Battle Station !

Some one had declared WAR to me.
Battle Station ! Battle Station !

Inilah barisan kita,
Yang ikhlas berjuang.
Siap sedia berkorban,
Untuk ibu pertiwi!

Sebelum kita berjaya,
Jangan harap kami pulang!
Inilah sumpah pendekar kita,
Menuju medan bakti!

Andai kata kami gugur semua,
Taburlah bunga di atas pusara.
Kami mohon doa,
Malaysia berjaya!
Semboyan telah berbunyi,
Menuju medan bakti!

You know who are you ! LOL

New Member

She is the latest member of my family. She was adopted by my father 1 week ago while she was wondering around the market somewhere near my house. Love her eyes, so naive and so cute.

What is her name ? Hmm... I'm not sure.

I'd been not keeping a dog for many many years. The last one I had before I headed to USM, Tronoh was a black dog where we shared our childhood together playing around the compound of my father's factory. Though cat is always my favourite pet, I could actually take care of a dog pretty well.

This little four legged creature would definitely plays an important role in my house: as the house guardian. It may not stop those people from coming into our house, but at least would give out some warnings to them and saying:"Stay away, or I'll bite !"



Anyway, although I have no problem with dogs, in fact, we like dogs, but I still prefer cats. Oh boy, how do I wish I could keep a cat. :D

Trying to be artistic

Today is Christmas. Merry Christmas.

I am bored. So, I try to be artistic today. Then I take these shot:

And this shot as well :


So, artistic or not ? LOL

It's a Winter Solstice Festival!

Time do flies like the Enterprise flying in Warp 8 towards the final frontier. Without much realise, 2008 really is coming to its ending already. And 4 days before the very commercialised Christmas is the Winter Solstice Festival; the winter festival for Chinese and the last festival before the CNY.

This year's Winter Solstice Festival is quite special to me because I'm celebrating the festival with my son. He had been discharged from the Hospital, and he is getting well everyday.

Yes, he may look cute at this moment. When I wish to rest my arm from holding him too long (hey, he is a 4kg++ baby !), this is what I get :

He literally transform from a pretty angel to a crying devil ! I think he is a Transformer fans already ! LOL

So, how was the tang yuan his grandmother cook during this festival ? Little Ee Young gave her these faces :

I think he likes the soup made by his grandmother. So do I! :D

Anyway, I wish all of you, Happy Belated Winter Solstice Festival ! :D

The year is coming to its end....

And I have nothing to share what happened in this year.

I supposed to leave this company and find another job, but I still stuck with current job with fake promises from the Management.
I supposed to get my title, but I do find out that a higher ranking title in Engineering world doesn't put me a better place.
I supposed to be a happy father, but now I'm thinking of him everyday; and I don't think thinking of him everyday is a happy thing to do.
I supposed to have completed my knowledge in photographing, but bad thing happened and forced me to a halt.

So, new year has come. Should I wish for new hope ? Hmm.... I better don't. Not all my new hope, in fact, none of my new year hopes materialised over my 30+ years of life. Hence, I better put it such a way that thank God that I'm still healthy, and I am still have a roof to cover me from all kind of weather and I still able to feed myself and my love ones and do not let them hungry.

Anyway, new year mar, must be happy one!

By the way, can I blog about Double Exposure ar ?

KL Walk

Last weekend were well spend. I received a message from George the Sony God saying he organised an outing with the Double Exposure gang and see if I wanted to join or not. Since I'm free over the weekend, so, why not ? So, I grab my trusty little Sony DSC H1 and joined the walk.

Who turned out ? Basri, KJ, Bryan, Christ, Ira, Shafiq and TC. Nine of us just nice of to make up a group to explore the heritage field of Kuala Lumpur.

So, what was our task ? George the Sony God said:"Try to find how bad our heritage buildings are beeing maintained ! Please limit to 50 shots only." Wait a minute, was it a task given from DE or what ? LOL. Anyway, what he tried to say was: train yourself to see and to plan your shots. He got his point lar. No point shot a lot and then come back to select our photos, right ? So, we headed to the heritage trail and start shooting ......

