GX GARNERINGS

(SHE: When I took this photo, the song SHE from the movie Notting Hill sprang to mind. I risked being caught taking this photo because I actually remained stationary three or four metres behind this girl for a while. She just walked and paused, back and fro, seemingly looking for someone. I got my GX200 ready for the split second when she turned her head, and took a few photos of her without her notice. This is the one I like best) This is the Valentine’s Day. First up, may I wish you and your loved one sweetness in love forever. May love be spread to the people around you. I picked some Chinese lines for the photo, as you see on the upper left side of it, which were written by an ancient poet, Xin Qiji (1140-1207). These famous lines are mostly quoted for people searching for love, for which I did a translation: I seek out her In an assiduous quest When I turn my head in a split second It occurs to me She is where dim light is shed Away, away from the rest Xin was not just a poet. H...

Results of 2009 World Press Photo Contest has been anounced. The winners gallery can be viewed here .  When compact camera users are having their cameras with them most of the time, I should actually call them amateur photography journalists.  There are a lot to be learnt from the winners in the way they got ready for the decisive moment, composed the photo and presented the message. The following image is the Press Photo of the Year 2008. It was not taken in a war zone. But the war-wrecked smell of the scene speaks volumes for the grave economic crisis the US is facing.

This is the last instalment on the reflections series. You may also check out instalments 1 , 2 , 3 and 4 . By mutation, I mean other creative ways to use reflections. Reflections can be real, and can be fake too. Let me give you some tips I have in stock. First, do post processing. Making post-processed reflections in the photos can give some intriguing abstract results. The photo above is made possible by using a rather full-fledged free software called Photoscape . It offers a wide array of effects like illusions and reflections. I used both to come up with another photo: More interesting results can be seen here by Paul. Second, reflections can be faked by asking your model to mimic, say, a mannequin in a display window, a real person nearby or a mugshot on a magazine cover. (Taken with Minolta Dynax 7) Otherwise, look for a wet surface. I am not speaking of real mirrored reflections here. But a wet surface can also do wonders to a photo. Take for example, walk around...

If you are in Tokyo, or going there this weekend, spare some time to go to “The Independent GR” photo exhibition.  Admission is free.  For information in English (with a link to map there), go here . The exhibition lasts until 17:00 hours on February 14 (Tokyo time).

Yesterday, we stopped at the suggestion of a photo assignment for which you may consider making use of mirrors to convey the theme. Let me take for example an on-going photo assignment about urban renewal I am working on for hobby. Like any big city in the world, Hong Kong is facing a tremendous pressure to renew old areas. The balance is, however, so skewed towards the commercial value of renewal projects that almost anything old has been bulldozed. The genius loci of old areas are fast disappearing. There is an outcry for heritage preservation in its totality, not haphazard retention of some fabric of the areas to be renewed. In parallel, people call for a better pedestrian environment in the old areas. So, I came up with some photos including the two below, in which mirrors are used to convey my messages. (A Jigsaw of Urban Renewal) I took the photo “Jigsaw of Urban Renewal” outside a new sky-high commercial tower in a neighbourhood undergoing renewal. The jigsaw-like Reflections ...

Further to my previous post about the G10 leather case, a local user in Hong Kong is selling his for a bargain price of HK$300 (approx. US$ 38).  If you’re interested, read here .  Mark that the user doesn’t mention if the price includes the leather neck strap in the package.

Reflection is a point of interest in its own right, especially for symmetric images. The penchant for symmetry seems to be in our genes. It attracts our eyes to symmetric facial features of people considered beautiful and handsome. The same can be speak of photos. Verging on a cliché, a scene with the mirrored images on the waters has never lost its appeal to viewers.   (A Kaleidoscope of Trees: Taken in Mai Po Marshes, Hong Kong) Symmetric images make the most appearances in architecture and landscape photography. Such images may connote a feeling of majesty , tranquillity or what you intend to convey by how you mirror a particular scene in composition. (A Remote Village: Mai Po Marshes, Hong Kong) A reflection is the point of interest not only for the lure of symmetry. A reflection is intriguing for it can also add an enriched visual dimension to the theme of an image. I like to make use of mirrored images to fascinate viewers. It is a great way to make them pause, ...

For LX3 users who are interested in winning some tailor-made accessory, here is a photo contest exclusively for the LX3 community.

  (Bamboo Poles: The first thing heaving into sight when I turned to this street was the stack of bamboo poles which blocked part of the road. Looking up, I noticed that a bamboo scaffolding was being built for the building undergoing refurbishment. How to tell the story was the question I had to solve. The scene was too wide to be covered by my GX200's 24mm lens and too contrasty to be reproduced in the final image. After walking the scene, I paused by a car and calculated that using the reflection of the building on the windscreen was the best solution. Now, from the image, viewers see the bamboo poles blocking the road section between the car and the shops and being used for making the scaffolding. This is the story I wished to convey) There is a story about the story of an American missionary which took place in Brazil. One day, the missionary attended a meeting in a Brazilian church which posted a big map of the world upside down on the wall. The puzzled missionar...

While London is literally snowed under and Melbourne is almost well done, Hong Kong is turning warmer. The other day I walked past this newspaper kiosk, the man was baring his upper body. I could understand why. He had been working there for over three hours when I took this picture around 8:30 p.m. in the morning. I know it because I once worked at a newspaper kiosk. When I was a student, I had done many different summer jobs, which are probably things of the past. It is even more so under this inclement economic climate. I was eleven when I worked part-time at a newspaper kiosk in a summer vacation. I had to get up at 5 o'clock every morning, too early for a youngster of my age indeed. After a quick breakfast, I went to the kiosk where the kiosk people had already unloaded their share of the newspapers from the delivery van. I was spared the unloading part because of my young age. Now when I arrived, people were sorting pages of the newspapers to make them in the right order. I ...

HSBC is offering its Hong Kong credit card customer the GRD2 for redemption at a price of HK$3,200 or 800,000 reward points. The local dealer for Ricoh cut the price of GRD II to HK$3,900 for Christmas . In a previous discussion in December 2008, I gathered the possibilty of the price cut as a way to shed the stock of GRDII: "Around nine months before the release of GX200, HSBC offered its local VISA card customers an approximately 30% off the price of GX100…. Some informed GRDII users commented that the release cycle of GRD model was two years. GRDII was released in October 2007. The cycle for GRDII will come to an end in ten months." Interestingly, and a good news too, the dealer is giving a 40% discount off the original price of GRDII. The guess above is fairly close I think. This is a real good deal for anyone (HSBC credit card customers) who finds the GRDII his or her cup of tea. Otherwise, if you can afford to wait, the GRDIII will see the light of the market this su...