Dead and hot pixel...

On 16th August 2008, it's time for team China to showcase their fireworks in Malaysia International Fireworks Competition in Putrajaya. I went there to brush up my fireworks photography skills. As usual, I carried my 9kg big tripod and all my gear to a nice spot. Set up everything and ready to shoot. The firework performance was impressive. I manage to get a few decent shot.

Reached home about 1am. Tiring and exhausted. I manage to copy all the photo into my 500GB external HDD before I go to bed.

The next day morning, I nicely open up the photo I took last night. I got a shocked. WTF! How come there's so many "colourful pimples" on every photo! I thought I was still dreaming. But then when I look closely on one of the photo taken, gosh! it is DEAD PIXEL! Situation got worst, when I found out that every photo contain dead pixel.

What is dead pixel? Dead pixels are elements on the CCD that do not work at all. This is determined by checking the RGB and luminance value of the pixel. In case of a lens cap shot this should be close to black. If the pixel is instead white or almost white it is a dead pixel.

Damn it! There goes my fireworks photo. I google and find my way through the web. Manage to get some information from Dpreview.com forum on curing dead pixel on Canon EOS 350D. Frankly speaking, it does not help much.

I manage to get some tips and guidance from Photomalaysia.com on how to test your camera for dead pixel accurately using a special software. You can download the software HERE! (by Starzen Technology).

I am a RAW shooter. I am using Canon therefore I use Canon Digital Photo Pro to process all my RAW (.CR2) images.

My step to prepare image from camera:
1. You will need your DSLR, lens (any lens will do, as long as you have lens cap) and of cause the CF card (or SD).
2. Put on the lens cap into your lens.
3. Set your AF mode to MF.
4. Cover your view finder and make sure there's no stray light goes into your viewfinder.
4. Now set your internal camera setting( ISO 400, F16, Shutter speed at 30 second, RAW image quality)
5. Fire the trigger.
6. Wait till the camera ready.

Step to prepare image for Dead Pixel test
1. Copy and save your RAW (.CR2) as TIFF format using Canon DPP (Without any post process)
2. Open Dead Pixel test and plug in your image in TIFF format.
3. Check the result how many DEAD pixel and HOT pixel you have.

What next? Send your camera to service centre for check up and remapping or replace your camera CCD sensor.

Beijing Olympic 2008 logo

08.08.08 mark the greatest day for China. Beijing Olympic 2008 opening ceremony dazzled the whole world by showcasing their ancient culture and civilizations, inventions and fireworks around the city. The performance together with the projection effect is simply WOW!

Have you ever think of who come out the idea of Beijing Olympic 2008 logo? Check out the video below how the idea of logo comes from...

PC Fair II 2008 - My View

PC Fair is Malaysia largest information and technology fair organized by The National ICT Association of Malaysia (PIKOM). PC Fair started off in year 1995 where is was organized in Putra World Trade Centre (PWTC) in Kuala Lumpur and The DOME (KOMTAR) in Penang. Today, PC Fair made it step into Malayia Books of Records and it's the largest ICT Fair in Malaysia. PC Fair is held in 13 location around Malaysia.

Well, that's the history and glamour part of Malaysia. Many people think that PC Fair = Cheap / Bargain Stuff. I would say their perception on PC Fair is totally untrue. I been to PC fair since 1995 and never missed any of it. From KOMTAR DOME to PWTC and the latest location in KLCCC (Kuala Lumpur Conference and Exhibition Centre) for more than 12 years. Things were cheap when it was held the first few years. Lately, most of the stuff sell in the fair are low quality China made product. My opinion, PC Fair is like a chance where all the dealer would throw out those low quality China made product at ridiculious low price just to finish off their stock.

My friend has been asking me should they go to PC fair and get their PC or laptop. I don't really like to shop in PC fair. There is a reason behind it:

1. Many offers in PC fair are equally same as normal price item you can get in Low Yat Plaza (LYP). Price the same, just you have a few free gift and extended warranty. Especially for branded laptop like Apple, Toshiba, Fujitsu etc...