It was raining, and I have no idea what to shoot. I choice to get the detail instead.

I tried to be artistic while taking this photo! Haha

Sometime, if I can't get anything from looking up, I just look down and find the reflection on the water. I found this spot and the building ngam ngam being reflected such this way. I wanted somebody would had jump over the pool of water and I'd capture him half way jumping over the pool, and I figured out that would be a great picture. Yes, I'm "copying" one shot from Henri Carter's photo. :p

Some of us do not know this building is the Gallery Kuala Lumpur and KL Library. I wonder what is the Gallery showcasing at the moment... The ground floor seem to be so dark.... Anyway, something to say about this photo. I tried so hard to capture the building so that the lines are straight. But being not at the same level as the building, what I got still has the line senget a bit. I waited for the motorcycle to come into the scene to fill up the empty space of the foreground. I left in the car in this shot to show as a scale of the building size. But seem like some of us think the car is a distraction element....

I waited so long hoping the flag would "fly" up but the wetted flag is too heavy to be lifted up by the wind. This is the best shot I got on that day. Tree leaves and trunk were added in as a frame. Pretty simple and back to basic rule of photography.


The Cathedral of St Mary, Kuala Lumpur. I've been to this church before, and this is my 2nd time I entered the church. Well, being no inspiration what to shoot, I saw this cross on top of the building. The roof pattern behind the cross provide quite nice texture background.

Pattern pattern and pattern.

Everyone has their own story to tell....

Conventional analogue TV programme?

Or the digital, overpriced, repeated TV programme?
Your call.

It was a fun walk around KL, although the rain is the mood killing. We ended our journey by photo sharing session with some great critics and comments from the floor, and it was damn late by the time I reach home, and fell sick after that ! LOL

Oh, by the way, thanks to the Sony God's treat on the dinner. I had just a nasi lemak from Old Town Kopitiam only. Look like we all are good to him, huh ? LOL

May I .....

Some time, I think I asked too many questions.....

I wish I could bear the sickness....

I wish, I'm the one who sleep in the hospital, not you.
I wish, I'm the one who need to take that medication, not you.
I wish, I'm the one who need to suffer the sickness, not you.
I wish, I'm the one who take all the pain, not you.

Let me suffer, my dear sickness.
Let me host you, my dear bacteria.

Please leave him and come to me, my dear bacteria,
I could provide you good food, good accommodation and good playground.
I am a better play field than him, come to me please.
I will give you what ever you need, I'm swear to fulfil all your requirements.
No 2nd questions asked, your request is my command.
Please come to me, and leave Ee Young.

Please.

Yes, full frame !!

Full frame !!

Yes, finally, I venture into full frame camera !!!!!
But, it's not a DSLR but an SLR ! LOL

Introducing, my good old SLR, the Yashica FX-3 Super !


This camera is actually my eldest brother's one. He had, what should I say, "abandoned" this camera quite some time already. I accidentally found it one day in a cupboard in my parent's house back in Penang. To my surprise, it's function able.

It's a fully mechanical manual camera. No complicated buttons, no settings, no screen and it has only one shutter speed knob. And to my surprise again, this camera has a built in metering !!

How the metering function ? I think there is a light meter inside the camera and that require batteries, two small pill like batteries. There is a light meter indicator when view through the view-finder. If the exposure is correct, a green dot will be lighted. Red plus indicate over expose, and red minus tells me underexpose. If a red plus and a green dot is lighted, then that's about "1/2 EV compensation" (not sure correct to say so or not), and vice-versa if a red minus sign with green dot is "-1/2 EV compensation". Like a digital camera, half press the shutter and the exposure light will be indicated. Oh yes, the metering take in film ISO into account one.

