John:Not my first rodeo. It's my second.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:Pragmatic is a show about technology and contemplating the finer details in their
John:practical application. By exploring the real-world trade-offs, we dive into how
John:great ideas can be transformed into products and services that impact our lives.
John:Pragmatic is entirely supported by you, our listeners. If you'd like to support us and
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John:all of our shows not available anywhere else. Just visit engineer.network/pragmatic to learn
John:how you can help this show to continue to be made. Thank you. I'm your host, John Chidjie,
John:and today I'm joined again once again by my good friend Vic Hudson. How you doing, Vic?
Vic:>> I'm good, John, how are you?
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:Not too bad. I'm enjoying the podcasting booth, aka sweatbox. It's the middle of summer. The
Vic:>> Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:air conditioning has not plumbed in properly yet, and hence, oh dear. But that's okay.
John:It's going to be sweaty, but it's going to be good. Tell me. But you see, you're talking
Vic:I will trade you weather if you'd like.
Vic:Do you know what I woke up to this morning?
Vic:Snow and three degrees Fahrenheit.
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:to the man that used to live in Calgary, mate. I mean, the only thing I didn't like about
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:the snow was de-icing my car in the morning in the car park. That's the only thing I didn't
Vic:Yeah, that blows, that blows really bad.
John:like. Yeah. Anyway, having said that, I also miss the mountains, and snow is beautiful
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:It is pretty through the window, through the window.
John:in its own way. Except when you... Yeah. Yes. When you're trying to get somewhere and there's
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:a foot of it on the ground, it's less good. But anyway. So I've got a whole bunch of stuff
Vic:Yeah, it's a lot less good then.
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John:I wanted to cover today. I do have a primary topic. Okay. I do have a primary topic, sort
Vic:What you got, man?
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:of. But it's all got to do with... You can't call it 3D, right? You've got to call it spatial.
Vic:Spatial computing, spatial computing.
John:But we'll get to that. 3D video. But we'll get to that. Yes, that's it. Indeed. I do
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:all my computing spatially. Oh God, please. I'll call it whatever the hell I want. Expensive
Vic:You should also not call it Vision Pro, the Vision Pro.
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:You have to call it Apple Vision Pro.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:doorstop. There's another name it may get. Anyway, let's keep going. There's other things
Vic:Mm, continue, I'm intrigued.
John:to talk about first. Okay. So just... I touched on it briefly. I have an issue with sound
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:booth cooling. So I have the air conditioning unit, and I have some of the parts necessary
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:that I acquired over the holidays. And anyway, unfortunately for me, I don't really have...
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:How do I put this? I don't have all of the last pieces for me to make a start on it.
John:Therefore, I haven't done anything about it. So I'm still on a non-air conditioned sound
John:booth. And there's one other tiny problem. I have no air conditioning in the rest of
John:my house. My wife spotted a air conditioning unit sitting next to the podcasting booth,
John:not doing anything. It's the middle of summer. It's 90 degrees Fahrenheit out there regularly.
Vic:[LAUGH]
John:So she says, "Well, can't have air conditioning units. Could be doing something constructive."
John:I'm like, "Yeah, it could be." And so it disappeared into the house. I think that it's borrowed.
Vic:She stole it, she stole it.
Vic:[LAUGH]
John:It's borrowed. And I borrowed it back just for this morning's recording. So there you
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John:go. So I've cooled down the inside of the sound booth, and we're good to go. As soon
John:as I start to melt into a puddle, we'll take a break. But I don't know. I'm tough. I can
John:handle this. I say now. Okay. Right. So just a note about that, but we'll move on. I'm
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John:hoping in the next month or two, I'll be able to finish this job because honestly, when
John:the air conditioning is running in here, it really is quite pleasant. It's just I can't
John:close the door because there's no exit hole. I got to cut one into the side of it, put
John:the baffle boxes on. It's on the to-do list. Anyway. All right. So next bit of news that
John:happened since last time is I finally have solar power back again at my house. I've got
John:10 kilowatts installed. I mean, technically it's 13.2 kilowatts of panels, and I've got
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:10 kilowatt three phase inverter. And it's a beautiful system. They're new panels. They've
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:been installed much better than the previous panels. And I'm producing something like 80.
John:I think yesterday was a sunny day. I had 82 kilowatt hours in one day. Very impressive.
John:So because I can't, yeah. Yeah. I could, yes. If I had batteries, I could run the house
Vic:That sounds impressive.
Vic:For those of us that don't speak kilowatt hours, like, what are we looking at here?
Vic:Can you run the whole house with that, and for how long?
John:indefinitely provided I was getting, yeah, I was getting, yeah, but I'd have to have
Vic:Nice.
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John:batteries that could do probably 20 kilowatt hour of storage, which I realized the whole
Vic:Uh-huh.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:thing with storage and capacity has all been messed up thanks to vehicles and stuff. So
John:technically we measure things in amp hours and such because voltage determines power,
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:but nevermind. Doesn't matter. Bottom line is I don't have batteries because they're
John:a little bit pricey still. So maybe someday I'll get a power wall or more likely a cheaper,
John:equally good Chinese version because they've got some really good ones coming out of China.
John:Keeping in keeping note that my Tesla model three has Chinese battery packs in it. Right.
Vic:Right, that's cool.
John:So the LFP anyway, nevermind. Yeah. Yep. That's right. So my last power bill, yeah. My last
Vic:Do you, you at least have the thing like where your electric meter runs backwards sometimes,
Vic:and you get credit from the power company, right?
Vic:That's sweet.
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John:power bill at this point in time for two months, I think my electricity's cost me a hundred
John:bucks for two months, which previously it was costing me about $800. So the solar system
John:is making an enormous difference. And I've been charging the car on solar just by using
John:a bunch of automations, which are probably going to go away. And then I signed up to
John:something that we're testing at work, which gives me 8 cents a kilowatt hour charging,
John:which is pretty cool for my Tesla. But so yeah. But because I'm the sort of, well, a
John:person that I am, I'm also going to go to my absolute limit as permitted by Queensland
Vic:Mm-hm.
John:law, which is 15 kilowatts. So I've got another five kilowatt system I'm waiting for final
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:approval from the electricity authority that's Energex. So hopefully that gets approved in
Vic:What's involved in that approval?
John:the next few weeks and installed sometime late February. That would be cool. And then
Vic:You expect any, what's involved in that approval?
John:it'll, I'll have even more. Sorry. Well, no. So the story was that about a year ago, we
Vic:Do you expect any trouble, or is it just formalities?