2. PC fair is bloody crowded and full of people. To find a parking space in KLCCC will take you at least an hour. Lots of young and old will come to the fair either for shopping or lurking for pretty and sexy ladies. I had seen a good looking Indian guy handing over his card to those sexy ladies on recruitment for "job" that promise high income.

3. Warranty issue. Can you imagine you bought an MP4 player at a dirt cheap price with 24 hours warranty? It is ridiculous isn't it? What if luck is not on your side and the player rip apart after 24 hours? There goes your investment, it's like paying RM50 for a MP4 player that can last for 1 day. PC Fair is a place where most of the dealer will throw away their outdated product for a dirt cheap price but with an extremely short warranty. Some even not warrantied.

4. Where to find the dealer? Yes, I bet some visitor don't even know they bought their product from the company unless it is clearly stated in the receipt. An example case like you bought a product in PC Fair from Dealer A. 2 weeks later, you have some problem with your product. You desperately need to get back to the dealer that you purchase your product from. But you have one problem, there's no dealer's location and detail printed on the receipt. What are you going to do with the product then?

5. Some scumbag and irresponsible dealer. Like I said earlier. Most of the dealer take PC Fair for granted as to dispose their old and outdated stock in a dirt cheap price. On top of that, they might think of just sell and dispose the product. After the product is sell off, they are clean from the product. They don't need to provide warranty on the product itself just in case the product fail after 2 weeks.

In short, PC Fair is good for windows shopping but not if you wanted to shop for your computer product. I rather shop in lowyat than having the hassle from finding parking to joining the crowd in PC FAIR.

Anyhow this is my opinion after I've been visiting PC Fair for the past 12 years.

Share with me your opinion and thought on PC Fair.

CW

Digital control black box

I am RM800 bucks poorer today. Why? Can't imagine I spend RM800 bucks on a 80 litre black box (it's not the black box that used in the aircraft to track the evidence if there is mishap!). What is so special about this box? Purchasing this box is like buying insurance foryour investment. WTH? A box can protect investment? Yes, the investment I refer to is my precious photography equipment.

This is actually a dry box. Dry box are famous in Asian country due to relatively high humidity (>60% RH). High humidity is enemy to the lens. High humidity (>60% RH), with temperature range of 30'C and in enclosed dark area is the best place for fungus growth. Once the fungus grow in your lens, basically you can say bye bye to the lens. Fungus not only eat up your expensive lens coating, but also deteriorate your lens optical quality. There's no 100% assurance that the fungus is completely remove even though you sent your lens for total cleanup. When the fungus is cleaned, this also means your lens coating is cleaned too.

To prevent fungus growth, there's few option. Fungus is growth is heavily depends on the humidity of the environment. Low humidity will prevent growth of fungus (<55% RH).You can either store your lens in direct sunlight and good ventilation area, or store it inside your back but put a lot of silica gel or store it inside the dry box. The first method discussed is the easiest, but not practical. The second solution seems to be good, but only apply when you are traveling and for temporally solution. You don't want to keep on changing the silica gel. The last one is costly but also the easiest way to store your equipment. Drybox are used to control the humidity of the content inside the box. It will automatically adjust the targeted humidity level. You only need to set it once and leave it there, the electronic unit will take care of the humidity. Take your lens when you need to use it and put it back once you had finish using the lens. No worry on changing silica gel, or ventilated area with sunlight.

I made my decision to get this AIPO dry box when I see some of my friend's expensive photographic lens and equipment are damaged by fungus. I bought this AIPO 80Litre drybox for RM800. It's the cheapest digital control dry cabinet available in our local market that comes with 5 years warranty. The service is also easily available once there is a problem with the drybox. This box also utilize TE (Thermoelectric) condensation drying method - a low power, low noise and high efficient dryer.

Selection of dry box depends on the amount of equipment you wanted to store. Even though you have only 1 body and 2 lens for the time being, you might wanna consider getting a bigger one to accomodate additional lenses or equipment you might purchase in the future. Choose wisely depends on the amount of equipment to store. The optimum humidity to store lenses, media, paper and battery are between 45% - 55% RH. Don't be too greedy set the control too low eg. 10%RH you might ended up having a crack rubber door due to too dry environment.