The lens could be the kit lens for this camera. It's a Yashica made, and its a zoom cover from 35mm to 70mm, TRUE ZOOM, no crop one ! LOL. And the aperture range from f/3.5 - f/4.8. However, the aperture blade kaput already, and it's now a constant f/3.5 lens throughout the whole zoom range! Cool ! LOL

I just bought its "sensor" not long ago, and I'm proud to say, I've started snapping 2 pictures already ! LOL. How is the result ? Well, I have to wait for the next 34 exposures before I can tell. Hahaha...

So, I should no longer worry about white balance, I guest. But without any anti-shake mechanism build in either the body or the lens, I'd pray hard hard that my pictures would not be shaky ones.

Finally, one of my "should I or should I not" quentions got its answer. :D

Decision, decision, decision.

Hmm... one thing no good being an adult is to make decisions.

Every time when I look at my little one, what he does for the time being is eat, sleep and cry out loud. Does he need to decide when to eat ? When to sleep ? Or what to do next ? I don't know. But seem to me that he has nothing else to trouble himself but eat sleep and cry.

How good if our world is not that complicated....

Anyway, holding Ee Young on my hands and pamper him to sleep has became my meditation. I felt so peaceful during the pampering action and I am focus on him. When he slowly close his eyes and sleep soundly on my arms, I felt tranquillity around me. That is the time my mind is peaceful and I have no to worry much thing.

However, when I awake from my meditation, I still need to make decision on lots of things. The questions of should I or should I not still un-answered.

Well, I believe this "should I or should I not" quenstions will still be haunting me for quite sometime. I think I need to note down all my questions and start to try to answer them as many as possible.

Maybe some of them will be answered before CNY. I do hope so. Let's wait and see....

Empty.

Just emptiness.

Can you feel it ?

Should I or should I not.

I am haunted by this question day and night. Decisions upon decisions to be made, but seem like I'm not able to cast my answers to all the "should I or should I not" questions.

What had been haunting me spread widely from my personal matters to my career matters. Questions like should I continue or not, should I change or not, should I stay or not etc, remain unanswered.

Too many things happen in such a short one month period. I'm like a computer that has too many programs to run, and my processor is just has not enough resource to perform every task from each program.

I think I need to stop some "unnecessary programs" to free out some juice of my already over-ran processor. I need a rest at the moment.

Becoming a father is one big change in my life. This young fella is already showing his particular "sarcastic" behaviour and I can foresee we will have some hard time to "tame" this little monster...

Participating into Double Exposure competition really open my eyes. Being categorised as an"experienced" participant, which I do feel this "assumption" is un-fair to me, had never give me any advantage in this competition. Not only we were tested for our physical strength, but also stamina stability and our ability to take the mental pressure. I should not tell much about what had happened in DE as we had signed a "No Tell" agreement. :p

Anyway, since the year is coming to its end, I believe some of my "questions" will be answered shortly. What I need to do now is to re-arrange my mind and put all together and start to analyse the situation and make some drastic adjustments. What kind of adjustments ? Wait and see lar.

He took my camera away....

... but he could never stop me from taking picture with my other camera !

It's time for me to awake the deep buried knowledge of mine. Yeah, I play guitar when I was young. Gee, sound like an old man mumbling about thing he did when he was young.

Well, I must admit, I'm no more categorised as young people, and I'm neither been labelled as elite, but rather hanging somewhere in the middle of no where.

Anyway, since I've nothing to do to fill up my spare time now, why not I just start to play guitar ? Ee Young would love to listen to me playing him a song to put him to sleep. Hehe....

Oh yes, I still have my trusty little Sony H1 with me. The above shots were done by pointing my flash with my DIY grid at camera right to the guitar. Of course my H1 could not do WL with my flash, but I can find a way to do that. How ? Secret. LOL

No lar, no secret behind it. Just put my camera on tripod, set long shutter speed at about 2sec and pop my flash with test button.

Easy, correct ? Everyone can do that. No problem.

Time to miss him.

Yes, I do miss him.

Separating from him really made me think of him every hour. I do miss his crying sound, and the way he wonder this world with his bright eyes. He has such a cute way of sleeping, and he is my cure to all those stressful incidents that happened to me recently: the broke in, Double Exposure etc etc.


