_GOTOBOTTOM
Modeling in General: Advice on...
Need some general advice? Place it here.
Hosted by Jim Starkweather
Down loading modeling references
Wolf-Leader
Visit this Community
New Hampshire, United States
Member Since: June 06, 2002
entire network: 1,225 Posts
KitMaker Network: 463 Posts
Posted: Friday, October 28, 2011 - 05:08 PM UTC
Ok, I am asking all of you for your advice on this subject.There is so much references on the subject of model building that you can go crazy and hours just being online.Also, by doing this you could have endless CD/DVD's at your disposal.
My question is does one need to down load photos and or articles for their modeling libruary or would it be easier to just grab the computer to pull it up on line when needed? The reason I ask is that now that we are in the high tech age where we can pull up anything who really needs books or how to videos?
jon_a_its
Visit this Community
England - East Midlands, United Kingdom
Member Since: April 29, 2004
entire network: 1,336 Posts
KitMaker Network: 170 Posts
Posted: Friday, October 28, 2011 - 10:00 PM UTC
depends how you like to work
Although others might say it seems like it, I'm not connected 24/7, & prefer to save pics & refs as I find them, then sort them into project folders, & print any pics as I want them for a build.
Browsing the folders also serves as inspiration.

Aside from that, I use 3 different pcs' so my bookmarks will be guaranteed to be on 'the other one'
Wolf-Leader
Visit this Community
New Hampshire, United States
Member Since: June 06, 2002
entire network: 1,225 Posts
KitMaker Network: 463 Posts
Posted: Friday, October 28, 2011 - 10:57 PM UTC
hey thanks for the response.Ya I think your right, it just seems like,am I ever going to build a model or diorama for all these photos?,maybe not who knows?
AJLaFleche
Visit this Community
Massachusetts, United States
Member Since: May 05, 2002
entire network: 8,074 Posts
KitMaker Network: 2,574 Posts
Posted: Saturday, October 29, 2011 - 02:37 AM UTC
It's probably good to save them, even if you're using them soon. Any site can be shut down on a moment's notice and there go your references. The images could be pulled. A $20 thumb drive will give you 16 gigs of storage, enough for almost 16000 1mb images. If you dropped a hundred bucks on a portable hard drive, you'd be pushing a terabite of storage, close to a billion images, if my math serves me well. Filling it, however, would severely cut into your modelling time.
Grumpyoldman
Staff MemberConsigliere
KITMAKER NETWORK
Visit this Community
Florida, United States
Member Since: October 17, 2003
entire network: 15,338 Posts
KitMaker Network: 5,072 Posts
Posted: Saturday, October 29, 2011 - 03:41 AM UTC
I usually download what I'm interested in, sort and file them, then burn to a CD or DVD. As Al stated just because a site is up today, doesn't mean it will be there next week.
slodder
Visit this Community
North Carolina, United States
Member Since: February 22, 2002
entire network: 11,718 Posts
KitMaker Network: 2,584 Posts
Posted: Saturday, October 29, 2011 - 10:18 AM UTC
I used to download everything and found myself with so much that it was hard to remember what I had. Many times it's easie to do a quick on line seach and find it 'again' than to look through all the CDs/DVDs

So - my personal method is- if it's not on paper (books) I don't save it, I google it.
Magpie
Visit this Community
Queensland, Australia
Member Since: July 10, 2011
entire network: 653 Posts
KitMaker Network: 140 Posts
Posted: Saturday, October 29, 2011 - 01:39 PM UTC

Quoted Text

The reason I ask is that now that we are in the high tech age where we can pull up anything who really needs books or how to videos?


Call me old school, but nothing matches a book for the level of engagement, the feel and the authority of a printed work. It will never be matched by the 'net.

