2013 - Fish Oil

This is one brand that have a better or more potent, therefore it cost more. But well said, not all are suitable to every person, do get a small pack before embarking on a big ones. Try to taste or smell to your liking.

 

2013 - toilet light switch replacement

Nothing fancy here, just make sure to off the power to the switch. after opening the switch, i found that the cables are not are not good condition, so i make a little trimming, on those 2 black, (live) wire. Not sure why nowadays the switch seem to be pretty low quality, easily damaged.

2013 Flamingo Penang

Flamingo Hotel Penang, it was an long booking process using the orient rewards membership, which not intend to be anything related to them anymore. Well lets start off with the hotel, it was a nice hotel, due to its location and its view from the room. All the rooms and facing sea view. As you can see it has a great pool, there is baby pool, main pool and the pool bar, which kids are not allowed, not sure why? Access to the beach is also easy if you want to enjoy the sea nature.

Breathtaking view from the balcony

Surprise, in the room it provides us the basic toiletries, so you no need to bring any of yours, well, if you need, you are also welcome, just it's duplicating and taking up luguage space

The setup in the room are pretty simple, one pantry, one toilet, and this control table with the phone. One thing here, notice the floor, not carpentered!!!, the air-cond in this room, is below par, not cold.

 

Shower, careful, this got a really hot water. Please test before jumping in.

Ya, nice 32 inch, LCD which I have to time to enjoy!

Another view of the pool

This is the BBQ area,

Pool Bar below.

 

Pretty much weird, on the layout of the restaurant, I dislike it, it has a stairs in between, this poses difficulty or safety risks, for babies, pregnant ladies, and old folks.

The nicely layout so called "Friday Night SeaFood" the dishes are also below what I've expected, you should try the one from Hydro Majestic Hotel first. One thing good, they have senior citizen discount.

 

Well from what I can say, you can stay here, it is a nice hotel, with nice pool and nice room with the affordable price and location. The down side is the food. They really need to improve. If not you can always go across the road for a really nice local food, for western, you can get Ingolf Knipe ( German Restaurant) and Bulgarian restaurant besides it and also 7-eleven if you need to get something else.

2013 new Chicco CT-06

After surveying for the one that suits us most, light weight and price, we decided to get this one"Chicco CT-06, it is light and the quality is good, compare to the ones from sweet cherry, but 3 times the price. So far so good that the kids are willing to ride on it. that is most important factor, you can get the one that cost thousands of ringgit, at the end becomes a white elephant due to the kid disliked it. That's money down the drain and the hassle to get a suitable ones. At this time, i think it is on discount in Parkson Gurney. So hurry while stock last.

2013 - bye bye cot

These were so demanding that it went off the house after a week, posted in mudah.my. 

March 2013

2013 stroller bye bye

It is timed and done for this unit to be replaced by a lighter umbrella stroller. Both units were sold to a nice couples whom is expecting a baby soon, hope these units will be useful to them.
30-Mar 2013

Down Lights - Lesson Learned

Well, today I just realized that we have make a mistakes by purchasing the wrong designed down lights for our toilets, which make a hassle when changing the light bulbs. No worry, I will be upgrading soon. So below are the 2 comparison.

 This (above) is the ones that we had currently, as you can see above the way the light bulbs are inserted, horizontally, well this makes it difficult to replace the light bulbs, what I can say and why it is design in this manner, our housing design are getting lower and lower in term of the ceiling heights, I guess you know what they do that?. So with the ceiling so low they have to make the light not to protruding at the top end when i normally covered with the ceiling boards. Therefore they invented this design, basically following the scale of economics, demands.

So if you can, try to get the ones below, where you can just plug in the bulbs from below. Nice and easy.

Pictures and brand names are property of its respective owners. I am here just to share and show some example.

Comparison - clip to the right, and blending modes.

Today I just got the task to replace our toilet light bulbs, there are lesson learn here, but i will elaborate more on that later, now it's the time for photography tips. As you can see the below to pictures, both are taken with 50mm 1.8D and flash sets to manual, i just control the power using the aperture mode. So the one below here are the ones that I clip the lights to the right, so this is brighter (pic 1). Details of the histogram shown in pic 2.

Pic 1

Pic 2

Here on Pic 3 i shoot it as pretty balance in the middle of the histogram.


 Pic 3

 

Pic 4

Here Pic 5, I use the previous blending mode to increase the contrast.

 Pic 5

Pic 6 , i just run the autolevel with the pic 1.

Pic 6

Lastly Pic 7 - I just applied a little unsharp mask.

Well for me I would say that clipping the light to the right of the histogram is the way for me. Even without any manipulations it is already good. So, you guys be the judge.

Gimp boost colors and contrast with blend modes

 Before

After

So here are the steps, after reading Digital SLR Photography for APril 2013. I somehow tried this on GIMP, of course you cannot compare the powers of the Adobe Lightroom, or rather I would say a easier way to completed those changes. Well, GIMP is FREE, and also capable of achieving the same results.