Such a small fingers but he do grab my finger pretty strong. I felt there is a bond between us, and I have the responsibility to guide him, and to bring him to this world, and to protect him from any harmful threat.

No matter what, you shall not left un-notice, my dear son. Though we are separated 360km apart, you always in my heart.

Thinking of you every time, any where.

Be well with your mother, Ee Young. She nurses you with her precious mother milk, and you shall be strong and healthy.

Be well, my dear son, be well.

Back to Basic

This is my first week after my camera been stolen from that filthy loathsome thieve! I am of sudden do not have an urge to continue writing my blog. Why ? I am not sure.

Though I had always remind myself that hey, no big deal. I just lost a camera, and I should be glad that me and my family are safe.

I am sad, really, deep in my heart, I am sad, because after one year of learning photographic skill, I am thrill to see my son is coming to me, and I am ready to start my recording of his growing stage and to make an album for him, but now I couldn't do this anymore....

Will I continue owning a camera after this ? I can't tell at the moment. To start from zero is not easy for me now, as I have a son to feed already. Raising a family is my current main priority and I could just put aside my other thing.

Meaning that, I might just as well forget about owning another DSLR and quit photography for good. Many has asked me not to quit photography so easily, but what can I do if I don't own a camera?

I must say my thankfulness to all my friends out there who had offer their help for me to stand up again. I am really touched to know that a member of Alphanatics had started a collection campaign for me to re-gain my gears. But I have to say "no" to this noble gesture. I should not accept such help from you guys as I still am able to raise by myself.

Thank you to those who had supported me and tried to help me to find this thieve in the web. I am really thankful of all your effort.

And now, I am back to basic, using my trusty camera-phone to do the photo taking.

Anyway, life still goes on, and the Earth never stops because of me. Nothing will bring me down, and I shall grow stronger and wiser each day. Mourning time had ended, and my life goes on.

Hmm... time to look for a PnS camera. Let me see what we have in the market.....

In the memory of

My Sony A700 and CZ1680

You will always be in my heart.
Farewell, my friend, my companion and my comrade.

He sleeps....

This little one sleeps with his left hand cover his left face. What a cute way of sleeping !

We did notice Ee Young has this cute sleeping habit when he was in his mother's womb; we saw him posing his left hand on his left face through the scan ! We didn't understand what he was trying to do, but we do now.


I do miss you, my little one. Especially what happened last night. I was relief that you were not with me when the robber broke into our apartment. No worry my little young one, I'm safe and sound here 360km away from you. Your mother had been sending your pics to me through handphone, and I'm glad you are well taken care of.


Sleep well, my son. Sleep well. You are unharmed from any danger. You are well protected. And you are loved.

Miss you so much, my dear Ee Young ! And do be gentle to your mum, will you ? :p

Today, is a day....

That I lost my beloved camera and lens, the A700 and the CZ1680. :(

As well as all my other lenses, the 50mm and the SAL 75300.

Because, a robber broke into my house, and took all my gears !

Not only camera, but watches; mine and my wife's watches. Which are so meaningful to us. And now they are gone.........

Curse to that bugger, he shall not live in peace ! Until his last breath !

And now, I am starting to miss my camera..... :(

I don't even had any chance to say farewell to my beloved camera and my lens.......

50mm on APS-C = 75mm on FF ?

Let's talk the Physics behind the lens, shall we ?

Ok, I have an APS-C sensor camera, and I have a 50mm lens. My 50mm lens is an old full frame (FF) lens. Meaning, it's made and used before the digital sensor camera was introduced into the market.

I know that APS-C sensors are smaller than the FF sensor. How small? I'm an engineer, hence I read numbers to comprehend facts. The size of a FF sensor is 35.9mm by 24.0mm so to give an area of 861.6 sq. mm. And the size of an APS-C sensor is 23.5mm by 15.6mm giving an area of 366.6 sq.mm. Thus, APS-C sensor is in fact smaller than the FF sensor.

