Too much time on my hands? Here’s a quick and dirty Perl script called acv2gimp that converts a Photoshop curves action file (.acv) to a GIMP curves file. Just run it on the ACV file and redirect stdout to a new file, which should then be put in your .gimp-2.*/curves/ directory. E.g.:

$ acv2gimp FancyCurve.acv > ~/.gimp-2.2/curves/FancyCurve

The file format was taken from this PS6 file format specifications document. There are some caveats:

• Photoshop can have up to sixteen channels, with a curve for each. However, most ACV files seem to contain only five curves for the K, R, G, B and Alpha channels, and GIMP curves files appear to match this.
• Photoshop allows up to 19 points on a curve (v3.0 - may be more in later versions?), whereas the GIMP only allows 17 points. My script outputs all the points (with a warning), but I have no idea what the GIMP will do with the extra data; it may crash. You can hand-edit the output and delete some of the points if this is a problem.

Update: Thanks to Ron Hickson for discovering a rather foolish bug: the script does not handle platform endianness variations. Fixed now, download again if you tried it previously.

Just a few tricks I’ve learnt, discovered or regularly use on my own shots.

My document about WAS on UNIX has been republished by WebSphere Journal (part two next month). They’ve loosened up the language somewhat to suit their cool, hip image, but the definitive - and updated - version remains my original paper.

We found Ade Rixon’s “Putting WAS on Unix” in a serendipitous way, simply by surfing the web in search of ideas one blessed week-end. “But I only posted it on my website two days ago,” he said. “How did you find me?” It’s simple, we are omniscient, I reminded him, and therefore knowledgeable enough to know a good subject and good writing when we see it, and give it a much wider audience.
- Roger Strukhoff, WJ Editor

Coming soon, my new article: “Giving up work for a life of abundant luxury”. Over here, Forbes magazine!

Of all the fascinating topics covered by BB, Warrington Bus Station must rank in the top five and we therefore expect our hit rate to treble after this post (so a warm welcome to our two new readers). And the big news for fans of this mighty edifice is: it’s going.

“Which braying, wide-eyed simpletons watch this stuff … ?”
- Rock star’s crazy, crazy nights at Christ’s

BB has very little to add other than that we tremendously enjoyed this news story, though more for what it says about “reality” TV than the ridiculous, posturing loon that is Gene Simmons.

BBC4 is running a series on Sunday nights called A Digital Picture of Britain, which is supposedly a companion to A Picture of Britain on the main channel. The latter is a look at the influence of the British landscape on the arts hosted by a rather grumpy David Dimbleby (“I suppose it’s worth it,” he harrumphed as he set off up Helvellyn in dangerous winter conditions), with each programme concentrating on a particular region. Unfortunately, the former forsakes the opportunity to draw comparisons between the artists and scenes mentioned by Dimbleby and the work of landscape photographers, in favour of pointless “Gee whizz, these digital cameras are really neat!” technolust.

When we look back on the things we’ve done, we tend to forget the minor annoyances (how hot it was, all the flies, busting to get to the toilet) and the boring bits.

It takes on a rosy glow, becoming better in recall than it was in reality. We even laugh over misadventures we found most unpleasant at the time.

• Activity is the goods for true satisfaction, Sydney Morning Herald, 18th Feb 2004.

Three years. Three years of lying awake at night thinking, “Please god, don’t make me go back there!” It’s been almost three years since BB took a three week vacation in New Zealand and there’s still no sign of a “rosy glow” of remembrance, only the cold shudder of an unpleasant dream. But at least we can talk about it now. In fact, we can whinge at length.

Those little boxes on forms that say, “Please do not tick here if you are not disinclined not to remain uninformed about our other products and activities” were made for BB. We tick them like a maniac, once we can figure out their fiendish logic. Don’t call us, we won’t call you.

It only took about ten years, but I finally got a story on Slashdot, about Nikon’s encryption of the white balance information in the NEF raw data from their DSLRs. Much inflamed commentary ensued in typical Slashdot “RTFA” style, which also spilled over on to the normally placid waters of PhotographyBlog (sorry, Mark). For what it’s worth now, assuming this is still of interest, here’s my take on it, including the reason for the “butt out” comment.

Whenever there’s an application problem, project managers and analysts immediately turn to two groups of people to find out what’s wrong: sysadmins and developers.

So once more, let’s play….IT’S NOT MY PROBLEM!!