Lastly, investing in a drybox is a step to protect your expensive lenses. IMHO, dry box give you better overall control humidity compared to silica gel etc. Think about this, what going to happened to that expensive lens if there's a fungus grow inside it? Replacing the coating and cleaning definately cost more than the value of a medium sized drybox.

CW.

Between blogger.com and wordpress.com

I am tempting to switch over to wordpress.com because their theme is attractive compared to blogger.com. Well there's pro's and con's between wordpress and blogger. It is quite hard to embed multimedia content into wordpres. Blogger is just piece of cake by copy and paste the script into your post. I doubt I am not that familiar with wordpress.

Other content like image linking in wordpress also takes some time to master. Blogger is ease but they have limitation in their theme selection.

Share your experience with wordpress and blogger here.

CW

10th Anniversary Grand Reunion Dinner

Specially for ex- Chung Ling Butterworth Class of 1999 graduates. Here I would like to present you the greatest event of the year 2009 - 10th Anniversary Grand Reunion dinner for Class of 1999 graduates.

Please follow the link below to the official site for the upcoming reunion dinner:

http://chungling99.wordpress.com


Your participation are most welcomed and appreciated.

Political drama

There's been a lot of hoo-haa in the political arena after Malaysian 2008 GE. Some update on current political situation in Malaysia:

1. Sodomize allegation against PKR leader Anwar Ibrahim.

2. Statutory declaration made by PI Balasubramaniam on the explosive claim link Najib to Altantuya.

3. Other political party issues involve the Pakatan Rakyat and BN..

I expect Malaysian politic to become more dramatic. Everday have different story. We shall see the final episod then..

Upset stomach

Current Status: Upset stomach, on MC yesterday

Source: Lunch at a kopitiam in Paramount

Causes: Thai fried rice

Remedy: Went to see doctor. According to him, there's gas inside my stomach

Result: Doc prescribe me with medicine for gas and stomach pain. Not effective

Last status: still sick...

SuperGT Round 4, Sepang International Circuit

Last weekend was a wonderful and enjoyable weekend for me. I was hanging out in Sepang International Circuit (SIC) since Friday till Sunday. The SuperGT Race was a thrill especially when racing under hot and humid condition in Malaysia. SuperGT race generally divided into two main category - GT500 for 500 HP cars and GT300 for 300HP cars. SuperGT is different compared to Formula 1 in term of the car and rolling start. Production cars are used in SuperGT race. Which also mean, those car you can buy from manufacturer if you have loads of disposable cash to spare such as Nissan Skyline GTR 35, Toyota Soarer SC430, Honda NSX Type R, Ferrari F430, Porsche GT2 etc.

Nissan Skyline GTR dominate the race of GT500 by becoming champion and first runner up for the race where as Subaru Impreza dominate the race for GT300.

Many spectators attended this event, not for the cars but the hot sexy Japanese chicks instead. They average age between 18 - 25 years old. Most of them have their main job as dentist, nurses, engineer etc. They are soft spoken, active and some of them have killer eyes. Most of the guy killed by their eyes added with their cute and sexy act.


Not to my surprise, I took more than 2000 shots in these three days in RAW format. I have hard time trying to select a few best one to put it here.

We did a darn thing when we were there. On the race day, during the Pit Walkabout session, we somehow manage to sneak into the paddock without the knowledge of the security. We sacrifice the pit walk about session. We stays on top of the roof of the paddock until the pit walk session finish. Then we walk behind the paddock and find a few interesting subject to shoot beside the racequeen and the cars. We also manage to get ourself into the starting grid session where we really enjoy the race and the starting grid process.

Once the race started, we headed back to the GT Restaurant. The food was catered by Pan Pacific KLIA and bloody expensive. 1 can of carbonated water cost RM5 and 1 bottle of 500ml mineral water cost RM4. A SuperGT Burger cost RM25 (Not that big and takes half an hour to prepare!).

Again, we back to the track when the race ended. There were tears and joy in the driver face. Some are darn too happy to win the race, some of them fainted and sent to the hospital by ambulance.

