Royal Caribbean Cruisers -- How Are Things Where You Are? (was "Routine" ​ 😁 ​day in lockdown... how was yours?)

[FromSea2ShiningSea]

Wish I could say that Carpenters Legacy was fantastic fantastic.  It was just okay to me.  The show was a Re-Creation of the 1976 U.K. Tour.  Have you ever heard of this tour, @grapau27?  To me, they wasted a lot of time doing other things than singing their songs.  From what I could see, I think some people in the audience were bored, too.  And when they did finally sang their songs, we all cheered.  But then they only sang medleys to them.  Karen Carpenter had the purest of voices that I don’t think anyone can come close to replicating.  Being at this concert made me miss her that much more.

 

Afterwards, we went to watch the Fountains of Bellagio.  That was fantastic.  The shows are every 15 minutes after 8:00 PM.  We stayed at the fountain for 3 hours because I wanted to watch the very last show at 11:55 PM, for one of my favorite songs- Star Spangled Banner.  I hope you like it.

 

 

 

 

I may need to enlist Bob or John for their help again, please, in converting it to another format so all can view it.  Thank you so much, @bobmacliberty  @Ozark_Kid

 

 

[Bailey & Sophie]

On 6/1/2023 at 10:02 AM, aussielozzie18 said:

And my final installation viewing was on the roof of the Maritime Museum & projected on HMAS Vampire which is moored at the museum.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You won’t be surprised to learn that this year’s theme is Vivid Sydney, Naturally.  Mother Nature.

 

Still got theRoyal Botanic Gardens to see & considering seeing the installations at Taronga Zoo, which I’ve never seen before.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Your waterfront areas have the most wonderful artistic displays! I love the diversity.

[Bailey & Sophie]

14 hours ago, Husky1987 said:

So, we had an eventful May.  Last weekend of April, we had a house fire.  Freak spark accident into an Arborvitae plant (pro tip: cut the torches-waiting-to-happen down if they're next to your house, like I always wanted to do but never got around to LOL).  Thankfully, the fire went up through the roof and not down.  Everybody....wife, dog, cat, chickens, were all okay.  Not a lot of fire damage to the house itself (in fact, you can't really tell there was a fire inside the house other than the smoke smell), but lots of smoke and water (fire department did an amazing job).

 

 

Looking at 6-8 months for reconstruction.  From the outside, 95% of the house looks normal.  I'm sure they'll have to gut the inside down to the studs due to the smoke and fire.  In the meantime, we were lucky to find a rental house in our neighborhood just a couple blocks away, so we are super close for the duration (depending on the wonderful county permitting/inspection process, may be there up to 12 months).  Easy enough to feed the chickens and keep an eye on things during reconstruction. 

 

Didn't lose anything sentimental.  Insurance company thus far has been great (even, dare I say, overly generous in their valuing of certain items).  Anything we lost....stuff is just stuff anyway. 

 

The only cruise-related casualty is a 16 day we had planned in October.  We really don't want to be away for 2-1/2 weeks so we're cutting it back to a week in October.  Which is fine, since we'll be on our favorite ship, the Adventure.

 

Which is appropriate, since life is an adventure, right?  

 

In the meantime, here's Stevie and her best friend Tucker, all tired out from playing.  We stayed with our next door neighbors for about three weeks while the whole rental deal was being hashed out.  They were wonderful, told us to stay as long as we needed to.  Stevie played with Tucker all day long, every day, and thought us burning the house down was the best thing we've ever done. 

 

 

So sorry about the fire. So glad you are OK! Hope the rebuild goes quickly.

[Keksie]

8 hours ago, aussielozzie18 said:

Hate to ask this because I love turtles - but do many get hit by cars?  
 

We have kangaroo warning road signs in area (for wallabies) so wondering why there are not turtle signs.  I assume there is a reason they are not required.

In the spring there are a lot of turtles and tortoises that get hit by cars.  Sometimes it is just a glancing blow and the refuge can patch them up.  If someone brings them in.  Most of the time we get dog attacks, string trimmer accidents and the occasional paint job.  There is a respiratory illness that turtles get and we get several of those each year.  