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John:applied to have a 15 kilowatt system installed. Actually it was more like 18 months ago and
John:Energex rejected it because our house, when we got three phase power connected, it was
John:actually connected up by three independent phases, one from each path, one from each
John:feeder that came through different physical pathways, which is a big no, no. You can do
John:it, but you really shouldn't. You can get away with it in residential because generally
John:you don't have balanced three phase machines. Whereas in an industrial environment, that
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John:would never work because you try and hook up phases A, B and C to an induction motor
John:and it would just, you'd probably destroy the motor. So anyway, at some point they realized
John:that that was only temporary and unbeknownst to us, we saw them doing a whole bunch of
John:upgrades to transformers on like pole mount transformers on the streets. And we had power
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:outages at our house, multiple power outages, and they pulled a new three phase cable into
John:our house. And this all just happened. I didn't ask them to do it. They just did it, which
John:is one of the great things about having an electricity authority that's actually on the
John:ball and for all of the crap that people give Energex, they were on the ball and they were
John:fixing up this hack job solution that they had.
John:Now, as soon as they did that, of course, knowing what I know, I'm looking at the rating
John:of the transformers because that's what people do when you walk down the street, you look
John:up and you say, "Oh wow, that's 100 kVA and that's 150. Okay, interesting." Anyway, I
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Vic:I always do that.
John:know normal people. Yes, I know. Yeah, totally. Yeah. And then you run into the pole and you're
Vic:Sometimes I get distracted staring at them while I'm driving.
Vic:[LAUGH]
John:like, "Oh, but yes." Anyhow, yeah. Anyway, listeners know that Vic has not done that,
Vic:Right?
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:so I'm just kidding. Anyhow, moving on.
John:So I went back to Energex with a new application and the rules had changed since I did the
John:last application and I had to split the system into two pieces, a 10 kW and a 5 kW. And so
John:the 10 kW got approved and the 5 kW got lost in the system. So the 10 kW got installed
John:and I'm still waiting for the 5 kW. Now, because they've upgraded all of the backend, it should
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John:just go ahead. It should, but I don't know what's going to happen. We'll see. So hopefully,
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:we'll find out soon. Hopefully, it is just a formality. All right?
Vic:That's cool, that's cool.
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John:The one thing I did do, creatively speaking at least, over the break, the Christmas holidays,
John:is I did an episode of Pragmatic Electric, which I hadn't done in a while. I did an episode
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:of... So now I made 10 episodes of Pragmatic Electric. That is a video version of this
John:podcast about DC charging infrastructure. This particular episode is very locally focused.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:So if you're not in Southeast Queensland or even Queensland as the state, you're probably
John:not going to care. But it's really been wonderful to see there's been a massive rollout of charging
John:infrastructure. Well, you can certainly do that, and I would
Vic:What if we wanna watch it just to see Chigi?
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:encourage you to do so. The video itself has had an enormous 49 views as of last night.
Vic:Okay.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:I think I checked it was. So I've almost cracked 50 views. Anyway, it's not a big thing. It's
John:just something to do to scratch that creativity itch and sort of thing. I figure that having
John:that on this show and going into all those details is probably not of very much interest
John:to the audience of this particular podcast. So if you want to, there'll be a link in the
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:show notes. Feel free to check it out. When I was doing... Why thank you, Vic. Oh, dear.
Vic:I'll post about it.
Vic:Should get you at least two, three more views.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:I do what I can, man.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:Oh, no, I know. It's awesome. So honestly, I just wanted to say about EVs, I came across
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:this in the last couple of weeks. I've been back at work now for two through three weeks
John:now. So I only had that one week over Christmas, a week and a half. You take the days off between
John:Christmas Day and New Year's Day and call it a holiday when it's really not because
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:you're running around going to family events and you're like, "Yeah, okay." Anyway, no,
Vic:There's not a lot of rest involved.
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John:that's the problem. I want a holiday where I can rest. Anyway, it's all good, really.
Vic:Right.
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John:All right. So I came across this article because there's a lot of electric vehicle hate, I
John:would say. I think it's a fair way of putting it. And so the hate is going to hate, hate,
John:hate, said Tay Tay. And anyway, yeah, so EV fires, they're like, "Oh, electric cars, they
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:catch on fire a lot and they're really, really dangerous," and so on and so forth. And I
John:always suspected that was BS because the number of cars I've seen on the side of a road that
John:have burnt out, and even one time I drove past a car that was currently on fire, gasoline
Vic:I was gonna say, I'll bet it ran on some sort of dinosaur fuel.
John:powered, petrol powered car. Yeah, exactly. People don't realize that they forget. And
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:I know that when they went away from single skin to double skin fuel tanks, and there
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:are improvements to the placing of fuel lines and everything in a car and fuel injectors
John:versus carburetors, and that they're all incremental improvements in safety and such for resilience.
John:Firewalls, for example, for protecting occupants and so on. But the bottom line is that I found
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:an article, I mean, it is an Australian article that's referencing an American study. So the
John:link is to the Australian article, but the American study that this came from is in there
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:anyway. So they found that petrol and diesel vehicles experienced 1,530 fires per 100,000
Vic:Right.
John:vehicles, whereas only 25 out of 100,000 electric vehicles caught fire. That's fully electric
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:vehicles too. So I think that that's good to clear up some fear, uncertainty, and doubt
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:that's often spread about electric vehicles. But of course, me being me, it's not entirely
John:that simple. And I kind of know that because that's not fair from the point of view of
John:there's no breakdown of the age of those cars. So the chances that a brand new car that's
John:gasoline powered is going to catch on fire is much lower than one that's 10 years old.
John:I think that's fair to say, because like rubber deteriorates and damage happens. So the number
Vic:Correct.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:of electric vehicles out there would not be 10 years old. I mean, there'd be some that
John:are 10 years old, absolutely, but there would not be very many. So yeah, you're not going
Vic:A few tests, listen, search, yeah.
Vic:Yeah.
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John:to have a 10 year old, well, you're going to have some 10 year old Teslas because the
John:first Model S was sold in 2014. So you will actually, but you're not going to have that
John:many. So saying like a hundred thousand new cars of either type, it's like that. So I
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John:realize there's a flaw in that. And I suspect the number of EVs that are of the same age
John:would actually have more than 25 out of a hundred thousand vehicles would have caught
John:fire. I don't think it'd be like an order of magnitude or two orders of magnitude more,
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:but it would certainly be a lot more, but it should still be less. Yeah, exactly. You
Vic:Maybe.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:I mean, well, the bottom line is, you know, when you're talking about petrol and diesel vehicles, I mean, the principle behind the whole thing is that the stuff is flammable.
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:light that stuff up, it goes bang inside an enclosed space, drives a piston, makes you
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:go. Yeah. So it's kind of like, "Hmm, is this stuff volatile?" Anyway. But I mean, this
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:is the thing that people need to get a grip on. And that is that any device that's capable
John:of storing energy is capable of releasing that energy in a very rapid fashion if something
John:goes wrong. And that something that goes wrong will vary depending upon the technology. Like
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:in a new case of a nuclear reactor, just pull all the control rods out and see what happens.
