Seize the storm

Fitting with the day that I write this - we’re under a tornado watch right now.   I’m at home - working on Photo Ops.   Last month was a very tough month.   Work has really become a lot more demanding of my energy.   I get home and all I want to do is rest or do mindless things.   I also had a couple decisions I had to make regarding a few features.   I’ve had to scale back their implementation because I just don’t have time to get them done.   Those delayed features will make it into the first couple releases.   I also had to go back to one of the big features I was working on and add another sub-component first.  

I get an email or two every couple weeks asking me about Photo Ops.   I always tell them the same thing - I’m working on a new version that is going to be MUCH better than the old one.   If they want to stay informed of development, I offer to inform them once I’m closer to the release.   I also tell them to keep checking the website.   Now that summer is coming, I think things will free up a bit more and I’ll be able to devote more time to development.   With gas prices the way they are, my chasing will definitely be much closer to home.   I’d rather be done with Photo Ops first anyways.   See ya next month!

I didn’t get as much as I hoped for in this last month of development.   Sickness and reorganizing the office stripped some time away from me.   I have gotten a lot done though.   The program is performing much better.   I have some ideas on further fine-tuning the performance.   I’ve finished up the big portion that has taken the last two months.   As I stare at my to-do board, I have seven things left to do.   Some of them are big and others I should be able to finish in a weekend of hard work.   I still haven’t settled on a new name for Photo Ops.   I still slip and call it that among my friends.   Never fear though, work is progressing.   I continue to stick with two months out as my target.   It would be really nice to finish up before the summer.  

I have had a few emails asking to download Photo Ops.   I still have the link disabled.   I understand all the wants and needs for freeware.   I love it myself - I’ve even thought of going with open source.   From my perspective though - only two people have donated.   Time is money and in my view, if I’m saving you (eventually) hours of time, I think it’s worth a donation.   No one has ever sent me feedback that says the program sucks.   I have had plenty of feedback that says it’s quite the opposite or if it just had this one more feature, they would even drop their expensive photo editing program.   I’m not really trying to compete or bring another competitor down.   I plainly just want to save people some time.   Yes, I would like to make some money in the process - and as I’ve priced it so far (in my head), I really don’t believe I’m breaking the bank at all.   There are people who have told me what they’ve seen is worth hundreds of dollars.   As excited as I am about that, I won’t go that direction.   I want the program to be available to everyone, not just prosumers & professionals.

Here’s my nice dream statement:   Just you wait, I’m going to redefine photo organization.

I hope I live up to it.   Now I should get back to work.

At 255 hours now, I am anxious to get  (Better than Photo Ops)  out the door.   Unfortunately, I still have a lot of work to do.   I would guess at least another month or two.   This feature I’m working on right now has taken a lot of the wind out of my sails.   It’s not so much difficult (as it was in the beginning) but now just eats up a lot of time.   Some of the design decisions I made early on caused me to go back and have to refactor how I do some things.   Fortunately, it wasn’t across the entire program.   I’ve slowly been fixing a few bugs as I’ve found them - even finding a bug in my licensing code!   That definitely was not fun to find, nor fix.   I can’t reveal the new name yet - I’m waiting to debut it with a logo.   As always, I’ll continue to keep you updated!