Musings

Ever since the first stocks of the E-M5 started showing up at various cities around the world about three weeks ago, owners have been raving about the camera. Interestingly, there doesn’t seem to be any discernable pattern on which store got the camera first. Big stores like Amazon are just starting to fulfill their orders right now – which explains why there are just seven reviews of the camera at the moment of writing now, barely a few more than the two reviews I saw 3 days ago.

To be fair, I was really torn between this and Sony’s NEX-7, the fact that I’d have to invest in a new camera system notwithstanding if I’d gone for the latter. There was a gadget site – Techradar– which posted up its review of the E-M5 a fortnight ago – and they thought very well of it but funnily docked off points for pretty trivial things in my opinion. More controversially though was that the site reported that the E-M5 had better dynamic range than the Fujifilm X-Pro 1 and NEX-7. That bought about howls of disbelief from owners of the X-Pro 1 and NEX-7s. Even the Olympus fans waiting for this camera were skeptical. Sort of fun to read about the resulting huge arguments and debates over whether Techradar had seriously messed up its testing methodology.

In any case; the clincher for me came when my favorite camera review site – DPReview – posted up their completed review a day ago, and gave it a solid thumbs-up. I made my decision there and then to buy the unit. The technical specifications have been well-reported in many hobbyist reviews already, but it’s still worth noting the couple of key ones that were the most important or interesting for me:

Magnesium alloy body with extensive weather sealing. There’s a video done by DigitalRev that has the reviewer emptying a bottle of water on the camera. Nope, I’m not going to try that, but I’ll have no fears bringing this camera right up next to a waterfall; I squirmed for my E-PL1 when shooting Niagara Falls 2 years ago!

In-Body 5-axis image stabilization. This one’s interesting, as it’s a revolutionary design that ‘floats’ the sensor using magnetic fields. To be fair, given the fact that the lens I use most on my micro-4/3s cameras is already the very fast 20mm f1.7 and that the shutter speeds I use to take Hannah’s pictures is typically 1/90s and faster, image stabilization at this point doesn’t bring as much as it could. At least maybe until I pick up a 300mm lens and start shooting birds.=)

Full HD recording. Hooray! Tried it out, and while it’s not quite up to the quality of our Panasonic TM700, it’s still pretty good.=)

Macro recording with the 12-50mm. I can finally do macro photography again after having sold away my Sigma 150mm f2.8 macro lens a year ago.=)

Many of the camera’s best features are all good too; like the lightning fast AF, touchscreen-capable AF (makes keeping Hannah off-centered in my pictures so much easier), tiltable screen, and the two customizable twin dials. And best of all, the system’s light enough for me to actually enjoy carrying the camera around.=)

On the downside; the weather-sealed 12-50mm kit lens is a little long in physical dimensions, and its f6.3 @ 50mm means shooting in low-light at that focal length is going to be a little more challenging than usual. Also, while the E-M5 is going to be my favorite traveling companion for casual photography now, the D7000 is still a lot more versatile – plus that I still love my two 35mm and 50mm f1.8 primes for it, not to mention that the D7000 + 70-200mm f2.8 is still going to let me do the low-light concert performance photography that I think will be coming our way soon when Hannah goes to kindergarten.

Couple of pictures of the E-M5 next.=)

That wraps it up. In the coming weeks, there’ll be photos of our girl using this new camera.=)

I sold my Olympus E-PL1 away late last week after having it for over a year and shooting about 6,000 pictures on it. I really liked the camera a lot. It was handsome looking, beautiful out of the camera JPGs, VERY reliable (it survived dunking in Niagara Falls!), and I found myself using it more than the D300 to take pictures of Hannah. And that’s to say nothing of that the camera’s a much more discreet device that I can bring around everywhere.

There was a single problem with the little mirrorless compact though, and it was the awful habit of its 14-42mm lens constantly hunting around for the appropriate focus point in low light. When I’m shooting in good light or outdoors, focusing is speedy. But indoors and with a hyper active Hannah, half the shots I took were invariably out of-of-focus. Occasionally that was because of subject motion – Hannah just wasn’t going to sit still while waiting for the lens to decide its optimal focus – but even when Hannah was still, a lot of images still came out blurred for some reason even though at this stage I’ve developed pretty robust camera-holding techniques now.