Of course I order my books off the 'net !
thegirl
Visit this Community
Alberta, Canada
Member Since: January 19, 2008
entire network: 6,743 Posts
KitMaker Network: 456 Posts
Posted: Saturday, October 29, 2011 - 01:45 PM UTC
I do a fair bit of down loading when it comes to info that I don't have to fill in gaps or if I have a very keen interest in the subject . Every month the info I down loaded gets transfered over on to disco and I keep a not book on what I have . Like the guy's have said you never know when the site will be gone or the info removed . Having the info on disco I can access the info on any laptop in the house . Nothing worse then having having your computer crash and losing all your info . USB sticks work well too , but I seem to lose them quite easily and frequently .


Terri
Jagdtiger46
Visit this Community
Missouri, United States
Member Since: October 26, 2011
entire network: 291 Posts
KitMaker Network: 7 Posts
Posted: Wednesday, November 02, 2011 - 07:55 AM UTC

Quoted Text

I do a fair bit of down loading when it comes to info that I don't have to fill in gaps or if I have a very keen interest in the subject . Every month the info I down loaded gets transfered over on to disco and I keep a not book on what I have . Like the guy's have said you never know when the site will be gone or the info removed . Having the info on disco I can access the info on any laptop in the house . Nothing worse then having having your computer crash and losing all your info . USB sticks work well too , but I seem to lose them quite easily and frequently .


Terri

I'm with Terri as far as concept is concerned, however I never seem to get around to sorting all that data in a manner that allows easy access and organization, rendering the whole mess unusable for all practical purposes. Perhaps I should have my head looked at?
fireman110
Visit this Community
Ontario, Canada
Member Since: December 27, 2005
entire network: 26 Posts
KitMaker Network: 14 Posts
Posted: Wednesday, November 02, 2011 - 08:34 AM UTC
Hey guys
I use an external hard drive with 1gb of space which is divided up. The book section has 5000 files in it, with thousands of pictures in other files. I also back it up on a computer in my modelling room, very handy for refrence at the work bench. I havent backed stuff up on to disks with the possibility of them being damaged and i have heard of them the disk deterioting.
There is still nothing like searching my physical libary of hundreds of armour books though
Spiderfrommars
Visit this Community
Milano, Italy
Member Since: July 13, 2010
entire network: 3,845 Posts
KitMaker Network: 209 Posts
Posted: Wednesday, November 02, 2011 - 09:36 AM UTC
I have more or less 17 GB of reference pics, half of them are about Russian tanks

As Dave told, I prefere downloading all the references because unfortunately sites could deseaper For exemple on Tankmaster site (on of my fav) recently ALL the pics have been removed . I regret I didn't download all the pics which I needed

Anyway, usually I print few pics in low res when I work. Usually I watch the reference pics on my 21" screen and that could be enough when I'm focused on the details

Anyway, I think I'll buy soon a 1T external drive to keep my references in a safer way

Cheers
Magpie
Visit this Community
Queensland, Australia
Member Since: July 10, 2011
entire network: 653 Posts
KitMaker Network: 140 Posts
Posted: Thursday, November 03, 2011 - 01:28 AM UTC

Quoted Text

I should have my head looked at?


No we are normal, these guys have OCD
grayghost666
#021
Member Since: August 02, 2007
entire network: 2,458 Posts
KitMaker Network: 163 Posts
Posted: Thursday, November 03, 2011 - 06:13 PM UTC
Hello Jody.
Books are the best for references, But I am a bit on the book side as I have over 80,000 Reference books in my Library. I also have 10,000+ Reference DVDs in my Library along with all of the FM Manuals.
I also google a topic for a fast answer if I cannot get to my Library and look through all the books and such for what I need (too lazy some times).
I would rather look at a book for the answer and maybe get an idea for a paint job, a diorama or something else that I would not have thought of if I did not pick up that book looking for something else.

Just my 2 cents,
Cheers,
Bruce
drabslab
Visit this Community
European Union
Member Since: September 28, 2004
entire network: 2,186 Posts
KitMaker Network: 263 Posts
Posted: Friday, November 04, 2011 - 01:18 AM UTC
Now look how old fashioned we modellers are

Saying this I have to admit that I tend to download as well, and this despite that I have been working in IT related research projects for many years and are still involved in web based It developments.