Three of us hanging there till 7.30pm before we call it the end of days for SuperGT because this is the last SuperGT in Malaysia. There won't be any SuperGT next year.

We were tired, but experience and exciting day out in SIC.

Let's talk about "PUNCTUALITY" the Malaysian way...

Today, I was helping out a demonstration on choosing and using landscaping and gardening tools at Kepong Metropolitan Park. This demonstration was held specially for DBKL (Dewan Bandaraya Kuala Lumpur).

There are two session, morning session from 9am to 12pm and afternoon session from 2pm to 4pm. The morning session are mainly for DBKL contractor and afternoon session for DBKL employee. Both session attendees are 100% Malay.

The morning session was conducted smoothly. I would say most of the contractor came just to show face and get their certification as this is part of the module they require to fulfill as a contractor for DBKL. Most of the time, their hand are fagging and puffing. I don't understand why these bunch of Malay still can smoke while they keep on complaining about the fuel increase but still have money to buy cigarettes even though it is expensive.

In the afternoon session, we waited until 2.30pm for DBKL employee to come. We started the demo even though there is only 6 person of them. One thing I notice, one by one started to appear when the clock pass 3pm. I doubt about their understanding in punctuality or they have some problem understanding their language. I guess when we inform then the demo will start at 2pm, they will only leave their house at 2pm or later.

This is only DBKL, what about other government department?

Petrol and diesel increase...

On last Thusday, our infamous Pak Lah announce increase of fuel price. His brilliant and selfish idea has lead to havoc for Malaysian. That night, once the petrol price increase to Rm2.70 announced, everyone rushed to the petrol station started to fill up their tank and caused major traffic jam in the entire city.

The next day after hike in fuel price, everything increase. Some take chances to increase their profit as well. One thing I don't really understand, Malaysia is a net exporter for crude oil and yet it the oil price is still so high. I have read an article published by our Ex-PM here, and it full of resources. Petronas have been enjoying the profit for more than 3 decade, where is the money goes? Money politics and corruption is not something new in this country. What the politician care not for the people, but for their own advantage.

Imagine the consequences of increase of fuel price and the impact to the society. This will definitely lead to dominoes effect. When fuel price increase, our basic necessities increase. Inflation also increase due to shrinking in our purchasing power. In my opinion, when situation change, the politician should be the first one to change their lifestyle not the people.

Be prepare for the 2nd and 3rd hit wave for fuel price surge in the future. I doubt how's the feeling of the people who voted for BN.

From Jonkoping, Sweden to Helsinge, Denmark

Today is my last day in Jonkoping, Sweden. Later I will depart to Helsinge, Denmark by car for conference. I have been staying in Jonkoping for the last five days. The weather was cool, sunny and nice. Temperature between13'c - 16'C in day time and night time was between 5'c - 9'c.

The distance between Jonkoping and Helsinge approximately 277KM.


View Larger Map

I wasn't driving, therefore I just enjoy the view along the road from Jonkoping to Helsinge, Denmark. We made a visit to a dealer in Laholm before proceed with our journey to Helsinge.

There's two option to drive to Denmark, you either drive down south to Malmo, Sweden and drive across the bridge to Copenhagen, Denmark OR drive to Helsinborg, Sweden then take Scanlines HH Ferry to cross over to Helsingor, Denmark.

Since we visiting a dealer in Laholm and a small town of Lund, we cross over to Denmark via Helsinborg Helsingor HH Ferries. It took us about 3 and half hours to drive from Jonkoping to Helsinborg ferry terminal include visiting dealer and have lunch in the town of Lund.

The scenery along the highway was beautiful. Forest and plantation in Jonkoping is totally different from southern Sweden. The forest around Jonkoping are mainly consist of pine forest compared to southern Sweden like town of Lund and Helsinborg which is more to flat land and farming. You can notice there's quite a number of windmill in the middle of farm.


