I Heart Olympics

Say whatever you want, I heart the Olympics. The opening was mesmerizing, I was psyched. I mean what's not to like? You can't see any human rights violation? Or any cops beating up journalists. Can you? The communists are known to be cheesy but seriously the Opening was anything but cheesy. I am not a big fan of Zhang's Heroes, I thought it was cheesy .... But he did an excellent job in creating the look and feel of the ceremony minus the cheesiness. Yeah, at times, I thought I was watching Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon live, and Yuen Wo Ping's Wire Fu and that was a complement. The thing was just grand and cinematic. And mind you intimidating given the sheer number of people and the ingenious choreography, basically a show of force, a fuck you to all the naysayers, if you will.

The Opening Ceremony was a success if you disagree you are simply wrong.

WTF Is White Balance?

According to Destination Armchair Photography or dpreview.com, my bad, actually a consumer survey by Reevoo.com as reported by dpreview.com that more than a quarter of Britons don't know how to properly use their cameras and never bother to read the manuels. I think that's about right. For my brand of shooting, all I need to know is actually just f-stop and shutter speed. The rest of the parameters are there just to confuse me.

Olympics Delay Cast From NBC

I think this is the first Olympics in high definition. And I can attest that the broadcast is really good.

The opening ceremony is mesmerizing. OKAY, more commercials ....

The cheerleading women welcoming the athletes entering the stadium are WHITE HOT as in white baseball cap, white tank top, white skirt, white go go boots, and red neck scarf with matching red holster belt for a water bottle. I am dying to drink from one or two or three or four of those bottles. I am thirsty.

The opening ceremony has been stunning. OKAY, more delegations streaming into the stadium ....

The US delegation is marching into the stadium. The US Olympians are clad in Ralph Lauren. The jacket is three-buttoned. Why three? I always think two is better and the jacket could be a bit more fitted. I like the guy's shirt. The collar is just the right size, a bit on the small side, maybe a bit Thom Brownish in my mind, but that's about it. The pants are long and roomy. Nothing much not to like, overall the outfit is smart. Bush woke up, put on his jacket once again. Rose up with Laura and waved to the delegation.

Kobe Bryant, seen taking pictures with other athletes. Mr Bryant's style is buttoning up two buttons of his three-button jacket, shockingly the bottom two. That could very well be a fashion faux pas. (OKAY, I went back in time in my DVR to double check, it's true) The rule of thumb is you either button the middle one, like James Blake does, or the top two. Whatever, I am just nitpicking, some loser got nothing better to do.

Random Picture

Breaking: Edwards Male Perfidy Used As O'lamepics Counter Programming

ABC News, in a bid to counter NBC's O'lamepics Opening Ceremony delay-no-more cast, is having John Edwards to admit male perfidy and sanctimony to Americans today on Nightline.

Edwards denied daughter is his.

Previously, the affair was reported by serious tabloid par excellance The National Enquirer last October. The MSM has been silent about it until now, when they need to have programming to counter NBC's 2 million hours of delay cast Olympics programming.

News from the future, like 9 months later:
Edwards admits child is his to ABC News.

NBC's O'lamepics

NBC paid gazillion dollars to have some exclusive rights to broadcast the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Now they aren't even going to live broadcast the opening ceremony. That's just lame, very lame.

Random Thoughts

Two Original Calpico $2 x 2
A Dozen Beard's Papa Original Cream Puffs $21
Kids' Smile priceless.

Olympics

More Olympics (pseudo) controversies ...
Hannibal Lector US Olympic cyclists were spotted wearing masks in the Beijing airport and on board of the aircraft. So where's the outrage? They just want to play Hannibal Lector.

This is not gay Olympics so quit saying this is a "coming-out" party for China already.

Chinese police continues to beat up journalists on sight. Two Japanese journalists were roughed up by the police in the midst of reporting the terrorist attack in Xinjiang that left 16 police dead .... With this beat-up journalist on sight policy going on, I feel much safer reporting the event three thousand miles away, at the comfort of my home.

