Night photography can be challenging, but inevitably gratifying when you manage to capture those “home run” photos. One of our favorites are photographing car light trails at night. If you plan it right you can capture a really engaging night photo as a result.

Let’s begin.

As you can guess, it is necessary to accomplish this type of night photography . A good SLR (Single Lens Reflex) Camera and some creativity will allow for even the novice to produce professional looking pictures. It is best that you are familiarize yourself with the camera’s exposure capabilities as well as shutter speed manipulation. Pick out a great place to shoot, which will allow you to involve as many trails as possible. Ideal locations should be somewhere with a high volume of traffic, and can provide an elevated viewpoint such as a hill, a bridge, or building, enabling you the perfect overlook at the cars in the night.

When choosing shooting angles remember that cars coming in your direction will provide yellow light trails, while those facing away will provide red, so keep that in mind when you decide what kind of effect you want with the colors.

Now focus on your exposure. A longer exposure will give you more trails, and extend their length, but if your exposure time is too long you will see the brightness of each trail beginning to fade, something you may want to avoid.

Use you viewfinder to find out how long a car needs to pass your scene, then add a couple of seconds on your exposure time. It is best to experiment with different shutter speeds to achieve your desired trail length.

Use a tripod if you want the trails to be straight, if you want some motion in the picture try holding your camera. Try different positions, zoom in and out, spin the camera.

Just be creative enjoy night photography and have fun with it. Good luck!

Windows Movie Maker is well known Video Editing application for home users implemented in Microsoft Windows. With him, every home user can capture, edit and export his home movies to another home video camera, digital video recording device or just on DVD discs.

Non-professional home videos are specific with short movie clips scenes, because the recording of live scenes are spontaneous and without any preparation like lights, decors, etc. For this we just hurry press Record button on the camera and press it again when the action scene is finished. For this on one video storage (video tape, miniDVD, memory card) very frequently have written many video files with short duration. To get more smooth performance when playback it is good to insert some transition effects on the clips to get some blending feel on the audience when the video scenes are changing.

With this tutorial I will show you how to add transition effects between movie clips in Windows Movie Maker.

First Import your video clips into Collections like shown on the picture below:

Next put the video clips on Storyboard panel. Here you can arrange the video clips depending on the place where recorded, by chronological order or just to be suitable for adding the transition effects.

When ready open Video Transition and select the transition. To preview the transition click on it and next play in the preview player. When you choose suitable transition, select it and next drag and drop to Storyboard panel. Transition have to be placed in small container between the movie clips which you want to be blended with this transition like shown in the picture below:

When ready go to File / Save Movie file … and wait until the file is saved. Now lets see the result: Get the Flash Player to see this content.

What happens when you try to quit the smoking habit on your own? Are you quickly pushed back into smoking by stress, nagging thoughts, or overwhelming cravings?

What is happening is that your own subconscious mind is fighting your conscious efforts because it believes that smoking is good for you. After all, wasn’t it really great to smoke when you were young? All your friends were doing it and it drove your parents crazy!

Since you began smoking every time you lifted a cigarette to your lips it has triggered those same feelings of confidence and security associated with smoking when you first started. The sheer repetition of the habit continually reinforces in the subconscious mind that all you need to do to receive those good feelings is to smoke a cigarette.

Hypnosis can teach your subconscious what you already understand consciously: that cigarettes are not good for you and you no longer want them in your life! With hypnosis we can remove the effects that come from years of constant smoking. We can give your inner mind a new source for those good feelings, a healthy source that adds to life instead of taking from it. The subconscious accepts those suggestions easily. When this is properly done you no longer feel a need for something outside yourself to feel good. And you also don’t replace the smoking habit with a habit of overeating. There is no battle going on inside of you. You simply don’t think about cigarettes. You are a nonsmoker.

Understand that hypnosis will only work when you have the proper motivation. You must truly want to quit smoking for yourself. When you have reached a point when you can say “I hate these things and I want them out of my life!” is when you are ready to make your hypnosis a success. Say it out loud and see for yourself. Look at a cigarette and say these words: “I hate you and I don’t want you in my life anymore.” If you can’t say those words with feeling, then save your time and money. If you can say those words and mean them, then hypnosis will work beautifully for you.

This recipe will make food for 8 people and can be prepared in a period of 25 minutes.

