March 31, 2008
Ichthyological Autoerotic Asphyxiation
Now that the Taiwan elections are over, the media have to find other sources of news to fill the void. After the raucous electoral rhetoric, what could be better to soothe the national psyche than a story about koi living peacefully in a pond?
錦鯉發情 精液悶死384尾
Apparently the pond was too small to hold 500 amorous kois, and all the semen from the male koi contaminated the water and suffocated the lot. Hmm... bukkake fish snuff... I think I've seen that movie before.
March 22, 2008
Switch +1
We've always used Macs at home but Sam started using PCs in college and the medical school pushed Dells and he went with the flow. At that time I didn't have any reason to dispute his decision. But as Apple began its comeback and Sam's latest Dell slowly succumbs to the Windows bit-rot, he began to consider the Macintosh option more seriously.
Apple's been on a steady roll in 2008, marching out almost weekly updates to their software and hardware products. People have been expecting the Macbook Pro update with bated breath ever since Intel rolled out their latest Penryn series of CPUs, and the weekly Apple Store shutdowns have been followed by bitter disappointment as just about everything else got updated except the notebooks. Finally, after one final kick-in-the-balls iPod Shuffle update, Apple finally dished out the laptop refresh, updating not only the Pro, but the Macbook as well.
Even before I got on him about the update, Sam was off to the Apple Store to pick up a brand new Macbook Pro. It's nice that they now come with 2GB memory standard so you don't have to upgrade them right away. I would've gone with one model up for the larger disk, since the HD is hard to upgrade in the Pro, but it should be plenty for him, plus he's thinking about picking up a Time Capsule anyway.
Fanboyism aside, I the AAPL-holder do owe him thanks for being the ideal Apple customer. Foregoing the academic discount and sucking up the sales tax to buy the new machine directly from the company store. Just thinking of all that delicious margin gets me all tingly.
The best part? He got his new toy just in time for Michelle's birthday. Very smooth. Looks like he owes, big time.
March 13, 2008
Landscape Photography, In A Nutshell
As seen on Mobile01, originally posted by nikonguy at 攝影家手札. It's truly everything you need to know about landscape photography, in Chinese couplet form.
風景攝影口訣（給新手）
大景靠勤跑，睡前看氣象
正午沒好光，好光在晨昏
奇景重氣氛，雨霧不放過
天雨帶相機，傍晚等放晴
大底加慢片，腳架快門線
變焦易耀光，儘量用定焦
取下保護鏡，裝上遮光罩
腳架要鎖緊，預鎖反光鏡
風景測中灰，白加黑要減
長曝勤測光，上下包幾張
負片宜稍加，正片可略減
廣角重主題，長焦壓縮景
小光圈景深，全開糊背景
拍花側逆光，慢門顯動感
溪流宜長曝，綿綿又密密
見山尋側光，見水拍倒影
對焦對主題，水平要抓平
偏光去反光，漸變平反差
反差如過大，黑卡效果佳
長曝避車燈，岩石要潑濕
有雲天要多，無雲地為主
前景位關鍵，三分九宮格
人物增趣味，畫龍要點睛
觀景去雜物，拍前撿垃圾
That's a real masterpiece right there.