John:They did that at Chernobyl and it went real well. Anyway. Indeed. Indeed. All right. And
Vic:No, no, I saw some things that taught me that was not a good thing to do.
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:speaking of electric vehicles, one of the long anticipated vehicles from Tesla finally
John:got released since we last spoke. And that is the Cybertruck. What are your thoughts
Vic:Oh, boy.
Vic:No.
Vic:[LAUGH]
John:and thoughts on the Cybertruck, Vic? Yeah. Yeah. See, I
Vic:I, mm, that thing is god awful ugly, man.
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:It's just god awful.
Vic:If I were in the market, I am actually in the market for a pickup truck.
Vic:I'm sorry, Scott, because he's going to hate to hear that because it's been a point of contention.
Vic:But if I were in the market for an EV truck, I've actually been pretty impressed with the Chevy Silverado EV.
Vic:The Cybertruck is god awful ugly, man.
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:think that the problem with the Cybertruck and its looks is that if you're trying to
John:go for mass adoption, having something that is that striking and that polarizing, that's
John:going to work against you because you're going to be trying to normalize and get... It does.
Vic:It looks like it's from a Mad Max movie, man.
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:It does a bit, yeah. I'd say more Blade Runner, but I mean, the reality is that, well, yeah,
Vic:Oh, that's the same difference.
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:I mean, not the same difference, but, you know, yeah.
John:it has some things in common. I mean, I guess my point is if in fact you're trying to get
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:as many of these out there as possible to solve the, "I want to build a truck, that
John:pickup truck that the majority of Americans are going to want to buy instead of their
John:traditional gasoline powered counterparts," making it look like something like that is
John:probably not... Making it look like something that's completely fundamentally different,
John:you then force people who would ordinarily buy a Chevy Silverado or a Ford F-150, and
John:they're going to look at this and they're going to say, "This thing looks terrible.
John:I'm not buying that crap." People that buy pickup trucks don't always buy them because
John:they want to be looked at. They buy them because they're practical and they're a truck. They
John:don't have to have a presence. You know what I mean? I don't know. Some people get off
John:on people staring at them. When I first got my Model 3 here in Australia,
John:it was the first few months that the Model 3 was available. I was not the first. I was
John:probably the... In Queensland, I was probably in the first thousand or two. It's not like
John:you're... How do I put this? It's like I did get people staring at me and waving and pointing
John:for the first few months, but after six months, there were so many of them on the road, it
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:just stopped. The Cybertruck strikes me as the sort of car that because it is so different,
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:you're going to get that for years. Some people don't want that. It made me feel a bit uncomfortable
John:sometimes because I'm just trying to go to the shops, mate. Don't stop me and have a
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:conversation about my car. I just want to go and buy some butter. What gives?
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:Anyway. Yeah. So, bottom line, Cybertruck is on sale. A part of me wants one. A part
John:of me measured their garage. Oh, actually, no. That was a... Yeah. I guess technically
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:it was a part of me and the measuring tape. I measured my garage and it won't fit. It'll
Vic:[LAUGH]
John:fit in my shed. Just. But yeah, it's a beast of a thing, eh? It's a beast of a thing. Honestly,
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:American pickup trucks are insanely huge. There's so few places in Australia where those
John:cars would fit because all of our cars are all based on... We did have bigger cars for
John:a while. Australian-made cars were bigger, but the Japanese won out because the Japanese
John:cars were, quite frankly, cheaper, more reliable, and more economical. So, that's why people
John:went for them. So, more than, I think, 60% of the cars that we have in Australia are
John:Japanese and those cars are just smaller by design. So, these big American pickups, we
John:look at them and they won't fit in 80, 90% of the car parks, unless you go into the handful
John:of Costco's that are out there. There's a handful of other newer shopping centers that
John:got wider car park spaces for them. But otherwise, you'll park in a car park and you don't have
John:to take up two spots. Otherwise, you won't be able to open the doors to get out. It's
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:just not going to work. So, anyway. I would like one, I think. Yeah, well, maybe. Good
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:luck scratching that thing. I tell you what, though, if it does get scratched, good luck
John:getting a scratch out. Oh, funny thing. You know what? As much as people like to take
John:the piss out of Tesla, they are so good at taking the piss out of themselves. It's like
John:on the touchscreen in the Tesla, you can actually open up a page on there that shows you an
John:isometric view of your car and you can spin the car around and just have a look at it
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:and it's like, "Oh, that's kind of cool." Like a 3D model sort of thing, right? And
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:on the Cybertruck, they have exactly the same thing. But there's a hidden Easter egg in
John:the Cybertruck. If you actually go into the Cybertruck's 3D model and you tap and keep
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:tapping on the glass, on the side window glass, it smashes. It comes up and it goes, "Yeah."
Vic:Does it break?
Vic:Nice.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:Well, at least I've got a sense of humor.
John:It's like so good. And you can buy. I know, right? It's like for all the crap that people
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:lay on Tesla and everything and Elon Musk's an idiot and whatever the hell people say,
John:it's like the haters are going to hate, but you can't deny the fact that at least they
John:don't try to bury stuff. At least they're being honest and they're owning it. And I
John:respect that. It takes a certain kind of company attitude to be able to laugh at yourself and
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:say, "Maybe throwing a massive ball bearing into the glass was not a good demo to do on
John:the live stage." Anyway, it's so funny. And it wasn't scripted, eh? It wasn't. Because
Vic:No, it was not.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:Elon Musk is like, "Oh my f***ing God." The look on his face, he's been saying, "Yeah,
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:it's bulletproof." Oh my f***ing God. No, no, no, no. Anyway, moving on. Now, last time
Vic:I can't imagine any circumstances where they would have done that on purpose.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:we spoke on Is This The Show, which is episode five, I was complaining about a whole bunch
John:of stuff. Specifically, one of them though, I was complaining about Nova. And I was saying,
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:"Oh, yeah, I can't really justify buying Nova because it's expensive. It's like $9.99 US
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:and every year if I want updates, I got to pay it again. I don't know how I should get
John:use out of it." Well, the truth is that once I configured it the way I liked it, I kept
Vic:Uh-huh.
John:using it and then I kept using it. And then I'm like, "Damn, this is so good." And so
Vic:It's really nice, John.
Vic:It's really nice.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:I bought it. I caved in and I bought it. And I don't regret it. It's... yeah. Oh no. Oh
Vic:It's a great text editor.
Vic:You've got terminals built in local and remote.
Vic:You've got local and remote file browsers built in.
