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From the
latest lenses to learning how to use your point and shoot, Photoxels is a mine of information on digital photography. The
site contains buyer's guides to latest cameras, covering all budgets.
My favorite
part of the site is the tutorials - these cover the fundamentals of digital photography, explaining how different kit works
and a glossary of terms which breaks down digital photography jargon into easily digestible chunks. The section of the site labelled "Special" contains articles on the history of
some of the major camera manufacturers.
If you have
soaked up all of the info in the tutorials and fancy putting it into practice, the "Special" section also contains a list
of international photography competitions and their entry criteria.
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Paul Thurrott's Supersite 4 Windows
Winsupersite.com
contains all of the up-to-date information you may need about future Windows versions, office suites, the Playstation, Xbox,
Apples OS X and much much more, and is updated weekly.
Created
almost 10 years ago, the site provides FAQs, guides, reviews, product comparisons, and screen shot galleries, video clips,
and a weekly podcast into products as far back as Windows 98, both during development and after their release. And the navigation
is really easy too. Just select your area of interest from the top menu or browse one of the newly added articles via the
list on the left hand side and follow the links from there. All articles are dated and arranged in clear lists with further
articles and relevant reading highlighted. The thousands of screenshots provide a great visual aid to the humorous articles,
making the normally dry topics really interesting for the casual reader. There are also videos of game trailers and gameplay,
along with windows tips. This site is not just about Microsoft products. There are honest reviews about the new iPhone, Sony
Playstation, Apple OS X, Linux and even Google. This is a fantastic site which should satisfy your technology and software
needs for weeks to come.
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Television
Obscurities plays host to a wealth of information about pilot shows, short-lived series and programmes that have been lost
or forgotten in broadcasters' archives. The homepage
is where you will find the video of the week. These tend to be trailers or clips of shows from the seriously weird end of
the spectrum.
The site
contains around 50 articles covering such topics as "the ten most outlandish TV concepts ever" and "famous faces do commercials".
The articles themselves are well written detailing the history of obscure shows or the reasons for a series being cancelled
in exhaustive detail.
Comments
and contributions from users who remember any of the shows featured on the site also help to add further information to the
discussions. This is an unusual but informative
site and great fun for anybody with an interest in TV history.
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Dark Horizons
has been running since 1997 and has become one of the most trusted sites on the web for movie news, reviews and the inside
track on film industry gossip. And by gossip I do not mean which movie stars are dating one another, this site deals with
the serious business of making movies. The site design is extremely clear and simple with all of the site's areas of interest
laid out at the top of the homepage. The news page is updated daily and brings together movie news from sources all of over
the world: the film section contains interviews with stars and directors as well as lots of confirmed information about upcoming
blockbusters. My favourite part of the site is the trailers section. In here you will find links to new movie trailers. This
site scores brownie points because its trailers are culled from all over the world, often containing different footage to
the trailers available in your own country.
There are
hundreds of movie news pages out there but this is a slick and very informative example of this kind of site.
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To hear
and find out about new music, we used to listen to the radio or read the music press, but the web is now one of the best places
to find and hear the latest tunes. Highly regarded by music journalists and one of the best sites for music fans has to be
Pitchforkmedia.com. This site is published daily and here you will find classic rock, hip-hop and electronica. All musical
tastes are catered for here. With a feel reminiscent of a magazine there is news and reviews about the latest singles and
albums releases. Plus there are features and interviews with rock royalty like Paul McCartney. So far so straightforward music
press. But it is the site's new music section which really shines. Pitchfork goes to great lengths to promote bands you may
never have heard of. A lot of the new music reviews also include streams of the tracks so you can hear what all the fuss is
about. Clicking on the Forkcast section of the site opens a page which includes streamed versions of featured tracks as well
as video content. This site acts as a great introduction to music and bands to watch out for. It is now so influential it
has even been sited with helping to launch the careers of bands like The Arcade Fire. What you mean you've never heard of
them ...
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Environment, Astronomy, Science & Technology
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Best Beaches of the World
Nowadays
when choosing a destination for a nice lazy holiday online you are kind of spoilt for choice. This site should help make that
decision a bit easier. While it might be called three best beaches, this site contains details of quite a few more than that.
The site lists beaches with the best sand, weather conditions, how much shade is available, if there are any beach sports
on hand and how easy they are to reach. The homepage has a featured beach which changes regularly - featuring a contributor's
review of the beach and its facilities, and in this case they have even shot a bit of video to illustrate the beach's best
bits. There is a world beach index, which is a bit small but the site encourages contributions from users, so you can always
suggest a beach to help fill out its database.
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A site for
all surfers and high flyers too. Windguru is a specialist weather site dedicated to providing detailed forecasts about - well
- the wind. If you windsurf, or sail, or even enjoy flying a kite, Windguru aims to take the guesswork out of when would be
the best time to do it. If you do not want to register, the site limits you to looking at predefined areas - but it is global
and forecasts offer a hour by hour summary up to seven days in advance.
While the
site offers a paid for service which includes maps and customised forecasts, the free section has plenty to offer most windsurfers
and "blows away" the general forecasts you might otherwise have to rely on.
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Space.com
is the resource for anybody with an interest in space flight, the stars and planets or astronomy.
This site
is so big it can take a while to navigate around it but the wealth of information it contains makes it well worth a visit.
The site is organized into categories such as spaceflight, technology and the night sky. The spaceflight section contains
up-to-date news about current space missions, here you will find the current training schedule for the international space
station and information about the latest privately owned space craft. These stories are accompanied by multimedia elements
which explain the technology involved as well as some pretty breathtaking photos. The science and technology sections host
more in depth articles about the latest space related discoveries, and technology is the home of the virtual tour of the solar
system. This is a cool little feature which includes photos and stats about planets along with CG diagrams explaining their
composition and atmospheres. Definitely the quickest way of taking a tour from Jupiter to Mercury. One of my favourite parts
of the site is the space views section which contains thousands of images of space and users are encouraged to upload their
own photos here. With contributions from astronauts such as Neil Armstrong and Eugene Cernan and noted scientists Space.com
is great site for anybody with an interest in the heavens above.
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