, occasional blurriness, lack of focus, with its imperfectness. Just like our life is - imperfect.

So here we are, I got it all now with ShakeItPhoto.

It’s a simple app. As a mater of fact it’s so simple that it does pretty much just one task. And this is exactly why I love it. It takes photos in a polaroid style. You point, you shoot, and… that’s it. It adds just one filter and the frame. Brilliant!

What also great about this app is that it’s a great fun to use. It takes time to ‘develop’ the photo and you can even shake ‘the picture’, just like the real thing. There is also always a bit of luck factor involved, which again, is what you get with an instant photography.

The first few days after I installed it, I just went crazy and took ,probably, hundreds of pictures, but they were mostly about what I saw at work or on my way to/from work. Naturally I ran out of things of interest, so settled down a bit, but still remain quite enthusiastic. I really feel like it brought the joy of everyday life photography back into my life and encourages me to experiment more and not just run through my life, but stop and have a look around and notice little things, to see the beauty in details.

These are just a few shots I did lately (I have also converted those few pictures I already had on my iPhone, which for me were DOA, but now they look great). I also started a new set on Flickr and constantly update it with a new material. Definitely go and check!

It would be a lie to say the app is perfect. The navigation is not particularly intuitive for the user, even for such a simple app - there is an extra step to get to the image folder, and the button which leads there says ‘Cancel’ (must be default interface used, but that does no make a lot of sense); it would be much better if the whole screen was a Shoot button, not just that tiny little one; and, probably the worst of it all, it crashes occasionally, while processing the picture and you can never recover that shot. But the app got a great feedback from other users and a warm reception so I hope the developer will continue to work on its flaws.

It also helps to have iPhone 3G with a letter S with its much much better focusing. I saw few shots and they were beautifully crisp (can’t get that with my phone).

One last thing. Of course there are tons of other similar apps in the Apple store, free or more advanced, and you should feel free to try them, but exactly the simplicity of ShakeItPhoto is what attracts me. Having said that, I would really recommend you to download an amazing Mill Colour app for a more advanced colour correction. It’s free and I use it sometimes on a picture before taking it to the ShakeItPhoto. They work really well in tandem.

A couple of months ago a good friend of mine offered me to go with him to the Get Loaded in the Park festival in South London. Lots of electronica on several stages, and one of its highlights was Royksopp. Well, of course I would go! :)

I discovered the band back in 2005 after listening to The Understanding and being in love with their work since, and that was the first time I saw them performing live. They had a 40 minute session and with their unique sound, feel and look it was awesome.

Later that night I was checking their website and found out that my favorite Scandinavians would be performing soon in London, O2 Academy in Shepherd Bush. Well, that was an easy choice for me, since it’s just 10 minute bus drive away from my place. I booked tickets immediately.

Time went by and here is the night and here we are. We decided to skip supporting act and arrived just some ten minutes before Royksopp began their act.

It was a mix of the material from all of their releases - from famous Elpe from Melody A.M. to, of course, What Else Is There from The Understanding and, well, naturally to the songs from the latest CD, Junior. Also Robyn made her appearance on Girl and the Robot and everyone was very cheerful about it. Everyone had their compacts and mobiles phones out and up in the air :)

No doubts the show was great, but I felt the set could have been a bit longer (even though they were encored twice). Also I must admit, the performance was pretty much the same as at the festival I saw, just a longer version of it, but I must be blaming myself for that, I should have had a bigger pause between the shows :)

What next? Well, Depeche Mode in O2 Arena in December. I just need to find the tickets, as I can’t remember where I put them…

You can also see the bigger version of these pictures, if you go to my Flickr set.

A year ago I was buying a domain name for my newly formed Skrinshot LTD. It did not come as a big surprise that skrinshot.com was already taken. So I had no choice, but to register under .co.uk (which wasn’t that bad, since business was registered and operating in UK).