Vic:It's basically got transmit built in, honestly.
Vic:It's just, it's really nice.
Vic:And there's a pretty good set of extensions and extension library for it.
John:yeah, it does. Yeah. It truly is amazing as an app. And it is honestly... yeah. I don't
Vic:Depending on what you're working on, you can find a lot of things to help with that.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:regret buying it now. Well, paying for it for 12 months. And it's been fantastic. Hasn't
John:missed a beat. It doesn't chew up memory the way Adam did, which is great. And it gives
John:me nicer choices and it's just easy to configure. And I'm not moving back. And the latest update,
John:which I forget the version number of it, but the latest update, .8. I think it might be
Vic:Mm-hm.
John:10.8, whatever the latest update is. They really improved their Git integration as well.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:Yeah.
John:So you can have a look at your commit tree comments and branches and everything. And
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:it is so sweet. All within Nova. So, yep. Hats off to Panic. Honestly, it is a great
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:app and it is worth it, I think. Even though I was humming and harring and I was annoyed
John:at the time. I did it anyway. And the fact that I did it anyway is a testament to how
Vic:Yeah.
John:good it is, I think. So, yes. Yeah. Yeah. No, it is a fantastic app. So I just wanted
Vic:I mean, honestly speaking, the subscription pricing on it does kind of hurt.
Vic:But if you're gonna get use out of it and really appreciate it,
Vic:that's not too bad of a price for the kind of tool that it is.
Vic:It's very nice.
Vic:And it's just, nothing comes close to it to me.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:to mention by way of, yes, I finally pulled the trigger and I rescind my previous frustration.
John:I just did it. Anyway. All right. Moving on. So I want to start now talking about the first
John:thing, which is last time we spoke on this show, we talked about my impending arrival
John:of an iPhone 15 Pro Max. So, yes. So I did actually buy one only a few days afterwards,
Vic:Correct.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:after we recorded, I believe. So I know that was a few months ago, but I have been using
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:my iPhone 15 Pro Max now for a couple of months, with its leather case. Sorry, guy. And it
John:is, it's, I mean, honestly, of course I'm going to say this because the phone I have
John:now is my favorite phone of all time. Like my favorite lens and the camera is the newest
John:one I just bought. So, but this, this phone, my only complaint with the Max size has always
John:been damn it's heavy. And so if I put it in shorts that I'm wearing and those shorts don't
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:have like original elastic that actually holds up, it just, my pants start falling down,
Vic:Mm.
John:it's, it's like, the thing is a brick. I didn't, no, no screw belts. I'll do belts for work.
Vic:Gonna need a belt.
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:No.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:That's it. Anyway, so, no, this is my back pocket. That is my back pocket. I'm talking
Vic:Is it any better if you put it in your back pocket?
Vic:Sorry, Clay.
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:Okay, this is your back pocket.
Vic:All right, carry on.
John:about my back pocket. Yeah. Anyway. All right. So bottom line is it is an amazing phone and
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:comparing it to an iPhone 12, which is a three year jump, clearly I'm going to say that.
John:So I've done a lot of video and I've done a lot of photos with it and I've been comparing
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:them in so like daylight, low light conditions, yeah, both video and still photos in both.
Vic:Oh.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:And I've also been doing some spatial videos, which we'll talk about later on. But for the
Vic:Okay.
John:moment, I guess my, my, my thinking, my thoughts on the camera is I was, I was buying it mainly
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:for the ability to do zoomed in video so that I could take it into indoor sports without
John:having to sign the damn waiver saying, yeah, here's a blood sample, here's a DNA sample,
John:here's a whatever sample, you know, driver's license, sign your life away. So I can now
Vic:Mm-hm.
John:go into these games and not have to worry about any of that, which is great. And there's
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:I'm assuming we're talking about that new 5x lens.
John:plenty of other parents that do exactly what I do. Yes. Although for indoor, for indoor
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:basketball, unless I'm right down the other end of the court, 2X is fine of the other
John:end of the court and they're playing down the other end at the moment, then that's the
John:only time I'd need the 5X. 2X is generally enough when I'm doing video. So 5X is great
Vic:Mm.
Vic:That's cool.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:for cricket. If I'm out in the boundary line, it gives passable video. It's not as good
John:obviously as 300 or 400 mil lenses that I've had in the past for my other camera, but it
Vic:Mm-hm.
John:is much nicer video in my opinion, because they, all of Apple's, I don't know, they do
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:a lot of video image processing and stuff. So they, they've got a lot of that. Whereas
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:I don't think that the Nikon is as good at it. So I don't know, I don't know how to describe
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:it, but 4K video out of my phone and 120 mil on the 5X is better than the equivalent out
John:of my Nikon. So take what you will from that. The flip side of it though, is the photos,
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:well they aren't. So in low light, in daylight conditions, it's not as, it's no contest in
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:daylight conditions. I could use either and you wouldn't be able to tell the difference.
John:So having the Nikon there with me is not going to get me that much better a photo than I
Vic:Yeah.
John:can take with my phone in good lighting conditions, which is great. But at nighttime, still photos
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:on the iPhone 15 are absolutely terrible of moving action. It's just, you don't even bother.
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:I tried it just to prove my point. There's just not enough light. It just, it just not
John:enough. It will not work. Yeah, if you stay still, that's fine. If you're moving, it will
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:I think all of their algorithms and stuff focus on still photography for low light.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:simply be terrible. So there is no substitute for having a camera, like an 85 millimeter
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:F 1.8 lens. You will not beat that or a 70 to 200 F 2.8 or F2 if you're good enough to
John:afford something like that. You cannot beat that if you're trying to take still photos
John:in low light conditions. So that still wins, but for video, it's fine. And I suspect the
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:reason is because there's a lot of computational video going on in the background on the phone.
Vic:Mm.
John:So it'll probably comparing like previous frame to next frame and compensating for lighting
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:levels and you'd, and if you do it, yeah. And if you actually pause and try and extract
Vic:Right.
Vic:Just doing a lot of cleanup.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:a frame, it's no better than an, a still photo. So it's a little bit mind bending, but because
John:you're, because it's moving video, the resolute, the sharpness of it is less apparent. So in
John:any case, I'm happy with it in that regard, but it will never replace my Nikon for still
John:photos in low light. It will never do it for sports, but that's okay. I kind of figured
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:that going in. But other than that, it's been a fantastic phone. It's, it is a little bit
John:on the big and heavy side. The bigger screen has pluses and minuses. Obviously it's been
John:well discussed on many, many by many people, but I did it for the 5X camera and I don't
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:regret that choice. So that is now my phone for the next three years. And yeah, so there
John:you go. Any thoughts or questions? I do. I'm currently enjoying the USB-C for data transfer,
Vic:You got USB-C, too.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:but I, what I want to do is I want to invest in a USB thumb drive. I have, but my problem
Vic:I was gonna say, have you tried the thing where you just basically offload your video directly to external storage yet?