Believe me, downloading will soon be as outdated as printing (instead of keeping an electronic copy) and as impossible as taking a backup of the internet.

Technology is rapidly evolving towards everybody being on-line 24 hours a day 365 days a year.

Very soon, we will not have a pc anymore (in the way such thing is understood today) but we will have private spaces on the internet cloud where we store our documents, we will not have word and excel anymore on our pc, but we will have subscriptions (or free tools) on the internet.

Data, pictures, and media files will be offered by libraries or huge databases.

Google, Microsoft, facebook, Twitter... are all working towards advanced "ecosystems" offering their clients webspace (e.g. Microsoft skydrive gives you 25Gb on-line dataspace for free), email, connections to friends, mobile devices, pc's...

Sites like Aeroscale will disappear... or learn how to combine (make a mash-up) of things like wikipedia, facebook, twitter... for a specialised audience like airplane model makers.

A grim future??? NO, instead, very exciting!!!

but also a huge challenge for site owners, as well as users

we all got an awfull lot to learn
Magpie
Visit this Community
Queensland, Australia
Member Since: July 10, 2011
entire network: 653 Posts
KitMaker Network: 140 Posts
Posted: Friday, November 04, 2011 - 01:24 AM UTC
Why would a specific site like Kit Maker and all its children disappear and become part of a social networking site?

Facebook and Twitter to my mind are far removed from a repository of subject specific information and discussion.
grayghost666
#021
Member Since: August 02, 2007
entire network: 2,458 Posts
KitMaker Network: 163 Posts
Posted: Friday, November 04, 2011 - 02:58 AM UTC
Hello Drabslab,
It may go the way you see it in the future, But for me I will stick with books as long as I can Buy them. I have all of the Jane's from the early 1900's to present and will keep buying them as long as they print them along with anyother research books that I find interesting.
As for the Cloud for photo's and such, It maybe out there But it is not for me.

I love to thumb thorugh a new book, I do not think you can do that with your cloud.
Cheers,
Bruce
mmeier
Visit this Community
Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany
Member Since: October 22, 2008
entire network: 1,280 Posts
KitMaker Network: 213 Posts
Posted: Friday, November 04, 2011 - 07:48 AM UTC
The latest developments in computers go an interesting direction.

Tablets (both the butterfinger operated toy tablets and the stylus operated tablet pc) are in a price range where decent systems are affordable for everyone. And with less than a kilogram in weight they can be everywhere, replacing quite a bit of printed material and giving fast access to photos. And with batteries reaching 4-10h between charging they easily last a typical session

Smartphones are mobile computers in themselfs. And with 4-6'' screens they are useable for quick previews. Not to mention that mating one with a tablet means "instant Internet"

Storage has become extremly cheap. A 64GIGAByte SD-Card costs about as much as a box of ten 720KILOBYTE floppy disks back in the late 80s and is faster and more rugged. A two TERRAByte NAS (more memory than my university had back in the early 1990s) is less than 200€

Wireless LAN has made the computer extremly portable. The latest model delivers data at 5-30 times the speed of 1990s era Ethernet. No longer is the computer tied to a specific place by cables

SSD replacing spinning metal hard drives makes computers extremly rugged. A modern tablet PC can be handled like a sturdy book, something I would not dare with a similar priced notebook of the mid-2000s(1)

In germany the "flatrate" is the common model of internet access. 24/7 for less than 50€/month including telefon and IPTV (and a 50/5 MBit access ) at least in the bigger cities. So "always on" is doable. And mobile data flatrates for mobile phones are similar priced and include "free access to your providers WLAN hotspots" (And the Big-T has a LOT of those)


So I find myself keeping more and more stuff on the computer. Either directly or more recently on the NAS (that allows Web-Access) and having a tablet around (Owning two actually). Now all that is needed is a nice indexing program and here we go. In the meantime I copy the "needed pictures" on the SD card in my main tablet and keep that at the workbench for quick indexing. Being the size of a "Spielberger" it does not take much space (less than a notebook) and with Dragon Natural Speaking I do not have to touch it to change pictures.