China is poking some holes on its firewall, at least briefly, so foreign journalists can enjoy all the porn and anti-reactionary websites they used to enjoy just like when they were at home. But I doubt one can see the tank man. Again, like CTGZ or Chang Ting Gong Zi, (what a name, I wish I have gotten it first), or other angry or not so angry youth from the New Yorker article, they can always bypass the Great Firewall of China by using some proxy server when browsing banned websites.

Chinese volleyball living legend Lang Ping is coaching the US volleyball Olympic team. And she has an English name Jenny.

Dragon Boat Race

This weekend was all about walking past the underpass.
Harry always likes to moon me whenever I point the camera at him. He has absolutely no faith in my brand of picture taking.
OKAY, we called it a day.

The obligatory dragon boat shot. I saw a lot of big guns. Sort of. But I know unless you have some 400mm otherwise forget about it. My 80~200 wasn't long enough for any conventional shot. On the otherhand if you are into fine art photography then anything kind of goes. I did shoot a few frames using my Yashica Mat. I could only hope something nice would come out. I didn't bother shoot with my D70 and 80~200 combination except for a few frames, just to show we were there.

Alley Pond Park Adventure Course

This was the last part of the adventure, and nobody got killed yet. The beam was about 100 feet above the ground. Everybody was brave enough to climb up and come down. Man that was intense. OKAY, not 100 feet, but what's the difference? The pictures are shown in reverse chronological sequence. (note: Blown highlight everywhere, with lighting condition like this, it's really a test of the photog skill and I failed miserably.)

Alley Pond Park Camping

All pictures shot using a Canon G3, a lowly 4MP camera. Jin was the photog.

Jin and the kids went there first and I joined them later after work. I would never miss camping, I love camping. I took the Queens bound F train all the way to Union Turnpike, then hopped on the Q46, got off at Winchester Blvd. Walked underneath the flyover ... And there it was, Alley Pond Park. I have never been this part of the Park, it was pretty nice. And fire is allowed, see pictures above. We had hamburgers and hot dogs for diner, all courtesy of tax payers' moneys, that is taxpayer as in myself included. Then it was time to setup the tent. It wasn't hard at all. When night came, it was time to roast marshmallow and smores. The kids had a lot of fun playing with the fire, of course. That's almost the whole point of roasting marshmallow. The last activity of the day was a night hike on one of the nature trails. The kids became whiners and moaners after maybe 10 or 15 minutes. Of course it could be a bit spooky in the wood at night. The rangers only showed us some plants and some worms along the trail, unfortunately we didn't see any lion, tiger or elephant. Too bad, the kids were disappointed plus they were totally exhausted after about 45 minutes.

Eggplants Destroyed

While I was out camping for a night, some animal ate the eggplants in the backyard. I am furious.

camping

This is a poor man's vacation. We are sleeping under the summer sky in a tent. I don't know y I always doing this. I am not the outdoor type but somehow I just end up in a tent....it's just weird.

Flushing For The Gastronomic Adventurous

The New York Times, in a ground breaking sort of way, introduces its readers Flushing, Queens as the culinary equivalence of Beijing, except it's right here in the backyard not 4,000 miles away. The feature is chock full of information both in print and in Web multimedia, the way it should be but seldom is. The printable list in pdf, with dish names in original Chinese characters is good especially if you are going to plan your gastronomic expedition. I think I must have tried a few of those eateries it mentioned. One shop I won't forget is Nian Shian Dumpling House. The food was all right, I don't think it was "the best soup dumplings in Flushing" as proclaimed on the list. I just think Joe's Shanghai still has an edge in its crab meat soup dumplings. When it comes to service, one of the women that served us was really bad. She was taking our order sitting on a stool, with the attitude of I couldn't be bothered. When an appetizer was not available she made us seem a bunch of idiots for even ordering that and proceeded to tell us to see the appetizer station ourselves to see what's available and again with an attitude that was reminiscence of some dragon lady. She would not lift a finger if that would make us just a bit more comfortable. Other wait staff from prior visits seemed a bit better. Basically don't expect professional hospitality from the wait staff at all. If you can look past that perhaps you can enjoy the food better. I have much better experience at other places like Happy Beef Noodle House (which is actually more of a Taiwanese food) also mentioned on the list.