Our friend Ann owns a similar camera and setup and I remember her remarking that that was a major difficulty for her too. Even Ling disliked using the E-PL1 because of this and preferred using that cheapo Panasonic LZ8 of hers.

For a while I thought it was an issue with the camera, until upon trawling the Internet for notes from other users, discovered that the focusing difficulty was a known problem with this lens and the E-PL1, and there was a revised edition of the 14-42mm (a Mark II) that solved this issue. Moreover, there was some kind of conflict between the lens’ shuttle vibration and lens elements when shot at a focal length range and at certain shuttle speeds, which resulted in vertical blurring (detailed analysis here).

Unfortunately, I couldn’t find someone to sell me a used copy of the updated lens, and a new one would have cost about $450 – ouch! Mildly exasperated, I decided to just sell the E-PL1 with the 14-42mm late last week for about half of what I originally paid for a year ago – within 12 hours of posting up the online ad, there were 17 persons all wanting the unit; should have asked for more – and look into an alternative.

More in the next post!

We had three fairly significant issues we had to decide for Hannah this year:

Putting Hannah into Infant care (Bad): This was initially a pretty clear decision even if it was not easy to make because of compounding factors. We thought she’d have adjustment issues with other babies and/or difficulties getting along with them, and while aware of Infant Cares being potential virus pickup-points, thought we weren’t going to be that unlucky. Boy, were we totally off the mark in this. Hannah got on great with her caregivers and other babies at Infant care, but fell sick with alarmingly regularity. And each time it happened, we were left scrambling to make work and leave adjustments, especially Ling.

Fortunately Lentor was on hand to provide assistance, but we really wanted to try to manage it ourselves without assuming grandparent assistance as a safety net that would always be there for us. By late April, we were just about fed up with poor Hannah picking up all kinds of viruses and falling sick like no tomorrow, so started making alternative plans, and…

Going with the Nanny (Win!!!): … has turned out to be one of the best and most right decisions in 2010. Our nanny adores Hannah, and even her husband and daughter enjoys Hannah too. Helps as well that our baby girl has a winsome personality and seems to be developing the right character traits – or maybe that’s just parental bias talking now haha.:) But it doesn’t take much to see that the nanny has really pulled out all stops to give her best to our baby girl – Hannah is putting on weight, is a happy baby, and adjusts well between the three places she spends the most time in relatively; at the nanny, at home, and on the occasion at Lentor with Grandparents on selected weekends.

Baby Play Yard (Mixed): We bought this as a way of helping keep Hannah within a safe play area when she’s at home. It’s easy to set up, and – for a while at least – Hannah seemed to adjust well to it too, learning to play with herself, develop a good degree of independency, and also learn how to take her first baby walking steps. Why is this a ‘Mixed’ verdict though? Well… Hannah outgrew the Play Yard a lot faster than we’d anticipated! In fact, we used it for just 2 months, after which Hannah increasingly displayed signs of restlessness when she was kept in the Yard. Still, we were able to resell the Yard at very low asking price (Ling had a long queue of persons who all wanted the yard at our asking price when she posted up the sale), and we hope it helps the new Mommy as much if not more than it did for us.

Other decisions made this year:

Ceramic Knives (Bad): This was an impulsive buy, sadly. We were at NTUC Fairprice @ Hougang Point and there was this display booth with a PRC salesman showing the use of ceramic knives. Long story short, Ling believed the sales pitch, and the NTUC Fairprice aunities endorsed the amazing quality of those knives. The two ceramic knives we bought were indeed very sharp… however, the kind of care and maintenance required of them meant that the only way it would remain sharp for us was… to never use it to begin with! Within a fortnight, our ceramic knives were chipping, even with Ling’s best attempts to care for it. Wasted money. We hope the Shigeharu knives we’ve picked up last week will fare better.

Boston trip (Win!!!): OK, so this was a work-trip that I didn’t actually have a choice in LOL. Still, I’m glad that I was at this 24 day trip. Saw Boston, Niagara Falls, Harvard University, the amazing Butterfly Garden, and whales! To say nothing of the amazing experience of working with Singapore’s best and brightest University and Polytechnic student interns, and with the staff from MIT in our Singapore-MIT collaborative research project.

Japan trip (Win): Visually, this trip was less interesting for me than the Boston one. But I’m glad that Ling enjoyed it nonetheless, especially since she was with me in Boston and thus didn’t have to go through the same comparisons. I keep telling her that the New England Aquarium is much better than Kaiyukan, but she doesn’t believe me LOL.