Due to strong and constant wind all year round, southern Sweden and Denmark take granted of power of wind to generate green power for their daily usage. Swedish policy - green and renewable power for the good of earth. I learn from one of my Swedish colleague that it is quite tough to get a driving license in Sweden because you need to pass the hardest module - Eco Driving. Eco Driving module are exam on the way you drive to reduce emission of harmful exhaust that can do a lot of damage to the environment and earth.

The road to Helsinge, Denmark is scenic. Both side of highway initially covered with pine forest in Jonkoping, slowly changed to farm and windmill as we travel south bound to Helsingborg. The greenery was beautiful. From far you can see several windmill and green and yellow plantation.

Saturday morning in Jonkoping, Sweden

Jonkoping is a little city located on the southern part of largest lake in Sweden - Lake Vattern. The time is 4am in the morning, I can see bright sunlight shining through my room windows. It was normal here in Sweden when summer coming.


View Larger Map

I was in Skelleftea, Sweden on Monday. Skelleftea is the Northern small town in Sweden. According to the people there, if you drive 15 minutes away from the CENTRUM (a.k.a town centre in Swedish), you will be in wilderness. The population in Skelleftea is 30K people the most. Night time in Skelleftea is only 3 hours. Imagine 12am midnight you got a Sun that shines like 11am in the morning.


View Larger Map

The Swedes like to talk about weather. In Skelleftea, the temperature was subzero at night time and hanging around 3'C in the day time. Jonkoping was far more better then Skelleftea, the temperature around 9'C

Addicted to L Lens

Recently got myself a copy of Canon 70 - 200 F2.8 L telephoto lens. I haven't got a chance to test it till recently. Been to birding, test shot of few telephoto end at 200mm. I would like to conclude that the optical quality was superb compared to my other EFS lens.

I did a comparison test between this lens and Tamron 18 - 250mm lens. Both at 200mm, exact exposure setting and mounted on tripod. You can easily differentiate and judge which photo comes from which lens.

I think I addicted to L lens. If the poison goes deeply into my heart, I won't hesitate to replace my 17 -85 IS EFS lens to 17 - 40 F4 L and 24 - 105 F4 L IS lens. It will cost me an arm and leg.

The con's part about these L lens is their optical reach. 17 - 40 is a little short and 24 - 105 is not that wide (Unless I change my DSLR body to EOS 5D).

Sigh, photography cost a lot. There are always a lot of opportunities to spend on gears, but the quality of picture taken so so only....

I need moolah. Moolah moolah come to me.... Lottery lottery strike on me....

*sigh*

Work Work Work

Work is all I have and what I do nonstop and in repetitive way everyday. Time is what I lack off maybe due to my time management. I don't have time for photography but keep on spending big bucks on photography.

I just finish revive the robot today. Next week I going to JB for demonstration of the robot. Week after that I will not be in Malaysia till end of this month. That's how I going to spend half of month of May in oversea WORKING!

Coming June 2008. Time passed by so fast. I can't get hold of time. It just slipped away from my hand. Half of 2008, what I had achieved? I have to admit I still dreaming....

Was Florida, Now Copenhagen, then where?

Busy, that's all I can think about. I smell busy and hard time ahead. It's the 3rd day now since I messed up the robot. Just imagine connecting a 24VDC to a 415VAC supply.....what gonna happene? Kaboom! Spark everywhere! Yeah...I fried the robot brain, now the heart stop and it got a fried brian. These few days we trying to bring the robot back to live. Been trying a lot of emergency rescue, feed him with special medicine called Fuse... 10A, 7.5A .but still in vain. Robot is our business, no robot = no business. What are the next step? Well I try to pump in new heart for the robot, still no respond.. The only thing we can do now is flying the damaged organ directly from Sweden and expert robot surgeon to the rescue. This takes a few week.

Beside the robot, other pieces of shit coming up one by one. Mid of next month, destination Copenhagen, Denmark for 2009 product training. Just came back from Florida, United States. I have to cope with these robotic corpse. Another two weeks time I will be in JB when we successfully bring back the robot to live.

All these are really pain in the arse... Lesson learned - check your circuit before you push the on buttons and don't trust the technician. If they are smarter than you, they already be in your position.

Ranting, yet still have to work...