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:is that none of my external drives have a fast enough write speed. They're all quite
John:old. I haven't bought a, an external drive recently. The only drive I bought recently
Vic:Gotcha.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:is connected to my lightning node and I can't really disconnect that and use it cause that
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:will, then I'll lose all of my, I'll lose my, I'll lose my SATs. So I can't use that
John:one. So I need to buy another one. Yeah, man, don't lose your SATs. But look, I, I need
Vic:Don't wanna lose your sets.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:to go and buy one, but it's not just that simple because you also need to buy one that's
John:got the right shape. Cause the USB-C hole in the base of the, the case that I've got,
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:Mm-hm.
John:it has an, it has like a certain shape to it. So if you don't get one that has a matching
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:shape, it won't fit. Yeah. Cause I tried, I've got a, I've got an adapter that does
Vic:Some of those are kind of a tight fit, aren't they?
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:USB-C to USB-A and it won't fit. Like it just won't fully insert when the case is on. And
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:so I've been doing my research and everything. I just haven't taken the plunge yet. I need
John:a spare 60, 70 bucks. It's on the, it's on the wishlist, but not very high on the wishlist,
John:I guess. Alrighty. So we'll talk about special videos in a minute. Now I don't think I've
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:talked about my 3D adventures on this show with the, the, the Fujifilm FinePix Real 3D
John:camera. I talked about that on Is This The Show? So I just want to give a quick rundown
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:of this. So in August last year, I bought myself a odd birthday present. I bought a,
John:a 3D camera, which was the most popular, highest rated 3D camera to date and like consumer
John:level. And this particular camera was notable for several reasons is it had a lenticular
John:display on the back. And it also allowed you to record video in 720p as well as take 3D
John:photos. And it's, it was a, it's a beautiful camera. And I, when I bought it, I got it
John:secondhand at a, at a, a pawn shop, I suppose you would say. Secondhand store, whatever
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:you want to call it. Cost me about 200 something. I think it was 200 bucks. I forget now, something
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:like that anyway. And I didn't notice it in the store, but the left hand lens sensor has
John:a single vertical row of pixels that's dead, which you can compensate for in post-production,
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:but it's just annoying. But what I was doing is I was trying to prove to myself that 3D
Vic:All right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:videos were worth the trouble and 3D videos as well. And my son had at the time an Oculus
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:Quest 2 and the Oculus Quest 2 now they prefer that it's called a MetaQuest because of course
John:Meta bought it, AKA Facebook, AKA Zucker, whatever. Mark Zuckerberg, anyway. And so he, they,
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:he basically said, "Here, borrow my head, my VR headset." And I wanted to test and see
John:whether or not it was actually worth it. So in order to convert the file formats on the
John:3D camera, the Fuji one, they do their own format called MPO for their video files and
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:such. And the JPEGs are actually, when you open them, you can't tell that they are in
John:fact 3D photos. So you had to convert them into the, the generic, what they call side
Vic:Mm-hm.
John:by side format. So you basically get two images, one on the left, one on the right. So it looks
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:like a big, long rectangle. And anyway, so what I learned and there, there's an app called
John:Stereo Photomaker. It's only runs on Windows, but you can run as a crossover app on your
John:Mac, which is what I did. But I tried a whole bunch of them and that was the one I preferred.
Vic:Mm-hm.
John:In any case, I converted all the Fuji photos across into side by side, loaded them into
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:this, this application on the, that I bought for the MetaQuest 2. And it's called Pegasus.
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:So I think Pegasus, but with the word pig instead of peg. Anyway, so yeah, it's weird,
Vic:Mm.
Vic:Did you put lipstick on it?
John:but I did not put lipsticks on my Pegasus. No, I did not. I probably could have, but
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:you know, nevermind. Anyway, so I found that video was pretty much almost a waste of time
Vic:Okay.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:Mm.
John:on that thing. Cause the depth issue, like if you didn't have the subject right up close
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:to you and you're just taking 3D film of a scene in front of you, and there was like
John:a group of people that are playing cricket or they're just wandering around or doing
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:whatever, you lose that 3D effect. It's like, it's not very striking. It's not very compelling.
John:And when I took photos of an individual subject that was right up close to me, like within
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:a few feet of the lens, that's when I'm like, whoa, this is, this is really impressive.
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:Like it is very, very impressive. But I was looking at it on MetaQuest 2 and the MetaQuest
Vic:Yeah.
John:2 does not have very good resolution at all. So I was really keen to see what it was like
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:a few months later when my son just, you know, basically caved in and bought himself a MetaQuest
John:3, which is a much newer, much higher resolution, much better headset, but still not as good
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:as an Apple Vision Pro, but certainly very, very good. And then as a comparative, I then
John:loaded the same photos into the MetaQuest 3 and the ones that looked good on the MetaQuest
John:2 looked amazing on the MetaQuest 3. And I'm just like, okay, this is definitely something.
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:Yeah.
John:But the problem with this camera, yeah, I know. Oh, I know. Oh, it's awesome. I got
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:a hand-me-down of a MetaQuest 2 from my son. So that's the first time I've had a reverse
John:hand down. It's kind of cool. It's a hand-me-up. Anyway, so, so there's the, the, the thing
John:that's, the biggest problem I had with this camera was that the video it took was only
John:720p. And this camera was made in 2012, 2010. It had no real decent image stabilization
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:at all. The dynamic range was, was terrible. And unless you're in really good light, it
John:was, it was grainy. It took amazing 3D photos, still photos was fantastic. And the interpupillary
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:distance, the gap between the lenses and such to match your pupils on the Fuji was 75 millimeters,
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:which was actually what's recommended because it'll, it'll essentially be more the average
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:for a human being. So what you're seeing will be more representative. Unfortunately, yes,
Vic:Like the spacing between your eyes.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:exactly. So in any case, I was itching once I got the, because that was one of the decisions
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:between getting the iPhone 15 Pro or Pro Max was the ability to take spatial videos. So
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:let's now talk a little bit about that. So one of the reasons I wanted to do it is because
John:I wanted to continue taking spatial videos or what Apple calls spatial videos, 3D videos.
