Trespassing Thoughts in Willy

NIE Project Runway 2008

2008-08-10T23:03:00.005+08:00

I thoroughly enjoyed Project Runway in NIE on Friday. As the name suggests, it is a modelling show; one that requires participating group to dress up their model in an original costume created in line with the theme of Youth Olympics and Singapore.

It is great to work with a team that is on fire and the dynamic change in leadership is very heartening. People rise up to the occasion when they can offer their expertise and quietly step down when they have served.

Here is a link on my facebook album. You can have a look at some of the pretty costumes, and models of the day.

JC Outing

2008-08-08T23:58:00.000+08:00

Isn't it great to have a JC reunion? I really enjoyed our conversation during dinner and the chill-out at Secret Garden. Click here for the other pictures.

Firefox Download Day

2008-06-18T08:01:00.002+08:00

I downloaded Firefox 3.0; it's sleeker and faster. Join in the download day to help Firefox set a world record for the most no. of download in a day.

Water Buffalo

2008-06-16T13:42:00.001+08:00

Rice Farmer

2008-06-15T23:28:00.002+08:00

I like this picture much. Though I thought it's a pity that I didn't capture the top part of the farmer's hat.

Jatiluwih, Bali Rice Field

2008-06-13T11:17:00.005+08:00

Got to click for larger view to get a better feel for this UNESCO World Heritage site in Bali.

Happy Birthday Dear!

2008-06-05T14:29:00.002+08:00

Had a super dinner at Jang Shou Korean B.B.Q (Esplanade) in celebration of Dear's birthday. The food was good in both quantity and quality. Ambience is ok. Highly recommended for family dinner or date!

Pine Trees on Huangshan

2008-06-02T21:29:00.002+08:00

I decided to dig into my old photo album and found a picture which I like now.

NJC Staff Retreat

2008-05-27T15:07:00.000+08:00

These are some pictures from the second half of the retreat in the botanic garden.

Matt and Cynthia Wedding!

2008-05-24T23:00:00.000+08:00

I think Matthias and Cynthia look super good.

NJC Term 2 Last Day

2008-05-23T23:00:00.000+08:00

Nano Outing 2008

2008-05-09T23:00:00.000+08:00

It's so nice to be able to meet you gal and guys! Our topics are always so out-of-this-world ;P

Artwork Use

2008-05-04T23:00:00.000+08:00

Got a nice surprise when an artist asked for permission to use one of my photos as a basis for her quilt design.

My Birthday!

2008-04-28T23:00:00.001+08:00

Celebrated 25th birthday @ Prego, an Italian restaurant (ground level of Raffles the Plaza)

First Day In NJC

2008-03-26T19:57:00.005+08:00

Today's a good first-day at NJC. The staff room is having a space crunch and so I wouldn't get my cubicle till Fri. The teachers are friendly and nice to talk-to. I had a deep impression of Keith, the IT HOD and a governance teacher. He introduced me to ikebana. Pretty cool huh? Here's his blog on the japanese art of flower arrangement.

I have got to start on the tutorial questions later. There's going to be a discussion on Fri among the teachers.

How Do Others Perceive Me?

2008-03-15T12:08:00.004+08:00

Dr Phil is an American television personality, psychologist. Just as many who appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show, he gained celebrity status following appearances on the show too. Here's a online test designed by Phil which I took. 10 simple questions. I don't know how empirical the data and results are. So just for fun and entertainment!

The Natural Leader

Others see you as an exciting, highly volatile, rather impulsive personality; a natural leader, who's quick to make decisions, though not always the right ones. They see you as bold and adventuresome, someone who will try anything once; someone who takes chances and enjoys an adventure. They enjoy being in your company because of the excitement you radiate.

Happy CNY

2008-02-08T23:11:00.000+08:00

Happy New Year

2008-01-01T18:43:00.000+08:00

I went blading with cell in ECP on the last day of 2007. It was Lilian's and Jasmine's first time trying the sport so I hope they have had fun. I know it was so tiring for me when I learnt inline skating.

I had fun! My techniques weren't smooth at all: I lost some balance, had a few near-falls and 2 falls.

Thanksgiving dinner is next Sat. I am so excited about it for I will be the one in charge of food. Gonna try some real experimental cooking techniques and recipes.

I must admit: I didn't update my blog cause I'm plain lazy.

Random: I feel 2008 gonna be great.

Santa Claus is Coming... So FAST?!

2007-11-25T21:02:00.000+08:00

Time flies by when I am busy: it's coming to the end of Nov! It's incredible that it's exactly 1 month to Christmas. Life has been so eventful. I am taking up the total responsibility of the photographic duties in camp and recently I took some pictures for Andy and Arie's ROM + some outdoor shots at Clark Quay. Time is against me (argh! i feel like doing so many things); I need to settle down to design an album for the newly wedded.

Recently, my tagboard was spammed by some online dating bots. So please do not get the wrong idea if you chance upon those comments on my tagboard. I.P. of the bots has been blocked so hopefully no more of such nonsense.

Friends often comment that my ORD in March is still far away but I am already visualizing things-to-be-done or -could-be-done. The future looks, sounds, and feels so near.

Bookout weekends are short and precious. And blogging is the least of my concern now; pardon for the lack of updates. I will try to slip in some pictures or rattle off some trespassing thoughts.

Surreal

2007-11-13T11:33:00.001+08:00

The long weekend ended with an overnight chalet with my army colleagues. Food was terrifically good. I think I had one of the best chalet-BBQ food of my life. We had a movie marathon:

Just Follow Law (I was late and saw only the last ~30min)
Apocalypto (super gory; curbed my appetite for the BBQ)
Silent Hill (hard to follow plot; was often left in a quandary about was happening)
Mr. and Mrs. Smith (watched for ~15min; slept...)

Guan Zhong drove down the long long highway to send a few of us back home. The feeling of wanting to travel infinitely and the end of this break is surreal.

Facebook

2007-11-10T10:40:00.000+08:00

I am addicted to the self-advertising on Facebook. [more to follow...]

Super Long Weekend in S1 Branch Cohesion Outing

2007-11-10T10:33:00.000+08:00

Having a super long weekend this week: all the way from Deepavali, Fri, Sat, Sun till Mon.

S1 Branch had a cohesion outing at Sentosa in the morning, followed by a stomach-bursting buffet lunch at Rice Table @ International Building. I will give the Indonesian food a 4* rating: highly recommended.

Pictures here.

Wakeboarding!

2007-10-12T08:56:00.000+08:00

This week has been absolutely fun-filled. I spent half a day in the office on Mon after which I cleared 2.5 days of leave till Wed. Yesterday, Thursday, was the my unit's 38th anniversary celebration. In the morning, we had games and in the evening, we had buffet dinner at Chevrons.

Wednesday... Joy, Cherylene and I arrived at Punggol Sea Sports Club, nested deeply within Marina Country Club, at around 11am. The weather was sunny and the gals didn't apply sunblock. I gladly offered my sis's SPF50 Bananaboat which I "kopped" from my sis's cupboard. And we were all thinking the weather would remain all sunny and scorching hot, perfect for a nice tan and, perhaps, a little burn for me. The upholstery of the speed-boat seats were hot after being in the sun all in the morning. It was a little uncomfortable for our butts but our enthusiasm for riding on wakes numbed our sensation after a short while.

Our boatman was Fido and he took us for a 10 min ride to an island just off the Punggol shoreline. The view was typical as what you might see canoeing around Singapore: small little islets over-grown with trees with rather thin trunks and not-very-green leaves. I think I saw a land reclamation project cause there were many excavators and big sand trucks.

We arrived at the water which was quite a popular area for wakeboarders; there were at least three other groups of wake-boarders in the vicinity. So as the only guy in the group, I stepped out of the rear of the boat and onto a small wooden platform. The wakeboard is slightly less than a metre and the left boot was especially difficult for me to slide in. And that signaled that I was going to have not-a-so-smooth time...

I floated on my life-vest on my back as the underside of the wakeboard faced the rear of the boat. And my leg was curled at 90 degrees. So basically, the steps to stand on water: tuck your chest close to your leg, arms straighten, feel the tension in the cable and come to a squat. Almost immediately after you've gained some balance squatting, proceed to stand up. Always maintain straight arms, a slight bent in the knees to act as suspension on water. Can't bend too much though because there won't be enough weight acting on the water to catch the wake. All about balance.

My legs were so straight during the initial few tries that Fido nicknamed me "Chopstick Boy". Haha... Sometimes, I would forget to straighten my arms, lose my balance and fall. There was always a tendency for me to want to exert strength and pull on the cable. Big NO NO! Like Joy said, "Don't be insecure! Just let the cable pull you." And after almost 10 tries, or maybe more, I finally got the hang of riding on wakes and travelled, for the first time, about 200m on water on a board! The feeling was amazing.

Joy and Cherylene were really relaxed and had little trouble standing and wakeboarding after less than 3-4 tries. Girl power! And just as we were having so much fun, it started to drizzle. Not much of a problem until the sky poured onto us. The rain drops hurled at us into our eyes as the boat travelled through the rain at high speed to the jetty. We were cold, tired and felt kind of miserable. Cherylene said we experienced all of Singapore's weather in that short 2 hours: sunny, cloudy, windy, drizzle, and downpour.

The hot shower was really comfortable after exerting much energy through the riding and enduring the cold wind and rain. And I think the rain is really a mini-storm. The strong wind and rain overthrew a few deck chairs and wrecked a potted plant on the jetty.

Lunch was at Cherylene's place. We cooked linguine and cream of mushroom. The chihuahua, Kiko, was super cute. She made herself comfortable and rested sweetly in the warmth of my lap.

P.S. Thank you, Joy, for introducing wakeboarding to me.

P.P.S. Edited with assistance from Joy :) 13/10/2007 0816

Battalion Photographer

2007-09-16T22:05:00.000+08:00

I volunteered to be the official photographer of my army battalion unit, 40SAR. I have covered the Victory Challenge (7 Sep, Fri), the 24km route march (10 Sep, Mon) and the BMT passing out parade (15 Sep, Sat). The responses to my pictures have been very positive and I feel valued. It brings me great pride to serve with my interest and passion. National service is alot more colorful now.

Due to security reason, I can only post pictures from the passing out parade which is a public event. The pictures from Victory Challenge and 24km route march might be classified.

Lilian's Baptism

2007-08-26T20:10:00.000+08:00

Army half-marathon was in the morning and my knees are hurting alot now. I have taken aspirin and I wonder if they, the knees, might feel worse without the drug. I was eating bananas and drinking 100-plus regularly during the last 3km of the run. Well, I was walking quite a bit too, just too tired to keep the jogging pace. Completed the 21km in about 2.5h. Decent.

Afternoon. Went for Lilian's baptism at Jurong West church. The weather was nice, the people were nice, everything was nice. Quite many DSLR-photographers, about 6. Luckily I was still able to get a good vantage point for taking pictures.