Well, that’s a wrap for 2010. Same post again, one year from now.:)

When I arrived at Blue’s more than 3 weeks ago, Blue asked if this was my first time to the United States. When I shared that I was in San Francisco last year, she jokingly remarked that Boston and Massachusetts were very different places. She added that it’s like living in a totally different country, where ‘traditional’ values are still important.

Below: Two pictures I took from the Longfellow Bridge of the Boston skyline. I was trying to duplicate the same shot from an earlier picture of Boston I found online.:)

My experiences of Boston & Cambridge versus San Francisco are indeed different though how one city compares to the other in its value systems I still can’t tell. I think though a good part of any difference might stem from where I’ve been primarily operating from on a day to day basis. I was staying right in the heart of San Francisco city, with my business venue right smack in the middle of town. Every morning when I stepped out of the hotel I’d be greeted by the morning commuter traffic, cars, trams, buses and the like, and hordes of people and tourists.

Cambridge by comparison, where I live and go to work everyday during this trip, is more laidback  and quieter. It feels a little like suburban America, and far less tourist-y. Apart from the weekends, I’ve not really experienced Boston city on typical weekdays. But from what I’ve observed, there seems to be relatively fewer tourist visitors to Boston.

In terms of trip highlights, I’m down to three experiences that have left me with unforgettable memories. The wonderful visit to the lovely Butterfly Garden, that very compact 8 by 2 meter rectangular area with hundreds of butterflies, the wet & wild whale-watching trip off Gloucester, and the quietness of Trinity Church’s massive sanctuary.

The trip to Niagara Falls left me with one impression, funnily a deeper one than the Falls itself. And It’s the sheer size of the country.

Just to get from Boston, which is on the Eastern side of Massachusetts, to Niagara Falls on the western end of the state of New York took 9 hours of flat out fast driving on the Interstates. And we’d not even traversed a quarter of the country!

I know global environmentalists would have you believe that Earth is getting more crowded, and those of us who live in Singapore routinely complain about its population density. But traveling across states and seeing the miles upon miles of green forest land with no houses in sight makes me wonder again if it isn’t so much a problem with Earth being over populated as it is with its population concentrated in a small number of areas.

Even after two trips, the thing about the sales tax in the United States still confuses me. I get a lot of small coin change which I just don’t know what to use them for apart from leaving them in tips jars. Items aren’t tagged with their sales tax priced in, which further adds to the confusion of how much exactly does an item cost. I ended up paying for most items using the credit card and saving myself the hassle of having pockets jingling of small coins.

Dining isn’t cheap in this part of the world though, which leads me to again conclude that as much as Singaporeans love to complain, one thing they have to concede is its availability of cheap, delicious and easily accessible eateries and restaurants everywhere. Meals here cost approximately twice what you’d routinely pay for in Singapore, and taste-wise, what Singaporeans get at home is easily comparable if not better in terms of range at least.

Ironically, it’s the stuff you buy at retail and large department stores that make up the difference in what you pay for processed goods and services. Simply put, household items and daily necessities cost lower, especially when you’re getting them from those big store chains (e.g. Wal-Mart, sorry bud LOL)

Now, as for books: I’m carting back about ten books I’ve picked up here. While retail-priced books are still somewhat cheaper than what you’ll pay for at home, they’re still more expensive compared to simply buying them online from Amazon and shipping it to your local address. The online store gives out huge discounts, and as long as you’re staying in the United States for any period long enough for Amazon to deliver to the place you’re putting up in, there’s really no reason to buy any sort of electronic gadgets or books from brick and mortar stores here. I only did so because they were mostly impulse buys, and I enjoy the experience of visiting the many book stores in the city and and in Cambridge.

For visitors intending to tour just Boston alone, I think a trip of about 3-4 days suffices nicely to leisurely see all the key places within the city itself. The city has a great subway system, and while single subway rides at USD2 are costly, picking up a weekly pass for unlimited rides solves that easily.

