Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
Any suggestions on how I can edit EXIF on multiple JPG files at once? Need to change Author field.
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Batch-editing EXIF data
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Windows updated breaks screen smoothing of text and graphics.
Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
I found plenty of notes on the problem but not a clear solution. Any suggestions how to deal with the fuzzy text and non-antialiased graphics that just cropped up this morning? Is there a simple way to roll back Windows updates?
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Final protective fire.
Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
The term “final protective fire” means the highest priority is given to this request due to the danger of a position being overrun. For the guy in the trenches, that means firing as fast as possible to break up a determined assault — even if that uses up barrels and ammo fast. If the FPF fails, there won’t be a “later” for those troops.
How does this relate to civilian self-defense? Very directly: almost every defense against a foe with a contact weapon is an FPF event. Most short range shootings are the same. They are rapid affairs with very little care given to the aftermath — if you fail to stop a guy with a shank, there won’t be an “after” for you. The difference is that you seldom have another person covering you and have to rely on your own firepower to break the attack.
There’s another, far less common case where the same considerations come up — riots and civil disturbances. Unlike personal defense events where attackers are usually few and retreat is sometimes an option, a large-scale civil disturbance doesn’t leave many safe havens. Your home or place of business ends up being the safest location. Having non-combatant dependents with you — such as kids or infirm grandparents — limits your ability to maneuver, while the flimsy construction of most modern homes and offices makes them poor cover against incoming fire. One way to deal with threats in that environment is to outrange the attackers in both firepower and the ability to spare innocent people. Gangbangers going after a juicy target don’t care who they shoot — but you ought to care. It’s good to have the ability to take a precise 200 yard shot against a hostile shooter and still be agile enough to break a rush at 20 yards. As LA riots showed, Molotov cocktails are no joke in urban areas.
Suppressive fire does have a place in such situations: you don’t really care if you kill the foe as long as they are prevented from killing you. The lack of automatic capability isn’t too big of a problem, because it reduces the problems from the lack of interchangeable or watercooled barrels. Thirty rounds per minute is sustainable for a medium/heavy AR15. A hundred would not be for long, but it could come in handy in case of push coming to a shove. While you are unlikely to face a human wave attack, a stolen commercial truck used to crash your neighborhood watch barricade would take a lot of stopping when all you have is a rifle.
This rifle is not shown with a bipod because of its dual long/short range role. Sandbags or other improvised supports would keep the shooter less visible than a bipod, and the forend thermal wrap combined with a VFG would keep the support hand from burning. Smaller magazines would work fine, but there’s something comforting about 150 rounds on tap in a reliable drum.
The rifle, incidentally, isn’t fully mine. The upper was acquired by a friend, a veteran of the South African civil war as an addition to the shorter-range arms. He’s concerned that the US situation may call for such a tool in the near future.
The thermal wraps, by the way, work just as well for three-gun competitions or a long day at the range as they do for stopping hordes of zombies in the wire.
Most equipment would do if you can. That said, an effective range of a 30-30 with open sights is under a hundred yards, while a an AR10 with a variable scope might stretch out to 400 and still be as fast at room distance. While I like having good gear on hand, I think that a dry run through the neighborhood with SuperSoakers or nerf “guns” would do as much to improve the defense plan as a day at the range. Given the cost of ammunition right now, the tactical exercises may be worth doing in preference to more trigger time. Finding ways to join forces with neighbors would be a help as well, since a typical family with two adults cannot hold a fixed position against even a slightly competent assault for any length of time. 24 hour/360 degree watch would be too hard to effect. Exceptions to that would be locations where the approach can be properly channeled, but that’s not the case for most of us.
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Minneapolis Art Institute
Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
Was there today with friends. Friends had cameras, so good photos exist.
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Minnesota was much too cold
Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
We all had to huddle together for warmth.
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Obsolescent calibers
Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
One approach to the current ammo shortage is to preserve the current calibers and use up less useful ammunition in practice. In my case, that means 7.62x54R gets used up in Mosins which are hardly useful for social purposes. The other approach is to bring older guns into service by because oddball ammunition is no longer any more expensive than .308. For example, 303British at $21.50/box is a deal compared to 308Win at $30/box.
If you have a surplus Enfield or a Mauser at home, a box of soft points gets it ready for the hunting season at lower cost than feeding an AR10. Even 6.5 Swedish suddenly looks relatively affordable, at the cost similar to 223Rem ball.