Heard about the new Nikon cameras: D3 and D300? Heart is itching for the D300 which is about $2700 (converted from USD). Perhaps after my ORD when I have some savings, or should I wait till my first pay-check during NIE? I would prefer the latter.

Congrats, Lilian! :)

National Day Squeeze

2007-08-09T22:30:00.000+08:00

I was silly enough to think that Joy and I could get a quiet place around Esplanade. We had lunch at Shimbashi Soba @ Paragon; then acted as bookworms crawling around the shelves in Kino [ Store was having a 20% national day discount and I bought The C. S. Lewis Signature Classics].

After Kino... Me:"Let's go to Fullerton Starbucks. We can see the fireworks from there." Joy was hesitant thinking that the crowd could be really bad. I pushed ahead anyway.

Fast forward travelling on 16...The whole Padang, Esplanade Bridge was super, super packed. It was (almost) impossible, to get to Fullerton Starbucks using the Bridge. We decided to walk from Fullerton Hotel and take the underpass. Wishful thinking. The whole area was either barricaded or plain choked with people. No through passage. Sianz.

Finally found a quiet Billy Bombers in The Central (shopping mall directly above Clarke Quay MRT) where we enjoyed our quiet time.

A backpost on NUS Pharmacy Convocation Dinner

2007-08-09T09:39:00.000+08:00

So this post should have been up last week and all these pictures were taken 3 weeks back. Well, shows how lazy I am. Anyway, the Pharmacy department in NUS is very much like the Chemistry department. As in the student demographic breakdown is very similar: more gals than guys. That explains why most of my photos are mainly...gals.

Updates...

2007-07-29T20:18:00.000+08:00

Really sorry for the lack of updates. Life back in the army is Internet-free. Saturdays are reserved for Joy and Sundays for church service. Energy level at nights are so low that I just want to sleep.

By the way, I am posted to S1, manpower, branch in my old unit, 40SAR, as a project specialist. I feel blessed for the mostly administrative jobs. I got a silver for my IPPT last week and I am disappointed. The next retest will be 2 weeks later, and I promise myself that I will get a gold. The problem is that I got so use to running long distance that my strides are so short. To get a good timing for the 2.4km run, one needs to open up his strides. Army half marathon (AHM) is on 26 Aug. Training hard for it... Next Tues, I am going to run 14km as part of the progressive training towards 21km. Aiming for under 2h.

The living condition in the camp is not bad. Other than the lack of the Internet and TV, I have nothing to complain. The room is spacious and the bed is quite comfortable.

I took some pictures for the pharmacy convocation dinner two weeks back. Hopefully I can find some time and energy in the coming Saturday morning and post them onto this blog. I need to do some house cleaning; cob-webs building up.

It's back to camp in a few hours; sianz. Till next weekend...

Commencement (2)

2007-07-07T08:20:00.000+08:00

A little lazy to post the pictures here. So please click here to access the album. I will reenlisted in the army from 9th July, so updates would only be done on weekends. ORD date is around March 2008.

Commencement (1)

2007-07-05T11:48:00.000+08:00

Graduands from Prof Li's Lab

I attended the convocation for Chemistry Department yesterday. The atrium of UCC was crazily packed. I think all of us had fun taking pictures together. We were grabbing one another for shots.

What I have been Busy with?

2007-07-02T14:47:00.000+08:00

Housework and Laundry; since Dad and Sis are both not around so I need to clean up the place. This work is never ending.
Sifting my old notes and books; packing the unwanted ones into recycling bags or selling them to the second-hand book store.
Getting ready for NS by pulling out and cleaning my equipment from under the bed.
Meeting friends during this last week of freedom.
Get ready for Commencement.
Read...

Life after Sino-Sing

2007-06-28T11:58:00.000+08:00

If you don't realize, I have been so so lazy these couple of weeks in updating this blog. You might be wondering why there are some blank posts. That's because I decided to pre-publish the posts for my Sino-Sing trip. And I have yet to distribute the photos to all my friends! Argh... super procrastinator, a perfectionist procrastinator.

Why is perfection a building block for procrastination? I am always thinking of post-processing my pictures perfectly before posting them. It takes up so much of my time then I am put off by the effort. High volume editing is boring; but I really enjoy small volume, high quality editing. My mentality is changing: post the pictures first and if there are any major improvements after editing, delete & replace the previous uploaded one; if one looks more or less the same before and after, leave it. Perhaps it's the same for everything we do? Like my 40SAR S2 officer said to me a long time ago:"Do a rough-and-dirty job first and edit it continuously later." I never quite believe it till now.

I have also been reading up on religion, relationship and, as usual, photography. Life has been so eventful and changing...

Travelling in Hong Kong

2007-06-28T11:56:00.000+08:00

Victoria Bay

Travelling in China

2007-06-28T11:55:00.000+08:00

Pudong from the Bund

The Bund

Sunrise @ Huangshan

Huangshan

Han Shan Temple @ Suzhou

Sino-Singapore @ Hangzhou

2007-06-28T11:51:00.001+08:00

Sino-Singapore @ Xiamen

2007-06-28T11:50:00.002+08:00

Sino-Singapore @ Guangzhou

2007-06-28T11:50:00.001+08:00

Sino-Singapore @ Kunming

2007-06-19T08:28:00.000+08:00

The first warning for Yunnan: it's going to be cold. Yes, and I was always checking the weather forecast on Yahoo! and Weatherunderground a few days prior departure and deciding very hard on whether to pack my fleece jacket into the little 21" trolley luggage. My always-cautious dad was perpetually psychoing me to bring that bulky, furry fleece while I struggle hard to pack as little as possible (I have had a bad experience backpacking in Europe). It doesn't really matter if I freeze a little, afterall, I have stayed endured the sub-zero temperature of Kiruna, Sweden overnight and outdoor. Ok, my dad won in the end... The weather in Kunming was really a little sucky, perhaps the suckiest of all the cities I visited. The temperature was really cool, maybe like a little over-powered air-conditioning ~13 degrees Celcius. But it was the rain, sometimes downpour and always drizzle, that made the weather really cold. Brrr... not to forget the wind that is blowing.

At the airport... it was really heart-warming to see my Chinese friends come and pick us up. It was during their exam period and I know it's a difficult struggle deciding between mugging a bit more and being hospitable; they were both important. They were so sweet: they gave us each a rose. Unfortunately, there was an urchin that went around stealing, snatching and smashing the beautiful flowers on the floor; he was very much like the manifestation of a destroyer.

The hotel in Kunming was the best among the 4 official visit-cities. The beds were huge, king-size single, and the room was large. I was happy to see a wedding couple receiving their guests at the lobby. It is one of the ways which allowed me to peer in one aspect of modern Chinese culture. Just want to share one interesting observation: the couple was holding a tray filled with candies, peanuts and cigarettes and offering the items to guests. I think the first two items are auspicious and the last is not quite getting anywhere when it comes to blessing the couple. I suppose it was just for the pleasure of the smoker-guests.

Prior the KTV session, I had the chance to walk the streets, small and shopping, of Kunming. We passed by this food court, which you can see from the picture above, where they had one of the most aggressive promoters I met on trip. It's quite easy to understand, we were travelling in a huge group of ~10 and if any stall successful sat us down, they could easily rip a huge bill off us. We didn't eat in the food court, obviously put off by the "extra" attention. We chose, in the end, to eat some roadside grilled food from a Muslim stall.

I had the wildest partities in Kunming. For this first-night party, I think Yefeng ordered close to 4 dozens of Budweiser beer for the KTV. You can see the number of empty bottles on the table, which is just the tip of the iceberg literally. The bulk of the empty bottles were at the bottom of the sea of chaos. One thing I found out about myself after all these parties: I will never mumble gibberish while drunk; I will maintain consciousness and recover from the violent head-throbs. Terrible feeling.

Back Home!

2007-06-14T12:31:00.000+08:00

I'm finally back in the comfort of my room after a month of traveling. I will be posting some stories and pictures later in the week. As usual, I am busily processing some pictures for printing (nothing beats a well-printed photo!)and sending out the presents to my relatives.

I will be meeting the Sino-Sing people this Sat, so hopefully, I can get as many photos printed out as possible.

Away

2007-05-14T23:49:00.000+08:00

Will be away in China from tomorrow till 12 June. Will update as much as possible when I have Internet access while traveling.

Fantasising the Ideal

2007-05-04T11:02:00.000+08:00

I think it would be rare for a man not to have, at some point in his life, dreamed of the perfect woman: her height, her shape, the length, color of her hair... I also sense that the imagination of young women (and maybe sometimes the older ones, too) can drift in similar directions. Gals, can you assure this :P?

Few of our loves of our lives would match our fantasies. The precious few. We can fall in love with anyone and be as happy (or unhappy), regardless of how well they fit our conceptions of 'perfection'. Perhaps, the idea of perfection is meaningless then. Afterall, I fall in love with a person, not an idea. Of course, there are may individual characteristics I avoid or seek out. But overall, it's a unique blend of emotional, mental and physical attributes that captivates me, repels me or leaves me, just, indifferent.

Perhaps, it's just like using a camera. I learn to use my trusty basic D50, just as I will learn to love. Working around the quirks, the unexpected felicities, the limitations, the new possibilities - all these things change me , whether I am talking about relationship or cameras. I suppose they (the troubles) can change me for the worse, leading to quarrels in the one case or selling away the camera in the other. Or they can change me for the better, leading to life-long happiness in the one case and better pictures in the other. Well, at least I am happily married to my D50 :)

Maybe I should only have ONE camera and stop thinking about redesigning it. For it will be foolish to redesign it to suit my ideas of what is 'perfect'. Perhaps no one is likely to find perfection anywhere unless he/she starts looking for it in his/her ability to adapt and to learn.

Food Poisoning

2007-05-02T18:30:00.000+08:00

Terrible night. Was experiencing vomiting, cramping abdominal pains, headache and impaired consciousness; all the classic symptoms of food poisoning. Didn't sleep well at all. Thinking back, it might have been the sushi from Cold Storage on Mon since food poisoning symptoms might be delayed as long as a day.

It never beats to have a chinese physician Dad; feel so much better now after Dad's medicine and massage.

Birthday Celebration

2007-05-02T18:09:00.000+08:00

Labour Day. The day was spent at Party World Orchard with my MOE friends. The place was kind of sleazy, with the entire place smelling of stale cigarette smoke. The vent hole at the room's ceiling was blackened with residue. Valerie caught her eyes on a xiao qiang even.

Anyway, the KTV session was thoroughly enjoyable though I was feeling a bit unwell then. When Val and I were singing 屋顶, the lights went out and screen played "Happy Birthday". It was so unexpected; a pleasant surprise. Never knew Party World could centralize-control all the TVs. Gals, Thank you so much!

P.S. Special thanks to Zhaoyue for giving me the "9 Habits of Highly Effective Teachers". Will digest the book thoroughly.