Pictures of my MIT colleagues, and also the group of student interns from the Singapore Universities and Polytechnics assigned to work on our project:

I’ll leave Boston and the state of Massachusetts in a few hours but with great memories. The trip has gone on pretty well; I was able to see a lot of places and sites in the weekends I had, and I completed my work objectives as well. Now that I’ve been to the west and east ends of the country, I think my next trip here – if ever – is going to have to be the mid and south-west – where all the spectacular natural sights are.:)

The Thousand Islands isn’t even an appropriate descriptor for the region: there are about 1,800 islands compacted into a relatively small area along St. Lawrence River and right smack in the Canada/US border. Ownership of the islands is split between Canada and the United States, with many privately owned as summer and holiday homes for the rich, famous and powerful.

The region is supposed to be really scenic – except again that the Saturday mid afternoon we arrived was all mood and gloom, and even rainy. Sigh.

Anyway: pictures. Some islands are barely just 12 meters across, like the below that sits a single cottage and a couple of chairs:

Some are slightly larger, like the below:

Below: Though not by that much: same island. Maybe about 100 meters across only.

Below: This has got to the be smallest lighthouse I’ve ever seen. It’s practically a baby.:)

Below: Some of the larger islands have beautifully built-up residences that also make for tourist places of attraction. Yep, that’s Boldt castle on the left, in addition to the smaller Power House in the foreground.

Below: Other islands are little more than rock croppings:

The boat ride lasted for about 45 minutes, and we – momentarily – crossed into Canada. So, while we didn’t go through customs, we can claim to have visited Canada for a couple of minutes, if as illegal entrants!

The detour to Thousand Islands on our way to Niagara Falls added about 5 hours of travel time though. Was it worth it? Well, if you have time to spare, it’s worth a look-see. But if you’re in a hurry, this region can be safely skipped in sight-seeing.

The second day of the trip – Sunday – saw us getting up bright and early, and heading from our hotel in Buffalo City to the Falls again. The first item on the itinerary was a 45 minute IMAX movie at the Niagara Adventure Theatre situated at the Visitors Center. The movie explains the history of the falls, starting with how the old Indians native to the continent worshipped it, to early explorations, and finally to crazed thrill seekers wanting to challenge the power of the Waterfalls.

For those persons who’re going to visit this place at some point, you can skip the film if you’re in a rush or on a tight budget. It’s watchable and informative, but you’re not missing too much if you give it a miss.

The massive structure on the right is the Observation Tower, situated on the American side. The ticketing and admission booths for the famed Maid of the Mist boat trip is situated at the Niagara Falls State Park – which is ground level – but to actually get to the boat’s berth area on the river, you take a fast elevator within the Tower all the way down to the river bed. The tower is massive and I judge it to be about 14 floors high. Most of the pictures later below are all taken from the tower’s observation deck.

From the Wikipedia entry of the trip, a number of the Maid/Mist’s boats work the area – as many as seven. I didn’t see all of them out on the Sunday morning; just perhaps four boats. So, while the area was pretty crowded on the weekend, crowds going for the boat trip were moving along briskly.

The above picture is of the Canadian side of the Boat ride as seen from the Observation Tower.

The boat trip itself lasts for a brisk 15-20 minutes. Yep, it’s really short. But if you’re going to the Falls, this is the only way to actually experience the sheer power, noise and din of one of nature’s most spectacular sights. Victoria Falls is of course even better than this, but also in a far less accessible location in Africa. But Ling now wants to go there – maybe we’ll end up skipping Japan this December and going to Zimbabwe instead.:)

 

The above four pictures were all taken on the Observation Tower’s deck at various perspectives and zoom levels, and of the American and Bridal Veil falls (the smaller one). You can’t really quite see the Horseshoe Falls from the American side because of the huge mist that’s thrown up. And yeah, the weather was no good. Very little sun, all cloudy. Both the E-Pl1 and D300 had difficulties dealing with the poor color tones, and I tried to recover whatever I could from Photoshop.

OK, two more perspectives of the falls. The picture below is taken of the Crows Nest, a small stoned paved walk away that brings you to take a really close look at the American and Bridal Veil falls. Lots of tourists walk this route, but because the path way is so narrow, a lot of human traffic jams result, thanks to persons who stop and pose to get their pictures taken.

Funnily though, I didn’t get drenched when I made the climb myself. The wind was blowing the mist in the other direction.:)

The below was taken at the Niagara Falls State Park, which lets you get a great review of the Rapids leading to the American Falls.