Ac couple of weeks ago I received an email from itdomainnames.net, basically saying ’skrinshot.com is coming available for sale in a few days. If you have interest in acquiring it, please fill up priority notice, and we will contact you when the domain is available.’ Right, that is interesting! So I followed the link in the email.

The first paragraph was saying ‘SKRINSHOT.COM will be listed for sale in the next 24 hours. This domain has been flagged as a premium domain and we expect it to sell quickly. Since you received a priority notice from us, you will be given first chance to acquire this domain.’

Nice, that feels like VIP treatment, and I like it. But also seems too good to be true. A premium domain? I doubt it.

Anyway, I started filling the form and came down to the ‘Your offer’ field. Hmm, my offer… What’s my offer?… OK, 20 bucks. But got an error message - ‘The minimum offer is $97′. Oh, screw you then! I don’t really need it that much (even skrinshot.co.uk is still just a holding page so far). Oh well then, I thought, I’ll stick to .co.uk.

They kept sending me reminder emails, hoping I was going to change my mind, but I was firm. Then a couple of days ago I received an email from another domain name seller, traderdomains.com, and this time ‘it is available for a one-time fee of only $49 USD’ as they ‘were able to secure it’.

Well, that’s definitely a good news! Looks like I saved myself $48, just by waiting a little bit and ignoring the initial price offer. Just like a good haggler. And this time it looked like a fair price to me, which I would be quite happy to pay.

But wait a second! I thought itdomainnames.net had already had that name at their disposal, so how have traderdomains.com managed to ’secure it’? Well that looked suspicious to me. Looked like scam.

And scam it was. I went to the first ‘cheap domains’ website, checked that skrinshot.com was available and bought it for just around $10. And that’s the end of story :) Done. Never just trust emails/internet, check first.

I will be transferring my one page ‘website’ to it’s new address in the next few days. I will also be happily ditching skrinshot.net and skrinshot.info I have bought a year ago and don’t need anymore, since I’ve got .com, the coolest one. Nice.

Ok, this time it is my birthday and we going on our next trip. Destination: sunny Turkey. Not particularly fancy or exotic one, but it’s not just a beach holiday either - it’s our annual ‘active holiday’ with Neilson (as their tag-line goes: ‘relax as hard as you like’). The plan: to catch a lot of sun, enjoy food and to do sports (primarily, windsurfing).
Below is my hopefully at least vaguely entertaining story about it.

Day 0: the flight.

I must say it wasn’t my luckiest day ever. We arrived at the Victoria station just in time to jump in the train to Gatwick airport. Literally 10 seconds before departure. Phew, that was close! Lucky us? Ummm, not really. In 10 minutes the conductor told us our tickets were not valid for the journey. What??? Apparently in a hurry we took the wrong train (same time, same destination). Actually I had a feeling something was wrong - it looked suspiciously fancier than usual. Well, It was a Gatwick Express. Unnecessary quicker and more expensive. Nothing to do - I had to buy another pair of tickets. Bollocks!

Next, at the check in we found out that there was a problem with our plane, so the flight would be delayed. No specific time yet. Taking express train to the airport seemed even worse idea. But apparently it wasn’t over. Not yet. My bank card was declined in one of the airport shops. Not now! I had another card with me, but no money on that account. Luckily I had a jezuz phone with me and could log in to my online banking to make a transfer between the accounts. It was painfully slow on EDGE, but possible.

You must agree, not a brilliant start. I did not want to take it as a bad sign, but I guess it made me a little bit more careful during the whole holiday :) Just a tiny bit.

The flight was 5 hours late. We visited most of the airport shops and had a dinner in a Cafe Rouge, where we had sea food with a bottle of white wine to my health (don’t forget, it was my birthday :)

Day 1.