Vivocity Outing

2007-04-28T00:51:00.000+08:00

Thank you all for celebrating my birthday :)

Special Project by Min Qi

2007-04-19T19:37:00.000+08:00

Min Qi conceptualized and produced this photo slide-show for Sam Honours Connect. A sentimental conglomerate of photos and messages... Enjoy.

Visa Application at China Embassy

2007-04-18T10:40:00.000+08:00

Left home early to process my visa application at Embassy of China in the morning. Though the office opens at 0900, I reckon that there will be quite a queue before the opening hour. And I was right, I arrived at 0830 and there was about ~30 people in front of me. When the gate opened, everyone just rushed forward and it was quite haphazardous. So much for the queue...

The queue line wasn't that defined during the initial formation. When a young lady standing beside me tried to get into the line, she was told off by another lady behind the queue saying that the latter was trying to cut queue. I really don't know whether she was trying to cut queue since everyone was cramped into a lump at that moment. In fact, I could have been the one that is being wrongly accused of cutting queue since I was standing slightly out of the line.

Anyway, the entire process was quite fast. The visa-application queue number starts from 300 and I was 319; there's a separate queue for passport collection. Left the Embassy at 0930.

Just to make the story complete, I need a visa since I will be in China for more than 14 days. I will be away for Sino-Singapore Exchange Programme from 14-29 May; following that I will be traveling with Cheryl and Nikki till 12 June. During the Exchange, I will be going to Kunming, Guangzhou, Xiamen and Hangzhou. And for the independent traveling leg, I will be going to Huangshan, Suzhou, Shanghai and Hong Kong.

Outdoor Holiday Portraits

2007-04-17T20:35:00.000+08:00

When I was on exchange in Sweden, and later on the Europe tour, I had a photographic project in mind but I was limited by my gear and knowledge. That project is to come up with portraits of my friends that exceed snap-shot quality. The continuation of this project will be from May-June in China. In preparation, I have been brushing up my skills and techniques. This is a post that I have set as a tutorial question for myself. I hope it will be useful for most of my friends since many will go on holiday this summer.

To me, I rate most of my holiday portraits snap-shot quality. That is to say (this description will be very familiar to most of us), you and your friend(s) stand at a point and another friend/helpful stranger will take a picture. And, hopefully, the photo will contain a relatively large area of the very scenic background with less emphasis on the character(s) in the photo. Boring. I have been doing outdoor portrait research for the past year and I want to share some tips and techniques I gathered from the standpoint of outdoor/studio setup wedding portraits and celebrity portfolios. In particualar, I will be discussing photos in Asian context.

I think most of my gal friends wouldn't want to spend time with photos of Taiwanese female singers, especially those who supposedly "act-cute" like Jolin (蔡依林) and Cyndi (王心凌). To me their photos represent the trend of commercial photography and serve as creative sources. Why do I discuss portraits in Asian context? Because I find it easier to utilize the photographic techniques in Asian-idol portfolios than Western celebrity portfolios. In addition, I like Asian photographic style more than the Western one.

Let us reverse engineer a photo of 王心凌 and learn some techniques.This picture was taken in Tokyo and distributed as photo post-card in the album Cyndi With U.

This is a nightshot portrait with flash, so turn to this mode on your camera. If you desire the effect of this photo, do not shoot with the flash only. You need the long exposure to capture the ambient light or the background will be dark.
Stay still for a while longer after the flash. The long exposure requires you to be stationary or there will be streaking.
A point about nightshots is try to take them when there's still some light in the sky. This is the period that lasts up to 60 min after sunset. Now, look at the sky in the picture above. There is still a tinge of blue in the sky and this is more interesting than a totally dark sky.
The standard rule of the third. Cyndi divides the photo ~1/3 right of the frame.
Choose a dramatic background. The tram in the background is a trivial subject but the extended exposure made it show as a slight blur; nice!
The tilt of the frame is another element that makes this picture work.
Posing tips. Gals, do not face the camera straight on. Turn your body away from the camera like what Cyndi is doing. It's more flattering since most of us appear slimmer in our side profile.
Lighting-wise. Most probably a on-camera flash with light modifier by the absence of shadow on the face. Side lighting would have created very prominent shadow near the nose area.

Last Stabs at the Exam Beasts

2007-04-17T11:28:00.000+08:00

I'm such a sucker for technology... Went to Sim Lim and bought a Digimate III with a 80GB (~8500 6MP RAW+JPEG photos) Seagate 2.5" harddisk for the 1 month China trip. Upon plugging in your SD/Compact Flash card into Digimate, the gadget will transfer the files from the SD/CF onto the harddisk. I have decided not to lug my bulky laptop around like what I did in Europe. Also upgraded lappy's RAM memory to 1GB due to the heavy Photoshop/Lightroom usage for RAW conversion, lappy is running quite a bit faster now.

Talk about preparing for exams... I think most of my honours-year friends are preparing for the exams halfheartedly. A browse through blogs and I reckon that some of my chemistry friends were lost in freedom on Saturday (one day after honours symposium). There's this sense of "what-to-do" feeling when I woke up on Sat too. I know I need to study for the three exams, but there is this growing hack-care attitude (I don't know if this is the correct term to use but you get what I mean...).

Anyway, not very hard-working on my side; have been spending the days watching webcasts. I skipped all Reason and Persuasion lectures after the mid-semester break and I got lots to catch up...

Sam Honours Connect

2007-04-16T11:48:00.000+08:00

Lijie setup a blog for the hons pple in Sam's lab. Click here for content. This address will reside in Links > Article Archive permanently.

Chemistry Honours Symposium

2007-04-14T01:44:00.000+08:00

The symposium was held at the lobby of University Hall - Lee Kong Chian wing. The entire place was quite crowded since more than 50 poster-panels (>100 posters) were squeezed into this floor.

My poster, me and my supervisor, Prof Sam Li.

Yumin and me.

Yumin came up with the concept of this shot. The gals gathered outside the University Hall for a posed group portrait. I like this pix.

The cocktail party started at 1830 followed by the dinner at 1930. I thought the food was very decent and tasty. Best of all, this banquet was sponsored by the Chemistry Department.

The ultimate group shot. NUS Chemistry Class of 2007.

Click here for the full album.

Science, Politics and Journalism

2007-04-11T22:00:00.000+08:00

In my previous post, an anonymous reader directed me a page on BBC. It says on the page "Billions face climate change risk." It seems like a stark reminder telling me to face the fact.

"Hello! Global warming is definitely an environmental issue. No questions about that."

Perhaps I should rephrase my thesis.

There is no argument about how a warmer global climate is going to affect lives around the world. However, the question is whether human activities have been made a scapegoat for global warming by politicians. Of course, there is no denial that human activities affect the climate. But is it significant enough to cause global climate changes? Or are there other reasons for the global warming we are experiencing.

Let me point you to a very simple alternative possibility about why we are experiencing warmer climate. Look up the sky. Do you see that glowing spot about 150 million km away? How about me telling you that the sun is responsible for our warmer climate? It makes absolute sense. The weather is cooler at night when the sun is out and the weather is freaking hot in a sunny day. If solar activity increases, I think that is going to be a strong reason for global warming. And it has been proven, there has been increased solar activity over the last 1000 years judging from the increased number of sun spots. Here's a page to our favorite BBC that reports this.

Not convinced? A report announced by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory provided further evidence. In short, a group of NASA and university scientists have turned to historical Egyptian records of the annual water level of Earth's longest river - the Nile for research. Together with historical aurora records in the Northern Hemisphere, which is a reflection of the strength of solar activity, they found a correlation between water level and solar activity. And the conclusion is simple and intuitive: "When solar activity is high, conditions are drier, and when it is low, conditions are wetter."

The whole issue made me reflect on journalism. It's simple. Secretive power will hate journalists who do their job: who push back the screens, look behind the facades and turn-over rocks. However, I think genuine journalism is under threat today. In these days of corporate "multimedia" being run by a powerful few and fueled by greed for profit, many journalists are part of a propaganda apparatus without even consciously realizing it. Together with a censorship in free societies, like Animal Farm author, Orwell says: "unpopular ideas can be silenced and inconvenient facts kept dark, without any need for an official ban." The situation might exactly be the same like in The Great Global Warming Swindle.

At the back of the book Tell Me No Lies - Investigative Journalism that Changed the World by John Pilger, there is a quotation by American journalist T. D. Allman. This quotation is one of my favourites.

"Genuinely objective journalism not only gets the facts right, it gets the meaning of events right. It is compelling not only today, but stands the test of time. It is validated not only by reliable sources, but by the unfolding of history. It is journalism that ten, twenty, fifty years after the fact still holds up a true and intelligent mirror to events."

Rattles

2007-04-10T12:18:00.000+08:00

There's this perpetual lag during MSN conversations and I can't accept file transfers when I'm using the LAN connection in my PGP room. Pardon me if you see me going on and off MSN and popping up in that silly little window alert.

Here's a super sweet quote I got from a mass-mail, enjoy:

For the ladies –

Find a guy who calls you beautiful instead of hot.

Who calls you back when you hang up on him.

Who will stay awake just to watch you sleep.

Wait for the boy who kisses your forehead, who wants to show you off to the world when you are in your sweats.

Who holds your hand in front of his friends.

Who thinks you're just as pretty without make-up on.

Wait for the one who is constantly reminding you of how much he cares about you and how lucky he is to have you.

Wait for the one who turns to his friends and says, "...that's her."

For the guys –

Find a girl who calls you baby faced instead of hot or sexy.

Who can't stand it when you hang up on her and calls right back.

Who would sit there for hours looking into your eyes.

Who doesn't care what you look like, but what's inside counts the most.

Who looks at you with the twinkle in her eyes and kisses you on the cheek instead of the lips.

Who wants to be with you in public, even if you wear those old grass stained and ripped pants with the bleached jersey like always.

Wait for the girl who is a constant reminder of your happiness and joy, who makes you smile just by knowing she loves you back.

Wait for the girl who you give piggy back rides to in public and she still is in view of her friends, while she gets off and you hear her go: "you're the one for me, for always".

Countdown...

2007-04-09T00:11:00.000+08:00

Yippee! One of the heaviest (most probably THE heaviest) burdens in my Uni life is off my shoulders: the thesis.

Spent the Good Friday planning the China itinerary with Cheryl and Nikki. It was pretty fast; since the plan was based largely on a Chan's Brothers itinerary which caught Nik's eyes. The planning déjà vu from the last Europe trip was overwhelming... I can never estimate the huge amount of time spent on the constant visits to travel forums, official travel destination websites, train schedules sites, domestic flight schedules, hotels, reviews, recommendations... Lots of clicking, traveler's anxiety, excitement and anticipation :D Had a talk with Sean, a travel executive with Pricebreaker in the evening; he helped us much with his travel tips. Night: Sino-Singapore outing at Timbre. The live band was great.