Ingredients

1 pound of lean ground beef ½ cup of chopped green pepper ½ cup chopped onion 15 ½ ounce chili beans mixed in chili gravy 8 ounce can of tomato sauce 6 ounce can of tomato paste 2 tsp. chili powder ½ tsp. ground cumin ½ tsp. hot pepper sauce (bottled) 11 ½ ounce packaged cornbread twists (pack of 8) 8 ounce dairy sour cream carton 2 tsp. all-purpose flour 4 ounces shredded cheddar cheese 2 cups of coarse corn chips

Instructions

1. Cook the ground beef, chopped onion and green pepper in a large skillet till brown. 2. Drain the fat from the mixture and add tomato sauce, tomato paste, undrained beans, chili powder, hot pepper sauce and the cumin. Stir till it is well mixed. 3. Bring the mixture to boiling. 4. Reduce the heat and let it simmer for five minutes while stirring frequently. 5. Get a ten inch pie plate and lightly grease it. 6. Separate the corn bread twists but don’t uncoil them. 7. Arrange the twists on the greased plate, pressing them on the side and the bottom of the plate. Ensure the twists have extended above the plate by ½ an inch. 8. Using a spoon, scoop the ground beef mixture onto the top of the crust. 9. Mix the sour cream with flour and spread it on top of the beef mixture. Sprinkle some corn chips and cheese atop the mixture. 10.Set your oven to 375 degree F and put the mixture in the oven. Bake for 30 minutes.

Let the baked dish stand for ten minutes then serve. You can garnish the dish with green pepper. Serve as a main dish for 8 people.

One serving of this dish will provide; 29 gm. fat 501 calories 11 gm. of saturated fat 63 mg of cholesterol 739 mg sodium 44 gm. carbohydrate 4g fiber 22 g protein

Get the Chili corn bread pie iIngredients and make point of tying

For those of you using a Linux OS, you might have wanted to start a particular program or application at start up – when you login.

Windows has a StartUp folder, and placing a shortcut there does the job. What about Linux?

This is something I have done on my setup – Ubuntu Feisty Fawn. But I am sure that it is available in other Linux distribution, because it is a reminiscent of Unix

Here is what you need to do. Go to the home folder, and edit your login’s .profile file. In Ubuntu, the steps would be as follows:

(There is a easy way in Ubuntu. Skip the steps and read the end of the post).

Application > Accessories > Terminal

Open the file in VI Editor.

vi .profile

You can use any editor that you are comfortable with.

Go to the end of the file.

[Shift]+g

If the .profile was never changed after the install, then just follow these steps. But if you had edited it, then you know what we are doing. We are just going to the end of the file where all the environment setups are completed.

Enter the command-line syntax of the application. Every Linux application has one. For me, I wanted to fire up the IM client.

That fires up the GAIM. The ‘&’ is to specify it to make it a background process.

Save it.

That is it. Next time you login, the application you specified would have started up. You can choose any application you want and if you have more than one application to be put on startup, put them on separate lines. 

In Ubuntu, there is a simpler way. Go to System > Preferences > Sessions. Then, with the ‘Startup Programs’ as the selected tab, click on Add. Give the name and command, and hit OK. You are done.

So, why do we need to know the hard way when there is a simpler solution? Well, the GUI setup does not have facility to order startups of more than one application. By working with the .profile, you have much more programmatic control over it.

Update : Andy has shared with us the tip to do the above mentioned task (i.e. configuring startup programs) in Kubuntu and most likely these steps will work with any KDE. Here are the steps mentioned by Andy.

Interior Design

Interior design is not just about looks. The home interior must be aesthetically appealing and practical at the same time. For a layman, it is often difficult to decide which interior design will align with the needs and lifestyle and also fit the budget. It is because most designs do not show the need for improvements or alterations until you are actually using them. This is where interior designer fits in. They are trained to help their clients choose a design according to their lifestyle. They take care of the layout, decor, lighting, paint colour, etc. and all this keeping your budget in mind.

Like any other field, change is inevitable in this field too. Trends keep changing and these designers keep tuning their ideas according to the changing trends. Let us see what the industry experts expect from the future of home interior designing.

1. Imbibing Personality into Design:

With internet taking the centre stage, home designing is quickly becoming an “IT” industry. Everyone is finding their voice. People search the internet and download pictures from online design platforms such as Freshome, Houzz and Pinterest before approaching a designer. They have a good idea of what they intend to do with their homes and these ideas are firmly contrived in their minds. These platforms have increased the work of designers because now they have to weed through all the content that clients have to reach to the root of what they actually want. With too many options, the clients are often confused and the designers really need to work hard to gain the trust of the client and churn those ideas and create something original for the client.

2. Style Profiling:

At times, it gets really difficult for the person to make decisions, especially when there are millions of products to choose from. In such times of distress, style profiling comes to the rescue. It helps them to articulate preferences and narrow down the scope of choices, thereby helping them to take correct decisions.