Freedom To Beat Up The Press

You aren't some bona fide superstar if you haven't beat up some photographers or paparazzi. Li Yapeng, now joining ranks with crazed Icelandic singer Bjork, is now an official press beating celebrity. Just looking at the video, mind you, shot by the paparazzi corps, you wouldn't know if Li was protecting the privacy of his family or her daughter as alleged by Li himself. It's not like he was hitting the photographer while he was snapping pictures of his daughter or inflicting possible bodily harm to members of his family. He just hit the photographer when being called the bluff by another reporter on the scene. I guess that just made it less defensible. He was outraged so he hit the photographer, he wasn't protecting his family. By doing that I think he stooped even lower than the paparazzi he so despised.

The press has taken a beating when it comes to reporting the Beijing Olympics. You got just as much as freedom as Beijing allows. And very much at the discretion of the Beijing law enforcement agents, i.e. the cops who have little idea to respect the freedom of press. For freedom is a concept too remote or freedom is a right inherently given by the state or by the law enforcement agents from that part of the world. The poor guy Alex Wong even admitted he was scared shitless during the time he was detained. And admitted signing some paper before his release. Where was his boss, the SCMP? Wong you just need to find another real paper to work with.

The obligatory YouTube from ESWN.

War Photographers Not Needed?

A fervent wish for any war photographer is unemployment, said Robert Capa, one of the world's best war photographers. But not like this. The Iraq war has been one of the most sanitized war ever (I just totally made this up, no citations my friends). You could hardly see any casualties at all from all the MSM. Zoriah Miller (it's not perezhilton.com) was practically fired and barred from the Marine Corps for publishing images of killed Marines. WTF? The Americans simply don't register the war in Iraq.

Picturing casualties. (images contain dead, wounded civilians and soldiers)

Olympics Fever

An Olympic without scandals and controversies wouldn't be called an Olympic. The New York Times now have a dedicated section for this year's Beijing Olympics.

The latest controversy is China maybe pushing girls with baby teeth and in diapers to compete in the Women's Gymnastics events. The athletes in question are He Kexin and Jiang Yuyuan, both are believed to be under aged and yet have passports to prove they are indeed 16, the minimum age for the Olympics. Note He is actually a she here, see pictures from the New York Times.

Nikon D700

The Nikon D700 is slowly getting into the hands of most amateur users. The D700 has a circular viewfinder with light curtain, I think having a circular viewfinder is impressive. It's a buy if it's $1,000 like roughly what I paid for my D70. Or when my D70 bites the dust, I will get a FX D700. Or if at craigslist, some wife is dumping his husband's D700 at $1,000. (note: It's virtually impossible for a D700 to sell for $1,000, maybe in the used market.)

Some Pictures

I shoot with what I have. I just used my Nikon 18~70 mounted on my only DSLR, that's the lowly D70. The camera can be a noise machine. Oh well, what you going to do. I needed a faster shutter speed in low light so the only option I had was to crank up the ISO which inevitably introduced noise to the pictures. The D70 is a general purpose DSLR for photo enthusiast, the AF is fast but not like D3 or D300 kind of fast and by today's standard, it's rather feeble. Anyway enough excuses. Sometimes, I do think, may be it would be better off just to switch off the AF and focus it myself. Given the subject distance from the camera and the focal length of the lens, I don't believe focusing is that critical. And I think I did get away with some lousy focusing without making the pictures too bad. Of course, that's my opinion. I didn't bring my Nikon 80~200 so there is no close-up shots.

Adobe Flash Crashes

Adobe Flash still crashes my system. I suspect it has to do with my old AMD Athlon chip from what I gathers.

I am running Ubuntu 8.04. Flash 9 or 10, Firefox 3. Flash 9, the production version, definitely without a doubt crashes Firefox 3 big time. I have to force quit the browser. I downloaded Flash 10 beta. Things get a bit better. Flash plays but not correctly, the audio will speed up in the midst of playing but it won't crash the whole browser but essentially defeats the whole Flash experience. It's Flash 10.0.0 d525. This is anecdotal, so take it with a grain of salt.