Explored the Nikon Capture NX software during the weekends. The noise reduction algorithm and RAW conversion engine are just fantastic (very good reasons for me just to try the software). The greatest weakness of Capture NX is its demand on system resources. I am running the software on a Pentium 4 M 2.0GHz with 768 MB RAM and the rendering of JPEG preview is so, so, so slow. Painfully slow. The upgrade from .NET 1.0 to .NET 2.0 speeds things up quite a bit though. Lots to explore: the optimization (fellow chemists, it brings back memories, right? ;P) of sharpening and noise reduction values, the U-point technology... However, it shouldn't take long for me to become proficient in the software, the user-interface is very friendly. I feel more and more like a technical geek rather than a photographer...

Anyway, two portrait shots from the Sino-Singapore farewell dinner. A little back-dated, I know. All processed from Nikon .nef RAW format to JPEG via Capture NX 1.10.

Nikon D50 @ ISO1600
with Tamron 17-50 f2.8
Noise reduction with Capture NX

Science and Politics

2007-04-02T09:32:00.000+08:00

Is global warming an environmental movement or political propaganda? Has the whole issue been cleverly used by political activists to cloak agendas that has more to do with, say, anti-capitalism or anti-globalization than ecological science?

In the movie, "An Incovenient Truth", Al Gore defends the underlying science of global warming and the movie gives him a strong platform on the environmental issue, much stronger than his position as vice president of his presidency candidacy. Having been brain-washed by the years of environmental education, I was pretty upset about how we humans have set the Earth on a course of heat destruction. Or should I?

Here's another movie for consideration: Apocalypto. In the movie, a Mayan high priest uses an eclipse to scare the masses and manipulate their minds. Do you see the parallel? How you ever considered that Al Gore is manipulating our minds just the same as the Mayan high priest? The slight increase (bear my words, the increase is slight) in temperature is being used by Al Gore or maybe the whole politics of environmentalism to scare the masses and manipulate our minds. Just like the intelligence experts that reported stock piles and building of weapons of mass destruction that were never found, the whole global warming issue might be just liberal nonsense.

If you have time, please watch The Great Global Warming Swindle. This documentary, which was broadcast on Channel 4 (UK), is better than expected.

Teaching Perspectives

2007-03-27T18:43:00.000+08:00

Here's a "personality" test for my teacher-to-be friends:
http://www.teachingperspectives.com

My dominant teaching style is "nuturing". And according to Junie, most teachers in MOE fall into this category.

Effective teaching assumes that long-term, hard, persistent effort to achieve comes from the heart, not the head.
People become motivated and productive learners when they are working on issues or problems without fear of failure. Learners are nurtured in knowing that (a) they can succeed at learning if they give it a good try; (b) their achievement is a product of their own effort and ability, rather than the benevolence of a teacher; and (c) their learning efforts will be supported by both teacher and peers. Good teachers care about their students and understand that some have histories of failure resulting in lowered self-confidence. However they make no excuses for learners. Rather, they encourage their efforts while challenging students to do their very best by promoting a climate of caring and trust, helping people set challenging but achievable goals, and supporting effort as well as achievement. Good teachers provide encouragement and support, along with clear expectations and reasonable goals for all learners but do not sacrifice self-efficacy or self-esteem for achievement. Their assessments of learning consider individual growth as well as absolute achievement.

USC Production

2007-03-26T00:34:00.000+08:00

USC Production gala night was great and I really enjoyed Chun's dance choreography. As usual: a picture to share with you.

I updated my previous entry on the Sino-Singapore farewell dinner. Some pictures have been replaced with album-like pages. Yup, I plan to come up with an album for the Sino-Singapore Exchange (Singapore), with a focus on Group 6. Each page will be printed super-8R size (12"x8") and I will search for a leather bound album to slot in the prints.

Glowing Q Dots

2007-03-24T22:25:00.000+08:00

If you are puzzled about how quantum dots look like... I think they are cool liquids that glow under black light, nothing really matters.

Farewell Dinner : (

2007-03-23T12:35:00.000+08:00

Dining Venue - The Belvedere @ Meritus Mandarin

The Pianist

Yesternite marked the last official event of the Singapore leg of the Sino-Singapore Student Exchange Program. I thought the dinner was quite melancholic. Many of us write autographs for one another and, of course, took many portrait momento pixs. As a semi-official photographer and also as a student participant, I was especially emotionally involved in documenting the event.

The photos were collated and burned onto CDs overnight and distributed to the returning-home students this morning. I had very little sleep and was constantly worrying about the MSN transfer from Charmaine.

The mood at the airport was kind of somber. I had to put on a smile even though I was sad to see my Chinese friends leave for home. I still remember Ye Feng took a picture of us and he said:"你们好象没什么状况", which means something like our faces were very neutral. Perhaps it's because our sadness deep inside us and our smile on our faces have neutralized each other...

As I am typing this, my mouth is ever so slightly sour...

Life as a Part-Time Tourist

2007-03-18T22:46:00.000+08:00

Whoa ho; what a week! I have been exploring Singapore like never before...

Cheryl, Nikki, Kalyn and I brought the Chinese students to Ministry of Sound on Wednesday. And yup, this is the first time I partied so hard. The last time I was in Zouk as an organizing committee member for KEVII Hall bash. The teachers decided to tag along and we thought our mood would be somehow affected but nope, they left after a short while (the music might have been too loud for them). The retro night music was fantastic and we had fun on the dance floor. Well, not that we were super-good dancers though. Music was so loud that all of us were deaf after leaving the place. And darn, I was waiting for Bananarama's Love in the First Degree and the DJ played it when we were at the exit :(

Fri... Chery, Nikki and I bought about 20 of them to the City Hall area. The group was split into two: Cheryl and Nikki bought some to shop at Raffles City while I bought the rest to Bugis Village and Bugis Junction. The gals, as usual, were incredible shoppers. The group met up and went to Glutton Square for supper... The exciting finale was when I bought the group to take bus 51. The taxi queue was super long at DXO and most of them were on call. It was super frustrating to see so many taxis and yet we couldn't take any. I was not that familiar with 51's bus route and took a wrong turn near City Hall. In the end, I had to call my sis to ask for bus directions. The time was 1215 and the last bus had left Hougang terminal at 2330. My sis reassured me that we could catch the last bus and true enough, as I jogged towards the bus-stop and turned my head to glimpse at my back, a bus 51 accelerated from a stop at the traffic light and headed towards me. I just ran for the bus... Super heng, got the last bus...

Kalyn and Nikki at the Luge

Skyride - I was one chairlift infront of the group

Sat... Sentosa. I carried the almost 3kg photographic equipment with me for the whole day. Many of them thought I was crazy to lug all the stuff around Sentosa. Well, lugging equipment is part of the fun too :P And if you can see the above picture, that's how I looked on Sat in Sentosa. Touristy enough? The Sentosa excursion is quite a photographic tutorial for me. My aim was to learn how to take souvenir-holiday portrait and how to balance the snap-shot nature of souvenir portrait and certain classic portrait requirements. Lunch was super crappy and I was embarrassed as a Singaporean host. The mini-steam boat dinner was way, way, way-better.

At the mini-steam boat

The Lyrical Moments

Impressive Pyrotechnics @ the Musical Fountain

If you have read the Sunday Times, you would have known that the musical fountain is going to be torn down to make way for the IR. I think this was the highlight of the day. I had a super nebulous memory of watching the musical fountain show and this was something new for me.

Just a quick tip: on the flash when you're outdoor. I flashed almost 100% of my outdoor pictures. The key is to balance the ambient light and the artificial flash (tuning down the flash power is impossible with most compact cameras though). The above picture would have been impossible without the flash. The face would have been dark and the background nicely exposed without the flash. Well, I don't want to be too technical here... If you need more information, please google for "fill-flash" or we could have a fire-side chat.

Some Updates

2007-03-13T23:06:00.000+08:00

I have been involved in hosting some Chinese students participating in the Sino-Singapore Exchange Programme. Been showing them around Singapore and NUS. Quite tired from the walking around... but fun. It would have been much better if it's the holiday period now. Been to the Night Safari, River Taxi ride; then Sat going Sentosa. Quite happening lah. More on the events that happened later...

Tagged along a pro photographer as a "second" for two events. I have learnt alot but I find that event photography is really boring. I don't think this is what I am pursuing in photography hobby. Money is ok but I don't like to do stuff for money. Event photography is contrary to my style. You anticipate, you jostle around, and you squeeze the trigger to try to get a shot. Perhaps I am too engrossed in pursuing all the "moments" like in wedding photography... Creativity plays a big role in modern photojournalistic style of photography... and even for photojournalism in the papers.

Ok, newspaper photo editors can choose really artistic shots for publishing work. Do I have a choice in selecting what to shoot when I'm employed? I really don't in event photography. There always have to be the standard speaker on the podium, the hand-shakes... The shots are standard, posed, lack space for creativity due to demand of the client... You get the idea.

Do people pay for some pixs which people's head/hand/leg are chopped off, even though the pix is excellently executed? I don't think so.
Do people pay for some fancy digital enhancement for event, like in the modern wedding album to add mood? I don't think so.
Are people looking out for details in your pictures, like a picture of a bouquet, a candle...? I don't think so. People don't pay you to shoot still-life.

I surfed around the web viewing event photographers' portfolio, and I am pretty disappointed. I am also disappointed with myself. Perhaps the portfolios I viewed are lousy and I am lousy. Pros, please show me some event photographs to revive my interest.

FYP is going quite well though I am still conducting experiments. At least now, my computational results are matching the experimental results. Now, it's on to the application...

Itchy Legs Got into Trouble

2007-03-04T14:30:00.000+08:00

See lah, all the months of training went to nought for the NUS triathlon...

I ran the regular route at Fort Canning Hill Park yesterday. Talk about Murphy's law: I have never sustained a really ankle sprain until then. Stepped onto some hole in the ground and kena a sprain. Not serious enough to make me unable to walk but enough to cause enough discomfort to put me out of action for the race today. Sorry Zixian, gotta disappoint you with my absence. And darn, my $20+ registration fees also gone. I will be back next year.

Pretty eventful week: participated in Singtel Information Group Annual Dinner on Fri as the photographer. Hmmm... will post some pixs later after I do my FNA1002X tutorial.

Bought a new toy: a Benro carbon fibre tripod. The aluminum Manfrotto 190PROB is just too heavy at 1.9kg and the wobbly joints amplify vibration. Benro 1127 is 1.4 kg and has alot stiffer legs and joints. Well, I lost the versatility of the Manfrotto's removable column though; the 1127 is a classic tripod.

Dad just got me a lobang as a backup photographer at some coporate dinner. He met his professional photographer friend who happens to want some help. Hope this will kick start some rolling money for my photography hobby.

Canon is kicking Nikon's ass in PMA 2007. The release of EOS-1D Mark III makes it the fastest DSLR in the world (10 frames per second!). I hope Nikon is holding back the latest DSLR(s) for last-minute revelation.