We arrived in Izmir in the early morning ( 3am, is it early in the morning or still late at night?) and got transferred to the hotel with a hundred of other guests. Did not sleep too long though and were up around 10am when we headed to the beach after a breakfast and induction meeting. Now we can relax…

The place is beautiful, the whole resort is laid out as a local village with streets and ‘houses’, quite big, but still compact. The temperature is about +30C, which is just hot enough for us to be enjoyably tolerable.

Ok, now remind myself why I am here in the first place? Oh yes, windsurfing. Got my kit out in the sea. Let’s see how we do it :) I am not a pro, just started it a few years ago and doing it pretty much one week a year, so not that experienced. But even so… I was shocked and disappointed - I could barely stand on a board. And here is the problem: lack of wind and choppy sea. I still spent 2 hours on the water, with first 40 minutes mostly in the water :), cause I am stubborn. Got back. Tired. And not happy. Not at all. That wasn’t a windsurfing at all, but a rather long balancing exercise.

I also had a short wakeboard session that day. Again, a big failure. Have I totally lost my skills? I swear I could do it!

Tired. Ok, a dinner will cheer me up. The food is always just amazing at Neilson’s resorts. And we were very happy to see it was not affected by the world crisis :) You think you will loose a couple of kilos after being involved in all the activities and doing all the kind of sports. Nope. Why? Inclusive meals. And it’s not just because it’s a buffet, but because it is soooo gooood. The variety of food, local one and also more traditional British cuisine, the abundance of fruit and vegetables… Even if you just try a little bit of everything… your plate is full. You are full.

Day 2.

We signed up for tennis lessons and windsurfing. A wider board and a smaller sail made it much more enjoyable for me. Yes, I can still do it, I am the man! Spent hours on the water. Almost missed my lunch. Cooooooool. Dinner was not inclusive, but we were too tired to venture to a local village restaurant. Stayed in. Slept well.

Day 3.

Tennis in the morning. Now I know how the scoring works :) Apparently, tennis, together with windsurfing were going to be my main activities that week. No time/energy left for yoga/stretching/biking/volleyball. Oh well…

Everything hurts. The whole body aches. Yes, I am being very active.

The wind was very good for surfing that day. Finally. A couple of hours before lunch and more windsurfing shortly after. Very excited. And insatiable. The wind got stronger. Even more fun. But getting very tired. Could barely hold on to the sail :). Planing and flying. Sometimes over the board, when it’s too late to unhook the harness. Still fun! Got back to the shore. Could barely work, so exhausted. Everything hurts. And aches. But I was happy. Very happy. Veronika, can you please carry me up to our room?

Had dinner together with Richie and Olona, a couple we had met. Olona is a Russian speaking Ukrainian girl. Richie used to be a graphic designer and as it turned out we share the love for some sci fi, music and video games :) Dead Space is the scariest one, Bioshock is the most beautiful one (I say the best game ever).

Day 4.

This was our cultural part of the holiday. It wasn’t not our first visit to Turkey, so we knew pretty much what the local life was like. But we had a special trip that day - to the remainders of the ancient city of Ephesus.

A mysterious sign. Some part of me wants to buy watch, because it’s ‘genuine’ and apparently cheap, and the other part is refusing, because it’s ‘fake’. Very confusing.

It’s a few thousand years old, being rebuilt and number of times and only 10% of it is excavated so far. But oh boy, it’s incredible. In the time of Augustus, the population of Ephesus was 200,000. Built between the hills, it still looks very impressive. Amazing things you can do with a free labor :)

This is Odeon theater. Apparently it was roofed. And the steps are carved in a special way so the acoustics is amazing.

Main street. I guess it was that busy in the ancient times as well.

Well, this is a public toilet. Made of marble, of course. A slave had to sit on it before his master to warm the seat up. Nice.

That’s the most famous sight of the city - the Celsus Library.

And this is another huge theater, for 20,000 people. Music, drama and gladiators’ fights. It is still used nowadays and was the stage for Sting, Elton John and other stars.