What I do NOT do is rely on a page "still being there" or a picture "still being visible" when I need it. With the picture hosters limiting bandwidth it may be "wait till next month" for that critical picture. So I download pictures and documents I find useful, back them up occasionally on a DVD and can be resonably sure "they are there".

The Cloud (just the latest hype-word in the bs bingo) sounds nice but as long as Bruno and his Bagger are still out there ripping up my internet cable(2) or a UPS van running down the DSLAM access box(3) having important stuff at home is still a bit safer. Just recently (relocation) I was on "restricted net access" (Mobile/UMTS only) for three weeks - it was horrible!





(1) Some top tier notebooks COULD do that even with HDD. But that is another price range even today

(2) Don't laugh, that happened TRICE in a year to me once

(3) No more internet for 50 homes. Wife! Bring me my torch and my pitchfork!
drabslab
Visit this Community
European Union
Member Since: September 28, 2004
entire network: 2,186 Posts
KitMaker Network: 263 Posts
Posted: Monday, November 07, 2011 - 01:40 AM UTC

Quoted Text

Why would a specific site like Kit Maker and all its children disappear


wow, I really love aeroscale and I don't want it to dissapear!

That does not mean that I don't see a danger when looking at evolution of the internet. Classically developed sites like kitmaker can NOT (by lack of resources) remain current (and continue to look attractive) from a technical point of view.

One example: Microsoft skydrive offers 25 GB of on-line storage space for free. and yuo can divide this space in folders and each folder you can share with another group of people. And the rest of microsot live gives you a messenger system, email .....


Quoted Text

and become part of a social networking site?. Facebook and Twitter to my mind are far removed from a repository of subject specific information and discussion.


That is NOT what i am saying and let's not forget that we talk here about something which is still a few years out.

The reality is that there are a few very big players (google, microsoft...) that are working extremily hard on "ecosystems" of services on the internet; Taking microsoft live as an example, a user can get an useraccount and then synchronise his pc at home with 25Gb of storage on the internet, connect wireless to a tablet, or a mobile phone, read emails, make folders of that 25GB availabel to a specific group of "friends" ...

A small specialised site like aerocale can not compete with these huge developments:
1. because it does not have the resources to develop all those fancy things for a relatively small group of people (facebook has 40 million users, aeroscale 15000?).

2. If I take pictures on an airshow, very interesting for aeroscale modellers, but also for people of the photography club, and friends from the local hobby club, and my girlfriend who wants to know where i am hanging out ( ;-) ) and ... then I want to upload those pictures once and make them availabel to everyone with one click.

So, is this all doom and gloom for aeroscale.

No it ain't, and certainly not when this evolution is recognised and anticipated.

Aeroscale could evolve towards becoming a portal, able to retrieve and put in the correct context (and present in an attractive way) information available on wikipedia, microsoft live, google... and combine this with modellers specific information only available on aeroscale itself like reviews, modelling tips, specialised articles...

and finally, predicting the future is not possible, so all this may turn out completely different at the end ;-)
mmeier
Visit this Community
Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany
Member Since: October 22, 2008
entire network: 1,280 Posts
KitMaker Network: 213 Posts
Posted: Monday, November 07, 2011 - 08:20 AM UTC
Sorry but the MS-Tools, Google Tools, Facebook etc. all fall way short of what a good forum software must and can do.

Discussion threads

FB-style "discussion threads" are VERY hard to follow if they get length. The UI is quite similar to the mailing lists of old - and I HAPPILY left those behind. To be useful for more than "Oh, look at my shiny picture" threads they need to evolve until they look like - Well a current day forum software

Picture storage

Centralized storage is there since half a decade ago. Just add a link where you want the picture to appear. No need to play around with rights management, folders and all. Just use photobucket. If you absolutely want to play around with permissions and all - get a VServer.

