GX GARNERINGS

Today's post is a bit late (as a Friday post) because I went to the movies for this hilarious thing . I caught sight of the copters while on the road holding the NX10 mounted with the long zoom lens. The copters are two of the rescue aircraft of Hong Kong's Government Flying Service (GFS), previously known as the Royal Flying Service during the days of the British's rule.  Well, there were lots or royal this and royal that then. Maybe because of the sovereignty change, the GFS didn't use the Black Hawk of the US soon after the British administration left and switched to the Eurocopter Super Puma AS332 L2 Helicopter (first photo, and the one immediately below) and Eurocopter EC155 B1 Helicopter (rest of the shots). Interestingly, there is a big mistake about the name of the EC155 copter.  Locally, it is dubbed the dolphin copter (well, versus the hawk).  Fact is, the copter belongs to the Dauphin family of copter; so, dauphin rather than dolphin.  ...

This is a picture taken in the Chinatown of San Francisco by Arnold Genthe  (1869-1942) between 1869 and 1906.  The people in the picture were likely from a family of high class as shown by their clothes.  In those days Chinese so well dressed were not common in the States at all. Almost every time when I look at an old photo like this, I wonder, "What if the photos I took are passed around for the same length of time?"  This somehow rekindle my interest in taking photos when the busyness of the day has dampened me.  I can be as well recording the history which gives another dimension to what I am photographing and how I approach it. Some history about the photographer: Originally trained as a classical scholar, Genthe taught himself photography soon after emigrating from Germany in 1895.  The success of his photographs of San Francisco's Chinatown led him to establish a local portrait studio. He became famous for his impressionistic portra...

  Drawings resembling those in the old days to show customers of food offered in a chanchangtan A repeatedly resurfaced topic of GX GARNERINGS, chachangtans are eateries unique to Hong Kong which offer a wide array of localised western food.  Previous posts about chanchangtans can be found by using the search box on the left column. Of all the chanchangtans in Hong Kong, there are some with a long history which are held dear to the hearts and, obviously, stomachs of the locals. For those living and working in Wanchai on the Hong Kong Island and the neighbouring areas, the luck is theirs because of the reign of the king of chachangtans in Wanchai: Kam Fung (literally, Golden Phoenix) Chachangtan. It is housed in a really small shop on the ground floor of an old building nestled in a side street (Spring Garden Lane) just a few steps away from the bustling Queen's Road East.  But don't be mistaken that it is quiet.  Hungry patrons are seen queuing up outside it fo...

Unless prevented by circumstances, a photographer should take good care of not only all elements across the screen but also their interrelationship before pressing the shutter release all the way down.  The balance and echo are two prominent considerations in respect of interrelationship. In general, human eyes prefer balanced images while the room for viewers' imagination can be expanded by any echo in an image, together making yoru images more intriguing and sometimes philosophical. Briefly put, the image here achieves a balance by: 1) bisecting the image vertically (that's why sometimes you've to turn on the gridlines) 2) distributing the weights of the man with the wooden cart and the road markings by not putting them on the same axis (I waited until the man moved up to the upper right position) The image also hopefully achieves an echo by: 3) juxtaposing the SLOW marking and the man moving slowing with the wooden cart on, paradoxically, the fast lane.

Here is a conversation of two dumb thieves under broad day light. "How?" "Keep pushing it up and I'll screw the wheels off .  And sell' em." "Okay but make haste, bloke." This is Sunday.  Have fun!

A customer with a satisfactory grin at the "Toy Street” of Waichai where shops selling cheap toys old and new franked the open-air market I walked the NX10 (Did I think that it's a dog?) today in Wanchai, definitely one of my favourite district in Hong Kong.  It is a place filled with exotic yet modern atmosphere, always bustling with as many expats as locals for business in the western and eastern ways.  It is a place of colours, literally so (check open the photos to see'em in colour), mixed with new and really old things. A typical side street in the district where you find surprises for food and shopping   The colour of these stalls gives this image a very atmospheric touch   Such a fairly pastel scene is not uncommon in Waichai, which I think is one of the elements making the place unique among all other areas     This is rather girly to me but very comfortable to look at   Waichai is a place to see old buildings...

A defocused shot with the NX10 at the critical moment. It looks good for its unintended dreamy effect though. While I truly admire the hard work to produce a lengthy multi-page review of a camera (you know who, don't you?), I still think that the best choice can be made not other than trying it out oneself if there is a chance. However meticulously an effort is made to produce an unbiased review, a review is by nature subjective. Sometimes, it is exactly because a review is so scientific in most parts that it leaves little room for suspicion, let alone objection, regarding the subjective parts. The tester says that several crew members have tried the NX10 for an extensive period and have no complain about the focusing speed. The NX10 is even comparable to Nikon D5000 in this regard, he states. I have been shooting with the NX10 for a week with all of its three lenses (now nearly 1,000 shots), which makes me more circumspect in reading such a conclusion. No, I am not implying th...