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AGP magazines for Saiga 12
Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
These magazines were acquired last year for the Kushnapup project. Since my Kushnapup stock went towards a friend’s build (which I’d like to photograph eventually), I had these magazines and no gun for them. So I put them to some use. Bad timing, as these magazines don’t need any help selling. But take a look at AGP site, they make quite a few other interesting things.
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Updating a Garmin GPS?
Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
I have a unit that’s about five years old. The maps in it are quite outdated. What’s the best option for getting them updated? I don’t think I can find the instruction manual or the cables for it anymore.
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Coyotes are charismatic.
Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
They are also among the best adapted predators out there.
PS: Dragging the 300/2.8 lens to the zoo was well worth the inconvenience.
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Wolverine
Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
A wolverine is 6% of grizzly body weight with 200% of the attitude.
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Serbu 50BMG rifle
Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
For an upcoming magazine article.
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The Old Issue
Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
I am often reminded of Kipling lately. One I just heard capably performed by Leslie Fish: The Old Issue (the lyrics). You can get this and other Kipling poems set to music from her web site.
The specific words that got my attention:
He shall take a tribute, toll of all our ware;
He shall change our gold for arms—arms we may not bear.
He shall break his judges if they cross his word;
He shall rule above the Law calling on the Lord.
Looking back at history, the Parliament had once saved England from its king. Then the Lord Protector had to save England from the Parliament. And once Cromwell died, the English invited a foreign king to rule them again. Kipling again:
As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man
There are only four things certain since Social Progress began.
That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire,
And the burnt Fool’s bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire;
I suspect that the coming US events will resemble his verses.
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Minimizing snubbie recoil.
Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
This revolver came in for the upcoming Concealed Carry magazine article about the Rhino revolver family. It’s an interesting weapon that showed significantly better accuracy than expected of snubbies and rather mild felt recoil even with .357 ammunition. Being double action only, it is optimized for the double action pull without a concern for rendering single action too light for safety.
All that said, .357Magnum is still a hot round. I have a friend whose hands and arms took too much damage in accidents and left her with much recoil sensitivity. She’s also unable to hold up heavy guns, so her preferred carry arms are a Keltec PMR30 and a 3″ S&W Model 65. I am curious to see if the Rhino would solve some of the issues with recoil. The low barrel placement and soft grips should help.
I am having a friend hand-load two different 110gr jacketed hollow points. I also got a box of Magtech 38Spl 95gr all-copper ammo to go with the all-copper Federal .357 rounds. I was going to link to the Lucky Gunner listing for it since they supplied the Magtech box for use as a photo prop…but all of what was on their 38Spl page sold out already.
In any case, the theory behind all-copper bullets is higher muzzle velocity and controlled expansion — and my practice with .44Special, .458SOCOM and .223 bullets bore this out. These loads are rated at 1400fps (357) and 1080fps (38), the latter from a 4″ barrel, the former presumably from a 6″. In a 2″ snubbie, 1000fps would be likely — slow enough to keep the recoil and noise down but fast to enough to expand the copper projectile. The main down side to copper bullets is higher price than for lead, but these days the difference isn’t all that much. With a fixed sight gun, the real test is to see how close to the point of aim the lighter bullet will shoot.
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Turning 18.
Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
Three years ago, I took this photo of 15 year old Rachel. She had fun with the bolt action but had to shoot it from a support due to the stock length and considerable overall heft. Yesterday, I took photos at a group birthday party — her 18th.
She took just a little time from shooting trap with a 12ga Winchester 12 to plink with the 8-shot .22 Hi Standard and to try out Rhino 50DS with .38s. The .38 had barely more kick than the .22 revolver. Then I was able to pry the pre-teen boys from the suppressed Savage MK.2 FV-SR and she got her turn. Since I have not yet received the Boyd stock, I raised the comb height with a leather wrap salvaged from an old M1A stock. It worked well enough to make aiming with the illuminated 4-16x comfortable. At ranges of 25 to 70 yards, that made scope set to lower magnification breaking propped-up clays too easy.