Hooked on Personality Test

2007-02-28T20:31:00.000+08:00

"Get to Know Yourself Better" Result

2007-02-25T23:48:00.000+08:00

Your view on yourself:
Other people find you very interesting, but you are really hiding your true self. Your friends love you because you are a good listener. They'll probably still love you if you learn to be yourself with them. (The question is: do you find me interesting? Very true about the "hiding your true self" part; quite true about being a good listener)

The type of girlfriend/boyfriend you are looking for:
You like serious, smart and determined people. You don't judge a book by its cover, so good-looking people aren't necessarily your style. This makes you an attractive person in many people's eyes. (I think most people would think this is very untrue since I enjoy eye-candies like Jolin Tsai and Fiona Xie. But hey, they are really eye-candies! I am not looking for someone who is super pretty or pretty in the first place. Perhaps one of the "untrues" in this report might be that I am "attractive in many people's eyes".)

Your readiness to commit to a relationship:
You prefer to get to know a person very well before deciding whether you will commit to the relationship. (Very true; perhaps true for everyone. A general statement, I must say.)

The seriousness of your love:
Your have very sensible tactics when approaching the opposite sex. In many ways people find your straightforwardness attractive, so you will find yourself with plenty of dates. (Whoa, when did I ever have lots of dates? Mostly untrue! Sensible tactics they might be, I got a feeling that they are out-of-date and not-that-effective tactics. Very true: straightforwardness.)

Your views on education
Education is very important in life. You want to study hard and learn as much as you can. (Yup, very true and accurate. Picked up lots of non-academic skills and knowledge: weight-training, running, swimming, magic, photography, human performance, persuasion, negotiation... I'm a typical jack-of-all-trade. But again, high chance that this is a general statement for most of my friends.)

The right job for you:
You're a practical person and will choose a secure job with a steady income. Knowing what you like to do is important. Find a regular job doing just that and you'll be set for life. (Very true: I have decided to climb up MOE's coporate ladder. Some people might say I'm naive to decide so early even before stepping into the Ministry. Do you know me better than I know myself?)

How do you view success:
You are afraid of failure and scared to have a go at the career you would like to have in case you don't succeed. Don't give up when you haven't yet even started! Be courageous. (True to a large extent. Afterall, the idea of starting a business has rarely struck me. Perhaps one of the largest risk I'm undertaking in investing a large portion of my savings in unit trusts.)

What are you most afraid of:
You are afraid of things that you cannot control. Sometimes you show your anger to cover up how you feel. (Very true. This shows up very often when I was in the army. In recent years, it has seldom happened. A lot better control of my emotions now, but I think the test revealed my inner self.)

Who is your true self:
You are mature, reasonable, honest and give good advice. People ask for your comments on all sorts of different issues. Sometimes you might find yourself in a dilemma when trapped with a problem, which your heart rather than your head needs to solve. (Mature? I'm not too sure about that. People still label me "immature" occasionally. Reasonable? Yup, I'm not irrationally demanding. Honest and give good advice? Yup, very true. Perhaps these qualifies me a bit as a teacher. Need to use my heart sometimes? Quite true, there are times when I find myself analyzing too much when I should have followed my heart.)

Go to here for the test. I think the test result has described me quite accurately (or do you find this test giving ambiguous report like most others?).

Struck a Chord

2007-02-21T16:33:00.000+08:00

Did you watch 花樣少年少女 yesterday? I thought I stuck a chord with Ruxi (cast by Ella) who went on a slimming regime because she likes Quan. I was, like Ruxi, a little plump to begin with until I became infatuated with a gal. I went on a slimming and keep-fit regime hoping to attract her; but nah, nothing worked out. The experience was life-changing though. I changed my supposedly genetically-plump frame (I was fat as a baby through sec 4) to a lean-frame and never got the weight back for the last 7 years. I think there is no need for such a strong emotion like love to create a life-changing experience; infatuation is enough.

I couldn't compare to Ruxi in terms of her tenacity to pursue Quan though.

A Short Summary - Digital Lenses

2007-02-19T21:25:00.000+08:00

Happy Chinese New Year!

I spent some time reading Amateur Photography, which is a popular UK photographic magazine, and came across some information on lenses. If you happen not to know, there is a small war between "cropped"(C)-sensor camera and full-frame (FF) camera. It's mainly between Nikon, representing the C-sensor, and Canon, representing the FF-sensor. I am on the Nikon C-sensor side. It's not that I am using a Nikon camera that I am saying this. But rather, C-sensor cameras are cheaper and that suits a student's budget. Also, one doesn't need such a good lens to get quality image on a C-sensor; money-saving again! For explanation, read on...

Content Summarized from the following articles (Amatuer Photographer 28 October 2006)

APAnswers by Barney Britton
Tamron AF 17-50mm f2.8 XR Di II LD Asph (IF) Review by Geoffrey Crawley

In the past, lenses were designed based on film. With the advent of digital sensors as light capturing devices, there might be some problems with conventional lens design. Characteristic of a lens may change when you change from a 1.5x digital body to a full frame digital body. For example, if some bright point of light is at the corner of the image then it might appear more than once. This is because light bounces between the low-pass filter of the sensor and the rear element of the lens then back again. This phenomenon is also known as ghosting.

A vintage Nikkor lens might give excellent result on a film camera but not on a digital body. This is not because the lens is below par but it wasn't designed with the digital sensor in mind. Light can hit film from a wide range of angles, and as long as it's properly focused, the film will record a sharp image. In digital sensors, light need to strike as close as possible to 90 degrees or the resulting image can display chromatic aberrations or vignetting. The problem will be much more severe close to the edges of a full-frame digital SLR, but still can be a problem even on those with "cropped" sensor. With an older or cheaper lens, the image defect will get even more severe. Nikon's decision to stick to cropped-sensor DSLRs makes sense since the imaging circle is smaller. Therefore, the edges of the 35mm-format frame will not be shown. The logical design of Nikon's "DX" lenses is based strongly on this reasoning.

Based on the reasoning that photosensors require the minimization of extraneous light and the adoption of the telecentric principle, lenes were designed such that the emergent rays from a lens arrive more vertically at the sensor across its whole surface. In this way, the microlenses which are in front of the picture elements receive the light on the optical axes, giving minimum aberrations and vignetting. Also, any reflections from the sensor's polished surface return vertically and thus can be optimally minimized from the recomputed coating of the rear lens element's surfaces.

Ok, for a more boring article on lenses... refer to my previous post on MTF theory.

Happy Valentine's Day

2007-02-14T22:55:00.000+08:00

Yes, I know it's all a bunch of Hallmark hype aimed at ripping off people by selling chocs and flowers. And I know I am a nice guy and I don't need a galfriend to feel fulfilled. But it still sucks. Really! Perhaps I shouldn't bemoan. I'm not lonely since I have plenty of friends (nice gal friends included). Lots of freedom which is kind of cool as a student. (Yah yah, just some self-consoling thoughts, maybe?)

The Chemistry department people were pretty sweet on this occasion. Jack wrapped up some candies for all the soccer players and supporters and he went round sci fac looking for all of us. I got one of his candy packs and munched up a large portion of it during the night. Min Qi folded origami lilies and gave them out yesterday. Elaine gave out the ever-classic Rocher. It's the first time I gave out roses on V-day. Not to one girl (though I hope to do so), but to all the gals in my lab who have been so nice all these while. Oh yah, I treated myself to a root-beer float after lunch. Be nice to myself. It's V-day!

I came across a super sweet blog. It's a wedding blog that has some basic preparation on Singapore's wedding plus some little thoughts from the Jhong Ren, the guy author. Anyway, I didn't stumble upon the blog for nothing. I was searching for some wedding dinner photography information because I was approached for some services. I need to sort out the rates and the fashionable styles. It's going to be a tough service tender since I have no experience in wedding dinner. Hope I can beat the competitors with my price.

Hofbräuhaus In-House Performer

2007-02-12T20:21:00.000+08:00

One-of-a-kind atmosphere in this "traditional" and "true" beer hall in Munich, Germany. The first impression was that the place is quite touristy. The in-house singing and dancing really added mood to the beer hall. This was the first of the two beer gardens/halls that I visited in Germany.

I ordered a roast pork-knuckle with two potato dumplings and homemade bacon-cabbage salad for about SGD20. If you like meat and roasted-to-crispy-perfection pork skin packaged as a heart-attack on a plate, you will like this dish. The texture of the potato dumpling didn't feel like mashed potato; it was a little spongy. I felt weird but refreshing... the dumpling didn't taste much though. Overall, an A- grade. By the way, the picture is a little grotesque (it, kind of, looks like a shot from anatomy lesson), so I wouldn't post it here. A huge mug of beer was shared among Grace, Songning and me.

How I Looked During Backpacking

2007-02-11T23:44:00.000+08:00

Here's a rather unglamorous picture of me during the backpacking days in Europe. Here's a breakdown of my extremely kiasu luggage/equipment.

On my back, I have a 80-litre (2.9kg empty weight) Jack Wolfskin Trailhead II backpack that mainly contained my clothes, souvenirs, and a 1.5-litre water-bag for long overnight train rides. My tripod went into this bag when I had to take a plane for certain legs of the trip.
The long sling by my right-side is my tripod in a bag - a Manfrotto 190PROB.
The red bag is very important; it contained my laptop (besides my pixs, Grace's and Songning's pixs are all inside) and some other important documents like a copy of my passport, vaccination certification booklet, itineraries and the Let's Go Europe guidebook. The paper in front jutting out are papers of short-term usefulness like directions to a particular hostel and attractions brochures. The brown thing is a hat I bought in Santorini, Greece. Then there is an easily accessible water bottle.
The cuboid bag on my left is my camera-bag.
I wore mostly bermuda shorts since jeans were really too hot.
I wore the SAF Gortex boots to protect against the occasional rain. Nothing is more irritating than traveling in a pair of wet sport shoes so I didn't wear them on the trip. A rather "cock" combination with the bermuda shorts, but who cares... nobody was looking.

Pix of the Day - Bluey

2007-02-10T11:39:00.000+08:00

I stopped to look at the sky this morning. It's so blue, so cloudless... so beautiful. I suppose few people would be as bored as me to stop and look at the sky. Or are you too busy with your routine that you don't stop to appreciate the little things around you? I met Shihui at the bus-stop and she said she wouldn't have noticed the sky if I don't remind her how beautiful it is. Don't you think we seldom appreciate what we have? I came across a very meaningful short quote and want to share it with you:

"If we start defining our success or failure by what we don't get, we're in deep trouble. Be thankful for what you have."

Well, since the weather is so perfect today, it reminds me of the super nice weather in Santorini too. At that time, the sky was just as cloudless and blue, though I think the temperature is a few degrees higher in Santorini than in Singapore. Here's another picture from the Greek island. It's a rather cliché shot that shows a white-washed church with blue dome roof. At the background is the Aegean Sea (爱情海).

P.S. Yup, the sky made my day!

