Merry-Go-Round

Canon P Rangefinder.  Canon RF 50mm f1.8.  HC-110 diluted at 1:49 for 8 minutes.

Epson V500 = POS

What a let down.

I was trying to scan a frame or two in the morning. But that POS just wouldn't co-operate. To get the 135mm negative onto the mount is in itself a chore already. But I guess I can live with. The holder for mounted 135mm slides can never give me a sharp scan. I mean never. The 120 film mount is close to impossible to mount. Now the software, today I just couldn't get to select Film as my medium. I re-started it a handful of times and re-positioned the negative holder, still no go. So this is the latest problem, a supposedly photo scanner that can't even scan film. Well your experience might differ.

UPDATE: The cable between the lib and the body came loose, so that was an easy fix. It didn't change my opinion on my experience in general with this scanner.

First Roll of Black and White from P Almost Ready

My first roll coming from the P is processed and is hung up in the bathroom to air dry. I shall scan once the negative is ready. I think this time I beat my record in loading up the steel reel, it took me probably 2 minutes to load the film. I did it in one go and there was no crinkles, a very clean load. The exposure doesn't look bad either considering I was just guestimating the exposures as I shot along. The accessory meter doesn't work.

That was the good news.

Here comes the not so great news. Well it wasn't exactly bad. I found out I left the FE film advance lever open and the battery was duly drained. This had never ever happened to me in the 20 plus years that I own the camera. The battery has been in the chamber forever and it had been good for years. I remember I only changed it once all these years. And I thought it has auto power off even if I leave the lever in the open position. Oh well, you live and learn. Without battery the FE only operates at M90 and B unless I use it with my MD-12 motor drive.

Well I can always shoot my Hasselblad 500C/M and my Canon P sans battery and sans meter.

I Got My P

Canon P, probably manufactured in 1959 and the lens in 1951, finally I found some camera gears that are even older than me. Woo hoo.

Snowboarding, Skiing and Shaving

They are all about the edges. And they demand your full attention or else you pay a very steep price for it. I like the brutality of them.

People ask me what is easier, skiing or snowboarding. I am not the best person to answer a question like that but my opinion is this: Skiing should be a bit easier to pick up. While learning to ski you can get away with not riding on the edge by doing the "pizza." You can survive a beginner slope by doing the "pizza" all the way down. For snowboarding, you have to find your edge pretty early on, during the process, you are going to catch your toe side or heel side, and it's not going to be pleasant or pretty. And there is no "pizza" to make to get you down, you have to edge your way down early on. My opinion is snowboard is harder to pick up. You experience might differ.

Times Square

Little Skiers

The Bra Tree

Girls feel the need to take off their bras (or some kids call booby patch) on the way up the mountain.

Oldest boarder

PA-145N

I-78

Google Has Had Enough

Google has had enough of bullshit from the China government, like nothing happened on June 4, 1989 in Tiananmen Square kind of fantasy history for one. In all likelihood Google is going to pull out of China, voluntarily or not, if it insists not to censor its search results, in the wake of a security breach found in its Gmail server. The breach, allegedly originated from China targets Chinese activists' Gmail accounts. Google has 29% of China's search market, oh well, might as well quit. At long last, Google is practicing what it preaches: "don't be evil."

More to read here.

Lost in Translation

QUOTE
雖然 Monique知衰，不過 o靚模 Jessica C.昨在柴灣出席電單車活動時，卻為 Monique藏 K仔一事感到羞恥， Jessica C.說：「我的感覺是，這是一件羞恥的事，也很可悲（ it's a shame you know, its sad.），因為她還很年輕。」
UNQUOTE

Apparently Jessica C is expressing her disappointment and sympathy towards this Monique girl. But the semi literate press sees "shame" and immediately just goes for 一件羞恥的事 which is anything but this Jessica is saying.