[bobmacliberty]

5 hours ago, FromSea2ShiningSea said:

I may need to enlist Bob or John for their help again, please, in converting it to another format so all can view it.  Thank you so much, @bobmacliberty  @Ozark_Kid

 

Here you go.  

 

I love the Bellagio fountain.   I was always partial to the Sinatra songs.  The choreography for them seemed to fit perfectly.  I've also seen the similar fountain in Dubai at the base of the Burj Khalifa that's probably 50% bigger (sorry Texas, but everything's bigger in Dubai).  That was very impressive to watch.  

 

[Momof3gurlz]

18 hours ago, h20skibum said:

He has been playing for three years, I think. I may have posted this before, but he took first place last year in a Junior Open for his age group.  His score was even lower than the next two age groups above him.  

 

 

 

12 hours ago, h20skibum said:

Just back from our grandson’s baseball game.  He pitched the first three innings, and had an all around great game.  They kept their undefeated season going.   
 

Now to relax with an adult beverage. 
 

oh, and granddaughter had one of her typical, off the wall explanations for everything in the picture.  No hidden meanings for her upside down pineapple. 

Kudos to your son! Seems we have another multi-sport athlete in the thread family, like @A&L_Ont’s Owen.  
 

@Husky1987 sorry to read about the fire at your home but thankful it wasn’t worse.  

[bobmacliberty]

Photoshop recently came out with a (scary) new feature called generative fill.  You draw a circle around an area of a photo and it will delete whatever is in the circle and generate a replacement based on what's around that area.  Some phones do this already but the AI that Adobe uses in impressive in terms of the detail in what gets inserted as a replacement.  Maybe more impressively, you can provide a few words and Photoshop will put whatever you describe into your photo.  I played around with some photos from our trip last fall.  

 

Here's a picture of the Seattle Great Wheel

 

Let's say that I don't want the Ferris Wheel in the picture.  Notice how Photoshop rebuilds the building where the wheel was.

 

Now let's add a cruise ship.

 

Here's a shot of the Flowrider

 

Let's add a dog surfing.

 

Here's the Sky Glider Gondola at Icy Strait Point.

 

Since they are prevalent in that area, let's add a bear.

 

Finally, here's the view from Coastal Kitchen at dinner one night.

 

Let's add a breaching whale.

 

This feature is still in beta, and the blending of something new into an existing photo isn't always great (e.g. the whale doesn't look very natural).  What they already do however with new shadows matching a photo's lighting (dog and surfboard), and with some foreground elements sitting on top of the newly inserted element (grass in front of bear) is both impressive and scary. Photoshop actually gives you 3 versions to look at and if you don't like any of those 3, hit the generate button again and it will give you 3 new ones.  Rince and repeat until you find something that you like.  This is only going to get better to the point where almost anyone will be able to modify a photo and it will be VERY difficult to tell.

[Sea Dog]

21 minutes ago, bobmacliberty said:

Photoshop recently came out with a (scary) new feature called generative fill.  You draw a circle around an area of a photo and it will delete whatever is in the circle and generate a replacement based on what's around that area.  Some phones do this already but the AI that Adobe uses in impressive in terms of the detail in what gets inserted as a replacement.  Maybe more impressively, you can provide a few words and Photoshop will put whatever you describe into your photo.  I played around with some photos from our trip last fall.  

 

Here's a picture of the Seattle Great Wheel

 

Let's say that I don't want the Ferris Wheel in the picture.  Notice how Photoshop rebuilds the building where the wheel was.

 

Now let's add a cruise ship.

 

Here's a shot of the Flowrider

 

Let's add a dog surfing.

 

Here's the Sky Glider Gondola at Icy Strait Point.

 

Since they are prevalent in that area, let's add a bear.

 

Finally, here's the view from Coastal Kitchen at dinner one night.

 

Let's add a breaching whale.