Not all clays were visible from the ground, so it went up on the truck hood. For the 5’4″ shooter, the stock was a much better fit than the heavy Mossberg. Being able to chat comfortably during the shoot just made it better. Alpine suppressor with subsonic ammo made it quieter than a Red Ryder BB gun. The feat of busting 11cm targets with a rested scoped rifle within point blank range isn’t great, but good equipment and patient instruction help with getting even the novice 8 year old shooter do that comfortably.
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For Sale: EOTech 551
Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
I am posting several items for a friend. First, EOTech 551:
- Law Enforcement and Military Night Vision compattable Holographic Red Dot Sight 65 MOA Circle with 1 MOA Dot Reticle Matte Finnish, (MSRP – $469.00)
- N Battery
- comes with a GG&G quick detach mount (MSRP – $85.00)
- Neoprene hood
It is in excellent condition and has never been used other than being mounted and unmounted from weapons. Chris is asking $525 for EOTech, hood and GG&G QD mount. Contact the seller if you want the sight.
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For Sale: Trijicon Tripower
Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
Also posted for a friend, Trijicon Tripower:
http://www.trijicon.com/na_en/products/product2.php?id=TriPower&mid=TriPower MSRP – $796.00
http://www.bravocompanyusa.com/LaRue-Tactical-CompM-Standard-Mount-QD-LT150-p/larue%20lt%20150.htm MSRP – $150.00
The TriPower has a couple small cosmetic scratches from being mounted and unmounted from different weapons, other than that its never been used while shooting. Includes original plastic box. The LaRue mount is already attached and ready to go.
The sight is in excellent condition and has never been used other than being mounted and unmounted from weapons. Chris is asking $675 for it. Contact the seller if you want to buy it.
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How to *remove* a copyright notice from Facebook posts?
Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
Recently, I added “Copyright:Oleg Volk (For use permission ask photo@olegvolk.net)” into EXIF generated by my camera. Today, I notice that photos posted on Facebook directly pop that up in the captions, which I do not want. Any ideas how I can get around that problem? I want my files tagged but I do not want FB to attach the notice to every image posted up.
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Very nice jewelry
Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
Mike Williamson just turned me onto jewelry by Jeni Benos. Gorgeous work — and the artist herself is a work of art too.
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So called “logic” of gun bans.
Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
To make the “logic” of gun bans a little more obvious, I’d like to use the analogy of cars as more familiar to everyone. Imagine a situation in which some tiny number of vehicles are used for criminal purposes, such as transporting drugs, kidnapping and drive-by shootings. By the logic currently applied to guns, the hypothetical car-banners can try several approaches:
- Ban everyone from using the same kind of cars as used by the majority of criminals. If the most popular “crime car” is a Ford Escort, ban those. Or all compact sedans. As everyone, including criminals, switches to other types, ban the most popular of those.
- Ban the most high-performance vehicles (or those with largest number of seats, greatest cargo capacity or some other useful feature) on the theory that they are most suitable for criminal use and evading police. Next year, ban the next to the most high performing types and so on.
- Prohibit ownership to specific people, defining the “specific” people broadly enough to include everyone besides specifically exempted politicians and their, so called “public”, servants.
Neither of these approaches is reasonable but anti-gun people push for them anyway. They are ok with victimizing the blameless. That tells us that their real goal isn’t disarming the criminals but disarming everyone they view as potential political opposition.
Some segments of gun control are aimed at producing a local electoral majority, the prime example being the Colorado bills that would cause enough pro-gun people to move out of the state to ensure a long-term Democrat majority. Others are aimed at disarming the “most probably enemy” population groups, and both political parties are guilty of that to some extent, though Democratic party does it far more.
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Mid-length 38s, old and new
Originally published at VolkStudio Blog. You can comment here or there.
Years ago, I got an old revolver for a small sum. Eventually, it went to a good friend. Then the friend died, and I inherited it. It had great lockwork and tight lockup but was pitted and worn.
It was fitted with laser grips. In low light, the adjustable laser is a big win over the black on black fixed sights. The rubber also made the already mild recoil even less noticeable.
Chad Kandros (Nashville, TN) beadblasted and Cerakoted it for me. If you are in Florida, Spectrum Coating does great work (they OEM for several large gun companies). In Iowa, Galt’s Guns does equally well.
It’s not perfect but I no longer have to worry about it rusting further. The slightly textured finish looks nice and feels good to the hand. I plan on comparison-firing it side by side with a brand new 5″ revolver, a Charter Police Bulldog.
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