Oh No Broken Laptop Screen!

"EEEK!" I shouted as I tripped and fell on my laptop.. (well actually the words used where too extreme to put here). 1 call to the insurance company and I thought, £150.00 excess?! so after trawling ebay (my Dell is the D820 with a 15.4 WUXGA 1920x1200 pixels) there are plenty of WXGA+ (1280x800) screens - i found MCS Technology Ltd who are actually pretty close and cheaper than my insurance excess, that supply spare parts from broken machines..

So ordered yesterday, arrived today. Cant beat that kind of service!

Onwards with the repair.. This is what my laptop displayed after I fell on it..

So after removing the battery, use a knife to prise the rubber bungs (also attached with sticky glue) out of the holes to reveal cross head screws (thank you Dell for not using star headed screws)

After all the screws are taken out, its just a case of carefully prising the front of the screen away from the back.

..To reveal more screws! another 8 need to be taken out before the LCD panel will come away from the back.

Once all the screws are out, carefully manoeuvre the panel so you can see the back, there are 2 cables attached that require a little dexterity to take off.

The larger flat cable has a couple of locking clips that require a firm grip to enable you to disconnect it from the screen.

The smaller cable just needs a little tug, while holding onto the PCB.

Then its to the bin with the busted screen, and giving the new (used screen) a little TLC to clean it. and reverse the above to put the screen in place..

Then replace battery, and power on, hopefully everything is ok.. I hadnt done anything with the settings for my screen, when I took this shot of my screen now back in working condition.

So happy to have my laptop back up and running again!

Will

I take no responsibility whatsoever for your hearts melting while looking at these shots of Will, he's a great little guy, just 18 months old and full of personality!
We had a blast while i was trying (and i use the term trying loosely) to get him to pose and stand in one place long enough for me to take some photographs of him..

Published

So with the shots I took on Friday night at the Britain's Got Talent Tour, I managed to grab a front page shot and page 3, my 2 seconds of fame..

Britain's Got Talent - Tour

Yesterday afternoon I received a phone call from the Deputy Head of Features at The Daily Echo asking if I would cover the Britain's Got Talent event at the BIC. I agreed and he sent through what I would be covering. Just 2 acts, DJ Talent

Britain's Got Talent Tour, Photography by Robert Whetton

and Diversity's opening number

Britain's Got Talent Tour, Photography by Robert Whetton

Britain's Got Talent Tour, Photography by Robert Whetton

Would have loved to stay for the whole thing, but rules are rules and I had to leave after only 20 minutes..

U2 play Kyps

U2, well the Tribute band for U2, Us4 played Kyps last night and I had the pleasure of hearing them perform and keep my low light photography eye in, and boy did it push me! A new lighting guy was in, his first time ever doing lighting! i tried for about 5 minutes to get some decent shots, but i was @ ISO3200, f/2.8 and shooting between 1/30-1/50 with a very energetic Bono jumping and dancing all over the stage, it just wasnt going to happen. So a quick word and we were back in business (still at ISO3200 for the most).

I have to say he picked up pretty quickly and the 2nd half of the show's light was near what i'm used to shooting at kyps.

U2 Tribute Us4 at Mr Kyps, Photography by Robert Whetton

U2 Tribute Us4 at Mr Kyps, Photography by Robert Whetton

U2 Tribute Us4 at Mr Kyps, Photography by Robert Whetton

U2 Tribute Us4 at Mr Kyps, Photography by Robert Whetton

U2 Tribute Us4 at Mr Kyps, Photography by Robert Whetton

U2 Tribute Us4 at Mr Kyps, Photography by Robert Whetton

Night Shooting

I had an itch last week to go out and get some night shots.. I needed a model, and up and coming Tog Jen Eustace was good enough to volunteer herself and boyfriend Steve for the task! We drove around for about an hour before I found a spot I was happy with the ambient light and background..

Anyway, I've used my new actions to compress the shots into 2 managable sizes

The staff from the Tesco Express we finally found to start the shoot couldn't believe their eyes!

Steve was a great help, holding the light stand when we were out in the open, it was quite windy to begin with.. He also helped by shining a light for my AF to work in the darker patches, thanks Steve.

I have an idea for some beach shots, so hopefully will be using the services of Miss Eustace and Steve once more..

FRANK goes to press!

Its been thrown about a bit, an extra track added, more people added to the credits. But today I put Frank to bed as it were.. Final separations were printed to high res PDF.

I can't wait to have a copy of the finished CD in my grubby mitts..

DVD

Ok, so a quick update on how my tutorials are coming, I'm getting there, in between script writing, I'm putting actions together for the bonus disc. I'll be doing the actual recording of the tutorials in about a month, and also hoping to enrol the help of a friend for something extra.

A glimpse of just a couple of actions that I've done to aid photographers with blogging their photographs.

The following shots can be found over on Creations Studio Blog and are used with their kind permission.

Canford School presents Oliver

Back in March Canford School asked me to attend and photograph the dress rehearsal for their play Oliver. The kids were much younger than the 6th form students who performed 1984, but this didn't make it any less dramatic, I was blown away by the skill of everyone of them!

Just the one shot for now..


Head of Music also wants the pano stitch as a 50 inch wide mounted print! stay tuned for that as well, ill post some photographs when its finished.