MikeBrum.com

Before my transition to my Mac, I used ID3 Renamer on Windows. It’s a great application and does everything that I need it to do – which is full renaming of mp3 files along with full id3 tag handling. One-stop shopping at its best. And it’s free.
Unfortunately, there isn’t an OS X version and running [...]

Over the past few days, I’ve done a bunch of work to redesign the site. I obviously rethemed WordPress, but also made a number of modifications to that theme and changed how the Google Ads are distributed and displayed.
I had to make a few changes to various plugins to get them working properly, but I [...]

My site was offline for a few hours. The hosting company had some problems that took them a while to fix. Not sure of the details. I just know that when I woke up I didn’t have access to email or any of my domains. Not fun. Only about two months ago there was an [...]

I was kinda bored tonight so I got a Centos box up and running.
This is going to perform a few important tasks that I didn’t previously have:

computer redundancy – since my last host died, I only have my laptop (macbook pro). Given how much of a PITA it is to repair hardware issues on a [...]

My NAS arrived today and after some poor documentation and frustration, it’s set up and running fine. I’m currently copying over about 400G to it — which is taking quite a while. I’m sure it’ll be running well past the time I head to bed.
That aside, I’m definitely seeing a lot of junk that I [...]

Some people had questions about the Singh-Ray Vari-ND Filter and I wanted to put together a quick set of images for those interested.
First, how the test was done:
All images were shot on a 5D mark II with the 35mm f1.4 lens. I have a 72mm-77mm step-up ring to attach the vari-nd to the lens. Since [...]

Back from Portland. Had a great time. Took a bunch of photos that need to get processed.
Got a body suit on Wednesday night from Ross Carlson at Living Art Tattoo where I was hanging out.
I’m absolutely loving it!

I saw The Watchmen today.
I am a big fan of the comics and expected a lot. Naturally, my expectations weren’t 100% met – but when do these sorts of adaptions truly deliver 100%? Little things aside, I was thoroughly pleased.
First, the most unexpected aspect that I was happy with was the soundtrack. It seemed to [...]

I’ve decided that I want to learn a “speed solving” algorithm for the Rubik’s Cube.
I already know a pretty easy-to-memorize algorithm that takes about a minute to two minutes to solve pending how much work needs to be done at each “step”. For whatever reason, I enjoy solving it – even if it’s very predictable [...]

When not working, I’ve been spending a lot of time building lego sets and tooling around with a tank concept.
The inspiration comes from this awesome tank bot created by Brian Davis:

I’ve been able to build the basic shooting mechanism and have prototyped a track as well. I need some additional parts before I can build [...]