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:Now the, the iPhone 15 Pro or Pro Max, the, the IPD, the distance between the lenses is
John:only 20 millimeters, which is nearly a quarter of what that is on the Fuji. And I was highly
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:skeptical. I mean, very, very, very skeptical that this would actually produce an effective
John:3D, 3D effect. And on the, on the plus side, you know, it's integrated into a device that
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:I don't have to, that I'll be with me anyway, most of the time. So unlike the Fuji, which
John:I got to take with me and make sure I charge it and all that other good stuff, the phone
John:will be with me at all times. So, you know, the best camera being the camera that you've
John:got on you, figure, you know, that's a, that's a, that's a positive. So you can do these,
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:these on the Pro and the Pro Max. And I actually installed the public beta before it was formally
John:released back in late 2023. And there's an app called Spatialify. It's currently in test
John:flight and in iOS test flight, and you can convert your, your spatial video to side-by-side
John:format, and then you can view it in any VR headset on the market. So that's exactly what
John:I did. You can also adjust the eye distance in the app between 20 millimeters and 70 millimeters.
John:It defaults to 36. I haven't actually played too much with that and looked at the resulting
John:output, but I leaving it at the default of 36, the export looks fantastic and it's, it's
John:not an issue. So you can also support in half side-by-side, full side-by-side, which is
John:what I use, half over under and full over under, just different formats. But I ended
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:up using full side-by-side. It just worked best for the, for the Quest. Now, obviously
John:these videos on Apple Vision Pro, they aren't going to require anything like that. It'll
Vic:Right.
John:be fine as it is. So you don't need to worry about it. In any case. So yes. And the other
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:thing that got me that I, it didn't occur to me at the time, cause I assumed, Oh, it
John:records 4k video. So you'll be recording 4k, you know, spatial videos. Not true. They're
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:Mm-hm.
John:only 1080p at 30 frames a second, which yeah. And I initially I'm like, Oh, that's ridiculous.
Vic:I was gonna say, that's what I thought I remembered.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:Maybe they'll, they'll, they're doing this in steps and I'll do it as a software update
John:down the road. But then I sat down and did the math and I'm like, Oh yeah, okay, now
John:I get it. So the problem is that the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max, that whilst it has three
John:lenses, only two of them are genuinely side-by-side. So whilst you can correct algorithmically for
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:having only 20 millimeters of IPD, it's more difficult in the vertical axis to correct
John:for it. So you're not going to use the zoom lens. So you end up using the one on the right
John:hand side. Well, when, when your phone lenses are pointing at the subject and the phone
John:screen is facing you, the one on the right hand side is the 48 megapixel, 24 millimeter
Vic:Right.
John:main camera. And the run on the left hand side is the ultra wide, which is only 12 megapixels.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:So initially I thought, why? Well, you know, the one on the right hand side is 80, 64 by
John:60, 48 raw. And I scale it down, of course, unless you want the raw. But in any case,
John:the ultra wide is 40, 32 by 30, 24. So you would think that there is enough pixels there
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:to do 38, 40 by 21, 60, which is 4k. But what you've got to do is compensate for the fact
Vic:Mm-hm.
John:that the focal lengths are completely different. It's almost 50%. It's almost half. So the
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:ultra wide is 13 millimeters and the standard main is 24 millimeter effective. So that is
John:a problem. It means that basically you have to crop in on your 13 mil and that crop in
John:to meet, reach an equivalent of 24 millimeters is 2184 by 1638. So there's not enough vertical
Vic:Doesn't quite make it.
John:lines. No, you can't do 2160. You could interpolate, you could probably like do some weird computational
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:stuff, but the left hand side of it would be dodgy. So I think Apple just said, nah,
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:we'll just stick with 1920 by 1080. Now, the thing that got me though, when I was doing
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:all this investigation, Vic, and playing with it in the beta, I was like, oh, this video,
John:this is a cool thing, right? Because there's a little image, an icon of the Apple Vision
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:Pro and you can tap on that and it'll automatically default you into spatial video settings. But
John:you can only do that in video. You can't do that for a still photograph. And I'm like,
Vic:Really?
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:yeah, why? Why not? I mean, I can take a 3D photo with my, yeah, I know, I can take a
Vic:That's a bummer.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:3D photo with my Fuji camera from 14 years old, 14 year old camera, and it looks great.
John:Why can't I do that with this camera? It's video only. Now, I don't know why, if I'm
John:missing something obvious, maybe I am, but I'm hoping that there'll be a software update.
Vic:It seems if they could get that pretty good for video,
Vic:then a still photo should be easier, I would think.
John:I would think too, and I don't get it. I suspect that it'll come down the road, but I just,
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:I don't get it. I don't get it. So maybe I'm missing something obvious. I don't think so.
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:So we'll see what happens with that. But most interested in this focus on what it can do,
John:which is the video. So as I said, my son purchased a MetaQuest 3, and again, the resolution is
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:fantastic. So I took and went through the same exercise, but unlike stereo photo maker,
John:Spotify is actually super easy to use. You basically just say, open up my photo library
John:and it'll show you all the photos that are spatial, I'm sorry, videos that are spatial,
John:and you just select one and choose the export format and away you go. I just put those onto
John:my Synology. So I load all of these, yeah, I load all my videos onto the Synology in
Vic:That's cool.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:the control, you go into the control panel and you go to the media indexing and you re-index
John:the video folder. And then it magically shows up in the DLNA UPnP folder in Pegasus. And
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:then you can just look at the videos. So honestly, I got, I was saying I crept up on my son.
John:So my son was cooking something in the kitchen and I walked up to him taking a spatial video
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:and I was getting close to him and he had the spatula and he was all, the egg flipper,
John:I should say. And he was, you know, he had the flip of thing anyway. And I said, Oh,
John:Hey, Hey Ben, I'm trying the spatial video thing. And he gets the spatula and he comes
John:up and he's waving it right in front of my face. And I'm like, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa. You
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:know, okay, let's just, you know, back off. It's all good, mate. Anyway. So then I go
John:and put that video in the MetaQuest 3 and I'm watching it and it pops in my face so
John:much. It felt very much like, you know, my son was essentially going to whack me in the
John:face with the flipper. And so it was mind-blowingly impressive. It was seriously, honestly, and
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:because it was 1080p and it was on a MetaQuest 3, the quality was exceptionally good. And
Vic:That's cool.
John:it's more, yeah, it's more or less at that point where I'm like, I may not get one immediately,
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:but I know I will eventually get an Apple Vision Pro because it will look even more
John:amazing. I have no doubt about that. It's just, wow. You know? So, but the same learnings
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:from the Fujifilm apply here because the laws of physics are the laws of physics. Like you
John:need to get close enough to the subject such that that extra eye view gets depth perception.
John:The further away you go, trigonometry tells you the angle gets too low. Yeah. And you
Vic:You lose that.