Pix of the Day - Santorini

2007-02-05T21:43:00.000+08:00

I think I haven't told many of you all that the 2 days 2 nights trip to Santorini was totally last minute (as usual; a common William's action). Well, I have heard about Santorini before I reached Athens, Greece and I have been told by a Greek friend that this island is beautiful. Somehow, the initial plan with Songning and Grace didn't include this paradise. Ok, so while the rest went to the oracle of Delphi, I decided to be a little independent (or anti-social) and went to Santorini alone.

I got an overnight ticket on a slow ferry to Santorini for about SGD36. The 240km ride was super... cold. There wasn't a bed; there wasn't any enclosed room; just pure open seating with huge gust of sea breeze through the night. To imagine how cold it is, here's how I felt: I was wearing a fleece jacket with a windproof shell jacket* and I still felt cold. Naturally, I didn't really had a good night rest with the constant bad wind. To make matter worse, I was also carrying my laptop, my tripod, and my big camera big; three big thief-magnets.

At about 4am, I just couldn't take it any more and went into the first class lounge for some warmth until I was chased out at about 6am (just a bit more to Santorini). If you remember, I caught the sunset at Oia, but I haven't told you that I caught the sunrise at sea on this ferry!

*I was carrying these thick warm clothes in preparation to camp out on Santorini (A repeat of the Kiruna miserably-cold stint, maybe?) These are the clothes that I actually wore daily in the Swedish winter; except this time I wasn't wearing my woolen thermal. But well, found a nice, cheap guest house to stay in afterall.

P.S. Thank you, alexandr0s for the compliment.

KK Hospital V-Work

2007-02-04T00:23:00.000+08:00

Second time at the KK Hospital. Tried to teach the kids how to fold a dinosaur. Obviously, the set of Net instructions is quite deceptive. At a 1-5 scale rating, this dinosaur is rated 1. Easy right? Lijie and I were stuck half-way. Well, perhaps the instructions and illustrations weren't that clear (yea, blame the instructions...). Lijie came to a conclusion that practicing origami trains intelligence by forcing one to decipher the mostly unclear instructions. While I came to a conclusion that you really need patience with these paper animals.

An active boy who has just learned to walk. He is always running around exploring his newly acquired skill.

Super patient Lijie detangling a hanging mobile

The gals had fun with the arts and craft too!

Click here for all pixs related to KK Hospital volunteer work.

Soccer Match - Chemistry Honours VS Staff

2007-02-02T21:23:00.000+08:00

Staff Team and Student Team

Almost all the supporters and soccer players

The Intensity of the Match

Team Captain - Suresh

The Cheering

At the post-match reception

The Team

Click here for full album.

The final score was 3:2. The student team won! Whoa ho!

USC Bazaar - Day 1

2007-01-31T22:36:00.000+08:00

Hah... Another nice opportunity for pictures: USC Bazaar @ Science Foyer.

I got to give up on a photography appointment for the surgery department dinner gathering at KK Hospital; the timing clashes with the honors class sports day. Josephine, sorry for disappointing you.

I got another lobang to add pixs to my portfolio from Andy, a fellow magician that I have known for 3 years. If I'm not wrong, he is working for Singtel and I am suppose to take some kind of DnD pixs on the 2 March. Browsing around the Net for more pix ideas...

Failure to Graduate

2007-01-31T09:29:00.000+08:00

I missed the deadline to check why I didn't qualify for graduation! Darn it. The deadline was 30 Jan and I only read the mail yesternite. Screwed up. This is what happens if you don't check the most-of-the-time crappy NUS email box. Apparently, I have failed my faculty requirement check and major requirement check. Though I know very confidently that I have fulfilled both requirements, it was still a rather difficult-to-sleep night (you know when your mind is thinking and thinking about something and you just keep tossing and turning in bed). I slumbered early @ 2330 with the mind set on waking up at 0730 the next morning so that I can ask the Dean's office and Chemistry Dept office at the first instant they open at 0830.

I am already a regular "customer" at the Chem office. Ema knew me by name and she was quite surprised when she saw my failure to qualify for graduation. After checking the records, she found out that my ISM module was coded as "UIS" so there was a failure to register this module as a level 3000 chemistry elective. Phew... relieved. There was still the faculty requirement to check; afterall, things are more complicated with this requirement. What 3 groups of modules plus 1 from any other + the two CBMs which could be counted as two distinct groups... whatever.

Ok, went to the Dean's office. Lili was there. Just like Ema, she kind of find me familiar too. After I say "William", she went on the say "Wong Yu Kai"? Yup, I got into too much administrative trouble. After checking the records, she said that I am cleared for graduation. Whoa Ho! The reason why the system said that I have not cleared the faculty requirement was that I had not cleared the major requirement, so it was like an automatic thing to say I didn't qualify A, I didn't qualify B. Worries over.

Pixs of the Day - Myanmar

2007-01-29T20:35:00.000+08:00

My dad made a pilgrimage to Myanmar for the past 3 weeks. He has been telling me much stories and some realization of Buddha nature upon his return; they are some religious inspirations for me. My dad took some pictures on this trip and some of them are real nice! Here's a visual treat:

Nice Windy Day

2007-01-29T19:44:00.000+08:00

Ha... a nice windy Monday. It's a pretty eventful day: went through a super confusing and messy Financial Accounting tutorial, a complexing Financial Accounting lecture, and exciting Reason and Persuasion tutorial and lecture. The philosophy tutorial kind of brought back the USP memories. I like the small class (only 12 in the class), interactive style of today's tutorial seminar. The tutor, Jason, is nice and casual.

The Fest la Vie @ Arts Forum was pretty happening. I think the auction was very well-executed. The bidders were spontaneous and I think the final bid prices were kind of reasonable (sometimes quite high in fact). Lots of external vendors selling food there. If you haven't been there, I think you should make a trip there. There are concerts and auctions going on from 1200-1400 from today till Wednesday.

Over-ordered my dinner @ biz canteen: one bowl of wonton soup and two mantou. The mantou's is super-filling; the dough is very dense. Since the weather was so nice, I walked from biz back to PGP. Hope the weather would be like this more often.

Tennis @ Zi Kai's Place

2007-01-28T19:32:00.000+08:00

The morning was spent at Zi Kai's place playing tennis. We were joined by his brother and three of his bro's friends. What a coincidence, all of us were from TJC and three of us are from Class 15/xx (xx=year). Long time since I played tennis, rusty rusty (groove came back after a while). I spent more time chasing and picking up the balls compared to the actual time I spend running on the court and hitting the ball. Oh well, all of us were of pretty much the same standard (maybe I am the lousiest). We had a good time laughing at each other's blunders and the crazy antics. The end of the session was spent picking up the balls that were hit out of the court. The balls were playing hide-and-seek in the bushes while we, the humans, went on the searching hunt. Fun!

Xin Qin Rong Ji Concert

2007-01-27T23:30:00.000+08:00

I got the tickets from Peter, the new UROP student in Prof Sam Li's Lab. I was from KEVII Hall when I was in year 1 but I did not attend the signature event of our hall. Thinking back, I kind of regret it. I decided to attend the concert this time before I graduate from NUS.

The style of presenting a song is quite different as you would expect from, say, Project Superstar. Afterall, this is a song writing competition not a performance talent competition. The score percentage given to the performance was like 10% only. Naturally, I wouldn't look out for and there wasn't any super flashy performance.

There was interaction between contestants and the judges after the performance of a song, which was a rather blatant adaption of Project Superstar. Not to say this style is bad, in fact, I like the way which the competition was carried out. At least, we have an idea of what the judges were thinking about the tune, lyrics and performance of a song.

The MVs accompanying the songs were quite funny. Have you ever sang in a KTV with a "pirated" video; those third-party company production which stars generic couple running on a beach for example? Yup, these are the kind of home-made videos which were screened. The scenes were hilarious because they are so cliche and predictable. Boy leaves girl. Girl becomes sad. Girl drops a torn-photo of boy down a cliff/window. You get the idea. However, I applaud the committee for their effort to try to inject some creativity into the performance!

Chen Wei Lian was one of the guest performers. And he sang Gu1 Dan1 De Ye4 Li3 Wo3 Bu4 Gu1 Dan1 and one other song which I can't remember the name. Anyway, Gu1 is the song I like best from his album. Hmm... Wei Lian didn't sing very well tonight though.

I thought the theme song of the writing competition is very nice. Click here to get directed to the official website and listen to it.

Stinky Lab + Meet-up

2007-01-26T23:57:00.000+08:00

Yes! My blocked nose finally cleared, however, that also meant that I will be able to smell things (duh!). And, our dear Yumin spilled some thiols while doing some lab work. In case you don't know, thiol is the active ingredient in skunk mask that imparts the intolerable, persistent odor. And, we human, can smell thiol at a concentration of 1 part in a 1,000,000,000 (billion!). Whoa, imagine the smell that pervaded the lab. The persistence of thiol is incredible; the fume hood was on, we tried to react the thiol with hydrogen peroxide and sodium bicarbonate and the smell was still lingering after all the effort. At the end, Xiaofeng decided to give out her jasmine tea bags; she hanged them from the drawers so that the jasmine fragrance will mask the pungent smell. Wai Xiang diluted some Dove shower cream with hot water so that the steam from the soapy concoction will also help mask the terrible odor. The lab smelled pretty good after that. Everybody evacuated from the lab after the brief clean-up. Well, at least Yumin provided the excuse for letting us go home early :p The time was 1830.

The evening was spent at the USP Alumni Sharing Session. I think the session was more focused on the selection criteria of the companies. Benjamin, Jet and Ivan are from the civil service and the point I gathered from their presentations was that the quality of the first degree was really important in determining the initial posting and, of course, the salary. From then on, it's a pretty level playing field.

The private sector was represented by Beatrice (P&G Key Account Manager) and Jaclyn (Deloitte Consulting, Strategy & Operations Dept Consultant). These are big company names and according to Beatrice and Jaclyn, they went through like >= 20 rounds of interview to land themselves their job. The quality of the first degree is still relevant since it is the first key that qualifies you for an interview. It seems like one's performance during the interview is the most important factor that determines whether one gets a job. Comparatively, such super vigorous interviews aren't that prevalent in civil service.

After the session, a few of us from the 5th USC MC went to Wala Wala for a beer and the Wala Wings. The wings were not bad, YC highly recommended the wings and they were definitely not disappointing. At $10 for a large plate, I think the value-for-money factor is quite high. Later in the night, we were joined by Benjamin, Jet, a couple of admin stuff and other friends.

P.S. I'm so happy to know that Benjamin and Jet are together.

Crazy Horse to Close

2007-01-25T22:05:00.000+08:00

Right from the start, I don't have a good feeling about Crazy Horse opening its door in Singapore. And man, Crazy Horse Paris is closing its door faster than I expected. In a short 13 months, the cabaret show will be drawing its curtain permanently (will they set foot on Singapore again?) in Clarke Quay. According to press release, Eng Wah Organization, the company that brought in the provocative entertainment, admitted that it was a strategic wrong move; they should have waited at least till the opening of the integrated resorts (IR).