After visiting Ephesus we came up the hill to visit what is believed to be the house of Virgin Mary, where she spent the last years of her life (a German nun saw a vision about this place, though had never traveled in her life), so the house was found/excavated.

There is a ‘holy water’ spring there with 3 tabs: one for good health, another for luck, and another one for love. I drank from all of them :)

And this is the Wishing Wall where people leave their wishes and prayers. I’ve left mine there as well. Who knows?

We got back to the hotel before the dinner. And we had quite a dinner that night :) The desserts were an absolute killer. I counted more than 30 different ones. In Turkey they say ‘Who eats sweats, talks sweet’. It must be very irresponsible. Can’t. Eat. Any. More. Desserts.

Day 5.

Cloudy. Lack of wind. Less windsurfing. More tennis. Chilling. Tried wake-boarding again. Much better this time.

Stayed in for bbq night. Tables were laid out in the pool area. Beautiful and romantic. Had fish and roasted lamb. And lamb again. Full.

Chilling out in the pool bar with Richie and Alona. Richie teaches me how to play backgammon. I actually won the second game :) Beginners’ luck.

Day 6.

Tennis tournament. Playing doubles me and Veronika won in the beginners’ group. Not too bad :) The wind is not picking up. We went snorkeling and took some pictures instead. And played tennis again.

Day 7.

Packing. The last lunch. Mmm, I am so going to miss this food… Got out in the water. Where is the wind? Nowhere near. Got back. Tennis. Swimming Pool. And the last chance to even the tan :)

Landed in Gatwick soon after the midnight. It’s quite chilly in here! Big city - cold and dirty. Still another couple of hours before I wrap myself in a duvet in my beloved bed. Tomorrow is a day for acclimatization and then back to work.

Dreams of another summer…

More picture here!

Last weekend we came down to Brighton with a few of our friends to catch some, probably last sunlight, before it all goes grey and gloomy. It’s pretty much the end of August and this is our… first visit to the seaside this summer. A bit late, yes, but hey, the summer wasn’t that brilliant. Well, it’s the British one.

Luckily it was warm and sunny (as a general rule it was raining or at least it was heavy-clouded on any day Veronika had a day off this summer, poor girl, her skin is still marble-white), so it was nice just to chill-out on the beach and read a book.

The water wasn’t warm though. As a matter of fact, it was freezing cold (that’s why you see me on the picture wrapped in the towel, as you could guess), and not so many ventured into going swimming. But I did. In the end, it would have looked to me as a missed opportunity if I hadn’t dare. Painfully to get in, then requiring intensive body and limbs movements once you are there, but then surprisingly nice and fresh (as long as you keep moving :). Yes, I am the man.

One of those lazy days… We walked around the beach to see the sunset before we jumped into the train back to London.

Product packaging. So often remarkably excessive and ‘not smart’. Waste of money, waste of space and non-recyclable most of the time. Some companies are getting it right nowadays, but still there are many more, which don’t seem to care. Just have a look inside your bin.

No wonder I have respect for the companies that do their best trying to minimize the environmental damage with their products. Or at least do something, since it’s not possible to become green and sustainable overnight, after hundreds of years of not caring about these issues at all. And I appreciate it even more when they do it with a style (and a sense of humor). And look what I found on the side of my yoghurt today:

Isn’t it cute? For me it’s a good example of marrying design and functionality. It’s a small thing, but hey, small things do matter.

The way it’s done actually reminds me of packaging of everyone’s favorite Innocent Smoothies with they cute witty comments on the boxes. By the way, here is the latest one, probably not as cute as ever, but still quite enjoyable.

So yeah, that little feature of youghurt packaging definitely wins me if the range of yoghurts is presented (even if it’s just a smart marketing of an evil corporation, which, and I hope it is not). Besides, the yoghurt itself tastes good.

Oh, in case you are wondering what I have I used the yoghurt for, here is a picture. A bit of a food porn for you. Yummy.