DPD fail!

Well, that's annoying. DPD just sent me an email saying they failed to deliver my order because no-one was available to sign for it... except I was there and I didn't hear the doorbell go. Fine, so the ninja delivery drivers strike again! Or not... because the tracking page thoughtfully included a blurry photo of where they've left the calling card:



That's not my flat. That's not my neighbour's flat either, or for that matter any building on my road. As it happens I do recognise it - it's a set of flats on another road with a completely different name a few minutes walk away with a different postcode.

I got in touch with ShopTo's customer service (with almost no waiting!) - they seemed equally puzzled by the whole thing but the best they could suggest was wait and see if DPD redeliver successfully on Monday, or get it sent to a DPD Pickup Shop for tomorrow (which I can achieve without the misdelivered calling card). So pickup tomorrow it is!


Edit: Eurogamer is reporting many fails with DPD deliveries today. Shame, DPD are normally a lot more competent than this.

Red 2741: Millennium Dome, cats, and rainbows, with bonus scanner repair

It's been a while since the last random film post, because my film scanner started making horrible droning noises and was failing to scan negatives correctly. It turns out there's a known issue with Nikon Coolscans, in that whatever lubricant they used in it gums up with age and makes the scanner mechanism stick. I'd previously tried opening it up and manually running the x-axis stepper back and forth but that was no longer helping so it was time for a more determined disassembly...

( Coolscan repair )

With that done it's time for another random film! Today's guinea pig is Red 2741, a roll of Kodak Gold 400-6 that dates from the turn of the millennium! This film has aged somewhat and the profile in Vuescan gives a rather greenish cast, but enabling Restore Fading gives pretty decent colours. It's actually doing a better job than some of the film profiles do...

( Photos! )