John:lose that depth. And there's just nothing you can do about it. It's just physics. So
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:honestly, Vic, I'm thoroughly impressed. But the questions I have, well, that's what I
Vic:I wonder if they'll ever start putting a camera lens on each end of the phone for that.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:thought they would do. And we talked about this a month ago, maybe even a year ago. And
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:I said that it was inevitable that they were going to introduce 3D video recording and
John:photo photography on iPhones to make people want an Apple Vision Pro, which is exactly
John:what they did. I mean, I'm not claiming that was like, oh, hey, I predicted the future
John:because it was so bleedingly obvious if you didn't see that and you just weren't thinking
John:about it. But the problem is that what I got wrong is, well, why didn't they do that for
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:still photos? And the other thing is, why only 1080p? So, and I'm stunned when they
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:put those lenses so close together, because clearly what they're doing is they've said,
John:well, we want our lenses in a lens cluster and we'll just compute our way out of it.
John:So I think that if you were to have them on extreme ends of the phone, I think it would
Vic:Mm, yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:actually give you slightly better 3D representation. But maybe they just figured in all of their
John:testing that computationally they can adjust the IPD and they get information that's good
John:enough. I don't think computation can solve the problem because it's like the whole, if
Vic:Yeah, well.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:you close your left eye and then you close your right eye, you will see different information
John:because different light from a different angle is hitting the 3D, coming off the 3D object
John:you're looking at. You can't fake that. You can't. Yeah. So, you know what I mean? It's
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:Right.
John:like, it's, yeah, it's never going to be quite as good, but you know what? Irrespective,
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:I was, yeah, I know, right. It'll be uneven, uneven, I tell you. Bottom line is that I
Vic:But the ugliness of two camera bumps, John.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:am absolutely pumped, excited about the Apple Vision Pro just for this feature alone. And
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:I know that there's so much more that it can do, but for me, this is its killer feature.
John:It always was. I just needed to satisfy myself that it was worth it. And I think it is, even
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:though I haven't tried Apple Vision Pro yet, I know that the step up from the Quest 2 to
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:the Quest 3 was massive. And the step up from the Quest 3 to the Apple Vision Pro, reportedly
John:by people that have used it, is a step up again. So I have no doubt whatsoever that
John:one of these is in my future. I just don't know how far down the road and which kidney
John:I'm selling. But anyway. I could, yeah, I could do that too. It's only a question of
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:Thought you were gonna say which kid you're selling first.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:Hm.
John:which is more painful. And I'm like, hmm, maybe selling the kid is less painful. We'll
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:The one of mine, yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:see. Dear me. But anyway, so I guess we can talk a little bit also about the, because
John:when I was doing the notes for this, the Apple Vision Pro had not actually been released
Vic:Right.
John:yet for sale. Now it's up for sale. Yeah, that's right. Have you had a chance to have
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:a look through the updated website? Why is Scott convinced you'll buy it? That is, do
Vic:No, not really.
Vic:I actually don't have a ton of interest in this product.
Vic:Although, Scott is convinced I'm going to buy one, but I don't really have a ton of interest in it.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:Because I buy everything Apple makes.
Vic:[LAUGH]
John:you have a Pro Display XDR? Do you have a Mac Pro? Anyway, rather than Scott not be
Vic:I do not.
Vic:I actually have a lot of things Apple makes I don't have.
Vic:I do not.
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:in the room to defend himself, I'm sure he has his reasons for thinking this. But irrespective,
John:I went on the website yesterday and had a bit of a scour through it. And they've got
Vic:Mm.
John:a couple of videos up there, like the making of it, which is always fun to watch the making
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:of videos. And so the making of this thing is like, oh, cool, that's how they do that.
John:And oh, wow, that seems excessive and over the top, but whatever. And yeah, so a little
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:minute and a half thing about the making of the Apple Vision Pro, and it all looks very
John:cool. But the one that's also interesting is there's a seven, eight, nine minute video,
John:I forget what it is. It's like introducing Apple Vision Pro. And it's supposedly the
John:first time this person has used it. So there's, I forget her name, Alexandra or something
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:like that, whatever her name is, introducing it to this guy. And this guy apparently never
John:used it before. And so she's like, well, you look at this and you do that and you do this
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:and you do that. And it's a bit cringy, but it kind of gets the point across. Because
John:I had wondered, well, how do you adjust the screen size? How do you move the windows around?
Vic:Mm-hm.
John:And it's like, okay, so you look at the corner and then the control will magically appear
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:and then you pinch and grab it as you're looking at it. And then you can drag to increase the
John:size of whatever. And it's like little details like this that aren't obvious from the previous
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:videos at WWDC, they walk through some of those basics. So that'll definitely help when
John:people go to use this thing and understanding how to use it.
Vic:Mm-hm.
John:So that was good. I watched that whole thing twice just to get my head around it and it
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:all looks pretty good. But yeah, going through the order page. So there's three models. You
John:can get a 256 gig, 512 gig and one terabyte model. Obviously each model as you go up has
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:a new insane step up in price because Apple storage rip off, blah, blah, blah. Of course,
Vic:Right.
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:of course. I mean, they're consistent, they're consistent and no, I'm not going to get anything
John:more than a 256 gig. You gotta be kidding me. I don't care. I will cycle through stuff
John:before I pay those prices. Thank you very much. Anyway. So the other, I don't have a
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:Just curious, what is the one terabyte?
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:lot of stuff in front of me, but, and yeah. You may have to scan your face. It won't let
Vic:Hold on a second, I'm looking.
Vic:Get started.
Vic:I'll grab an iPhone.
Vic:I don't want to grab an iPhone to find the right.
Vic:I, no, I don't want to scan my face.
Vic:I can't.
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:you. So this is the thing, right? Is that, so when you do this, there's an app clip.
Vic:Wait, wait, wait, one terabyte, 38.99.
Vic:Jeez.
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:I think that's a better, better price than the laptops.
Vic:34.99, 36.99, and 38.99.
John:It is, but it's still not worth it. We can buy one terabyte solid state drive for under
Vic:But I agree, it's not worth it.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:I, yeah, I know.
John:a hundred bucks. Please, you know, no, just no. Anyway. All right. So the, yeah, what
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:was I going to say? Yeah, right. So the, the Apple vision pro website, when you log into
John:on Apple, when you go to the Apple website, there's an app clip. And so you hold your
John:phone up to the app clip. It downloads this app clip, and then it just scans your face.
John:And it's very analogous. If you've got a phone has to have face ID. If you've done the face
John:ID set up, that's all it is. It's effectively the same kind of thing. And you just got to
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:move your head around in a couple of times. And it says, yep, I got your face. And I was
John:like, great, please don't do anything dodgy with that. And Apple says, yep, we've picked
John:your light shield. And they're not going to tell you what the hell the light shield is,
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:but you know, just trust us, you know, good one. Great. Anyway. So once you've done that,
John:then you go through and you select the option that you want. And then you can talk about
John:your lenses. Now, the thing that's interesting is that they say very clearly in there that
John:the Zeiss inserts will not work if you have a prism setting on your lens and your glasses
John:prescription. Now, unfortunately for me, I lost my, it, yeah, the, the problem is it's,
Vic:What does that mean?