 

This feature is still in beta, and the blending of something new into an existing photo isn't always great (e.g. the whale doesn't look very natural).  What they already do however with new shadows matching a photo's lighting (dog and surfboard), and with some foreground elements sitting on top of the newly inserted element (grass in front of bear) is both impressive and scary. Photoshop actually gives you 3 versions to look at and if you don't like any of those 3, hit the generate button again and it will give you 3 new ones.  Rince and repeat until you find something that you like.  This is only going to get better to the point where almost anyone will be able to modify a photo and it will be VERY difficult to tell.

What version of Photoshop is this? I have the creative cloud, can I download the beta version there? Looks cool.

[bobmacliberty]

22 minutes ago, Sea Dog said:

What version of Photoshop is this? I have the creative cloud, can I download the beta version there? Looks cool.

 

Yes.  Open up your Creative Cloud desktop app and click on the Beta apps category on the left.  You'll see Photoshop (Beta) listed.  Click Install (I've already installed so mine says Open).  My understanding is that any beta apps that you install will be completely separate from the production version, so you can add/delete at will without impacting anything. 

 

EDIT: You might need to update your production version of PS to the current version to be able to install the beta version.

 

EDIT2: I haven't installed the beta version version of Premiere Pro but it's supposedly getting the Firefly AI technology also so that you can do similar things to a video. 

 

 

Lots of YouTube videos on this feature.  Here's one of the intro videos from Adobe:

 

Edited June 3, 2023 by bobmacliberty

[Sea Dog]

5 minutes ago, bobmacliberty said:

 

Yes.  Open up your Creative Cloud desktop app and click on the Beta apps category on the left.  You'll see Photoshop (Beta) listed.  Click Install (I've already installed so mine says Open).  My understanding is that any beta apps that you install will be completely separate from the production version, so you can add/delete at will without impacting anything. 

 

EDIT: You might need to update your production version of PS to the current version to be able to install the beta version.

 

EDIT2: I haven't installed the beta version version of Premiere Pro but it's supposedly getting the Firefly AI technology also so that you can do similar things to a video. 

 

 

Lots of YouTube videos on this feature.  Here's one of the intro videos from Adobe:

 

Thanks Bob! I’m excited to try this out

[bobmacliberty]

12 minutes ago, Sea Dog said:

Thanks Bob! I’m excited to try this out

 

It would be very interesting to see what you can do with your video skills once Adobe Firefly AI is in Premiere.

[Sea Dog]

11 minutes ago, bobmacliberty said:

 

It would be very interesting to see what you can do with your video skills once Adobe Firefly AI is in Premiere.

I think you can do some pretty creative art with it. I also am scared what some people might create. It’s going to hard now to tell what’s real and not. Potential for abuse is great

[dani negreanu]

1 hour ago, bobmacliberty said:

Photoshop recently came out with a (scary) new feature called generative fill.

 

45 minutes ago, Sea Dog said:

What version of Photoshop is this? 

 

Since DH is also "dabbling" in photoshops, I very enthusiastically showed him the new feature. He mumbled some unintelligible words under his [non-existing] moustache... and showed me several photoshopped pics of his... Turns out he managed to buy some time ago such an app. 

 

@bobmacliberty Bob, DH kindly ask you if you can show him the "process" of photoshopping 2 pics with minimal difference & contrast between them, to see how much better this "Beta" is working, thanks.

 

Peggy cove lighthouse (also for OB @Ocean Boy 😉)

 

 

 

 

[Ozark_Kid]

1 hour ago, bobmacliberty said:

Photoshop recently came out with a (scary) new feature called generative fill.  You draw a circle around an area of a photo and it will delete whatever is in the circle and generate a replacement based on what's around that area.  Some phones do this already but the AI that Adobe uses in impressive in terms of the detail in what gets inserted as a replacement.  Maybe more impressively, you can provide a few words and Photoshop will put whatever you describe into your photo.  I played around with some photos from our trip last fall.  

 

Here's a picture of the Seattle Great Wheel

 

Let's say that I don't want the Ferris Wheel in the picture.  Notice how Photoshop rebuilds the building where the wheel was.

