Sunday 30 March 2008

Misc shots of Yoda

Sniff.. no poison ya?


Give it to me!!


You can't possible get a shot with my tongue out!


Leave me alone already..

Yoda feels the dark force..

[100% crop]


mmMmmMmmm the dark force.. I feel..

Lambency Flash Diffuser

I love this Lambency flash diffuser.. This would seem to be the only flash diffuser that I need. The one I got comes with 3 extra domes.. Clear dome comes in the box with patent pending.. the other 3, orange, yellow, blue came separate and seems to me a clone ;-). Whatever it may be, it works beautifully.

I must say it adds weight to the already heavy device.. and could be cumbersome.. but the illumination rocks!

Orange dome..


Yellow dome..


Blue dome..


Clear dome..


Domeless..


A shot with the orange dome.. take a look at the 'autumnish' illumination..

Yoda prepares for a snooze

Yoda loves his toys, amazingly he doesn't destroy them, this is one of his common maneuvers just before he rests/sleeps.. Bite on the toy and snore away!

Yoda 'looks'

The eye.. that sees the future.. [100% crop, no editing]


He is Yoda, master Jedi..

King Joseph

Introducing..

PETWORLD MALAYSIA 2008 - MID VALLEY DOG SHOW - 29 March 2008

PETWORLD MALAYSIA 2008 - MID VALLEY DOG SHOW - 29 March 2008

So I thought it'll be a fun event..

A group of fur kids and their masters..


Take a look at the crowd a.k.a promising response..


The ringed area for the various events..


So what's the problem here? Look at the amount of people and the space that was planned for? IMHO, terrible. I couldn't even get near. It was stuffy, it was planned in such a manner that it made me feel like the organizers were only interested to show but not to be watched.

So I was fed up and started wandering about.. and hey a Discus section!







There are lots of interesting events that masters show off their fur kids talents. Besides agility this is one I love most.

Sniff~ sniff~

Staff placing sanitized pieces of cloth..


A random piece is picked..


There, the chosen one..


Master is given the chosen piece to 'place' his scent on.. This master was thoroughly rubbing his palms with the cloth..


Off the fur kid goes in sniffing search.. There, that smells like me 'smelly' master..


Doggy picks it up and returns to the master..


Because I was already irritated with the arrangements.. I left right after this knowing there were more interesting events to come.. I recall a Border Collie was up next.. but..

What did I leave with? A blardy smudged chop on my hand. Even the clubs use far better ink..


I so got to get myself media seats.. any leads?

Saturday 29 March 2008

Queen Eunice Calls for Peace

In some parts of the world, people don't understand why some(if not a lot of) Asians show the peace/victory sign when they pose for shots. Some find it down right silly, I guess it's just different in different parts of the world huh?

This lil' girl automagically did this when I asked to take her photo.. Sweet!!

The art of hand rolling

Ok minus the 'hand' part.. I noticed quite a few people rolling their own ciggies when I was in Netherlands. I was tempted to try. So I tried n tried n tried to hand roll for 2 weeks.. and gave up..

What you essentially need;
Rolling tobacco (variety of flavors available)
Tobacco paper

What you optionally need;
Cigarette filter
Rolling machine

In this foto, you see all 4 items..


My secret device, the rolling machine! place the filter, evenly spread the tobacco(amount is up to ya preference)..


Then you close the machine and start rolling it downwards, one full roll will do just nice..


Next you take a piece of tobacco paper and slide one side in with the glue part facing you and do another roll downwards..


Leaving the last part of the paper out (this is where the glue strip is), slurpppp~ along and complete the roll..


Deng deng deng.. your hand rolled cigarette!

Wednesday 26 March 2008

Getting familiar with the 40D

Shot with the Tamron 17-50mm f2.8.


[click on the foto for the blown up doll]

ISO 100, 1/250 sec at f/5.6, Focal Length 25mm.


ISO 100, 30 sec at f/32, Focal Length 17mm.


30 secs and hardly any noise. I'm baffled.. One early comment, the auto iso function could sure use some tweaking.

Sunday 23 March 2008

Light Sculpture Done Bad

There's a writeup in this month's Digital Camera magazine describing light sculpture. Pretty interesting, this is my first try.. Haha don't know what I'm sculpturing but hell I was just waving my hand in mid air! Of course one is suppose to sculpture something meaningful if not nice to the eyes.


The magazine also includes a booklet with tips and hints for Photoshop and Elements. Digital Camera's March edition is a must buy!

I'm Lost..

One system to another.. I'm lost.. Here I am as puzzled as an overturned snail.. I didn't manage to get one sharp shot today.. darn it's embarrassing..

I'm a Jedi

Often you hear, are you on the dark side?

Dark side = Nikon
White side(what I aptly call The Jedi) = Canon

Why? If you notice, Canon's telephoto lenses are white. That's kinda self explanatory ain't it?

What I got myself today;

Canon EOS 40D (Body Only)


Tamron SP AF17-50mm F/2.8 XR Di II LD Aspherical [IF]


Now I gotta fast for the next 2 -3 months.

I first went with Konica Minolta Dynax 5D 2 years back. I love the camera, it is till today functioning very well!

I soon felt the gripe, accessories were a pain in the butt to get in Malaysia. Sure there were a few, and I had to hunt for it. Choices were terrible. Then Sony bought over Konica Minolta's photo imaging division. I thought it'll do good. Well it did, with Sony's muscles look at the progress.

So why change systems?

1. Take a look at the prices of Sony accessories for the DSLR. Ahem*
2. It's much easier to get stuff now, but still not to my expectations

I walked into many shops these few days hunting for the best bargains. The vast accessories readily available for Canon and Nikon DSLRs were so the damn welcoming! They were like yelling at me 'grab me! grab me!'

What's gonna happen to my Dynax 5D now? Hmmm..

Now let's go make some babies! Whoops.. I meant photos..

Saturday 22 March 2008

Lithium-Ion Batteries First Charge

When we buy electrical gadgets that comes with batteries, they usually come with Lithium-Ion batteries. Funny thing is, the seller will always tell you to charge the battery for the 1st time for no less than 8 hours.

Lithium-ion is a very clean system and does not need priming as nickel-based batteries do. The 1st charge is no different to the 5th or the 50th charge. Stickers instructing to charge the battery for 8 hours or more for the first time may be a leftover from the nickel battery days.
-- http://batteryuniversity.com/print-partone-12.htm

Google for more matching results.

Sunday 16 March 2008

Nice Puzzle Game on the iPhone

HuaRongDao is one of the first games I installed on my iPhone and it has been there all this while and survived all the upgrade (with re installation of coz). The objective of the game is to move the nasty fella (the biggest square block) the opening at the bottom.

Don't underestimate this game folks, level 9 and 10 individually took me over 30 mins to solve. So far I've only been able to solve these 2 levels only once. Retrying often leaves me stuck ;-)

HuaRongDao


Ange trying hard at level 9..

Donut oh Donut

so early for what?
sweet light lor..
regret o not?
Hell no ;-)

Donut my model..





Anyone wanna volunteer to groom donut? ;-) I'd love to photograph a grooming session!

Hmm.. now I wonder where the human factor came into place? :-)



After the session Ange introduced us to the best 'pork noodle' I've tried so far! Slurp~~~ That place I'd definitely be going back to..