Bradenton, Florida, United States

Known as sunshine states in the land of free - United States. Weather are all time cool and warm. Lots of nice beaches and bitches. Lots of rich asshole stay here... Stay tunes for photo. P/S Tonight I going to HOOTERS

Some Updates and my gorrilapod

March was a busy month for me and and the end of first quarter for year 2008. Time flies by. There is a lot to do. I was busy preparing my interview for my United States VISA which has been approved. I was lucky to get 10 years multiple entry VISA. Husqvarna Asian Technical Conference was over and it was a great experience to held and organize such a an event in the company I work for. Tired but yet get to eat a lot of superb food.

I expect my friend to bring back my iPhone from U.S. and I have no time to go back Penang to get my new iPhone. Anyhow, 6 pcs of iPhone in my shopping list for my upcoming trip to Bradenton, Florida, United States. I don't know how to bring it back.

Last Sunday, went to Pudu Plaza for Clicque photo fair organized by YL Camera and Futuromic. Mostly Nikon, Tamron, Jenova, Ricoh and Joby product. I am a Canon user. The Joby Gorrilapod caught my attention. This is the tools you need when you travel a lot and bringing tripod (even if it is a carbon fiber) is very very messy. Just imagine you have to gone through immigration checking and check in luggage. I got myself a Gorrilapod SLR Zoom. The biggest brother in it's range. Can support to a maximum of 3kg (A 70-200 F2.8L IS and 1Ds Mark III)and include 3/4 thread to mount tripod head. Damaged cost - RM159. I think it is fairly priced and a very very useful item for traveler.




From my past experience, it like an idiot carrying a Manfrotto 099ProB with K2 Benro Ball head walking around in Europe. The tripod itself with head already near to 5kg! So this is the best tools so far. Easy and fast to set-up anywhere, any surface condition.

Today the first day of April. It is April Fools, but can't fool around. I have list of to-do things before I depart to the states. Still busy as usual.

How nice would it be if there's 48 hours in a day... Are day dreaming again...

A week after Malaysia General Election 2008

A week has passed after Political Tsunami hit Malaysia one week ago. A lot of issue steered up during the announcement of the result for the general election. I don't wanna talk about which party wins, lose or take over which state. The heated topic among Malaysian now.

From my point of view, I agree with a statement commented by our ex-prime minister - Dr M "...UMNO is paralyzed now...". For your info UMNO stands for United Malays Nation Organization. As far as I can see... UMNO are getting more "KIASU" now. (KIASU = scare lose / takut kalah). They are becoming like Singaporeans. Most of them are KIASU. To prove that they are KIASU, they held a demostration in front of KOMTAR building in Penang. You can see it here and here. Bahasa Melayu version here.

When the were in winning side, what they do? They sprayed water cannon and engage tear gas to the demonstrator. But when things turn other way round, they just held the demo without any water cannon or tear gas sprayed at them? What kind of rules is that? UMNO is paralyzed..and I should call them barbarian instead of human. Why? They don't deserve to be called human as simple as that. You can ask any Malaysian, what they think of UMNO? I can be assure that most of Malaysian call the UMNO member barbarian.

The Penang Chief Minister have not make any statement regarding the policy of the new government the UMNO Penang already demonstrated their anger and dissatisfaction in front of KOMTAR. Unless they hired a highly skilled master bomoh to predict what the current CM of Penang going to say or execute.

Check out the UMNO demontration video in Penang below:



and...



and...




and...more...try to google it.

As a citizen of Malaysia. I can just wish all the people of Malaysia good luck for new government.

Countdown 1 day to Malaysian General Election 2008

Time flies by. Tomorrow is showdown day for all Malaysian - It's Malaysian 2008 General Election. Who will win the majority? The heat is on now. Almost everywhere you can see political leader giving their speech. Are they speaking the truth. You decide who are speaking the truth. Some are nice and some are as bad as bad egg...

The fate and the future of our country Malaysia will be determined by the people tomorrow. Let's see what going to happen after 8th of March 2008..

Will there be changes? Change for good? or change for worst?

Vote wisely! Use your wisdom...