Sandman

You got balls, I'll give you that. This is popping up with alarming regularity.

We have some terrible players.

I think what last night has shown (for those that insist otherwise) is that it's possible to play aggressive attacking football without spending a shed load of cash to assemble a team and that great coaching can get them playing well quickly. Also that if you have money to spend then you need to spend it appropriately, if your vision is to play direct football with a big striker upfront then by all means purchase the players to do so, as a coach / manager that's your prerogative. But then coach your team well enough so that they do your vision justice.

24 Cups and 8 League Titles is a fantastic record for a club that has the recruiting restrictions that they have. Don't dismiss them as a small club, they're hugely storied. The statement that they've all grown up playing together in this way is also incorrect. Until last season they were pretty much a direct long ball type team, this change in philosophy has come about with Marcelo Bielsa. Over the course of half a season. It really is a fantastic achievement.

It hasn't been 18 months has it ? He joined Athletic this season. Love the way his teams play the game. Should have been out of sight last night.

What software are you using once you get the images from the 550d to your computer ? Generally you can adjust contrast by manipulating either 'Curves' or 'Levels' regardless of which software package (Photoshop/Aperture/Lightroom etc) you're using. Well worth it.

Very Nice withnail. A contrast adjustment would really make the images pop.

I have the 550d as well. It's a fantastic little camera. What lens do you have ? This camera (well like all cameras really) benefits from good glass. If you have the kit lens, then you're not getting the most out of it. Pick up a good prime and you'll be blown away at the quality. Turn off Auto ISO and change your Max ISO to 400. Images shot at ISO 800 and up show a lot of noise in low light and require a lot of effort to clean up in software. If you're going to be shooting a lot of low light stuff then you should definitely pick up a 1.8/1.4 Prime Lens, and invest in separate Noise Reduction software. If you plan on shooting video with this then you may want to consider investing in the battery grip as it makes the camera better balanced. Video Quality is terrific, again with the same caveats with regard to High ISO numbers. But most importantly, shoot a lot and have fun!

Nice pics rainblood! Especially like the colors on the ship in the first one.

Agree with Anubis. As an aside, my cousin has one with the pancake lens. Decent enough images, however...add a Nikon/Canon Prime lens with a Fotodiox adapter and the images are incredible! Has a lot of cool technology. I'd suggest getting a bounce flash as well, as High ISO performance is not stellar.

Try this mate: HDR Tutorial | High Dynamic Range Tutorial

The D5000 shoots video at the following resolutions: VGA 640x424 / 24 fps QVGA 320x216 / 24fps HD 1280x720 / 24 fps VGA and QVGA are pretty much unusable these days - think of the crappy videos cell phones used to put out a few years ago. 1280x720 @ 24fps is fine. The thing with shooting video on a DSLR is that you need decent lenses, probably more so than if you were just shooting stills. The ability to focus on objects further than 3 feet away is a function of the aperture you're using. I don't know what lens you're currently using, but I've found that prime lenses work best with video from these DSLR's - even when compared to the top of the line zooms (L Series from Canon and Nikons pro range). You can't go wrong with a good prime lens. The 50mm f1.8 is a good lens to start with, affordable, fast and very sharp. I'd get the D version and avoid the G. If you're finding it a bit long on your D5000 - as it's equivalent to a 75mm (50mm x 1.5 crop factor) then you can look into either a 24mm/28mm or a 35mm. But those will cost significantly more. Hope that helps, let me know if you have any more questions!

I've been with my woman for 4 years and have no complaints. Is it just a marriage thing ? I have a couple of married friends who're pretty frustrated - and this is a little over a year into it.

The North West - Sikkhim, Mhow, Ladakh etc - is beautiful too. Not many people seem to head down there, but it's fantastic. Get the Lonely Planet Guide, it's got a lot of info. And give me a shout out when you land in Mumbai, beer's on me.

My favorite system ever. Super Metroid Contra 3 Super Mario All Stars The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past Super Mario RPG Chrono Trigger Michael Andretti Racing Super Soccer Super Tennis Good Times.

More Izzy photos...

Two more photos of my cat Izzy, taken with my 85mm f1.8 on the Canon 550d. Have to say I'm loving the ease of use of Digital. Now what am I going to do with the 80 rolls of Fuji 160S sitting in my fridge ?