 

Now let's add a cruise ship.

 

Here's a shot of the Flowrider

 

Let's add a dog surfing.

 

Here's the Sky Glider Gondola at Icy Strait Point.

 

Since they are prevalent in that area, let's add a bear.

 

Finally, here's the view from Coastal Kitchen at dinner one night.

 

Let's add a breaching whale.

 

This feature is still in beta, and the blending of something new into an existing photo isn't always great (e.g. the whale doesn't look very natural).  What they already do however with new shadows matching a photo's lighting (dog and surfboard), and with some foreground elements sitting on top of the newly inserted element (grass in front of bear) is both impressive and scary. Photoshop actually gives you 3 versions to look at and if you don't like any of those 3, hit the generate button again and it will give you 3 new ones.  Rince and repeat until you find something that you like.  This is only going to get better to the point where almost anyone will be able to modify a photo and it will be VERY difficult to tell.

So are you saying that this is not Firefly but a beta of the actual Photoshop program?  

I just watched the video and now understand that they have worked Firefly into the Photoshop program.   That is nice!  I wonder if he would of added the panoramic with the sun first that the shadow in the water would of been on the correct side.

Edited June 3, 2023 by Ozark_Kid
Watched the video

[jmh2006]

20 hours ago, Husky1987 said:

 

Things aren't finalized yet, but that's the sailing we're looking at and have decided to move to....that's great!  If it all comes together I'll definitely let you know and we'll have plenty of time at the Schooner Bar to share drinks and Linda and I can share some UMKC war stories! 

DH and I are also on this cruise!!  Yay!

[Sea Dog]

1 hour ago, bobmacliberty said:

 

It would be very interesting to see what you can do with your video skills once Adobe Firefly AI is in Premiere.

 

Yes that will be interesting. In the meantime how about a new backyard for us. From this.

 

 

To this.

 

 

 

[Luckynana]

9 hours ago, FromSea2ShiningSea said:

Wish I could say that Carpenters Legacy was fantastic fantastic.  It was just okay to me.  The show was a Re-Creation of the 1976 U.K. Tour.  Have you ever heard of this tour, @grapau27?  To me, they wasted a lot of time doing other things than singing their songs.  From what I could see, I think some people in the audience were bored, too.  And when they did finally sang their songs, we all cheered.  But then they only sang medleys to them.  Karen Carpenter had the purest of voices that I don’t think anyone can come close to replicating.  Being at this concert made me miss her that much more.

 

Afterwards, we went to watch the Fountains of Bellagio.  That was fantastic.  The shows are every 15 minutes after 8:00 PM.  We stayed at the fountain for 3 hours because I wanted to watch the very last show at 11:55 PM, for one of my favorite songs- Star Spangled Banner.  I hope you like it.

 

 

 

 

I may need to enlist Bob or John for their help again, please, in converting it to another format so all can view it.  Thank you so much, @bobmacliberty  @Ozark_Kid

 

FullSizeRender.MOV 240.51 MB · 6 downloads  

 

Thank you, Helen, and thank you, Bob @bobmacliberty for converting the format so I could watch and hear it.   Goose bumps all over while enjoying the Star Spangled Banner.  God Bless America!!🇺🇸

[bobmacliberty]

37 minutes ago, dani negreanu said:

 

@bobmacliberty Bob, DH kindly ask you if you can show him the "process" of photoshopping 2 pics with minimal difference & contrast between them, to see how much better this "Beta" is working, thanks.

 

Dani - I'm not an expert in this new technology, but I don't believe that it is used to blend 2 separate photos into one, like removing a person from one background and placing them into another, or blending a candle flame onto the top of a lighthouse.   I think, but am not sure, that this is what your DH is asking. Blending 2 photos is difficult because you need to match lighting, color, shadows, etc. or it doesn't look natural.  

 

Rather, this new Photoshop feature puts an AI generated image into another existing image, or adds AI generated details where none existed previously.  I would not be surprised however if Adobe is actively working on an AI powered ability to blend 2 photos together in Photoshop.  Photoshop over the years has added capabilities to their core program that were previously addressed by other apps that worked with Photoshop, essentially making these other apps no longer useful.  "AI blending" would seem like a natural next step for them.