Perhaps, it doesn't take a marketing genius to see that the Singapore market is just not ready for Crazy Horse. Would you pay a minimum of SGD85.00 to watch the arty nude show? I know I wouldn't. $85.00 is a lot of money. The pricing is right for the performance standard but it just doesn't fit the income margin of most Singaporeans. Ya, I know the performance is world-class, but I wouldn't watch something I don't understand. Now this leads me to the second point, do most Singaporeans appreciate the performance? Well, I think not; so the market is niche. Would one watch the show again and again? Did I hear "no"? Yup, no renewable income.

Initially, Eng Wah was saying that the local market would be supplemented by the tourist market. I just don't think it make sense. Is Crazy Horse a Singapore thing? Or well, it might be the first in Asia but would I want to pay at least SGD85.00 and spend one of my holiday nights watching a cabaret show? From my observation, tour groups spend a short 3-4 days in Singapore and backpackers wouldn't have the budget/interest to watch the show. I wouldn't even think tour groups will organize trips to the show since the profit margin for them wouldn't be high. Compared to the Thai-girl shows, Crazy Horse is way too arty for most lay people. It's no wonder Crazy Horse was doomed from the start.

Let us look at reverse-bungee jump, a hype that is slowly loosing steam and I expect it to close eventually too. Way-overpriced: is it something like $35 for 3 min? Crazy, the rate is higher than $85.00 for the 1h+ Crazy Horse show.

Kaypohing

2007-01-24T21:13:00.000+08:00

Don't you agree with me that Friendster may well be one of the largest and most powerful kaypohing tool around? One can browse any member's network of friends and who knows, you might just find another common friend and say," I know this guy/gal; I never knew we had so many friends in common." Or you might find a long lost friend, like how I found my primary school best friend, David, on Friendster. Friendster also allows one to have a mini photo album; for kaypohs, another place that reveals a person's life.

If everyone is truthful about their relationship status, you can find out whether you, at least, stand a slight chance with a gal/guy you like. (Perhaps you would like to set your viewing status to anonymous, so that he/she wouldn't suspect you? But what if he/she is also interested in you and start clicking you? Then you wouldn't know he/she click you...) I have heard stories about people sending cold-messages (like cold-calls) to gals/guys saying that they would like to befriend them. Well, of course, the targets would most likely be pretty gals and handsome guys. Obviously, I have not received any cold-emails.

Kaypohing carries such a negative connotation that I am reluctant to use it. After all, Friendster has killed many of my boring hours by allowing me to peer into a very small part of the private lives of many people. Besides, if one doesn't keep a blog/ haven't been in contact with social life due to work/ busy with study/ too tired/ or whatever that prevents you from updating people of your life, I think Friendster is a nice place (ranked third) for that purpose. The second would be a blog. Of course, nothing beats a face-to-face dinner gathering to catch up.

Still Feeling Lousy

2007-01-23T21:05:00.000+08:00

Not much better after yesterday's sleep. I am still coughing; but luckily the throat has improved much. I suspect there is this virus going around infecting people. It seems like many people around me have been suffering similar symptoms.

Feeling Lousy

2007-01-22T20:33:00.000+08:00

Gee... I thought I am recovering well from the mild sore throat after last night's sleep but man, I am still feeling a little lousy this afternoon. Have you ever noticed that whenever you are recovering from a sore throat, you cough more often. Yup, that's what happened to me through out the day: coughing and coughing. After the financial accounting lecture, I went to rest in my room. It was quite miserable, can't rest well because of the throat irritation. Hope the throat will improve a lot by tomorrow.

Financial accounting tutorial was quite fun. Met some new people: Stephenie, Chu Wen and Nen Wen. They look quite fun. Grading is quite strict during tutorial. The tutor said that if we don't speak every other tutorial, be prepared to fail the 15% assessment.

My TA duty payment for last semester is still not here! What the h*** are they doing? My payment for the Nobel Museum guide duty was credited two weeks before 2006 Christmas. It's now 22 Jan and the normal payment day is the 15th day of every month. Don't tell me I have to wait until the next 15.

I had a nice chat with Zikai, my ex-KEVII neighbor. I borrowed Who Moved My Cheese? from ZK; "changes" became a topic of our conversation. Our common understanding: we need to embrace changes with enthusiasm. Like Sniff and Scurry(the two mice that seek out their own new supplies of cheese), we have to sniff out new opportunities and scurry fast during our actions.

Rattles

2007-01-21T23:54:00.000+08:00

There was a date on Zixian's MSN: 4 March Biathlon. Out of curiosity, I re-clicked him to resume the broken conversation. Yay! I think we have found each other. He wants to take part in the race, me too. Both of us have some sort of resistance to actually taking part in the race due to the lack in training or a deficiency in swimming speed. But well, since now we have each other's company, we might as well make the best of the situation and be training partners. I think I will most probably take part in the "sprint" category: 750m swim + 5km run. The full race is 1.5km swim + 10km run: too much for me to handle now, maybe next year. Training is reaching mid-gear liao: ran 5km on Fri and today. I will increase the weekly mileage to about 15-20km in the next couple of weeks. Hmmm, looks like I will be adding one more To-Dos in 2007 and completing in very soon: Complete a biathlon race.

Have you been following the news? The weather is going crazy. Just a couple of weeks ago, the TV was showing The Day After Tomorrow and now the news is showing all that is not so far-fetch fiction. The extremely cold winter in Anhui, China and warm winter in Harbin, China. Even the hibernating animals are being affected. The cold wave that hit India killed many. At this point of writing, the news is showing Adelaide, Australia being hit by a torrential rain that has resulted in flash floods. Not to talk about the Pacific Ring of Fire earthquakes that have been hitting Asia. I still remember reading about a prophecy about 2007 (I have lost the source); it says that there will be a major disaster on the same scale as the 2004 Indian earthquake tsunami. Will it come true? I hope the prophet is wrong.

I wanted to watch Stranger than Fiction over the weekends but didn't manage to find someone to accompany me. Oh well, then I was too lazy to go all the way to Cathay Orchard (only theater showing; movie about to end run) to watch the movie alone. Some time was, once again, spent reading Photoshop literature. To me, PS is just like a lab: filled with all the instruments and chemicals you will ever need to complete reactions and, maybe, discover something new. In PS, commands and tools are your instruments to create something new... the limiting thing: your imagination and knowledge of how it works. And reading PS is like reading academic journals; it opens up possibilities. And from there, you emulate the steps, apply to your own system/images and see how things work out... perhaps a miracle might happen. If you want a glimpse of my PS library, here it is: an Amazon Listmania List.

Hah... financial accounting tutorial starts tomorrow. It has been a long time since I attended a proper class tutorial conducted by a TA. How will it be like tomorrow? Probably a feeling of nostalgia.

Ok, enough rattling. Time for bed. Nitz!

Volunteer Work + Got Tipsy

2007-01-14T21:44:00.000+08:00

I was in Chatterbox on Saturday morning taking some interior shots for club publicity. If you haven't been to revamped USC lounge, here are some pictures of the nice place.

I then went to KK hospital to participate in the craniofacial support group activity. It was pretty fun. It has been a long long time since I did arts and craft. Interacting with the children at the center was fun. I have forgotten some of the kids' names. Some will stick in my mind for a long time: Nicholas, Francis (naughty boys), Amanda (the nice gal who wants to play with the boys but was a little shy) and Eeshane (the little gal who was shy at first but warms up as I talk more and more to her).

The evening was spent at Charlotte's house for a SEP 1st anniversary gathering. It was a pot-luck party which ended with too much food. JY and I thought the situation would have been better if Alec was there. The group plotted against Janice while playing finger-guessing game; and this kind of forced her to drink a more than the rest. And there was JY who never failed to tease Jan's cheatingly tiny sip from the glass. Too much alcohol for me to handle over here. I had some Baileys after dinner and that put me out a little (I'm a poor drinker). My loses during the word game gave me the opportunity to drink a shot of Ruby Red Vodka (nice grapefruit taste) and that gave me the fatal blow. I was feeling heavy in the head and I felt miserable. I rested on the couch while the rest continued with chatting. Darn, I was a little disappointed to miss out on the conversations. Next time, let us chat over coffee/tea instead of liquor.

P.S. Thank you Kaixin, Junyi, Char and Jan for seeing me back. I knocked out immediately once I reached home.

Picture of the Day: Prague Bellmaker

2007-01-11T10:06:00.000+08:00

I was walking down a street when I saw a crowd around a fire. Curiosity drove me to see that the bellmaker was performing and promoting the bells he was making.

Bereaved

2007-01-10T19:13:00.000+08:00

I read about the demise of Bruce Fraser (1954-2006) to lung cancer while I was surfing for some photoshop techniques. To me, Bruce is a wonderful digital photography teacher; I have read most of his books. He is able to understand and sort out the complex nature of digital photography and, in particularly, the application of photoshop to photography, and make sense of the theory and techniques to us. His books are devilishly illuminating. I was still waiting for his book on Photoshop CS3, I will never get to read it now.

Tommy Wonder (1953-2006) is another idol of mine and my magic teacher. Incidentally, he lost the battle to lung cancer too. Tommy was a greater thinker in magic, his sleight of hand is world-class and his methods ingenious. I will always remember this Teacher.

Changed my Shaving System

2007-01-09T20:40:00.000+08:00

I forgot to bring my Gillette shaver to PGP. And darn, the shavers in Georgie's Mart is so over-priced. I saw a gilttering copper box on the shelf while shopping there, it says: Shanghai Flying Eagle Razor Blade Factory (translated): $2. Heck, I thought I might just make do with the cheap double-edged razor (and maybe suffer some razor burn, nicks and cuts) until I reach home on Sat. The razor looked a little itimidating to use initially, I had to unfold the thin razor from the paper package, unscrew the holder and secure the blade to the handle. This is quite unlike the convenience of modern cartridge twin, triple or quad blade shavers. Surprise! Shaving with this razor is an enjoyment in itself, I like the control which I must exert to get a good shave. You really gotta be careful with this "safety razor" and the shaving result is quite smooth.

This razor is one seriously old piece of technology and was invented in 1895 (telephone was invented in 1876). And yup, it has picked up another follower even though there have been multiple redesigns, hundreds of millions of dollars in development and marketing costs, and a thoroughly confused and frustrated consuming public. I am going to stick to this old-school shaving system for a very long time.

P.S. I didn't suffer from any razor burns, nicks and cuts from the first shave!

Day 1 of School

2007-01-08T20:17:00.000+08:00

Ok, I didn't get the personal finance module. The bid point for financial accounting suddenly shot up to 1150 and I was left with 1400. The max bid for the single seat in personal finance was 2060. By right, if I haven't bidded for financial accounting then I would triumph the guy/gal by over 500 points. But anyway, financial accounting is quite fun too.