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:I think it's a barrel correction for barrel distortion. So I didn't have time to look
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:into this before the show, cause I only went up, you know, I only looked at this yesterday,
John:but and I was busy yesterday, but yeah, at this stage, my understanding is if you've
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:got multifocal lenses, it's probably going to be an issue. If you wear glasses for distance
John:viewing or for reading, it's not a problem, but if you've got multifocals, it's going
John:to be an issue. So they basically said, if you've got a prism value, then you basically,
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:you can't get a lens for it. Sorry. So I don't know the jury's out as to how this is going
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:to work. Correct. Yeah. So Syracuse's eyes rather like mine we have two scripts, one
Vic:This is like where Syracuse was talking about,
Vic:which of my prescriptions do I need?
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:for distance viewing and one for up close, or in his case, one for computer work which,
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:you know, so the way that a lot of people with this condition, you know, which is just
John:called getting old, I guess everybody, oh dear, it's an inevitable condition for most
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:It's a condition we all have.
Vic:[LAUGH]
John:of us, you know? Oh my God. Anyway, nevermind. Nevermind at all. Anyhow. Yeah. Anyway. So
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:yeah, we, so you can get contact lenses for your distance vision correction, and then
John:when you want to do reading up close, you can then put just normal readers that you'll
John:buy at the chemist or drug store and put them over the top. And that's what I did there
John:for a while. But what I don't understand is, is that therefore a viable solution if you're
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:wearing the Apple Vision Pro? Like would you wear contacts for distance viewing and then
John:get the readers inserts, which are only a hundred bucks US versus the prescription,
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:you know, 149s. But I'm just, like I said, I need to understand, and other people will
John:figure this out. And this is one of those few things that I'm grateful that it's launching
John:in the States before it's launching here. Cause I, the Americans, you're all going to
John:be guinea pigs for me and you're going to figure this stuff out. So I'll just sit back
John:and watch and let you work through the detail. Okay. And then once you've figured all that
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:out, I'll be like, aha, now I know I need to do. So anyway, I do need to get new glasses.
John:These ones are getting close to three years old. So I looked at the script the other day
John:and these lenses are scratched up to hell and I need new ones. So this time I'll be
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:a little bit more careful about it, but I'd like to go in there and say, oh, you know,
John:I need a copy of my prescription because last time I, they give you one when you buy the
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:glasses, but I've can't find it. It's, it's gone somewhere. So I need to get that again.
John:So while I will ask them these questions once I know, cause I mean, it may well be that
John:if you need two different kinds of lenses, the only way to do it is like I say, pop on
John:contact lenses and then get the readers inserts and then you've got the full range of vision.
Vic:Right.
John:Otherwise it might just be that it's tuned for up close. It might be tuned for distance.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:I don't know. It depends on how they've engineered it. Anyway. So yeah, finally exciting. So
Vic:Yeah.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:they'll, they'll be available on the 2nd of February, which will be probably about a week
John:after this episode goes live. And yes, to all the guinea pigs out there, let me know
Vic:Mm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:how it goes.
Vic:Okay.
John:Yeah.
Vic:I won't be one of them.
Vic:My only interest in it really is honestly, I'd like to watch TV.
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:But I'm also pretty fond of my actual real Dolby Atmos surround sound system.
John:Yeah.
Vic:And spatial audio and AirPods and stuff is really nice, but
Vic:it's just not gonna compete with that.
Vic:And also there's a $3,500 price tag to watch TV with it.
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:And then using it as an external display for my MacBook Pro would be really nice too.
John:Yeah, yeah, exactly. Indeed. See the other thing to keep in mind too, Vic, is that if
Vic:But again, $3,500 price tag on it.
Vic:It really kind of curbs my enthusiasm for this product.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:you want to have a, a private experience, you need your AirPods. And then what I, so
Vic:Mm-hm.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:what I had is a situation where I, my son's AirPods met the dryer. And so I bought new
John:AirPods pro and gave him my old ones. Anyway. I did that two months before they released
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:the USB-C version. Now I don't, there was nothing on the specs for the AirPods pro USB-C
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:version that jumped out at anybody as them being different. They were just a USB-C charging
John:case. Everyone just like shrugged. Let's, you know, nothing to see here. Turns out they
John:put in five gigahertz into the damn AirPods. And that's what the Vision Pro will use for
John:low latency audio. And I'm like, so I missed out on those AirPods by two months. I'm not,
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:not that I knew I needed to wait. So it's like, if I want to have that kind of an experience,
John:if I do get an Apple Vision Pro, I'm up for another set of fricking AirPods. Yay. So that's
John:annoying.
John:Yeah. The second gen of the second gen. Yeah, exactly. Don't call it the third gen. Aye
Vic:Yeah, this is the discreetly labeled second gen, second gen.
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:yai yai. Anyway. All right. So if you want to talk more about this, you can reach me
John:on the Fediverse at chichi@engineer.space or the network at engnet@engineer.space. If
John:you're enjoying Pragmatic and you'd like to support us and keep the show ad free, you
John:can by becoming a premium supporter. Just visit engineer.network/pragmatic to learn
John:how you can help this show to continue to be made. Thank you. A big thank you to all
John:of our supporters. A special thank you to our silver producers, Mitch Bilger, Shane
John:O'Neill, Lesley, Kellen Fredelius Fujimoto, Jared Roman, Joel Maher, Katarina Will, Chad
John:Juring and Ian Gallagher. And an extra special thank you to our gold producer, Stephen Bridle
John:and our gold producer known only as R. Pragmatic is a podcasting 2.0 enhanced show and with
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John:subtitles on selected episodes. And you can also stream sats and boost with messages if
John:you like. There's details on how along with the Boostergram leaderboard for this and all
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:the shows on our website. If you'd like to get in touch with Vic, what's the best way
John:for them to get in touch with you, mate?
Vic:You can find me in most places at Big Hudson 1.
John:There you go. I cringe every time I hear that domain. But anyway. Yeah.
Vic:I still have a Twitter/X account, although it doesn't get a lot of use.
Vic:And you can find me on the Fediverse as Big Hudson 1 at, no wait,
Vic:Big Hudson 1 at app.net, that's it.
Vic:Yeah, app.net.
Vic:[LAUGH]
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
Vic:Right.
Vic:[BLANK_AUDIO]
John:Yeah, I know. That's all good. Well, a special thank you to our supporters and a big thank
John:you to everyone for listening. And as always, thank you, Vic. It's always a good time having
Vic:Yes, thank you for having me.
Vic:I had a good time as well.