[Luckynana]

3 hours ago, Keksie said:

In the spring there are a lot of turtles and tortoises that get hit by cars.  Sometimes it is just a glancing blow and the refuge can patch them up.  If someone brings them in.  Most of the time we get dog attacks, string trimmer accidents and the occasional paint job.  There is a respiratory illness that turtles get and we get several of those each year.  

I may have mentioned this the other day that our daughter has two big turtles in big separate tanks.  She belongs to a group (FB?) where everyone shares tips, etc.  I sent a picture of several turtles in a pond, with some of them on top of each other, where I said how cute this was.  She informed me that it may look cute, but a turtle or two were being aggressive in the photo that I sent.

[Sea Dog]

25 minutes ago, jmh2006 said:

DH and I are also on this cruise!!  Yay!

Wow that’s great. It’s kinda like Bella 1A.

Join us at the Soggy Dollar Bar when in Tortola on Royal’s excursion “Escape to Jost Van Dyke.”

[bobmacliberty]

37 minutes ago, Ozark_Kid said:

So are you saying that this is not Firefly but a beta of the actual Photoshop program?  

 

Correct.  Firefly is Adobe's "creative generative AI engine".  This is the Firefly engine embedded in a new Photoshop beta. 

 

15 minutes ago, Sea Dog said:

 

Yes that will be interesting. In the meantime how about a new backyard for us. From this.

 

 

To this.

 

 

 

 

That didn't take long.  You learn quickly.  Nice new backyard!

[h20skibum]

2 hours ago, Momof3gurlz said:

Kudos to your son! Seems we have another multi-sport athlete in the thread family, like @A&L_Ont’s Owen.  

Yes, my grandson in PA seems to be very good at his favorite sports of football, baseball and golf.  
 

Now my other grandson in California, has shown zero interest in any sports, but that is ok.  Kids should be free to discover and pursue their talents.  His dad, who was an excellent golfer before his back surgery, tried to get him interested in golf, but he didn’t like it.  He has expressed an interest in martial arts, and may pursue that. 

[lenquixote66]

TSOTD is Aruba .We have been there several times and each time I bought a tee shirt.

[FromSea2ShiningSea]

2 hours ago, bobmacliberty said:

Photoshop recently came out with a (scary) new feature called generative fill.  You draw a circle around an area of a photo and it will delete whatever is in the circle and generate a replacement based on what's around that area.  Some phones do this already but the AI that Adobe uses in impressive in terms of the detail in what gets inserted as a replacement.  Maybe more impressively, you can provide a few words and Photoshop will put whatever you describe into your photo.  I played around with some photos from our trip last fall.                                                                                           

 

1 hour ago, Sea Dog said:

I think you can do some pretty creative art with it. I also am scared what some people might create. It’s going to hard now to tell what’s real and not. Potential for abuse is great

 

This is really scary to me.  In the wrong hands and with bad intentions, this can create a lot of trouble.  Just recently with the AI-generated photo of a fire from an explosion at the US Pentagon.  It caused a lot of fear, confusion and panic.  This technology will get more and more sophisticated as time goes on.  Can’t imagine what the bad guys will do.  It worries me.

 

@Husky1987 Sorry about your house fire.  I’m glad everyone was safe and not hurt.  Will miss you on the Panama Canal cruise in October, as well as @Jimbo.  Was looking forward to meeting you guys.

[Sea Dog]

4 minutes ago, FromSea2ShiningSea said:

 

 

This is really scary to me.  In the wrong hands and with bad intentions, this can create a lot of trouble.  Just recently with the AI-generated photo of a fire from an explosion at the US Pentagon.  It caused a lot of fear, confusion and panic.  This technology will get more and more sophisticated as time goes on.  Can’t imagine what the bad guys will do.  It worries me.

 

 

Yes it worries me too. Even the execs who created it are issuing a warning. There is a line between artistic expression and outright fraud.