QUOTE
這項活動由一個名為「到處都改善」（Improv Everywhere）的組織舉辦，這個組織表示，此舉目的是要「在公共場所製造混亂的場面與大眾的歡樂」。
UNQUOTE

Improv <> Improve, Improv == Improvisation

If you don't study hard you may end up translating crap like the above translators or worse write about it like yours truly here. Remember kids, stay in school and study hard.

Grand Central

Developed for 8 minutes using HC-110 diluted at 1:49 at 68F. I am not too anal about the numbers even supposedly I should be. The temperature is probably off and the time probably off a bit.

The Epson V500 is basically a disappointment. The software and the film mounts are just atrocious. I cut my 6x6 in 3-frame strip and it's very cumbersome to load that onto the mount, a 4-frame strip maybe a bit easier but my protective sleeve is for 3-frame film. In any event the frames on both ends of the strip would definitely be difficult to mount no matter it's a 3 or 4 frame strip. That said, I believe you can get decent scans from the machine, if you can get the negative properly mounted, and you can get rid of the dust. Good luck wrestling those.

Sometimes, I am pleasantly surprised by my Yashica. It's just a little camera that can. Many of the pictures I like are from this TLR. I can't change the lens so there is no chance I could be using the wrong lens, like my Nikon and Hasselblad. And the pictures are sharp though I don't have any empirical proof it's sharper than my Carl Zeiss but it really doesn't matter much. The shooting experience is great. With no meter, I got most of the exposures all right, of course, film latitude helps a great deal.

Grand Central

No Pants Subway Ride

No I didn't join the No Pants 2009.

They should have it 24x7 at the airports around the nation.  That way everybody is safer.

More hairy legs and cutie butts here.

3D TV

Just when you thought you bought the latest and greatest 1080p LCD HD set, they come up with this 3D TV, like now.  What am I going to do with my 1080p LCD TV?  Oh, I forgot I don't have one.  Woo Hoo.

Hasselblad C12 Back 13 Frames

I developed my 13th frame from a C12 back.  Notice that I only read the term C12 online from sources other than anything official.  It's just an older back with a peep hole and I really not sure it's officially known as a C12 back or people just retroactively call it a C12 back since the newer one is called A12.  I shot 13 frames and was able to see the image on the negative all right, though the 13th frame is a too close to the end where it meets the reel's clip but it's definitely doable albeit some crinkles on the edge due to the clip.

Now I wonder if I can squeeze in the 14th frame by shooting before I see the pair of 1s.  I think I can find that out too.

Yashica Mat-124 G and Hasselblad 500C/M

Both use 120 film, but I took a measurement of the image size on the negative and the Yashica is a 56x56mm square while the Hasselblad with my C12 back produces an image size of 55x55mm.  The images from the Yashica almost always stray too close to the film edges.  When I load the film I have to make sure the top take up spool mechanism is flushed all the way in and during shooting (it has some play), otherwise the image may really go too close to one side of the edge overlapping the film code there.

UPDATE:  YOU'VE COME A LONG WAY, CLICK THE LABELS BELOW TO SEE MORE.

Romantic Terrorist Arrested

OKAY, he is romantic but he is hardly any terrorist. Perhaps the nation should just thank him for exposing how lame our airport security is even just days after the crotch bomber was subdued and arrested. Romantic 28-year-old Rutgers grad student Haisong Jiang from China just wanted to have one more kiss with his girl friend before she departed to California. The minor inconvenience was she was already in the restricted area for flying passengers only and Jiang wasn't supposed to be there. But that wouldn't stop Jiang. Mind you he isn't a ninja or a trained terrorist, but all he needed to do was wait till the security personnel stepped away he just ducked under the security tape and that was pretty much it. Now some NJ senator is trying to rewrite the law to punish Jiang for embarrassing New Jersey and inconveniencing thousands of travelers. I think, yes, his act was pretty moronic for a 28-year-old grad student but you can't just make up laws to punish somebody because you think some law is not harsh enough, the guy is Chinese but New Jersey is not China. So don't just bend the law to suit your taste.