In this tutorial you will learn how to design a simple but modern website layout. I, personally, like this kind of layouts so this one looks perfect for me…

1. Make new document, with proportions like on picture below.

2. Make a new layer and name it header. Now, by using Rectangular Marquee Tool (M) make a selection with width 800 and height 87 pixels. Place it like on picture below and fill with any color.

Hit CTRL + D to deselect and add following styles (Layer -> Layer Styles)

Drop Shadow

Gradient Overlay

Now, add some text and you can add some shapes, brushes…this is what I came up with.

3. We’re finished with our header now lets proceed to navigation and search bar. By using Rounded Rectangle Tool (U) with radius 2 make new shape, place it like I did.

Now, rasterize your shape layer. To rasterize this layer click on it, go to Layer -> Rasterize -> Layer. Add styles like for header.

Now, copy this layer 5-6 times, depends how much links you’d have, add some text and also, you can add some little shapes to it. Here’s how I did this.

At the end of your buttons add another shape like buttons but make it a bit longer (Transform tool (T)) and another one, smaller. This will be as your search box.

4. Allright, now make 2 smaller boxes. Use Rectangle Marquee Tool (M) , set Smooth to 2 (Select -> Modify -> Smooth) before you make a selection, width 253 height 60. Add layer style like in header and navigation.

You got it? Now, the same way you made these two boxes in step 4. you should make the other boxes. I set them up like this.

Add some titles to these boxes, text and also some icons…

And, at the end add some brushes to these boxes and background to spice a little up your layout!

Now, you got the idea, basics. Go, design layouts,websites. Use your imagination and only sky is your limit!

If you are passionate about web layouts and design why not get an online graphic design degree! With tons of online degree programs available you can find the learning experience that works for you! Online universities will fit into any education schedule!

In the last two weeks I’ve been asked to share my secrets to success. Both requests are for events I’m attending and/or doing a presentation. While there are many things that contribute to my success, the #1 thing is this…

My #1 secret is that I invest in working with mentors and coaches. There’s nothing like spending time with someone who has been there, done that. Not only do I want their support and insights, but I want to fast-track my own business and personal growth and development. I’ve invested a lot of money on coaches and every penny has been worth it. Usually I realize there is something missing in my business or something I need to do better.

Then I match it with the person who is expert in that area. I’ll often start by getting to know a person I’m interested in learning from. I’ll follow them, subscribe to their ezine, buy a starter product to see their style and content. I watch and listen to what others are saying. Then, generally after meeting the mentor/coach in person, I’ll know whether or not we’re a good fit. I’ve worked with a lot of exceptional people and each has contributed to an element of my success. If you want to grow, you need to invest in mentoring/coaching. Period.

For the last 9 months I’ve been working with Terri Levine. I had the good fortune to meet Terri in person at a mastermind meeting after having followed and known her for at least 9 years. I was at a point in my business where I was doing pretty well and I knew I needed to take it up a few notches. Terri has an amazing knack for cutting right to the core of the issue and then offering valuable solutions and ideas that create new opportunities and more revenue. She’s tough and loving and doesn’t shy away from giving me a kick in the butt when I need it.

Terri’s in Los Angeles this weekend pr27esenting a two-day workshop on Entrepreneurial Bootstrapping. I know I’ll soak up a lot of great content and be inspired and mentored to continuing achieving great things.

What’s your secret to success?

Okay there are 2 types of bullying im going address which is minor bullying (once in a blue moon) and severe bullying (everyday).

I get it minor bullying isnt a big deal. This happens to everyone. someone will be mocked, laughed at and beaten once in their life but this only happens to a small amount which really has no major effect on the victims self-esteem and mindset

But severe bullying is a BIG issue. This bullying is where certain victims get harrassed and abused everyday for their appearence, belifes or intrests. This is serious bullying. These can lead to victims losing all their confidence, self-worth and could give them many mental problems (angry, anxeity, paranoia and depression) some even end up killing themselves because they feel like everyone hates the

So why do some people think every type of bullying is no big deal when it has destroyed peoples minds, ended lives and destroyed families. There has always been bullies, this is just the first generation to whine about it. In the past we took care of our own problems. It’s good training for becoming a responsible adult to solve your own problems. And yes, to the other poster, martial arts is a good answer. I’m a 5th degree black belt in Kung Fu and have instructed many. The first step in the arts or in any other method is to defend yourself in the same way you’re attacked. verbal for verbal—physical for physical. What are we raising here….a generation of incapable whiners??? I fear for their future.