John Holbo, the lecturer of Reason and Persuasion is a funny guy. His lecture notes are filled with comical drawings of Socrates, Plato, and a few other historical characters (don't ask me who these people are, they are not so famous as the first two, so I don't know; I think he illustrated the lecture notes himself). Besides, he talks in a very interesting manner. He blogs at Crooked Timber and John & Belle Have a Blog. The first philosophy module, Negotiating Moral Issues, I took was in year 1 in USP. Nuyen, Anh Tuan was and still is the lecturer; he never failed to amuse me with his jokes too. Who says philosophy/philosphers is/are boring?

I enjoyed the big lecture theatre during lessons today. Although it can get quite boring with no-one taking the modules with me. Luckily, I met Zi Kai (know him from KEVII stay) during the Reason and Persuasion lecture break, now at least can talk cock with him.

Some To-Dos in 2007

2007-01-07T22:35:00.000+08:00

2007 is going to another milestone in my life. I will be graduating from NUS and going back to the army. What a break! Four years have passed since my disruption. I'm pretty excited about going back. Crazy maybe. The army gives me the opportunity to be fitter. Hmmm... I thought of accomplishing some things this year and here they are

1. To graduate smoothly
2. To beat or equal my 2.4km timing of 9:24
3. To beat or equal my pull-up record of x36
4. To dead-lift 120kg once
5. To squat 80kg three times
6. To run in the Army Half-Marathon and the Marathon (No timing goal, I just want to complete the events)
7. To become more and more proficient in Adobe Photoshop, and eventually, taking the Adobe Certified Expert in Adobe Photoshop CS3 test by this year.
8. To learn to drive
9. To learn to swim more efficiently by taking up courses if need to

I will add more To-Dos whenever they pop-up.

Photography Session @ Courts

2007-01-06T22:56:00.000+08:00

I met up with the USP production team for a poster photo-shoot at Courts Bukit Timah. The photographer was Sarah and I was the assistant. It was quite fun being the assistant. I gotta setup the light-stands, mount the strobes (first time handling them!), setup the light modifiers (softboxes, honey comb, umbrella), pull the power cords, stand around with a reflector and some nitty gritty stuff. Actually I was quite surprised to see Sarah working without a light-meter with the strobes. She had relied exclusively on the LCD screen. Perhaps she has got the experienced to determine the exposure from the LCD but I highly doubt it. The LCD is very poor at determining the exact exposure of a picture. Some speculations: the exposures are not-consistent and lighting ratios are quite messy. But who cares anyway if the pictures turn out to their liking? Maybe a technical junky like me will.

Eugene got a summon by parking outside Courts. Apparently, there is a inner Courts- parking-lane and outer government-parking-lane. He had parked on the outer one and exceeded the coupon by an hour. Fine: $10.00. Quite suay for a good guy who volunteered for the production. Lunch was back at NUS Mac cause they need to put some stuff back at the club-room. The revamped Chatterbox is so nice with a Zen feel. Fellow USPians, go take a look if you haven't. They have got 2 8-(sofa)-seater project rooms and 2 study rooms. An air-conditioned dining area for your da-baoed food and a big meeting table if you need to call for a committee meeting. It's way-better than the NUSSU lounge and The Space. Do bring a jacket, Chatterbox has one of the coldest air-con in NUS. USC MC, Well done!

The year-ones are so interesting to talk to. I can see myself in them who was so onz the last time. Julia is performing in the production. She has completed the production cycle. She was the stage manager then the head of production then went off for NOC and now she's back as an actress. We both think that it's fun to be part of the club as a year 4 cause we're participating as a member and working in a committee.

It's pretty low pressure for me now in the last semester. 2 UEs which I'm going to SU + 1 Level 5000 core + 1 FYP. Finally I'm going to study modules that interest me thoroughly: financial accounting and personal finance. I have been reading investment books but never a formal education. Hope these modules will do me good in the coming year.

Nagging: I can't find single sheets of Lee color correction filters (#244 and #441) in Singapore. Called the suppliers recommended by BK and they only have rolls! It's insane to buy a roll cause all I need is to tape up the flash for matching tungsten ambient lighting and fluorescent lighting. Found an online lighting gel store and I feel the seller is quite genuine and sincere. Ok, buy from him! Filters + shipping + handling = USD11.95. Not too bad, still affordable.

Janice's House-Warming

2007-01-03T00:39:00.000+08:00

Some fun with the camera

Prague Square

2006-12-31T16:23:00.000+08:00

After a long break from posting pictures from my Europe tour, here's another one:

By the way, it's another 5 months to graduation. Anyone started planning on their graduation trip? How does Australia OR China OR Southeast Asia sound? If you're interested in these locations, maybe we can work out something together.

Chemistry Party!

2006-12-31T01:57:00.000+08:00

Went to Wansi's place for a Chemistry Party. The darn bus 170 was so hard to wait (waited for 40 min and still haven't arrive) that I ended up taking a cab so that the gals would wait so long for me at the bus-stop. It was a booze party: Vodka, Sheridan's Cream liqueur, Hoegaarden, Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay.

Weather was a little disappointing initially with the drizzle wetting the pit. The fire was a little difficult to setup but no problem for the BBQ gang which got the flame going finally. Weather turned for the best towards 9pm: it was windy and the rain stopped. I thought the atmosphere of the party was very good. There was the usual talking-cock period, the "grilling" session, and the sit-together-and-finish-the-booze ending.

Xiaoling drank a little.

To the "organizing committee": thanks for this party. Aifen (the gal), Jack (the tallest guy) and Suresh (extreme right guy) were the game masters for Xiaoling's party and they played a large role in organizing today's event. Right at the back: Gabriel. Blue provocative T-shirt: Chee Koon.

Chee Koon with a mesh of food.

I think there was too much Vodka and Chee Koon decided to play with Vodka fire. I think a bit wasted.

More pictures...

P.S. We had a discussion on the raw material for Vodka. I remembered Chris (my Swedish corridormate) telling me potatoes and I told the rest. Did a Google... Yup, traditional Russian and Polish Vodkas use potatoes; the modern Vodkas are usually made from grain, especially corn.

An Essay on Lens

2006-12-30T13:02:00.000+08:00

Photography technical geeks are always on the look-out for the best lens on the market. One of the points to note in selecting a lens is its image quality and it is quite difficult to quantify the quality by a number. The sharpness of a lens is very often talked about and is a quality which is very subjective.

There are two important parameters that we should look at when we are judging the clarity of the image, or the sharpness: the image contrast and the resolution of detail. A lens can give good contrast but poor resolution and alternatively, a lens can give poor contrast but good resolution. The latter will give better sharpness at a normal viewing distance of say, 30cm; while the former will be perceived to be sharper at 2m away. This is because our eyes can no longer see the fine details produced by the higher resolution lens; contrast of the lens becomes the determining factor for image sharpness at long viewing distance.

Lens manufacturers cannot quantify the quality of their lenses based on subjective characteristics. They publish an extensive test report in a graph known as the “modular transfer function” (MTF) information. In this test, the subject is a test chart of grids. A grid consists of pairs of black and white lines. And the number of line pairs per millimeter (lp/mm) is quoted. The larger the lp/mm means that in 1mm we squeeze more B/W pairs (high spatial frequency) into that space; the ability for a lens to resolve the lines means that we have a high resolution lens. Low lp/mm represents a coarse detail or low spatial frequency. Now we have taken care of the resolution part when it comes to determining the sharpness of a lens.

The next term is modulation. This term is a quantification of the change between the black and white lines. A perfect lens would give 100% black and 100% white at the border of a line pair. In a real world, aberrations and diffraction would make the black line fade gradually into the white line (the black becomes less black and the white becomes less white). The original 100% contrast between a black line and white line on the test subject grid becomes graduated when the light from the subject is transferred through the lens. Modulation is therefore always <100%.

What happens if we plot two lenses MTF on the same graph and plotting percentage modulation against a wide range of lp/mm? It doesn't tell us anything about image quality across the image field, but it makes it easy to see how responses worsens as details become finer. The greater the area under the curve, the better the lens. If a lens is good at resolving broad details, it would make a good video camera lens while a lens good at resolving fine details would make it a better photographic camera lens.

Lens should be bought for a specific purpose in mind. We can always fit an extension tube to a telephoto and focus closer but the image quality will not be as good as a macro lens which is specialized for close-up photography. An aerial survey lens will give results for distant subjects. A lens for enlarging or copying will have optics correction for close subjects. A shift lens will have a very large covering power (to achieve this, the lens aperture is not likely to be large), therefore, likely a wide angle (Have we seen a telephoto shift lens?). By right, digital backs camera is giving very high resolution compared to silver halide films. Therefore, digital optimized lenses should have their circle of confusion (the smallest optical spot) no larger than the distance separating pixels on a CCD or CMOS.

And a tip here, do not clean your lens too often. You will cover your lens with scratch marks. This will more seriously affect the quality of your image than a speck of dust.

I haven't post any images here to illustrate how to read a MTF graph. This is to prevent any infringement of copyrights. We can have a chat if you are really interested to learn how to read one.

Christmas Eve-Eve

2006-12-23T23:36:00.000+08:00

I haven't been on a date with anyone so I took my camera to Bugis Junction trying to capture a bit of the Christmas spirit.

Party Again!

2006-12-22T01:15:00.000+08:00

Here is the link to the group-portrait-photoset on Flickr:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/69533277@N00/sets/72157594431707823/

Nano-Outing: 2006 Christmas Edition

2006-12-16T16:45:00.001+08:00

Surprise Party!

2006-12-16T16:43:00.001+08:00

Went Swimming

2006-12-13T00:13:00.000+08:00

I went swimming at Jalan Besar Swimming Complex. I was trying out some front crawl techniques but I just can't seem to be able to get my flutter kick right. It's more like a psycho-motor problem. I can get the flutter kick right when I am just kicking; but it develop into a very ugly, energy inefficient movement when I start rowing my upper body during breathing . I have neglected the front crawl for a long time. My breast-stroke, like most of you all, is quite ok: reasonably fast and sustainable for more than 10 laps. But 2 laps of front crawl will leave me panting like a mad-dog. When will I improve?!

The 7-11 slurppy machine turned to a spewing machine on me. The Atomic Green Apple flavor slurppy is so incredibly-hulky that it spat on me. Sux... got my hand all sticky. Thankfully the cashier was very prompt in her service and came over to help me. Oh yah, she was not grouchy. In the end, I strolled to Sim Lim Square with a cup of too-sweat, no-flavor slurppy along Jalan Besar enjoying the sights that I have missed when I travel in a vehicle.

I was looking for Sony rechargeable batteries in Sim Lim Square and it seems almost all the shops are not carrying them. Some carried the less popular AAA when all the AAs are sold out. Is Sony still interested in manufacturing rechargeables? Should I switch to Maha Powerex?

Then I met Wei Qiang, my army friend, whom I have not met for a year. His computer is driving him crazy: 6 repairs in a year! Hopefully after the change of the graphics card and a clean install of the whole system, it will turn out good.

The night was spent familiarizing (even though I have bought it for a year, I haven't unleashed the full power of this photographic tool) myself with the operation of the Sekonic L358 meter and organizing some of my computational results.