So here,
1. Open your photos
2. Click duplicate at the bottom of the tool palatte
3. top menu - colors -> hue-saturation, on the hue slide all the way down to 0 and play around with the Lightness
4. on the layers - choose Overlay (75% opacity) as the blending mode.
5. merge the photos and done

What i like about the above is that, it make the photos separate the skies and the building, this is more 3D and realistic.

Try it!

2013 - Sharp Microwave Over

Kitchen needs, controversial topics, and debate are amount the draw for using this equipment, but scientifically have not proven the bad status of this items, thus they are still producing it, if this is really bad don't the government in the first country would announce its ban!!!. But i have personally experience that when ever you on this device, all your wife cameras would be disrupted. And the best is do not stand in front once you started it.

but here is the pros:
1. no need to wash so many dishes, like the pans needed to heat food.
2. no need to have or buy so many other items, like rice cooker and steamers and grills oven , all that is just for single use
3. save space - imaging you have rice cooker, grill oven and steamers, how much would that all take. In modern and expensive living here , it is about rm3000 floor space for that.
4. save time.

2013 New case for IPADs

Today our New IPAD (IPAD3) and IPAD2 cases have to be replaced, damage by our 2 babies lol, so one get from switch for RM159.00 called MOCRAN and the other one from Gadget Zone Queensbay Mall called REMAX for RM109.90. i feel that for full protection the REMAX is better but for sturdy standing the MOCRAN is better. MOCRAN on the plus site which have a rubber strap to secure the lid.

if your babies is playing with your IPADs, please please go to get one of this, else you will know what will happened to your IPADs soon. :D

good luck.

2013 Godiva chocolate from wife

Would like to thank wifey, for bringing this back for me from Singapore.

Here I got a chance to test the 2 lens 18-55 vr and the 50mm 1.8d, guess which is which?

NIKON D5000

Nikon D5000 12mp , this shot was taken with D7000, Nissin Di622 , 18-55mm VR lens. Flash was set to manual full blast

2013 Playground - camera findings - tutorials

Today manage to have some micro time, to take a look and fiddle with the D7000, to my surprise there is still tons of functions that i have not yet understood or do I ever use them. No wonder I get unsatisfactory pictures most of the time. Now I know why this camera is rated so highly.

So, quick to the findings. As I browse around the Menu->Autofocus.

AF-S priority selection and AF-S priority selections - this are basically settings to tell the camera not to snap when it is not in focus, or just snap? Choose.

Now then this one below, remember we are still at Autofocus menu. Item *a3 - still wonder what those * for. So This one is really important.

This selection will determined the delays when you move your camera to point/focus at other place. For example, you are shooting at your girl friend and then there is another pretty girl at the back to you wanted to capture her, now there are 1 to 5 delays here and OFF. For OFF the camera will focus immediately when you half press the shutter button. For 5 - it will wait for 5 sec then it sill only focus. I choose OFF of course, as you do not want the pretty girl to get away, ya? Simple.

Still I have do idea why people would choose 5 for this? any tips?

Now, at a8 - LiveView/Movie Mode, you have 2 options here. Autofocus mode (AF-F and AF-S). The usage is simple, when ever you pan your camera while shooting video and wanted to have so called like camcorder, then choose AF-F ( full time servo) if you are shooting manual, then choose AF-S. But for me, I think better choose AF-S and manually focus, cos this is still not up to the camcorder standard. Not sure about Canon on this one, anyone care to share?

Then here also , there is AF-Area mode, where you can set Face priority, Wide Area AF, Normal area AF and subject tracking AF. Well i assure you that face and subject tracking will not work as you expected, as this is still a DSLR not a camcorder, if you need, go get GoPro 2 with 2048 pixel resolution.

So we are done with Autofocus, lets go to Metering/exposure

I'll like to talk about *b3 Easy exposure compensation mode (over written by (shooting/display -> *d3 ISO display and adjustment, Easy ISO). For me I tested and set it to ON. It will auto compensate the exposure whenever you shoot. If you dislike the amount you can goto b5 Fine tune optimal exposure, here you will be prompted, basically telling you that by the pressing of the 2 green button do not reset this area. Choose yes and you will see the menu to choose the amount of compensation for each metering (Matrix, Center and Spot.) So depending on your area, test it and set it, this will make shooting more fun.

Now under d Shooting/display, one thing here that I like to mention. it is the ISO display, this is to basically to let you see the ISO instead of your storage space. For me, I prefer to see the ISO, cos now the SD cards are affordable now.

With this I conclude my learning for now.

2013 new bag pack for convenience sake!!!

Here is some review about this bag that i've just purchased from a well known shop at Queesbay Mall, they only sells bags, be it leather or canvas, this bag is pretty light and well match with my relatively big body, the material is strong and the seems are pretty stitched well. It has 3 part compartment and look sturdy, it is weather sealed at the zipper area and it is not on sale, i got this for less than RM100.00, good deal.

About shop assistance: nothing to complaint, very polite and helpful, sure to attacked this shop when there is another sale.

check out for now.