A forum/portal today delivers more than simple storage with less hassle

The community is bigger than you thing

Most forums these days do not run on an "Admins heartbreaker" homebrew but on one of the few forum/portal systems that survived. And those have a solid support team that keeps development going.

MS won't deliver more

MS will at best deliver YAPF - Yet Another Portal/Forum. Like Netweaver did and others do. It's likely a well done one but so are those currently on the market. The rest is "admins work" just like today. MS did so with Sharepoint.

The endpoint devices are unimportant as long as they can do HTML/CSS/JScript. I can use this forum just fine from a Fandroid tablet or the iosef pad.

Don't fall for the hype

The Cloud is nothing more than a group of redundant servers and a load balancer. Ooooold stuff, used that even before "da Web" was around. And using it for years commercially with distributed image hosting


Overall classic portal/forum system will stay for a long time since they deliver features that the "Oh Shiny!" world of the iThingy and Social Networks can not deliver due to their need to keep the UI useable by the "less educated" to get the masses.
drabslab
Visit this Community
European Union
Member Since: September 28, 2004
entire network: 2,186 Posts
KitMaker Network: 263 Posts
Posted: Tuesday, November 22, 2011 - 12:58 AM UTC

Quoted Text

Sorry but the MS-Tools, Google Tools, Facebook etc. all fall way short of what a good forum software must and can do.

Discussion threads

FB-style "discussion threads" are VERY hard to follow if they get length. The UI is quite similar to the mailing lists of old - and I HAPPILY left those behind. To be useful for more than "Oh, look at my shiny picture" threads they need to evolve until they look like - Well a current day forum software

Picture storage

Centralized storage is there since half a decade ago. Just add a link where you want the picture to appear. No need to play around with rights management, folders and all. Just use photobucket. If you absolutely want to play around with permissions and all - get a VServer.

A forum/portal today delivers more than simple storage with less hassle

The community is bigger than you thing

Most forums these days do not run on an "Admins heartbreaker" homebrew but on one of the few forum/portal systems that survived. And those have a solid support team that keeps development going.

MS won't deliver more

MS will at best deliver YAPF - Yet Another Portal/Forum. Like Netweaver did and others do. It's likely a well done one but so are those currently on the market. The rest is "admins work" just like today. MS did so with Sharepoint.

The endpoint devices are unimportant as long as they can do HTML/CSS/JScript. I can use this forum just fine from a Fandroid tablet or the iosef pad.

Don't fall for the hype

The Cloud is nothing more than a group of redundant servers and a load balancer. Ooooold stuff, used that even before "da Web" was around. And using it for years commercially with distributed image hosting


Overall classic portal/forum system will stay for a long time since they deliver features that the "Oh Shiny!" world of the iThingy and Social Networks can not deliver due to their need to keep the UI useable by the "less educated" to get the masses.


Very interesting

I hope that in five years time, when all posiible futures have condensed to a single reality, we can come back to this thread and look at our writings again.

kaiyudsai
Visit this Community
Louisiana, United States
Member Since: October 30, 2011
entire network: 11 Posts
KitMaker Network: 4 Posts
Posted: Tuesday, November 29, 2011 - 06:57 AM UTC
If you want some great references go to pirate bay... I downloaded about 40 ebooks the other day.... all of the squadron walkj around series..... and the Russian Fighter books.... just type in the books you are looking for or the aircraft and you will see any ebooks they have pop up... then send the file to your torrent program like bit torrent.......


Memory is so cheap these days... might as well just store up as much data as possible.... You cannoht pu price on good photos.....
captfue
Visit this Community
Texas, United States
Member Since: September 02, 2006
entire network: 785 Posts
KitMaker Network: 210 Posts
Posted: Tuesday, November 29, 2011 - 09:44 AM UTC
Me I'll down load for the project I'm currently on, otherwise I'd spend to much time reaserching and not working. Also being on dial-up internet it takes a long time to get one useable photo.
mmeier
Visit this Community
Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany
Member Since: October 22, 2008
entire network: 1,280 Posts
KitMaker Network: 213 Posts
Posted: Thursday, December 15, 2011 - 08:37 AM UTC

Quoted Text

If you want some great references go to pirate bay... I downloaded about 40 ebooks the other day.... all of the squadron walkj around series..... and the Russian Fighter books.... just type in the books you are looking for or the aircraft and you will see any ebooks they have pop up... then send the file to your torrent program like bit torrent.......