First off, apologies for the late response - haven't been on the site since I made my last post: Coro: I mean you make out that Robinho is anything more than distinctly average (arse or no arse) that's mystifying for starters and then you go on to draw conclusions over some of our summer signings yet we're barely into autumn. You single out Adam for contributing little just days after his best performance for us against United and then compare him to Meireles - the epitome of the phrase all style and no substance - a player who, let's not forget, simply didn't want to be at the club any longer. Re: Our summer signings, specifically the ones I mentioned, I never felt that they had the talent to be Liverpool players. Nothing I saw of Adam at Blackpool suggested that he would enhance our midfield, and I don't believe he has. Yes he was decent against the Mancs, but is that what we're happy with? It may have been his best performance for us, but at no point did I feel that he would be our matchwinner. That's just my opinion. As for Merieles, I think he brings more to the table in terms of ability, and was sorry to see him leave. I'm not sure what you mean by 'substance', but if you're referring to his unwillingness to throw himself into tackles then I'd have to say that Adam doesn't really do that either. The team lacks the flexibility it had last season, the fluidity we had has disappeared but yet so much has changed over the summer - new players, different pressures, greater expectations. We're building for the long term, we're creating a more solid footing, we're trying to accommodate new players to a new system so the priority at this moment isn't playing expansive, attacking football, it's about learning to move around the pitch as a unit and striking that all important balance between attack and defence. I'm happy to be patient while we build for the long term, I just happen to disagree with some of the choices made. We've bought Henderson and Carroll for the future...but at ridiculous prices. How good are these two going to be 2 or 3 years from now? Will they be 40 million and 70 million players by then ? Will they really improve to such an extent that we'll have 2 world class players on our hands ? I certainly hope so, but I have my doubts. For 50 million, we should expect better, Champions League or no Champions League. As far as different pressures, greater expectations go, I do understand that it takes time for players from Blackpool, Sunderland and Newcastle to come to terms with what playing for Liverpool entails. As the season progresses they should get more comfortable, but I doubt that we'll see a significant improvement in their performances. I just don't think the footballing ability is there. I'm not sure how high your expectations were at the beginning of the season but looking at the table, after 8 games played (4 of which are usually very difficult away fixtures for us) i'm certainly not downbeat at all. 14 points from a possible 24 for a team undergoing a fairly hefty transition isn't bad, in fact i'm more confident now about finishing 4th than i was at the start of the season. Honestly, I expected us to be in a scrap with Spurs for 4th, but I'll be surprised if we pip them to it. silverlining And no, as a CM partnership, him and Lucas is shit, but he has quality: he probes, passes well, sees space, can score goals and is confident enough to take responsibility. His game is biased towards attack and penetration. Partnered with a better player than Lucas - who famously needs one midfield partner to help him defensively, and another to help out with the attacking side of the game, while he...I dunno, makes cups of tea - he will be fine. While I don't agree that Lucas is shit, I do wish he was better.

There is no doubt the 100 million or whatever it was could have been better spent. Personally, I couldn't believe we went after the likes of Carroll (in Jan), Adam and Henderson this summer. The football we're playing isn't that great, the tactical flexibility that we had when Kenny took-over last season seems to have disappeared, and we're still lacking pace and are still reliant on 2 players. This is reminding me of City after Mansour bought the club. They paid a lot of money for some distinctly average players (apart from Robinho, when he could be arsed), and used them to move up the table. But I doubt our guys will end up spending a 100 mill next season as well. I also don't feel Lucas is the problem in midfield, I think Adam contributes very little. I'm astonished that we went in for him when we had Mereiles. Don't think we'll get fourth this season to be honest.

This is like saying, hey you were held down and arse raped by a bunch of thugs a couple of years ago, but now that you've recently hooked up with an ex-girlfriend, it's ok. You had to go through the butt plumbing to get to where you are now. Like everything else you say, it's fucking senseless.

Well said. Same old tedious arguments from the usual suspects. Have to admit Ant's heartfelt defense of Purslow made me laugh. Well worth the 5 minutes spent scrolling through this thread.

Just use keepvid.com. Paste the YouTube url into keepvid's url box and it lets you choose different formats to convert/download the file to. Highly recommended.

Chris, love those copper eyes on your girl.

Callie, my female cat. She's a lot more chilled out. Relaxing by the bookshelf. Cleaning herself ;)

Some photos of Izzy, my male cat. Wake up, it's feeding time. Seriously! ...