Hmm... sound stupid I am, right ? LOL. Well, I have time to kill, hence, just talk some crap ! LOL

Anyway, when we talked about mounting an FF 50mm lens onto the APS-C DSRL camera, the correct focal length is no more 50mm, but to multiply a crop factor of the APS-C sensor. Hence, in my case, my 50mm lens is actually a 75mm lens on my trusty A700 camera.

Sound complicated, eh ?

Well, again, I'm engineer and I speak in numbers. To understand more about this focal length change from 50mm to 75mm, I turn to my STPM Physics!

Oh crap, I had returned all my physics back to my teacher after I left school about 10 years ago. Refer back to the text book is a wise move to refresh my deep buried knowledge of optical physics.


This Advance Level Physics textbook written by Nelkon&Parker is damn boring if compared to the University Physics textbook. Well, what could I expect from a textbook that is written and published by a Brit ? LOL


Ok, turn to the page where the textbook talk about the physics of optic. There is a thin lens topic with the the Lens Equation is being derived. Not to bored myself, I skip the derivation part, and straight search for the thin lens equation, that is

The Lens Equation !

1/v + 1/u = 1/f

where v = distance of object from lens axis, u = distance of image from lens axis and f = focal length of the lens.

So, I have my equation. Then how to show that a 75mm FF lens is actually 50mm APS-C lens?

Not to complicate the whole thing, I assume my lens is a single lens only. Hence, my focal length, f is 50mm.

Say I have an object of 600mm in height. Say to cast the image onto a FF sensor, the size of the image will be 24mm. Hence, the magnification factor, m = 24/600 = 0.04.

By definition, the Magnification Factor, m is v/u or size of image/size of object.
Therefore,

m = 0.04 = v/u
v = 0.04u

So, in the lens equation, rearrange, I got this

1/0.04u + 1/u = 1/50

Solve it, I got the distance of object is u = 1,300 mm.

These numbers say : when an object of 600mm in height is placed at 1,300mm away from a 50mm lens, the image size is 24mm on a FF sensor.

So, what happen if the same object is cast onto an APS-C size sensor?
The size of the APS-C size sensor is 15.6mm. Hence, the magnification factor is 15.6/600 = 0.026.

Since the focal length of the lens doesn't change, hence the f = 50mm. Solving the equations similar to the above give this

1/0.026u + 1/u = 1/50
u = 1,973.07mm

So, this number tells me, if I put my object at 1,973.07 mm away from the lens, the image size will be at 15.6mm on a FF sensor. But, the actual object is actually placed at 1,300mm away from the lens. Hence, the actual lens focal length that give the image size of 15.6mm is

v = 0.04 x 1,973.07 = 78.92 mm
1/1,973.07 + 1/78.92 = 1/f
f = 75.89 mm

Hence, as conclude, when a 50mm FF lens mounted on an APS-C camera, I actually get a 75mm zoom lens instead.

So, do you understand what I wrote so far ?

I admit it sounds confusing. To sum up everything, when we mount a FF lens onto a APS-C camera, we get extra zoom by 1.5x factor.

Got it ?

No? Never mind, because I started to confuse also ! LOL

How do you feel ?

Were you in pain when the doctor vacuum you out?

What shoe size will you wear when you've grown up ?

Which is the lucky girl's hand you will hold when you've grown up?

Sleep well, my dear son.
Don't worry about the future.
The future is full of unknown.
But what I know at the moment is,
you are safe and sound with us.

Sleep well, and be a healthy boy. :)

His Name is Ee Young

His name is Ee Yong.
He is 3.49kg in weight, and 51cm in length.
He is my son. :D

He was born on the 30th day of 10th month of the year of Rat.
And he is our very first son. :D


And we are trying our very hard to breast feed him !

To Ee Young, my son.
We are very proud of you.
You have bring joy to us, and those who are with us.
Please bare with us, and we shall succeed in breast fed you.


And to my son,
Welcome to this World ! ^_^

Happy Deepavali !

Some Indian Sweets for all my Hindu Friends !

Happy Deepavali !