Memory is so cheap these days... might as well just store up as much data as possible.... You cannoht pu price on good photos.....


Na, too boring for me. I go to the next bookshop and when no one is looking I stuff the book I need under my coat and walk out. More thrill in stealing physical goods.

Telling others to rip of the publisher is not only a sign of low character but ultimately self-defeating when the publishers stop working due to lack of customers. If you want PDF there are two ways:

+ If the publisher offers them - buy them. Even if you have the paper book

+ If the publisher does not offer them - buy the physical book and make a PRIVAT copy. KEEP the book and do not circulate copy!


I am tired of people thinking "Oh it is easily copies, I don't have to pay for that/copying harms no one". Had this last saturday during an RPG con. I used a PDF set of GDW's Twilight:2000 V2.2 (A steal at 40€) and the first a player said was "O great, I have a USB-stick gimme a copy". Instead he got the boot.
mmeier
Visit this Community
Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany
Member Since: October 22, 2008
entire network: 1,280 Posts
KitMaker Network: 213 Posts
Posted: Thursday, December 15, 2011 - 08:55 AM UTC
For the techically inclined:

I did this for roleplaying not for modelling but it may be useful here as well. One problem with PDFs is "the leech" so unlike physical books it is a bit difficult to lend/loan PDFs. And having only one manual at the table makes them less of a benefit. Since limited privat copies are allowed by most rules sets I ended up with the following setup:

An elderly PC (Pentium 4, 2.53GHz, 2GB memory) was set up using a UNIX system (I used SOLARIS but any including the Penguin stuff would do). I activated the X-Windows System an allowed graphical login for a guest account. I also limited the software they can access (A simply PDF viewer) and the ports

I made the PDFs in question available "read only" to that account and then set up a free X-Windows Server on each client pc(1). The players log in and can access a limited UI that is restricted to viewing the files.

Since the actual program runs on the central box even "save as" does not work so the files "stay" and no copy is made

Since the X-Window System is network capabel and build in the (D)Arpanet times this setup will even work remotely for showing manuals/pictures etc. on a convention etc.


(1) Yes, the client has the server in the X-System. The "service" is to display graphics and the software is asking for that service

Rouse713
Visit this Community
Wisconsin, United States
Member Since: February 03, 2009
entire network: 367 Posts
KitMaker Network: 40 Posts
Posted: Thursday, December 15, 2011 - 12:16 PM UTC


Quoted Text

Telling others to rip of the publisher is not only a sign of low character but ultimately self-defeating when the publishers stop working due to lack of customers. If you want PDF there are two ways:


This! x 1000000000

Who do you think is going to spend the time to do all the research next time if everybody is going to download it? All those cool books on pirate bay won't be there in the future because of leeches.

I was keeping silent on this thread, but the name bothered me enough to look. I was afraid it was going to get in this area of downloading whole books. In my eyes:

1) Posting a photo here and there from a book if someone really needs it for a build is fine. I will do this, but I will also suggest buying the book if it is truely a good book to have.

2) If you find a photo online that depicts what you will need for modelling and isn't copyrighted or from someone's personal collection that they are sharing, by all means save a copy to your computer for future reference.

I am not a ninny against all law breaking. Hell, I j-walked today! But it is stupid to steal from a market that is driven as a hobby, supported by my mind a dwindling group of people. Modelling references are not a necessity and I would imagine the market isn't easily profitable. The day quality reference books stop coming out will be a sad day. Please don't promote this!

Go spend a few years of your life writting an original, accurate book and then recommend to all your friends to just go and download it.
 _GOTOTOP