To be honest, I don’t think the pictures have turned out well at all. The weather was less than pleasing, and the viewing perspective of the falls the Americans get is all wrong, though admittedly if you want to experience the physical prowess of the falls and are less interested in taking great pictures, this is the preferred side rather than the Canadians.

The videos fared a little better, if nothing else they give you an idea of how big the area is. The first video was taken on the climb up the Crows Nest:

And the second video below is taken from the Observation Tower’s deck:

I still have a whole bunch of panoramas taken of the area, which I’ll comment on at the end of the trip. If I’m coming to this region ever again, I’ll want to be on the other side – and hope for better weather too.:)

If there’s one recommendation I’ve got for persons who’d like to visit Niagara Falls from Boston, it’s this – unless you’re up to busing 705+ kilometres – and that’s about 9 hours without traffic and if your driver zooms at about 100 km/h on the Interstate – your best bet is to just fly into Buffalo International Airport, then taking a bus or coach from Buffalo City to the falls.

I was considering two options for visiting Niagara Falls; make my own way by flying in using the above mentioned route, or take the convenient route of a tour agency arranged bus trip. The flight would have required more planning and about 1.5 times the cost, the tour package would had let me travel on the famous Interstate I-90, something I’ve always wanted to try out just for the experience.

Truth to tell, the bus journey wasn’t so bad, though the tour group was pretty packed with Asians, Middle-Easterners, Indians, East Europeans, and I suspect a couple of Russians. The group on balance was pretty well-behaved, though towards the end of the return trip when we’d been on the road for 8.5 hours and just about 5 km from Boston, a couple of them started singing “Memories”. I would have gladly got out of the bus and walked the remaining distance back. That said, I’m just happy though that there were no China aunties yakking in Mandarin all the way throughout. Small mercies!

The trip had a major detour: to visit the Thousand Island region from Alexandria Bay (you can see it near the map’s top edge), which added about 5 hours to the outbound journey to the Falls. I’ll blog about this in another post later.

As described in the earlier post, there are two falls in the area: the American and Bridal Veil Falls (marked ‘A’ on the satellite map below) and the Horseshoe Falls (marked ‘B’). There are also two sides to view the Falls, and there are pros and cons to both. The Canadians enjoy a spectacular view, since their side of the river is directly facing both waterfalls. Their side of the river is heavily built up – you can see it from the pictures – with casinos, parks, restaurants, and swanky hotels. However, they’re also – literally – across the river and have to see the falls from across it!

The American side doesn’t quite get the same view perspective (the Observation Tower alleviates it somewhat though), but you get a lot closer to the Falls, in some spots just meters away through walkways, and close enough to get millions of gallons of water crashing on your head.:)

We got to the Falls proper on Saturday night at about 10 PM, after having left Boston 15 hours earlier. The first stop was Terrapin Point to see the Horseshoe Falls, all spectacularly lit up by the Canadian side. These four pictures were taken of the Horseshoe Falls with very slow exposure times, handheld.:)

That’s us on the American side, with the Top of the Falls Restaurant to my rear. The powerful strobe lights change shade and color every once in a while, and it makes for spectacular photography.

Next post is on pictures taken on the following morning (Sunday).:)

Videos taken during the Maid of the Mist boat ride.

Passing by the American Falls:

Passing by the Horseshoe Falls:

If you listen hard enough, above the din you’ll be able to hear Mandarin-speaking voices. There were these two aunties standing beside me yelling at their top of their heads to be heard.:)

There’s a bunch more of other videos taken from the Observation Tower that’s easier seeing the waterfalls from. I’ll post them up later alongside the other photos taken from the tower.

Well, that’s another item checked off the “to do list” in my visit to Massachusetts. Just about every person who visits Niagara Falls take the Maid of the Mist boat ride, as there’s really no other way to experience the sheer power of millions of gallons of water pouring into Niagara River.

Here’s the first series of pictures: focusing specifically just on the Maid of the Mist boat ride first. The other pictures taken from the observation tower I’ll post up later… after I’ve slept the night (dead beat after 9 hours just to get back to Boston).

Below: sightseers and thrillseekers boarding one of the boats that will take its passengers to the falls. This picture was taken from the observation tower straight down. It’s very high up.

Below: A boat departing from the American side of Niagara River, and on the other bank, passengers boarding a boat on the Canadian side.

Below: Depending on how drench you don’t mind getting, you’ll have to decide which spot on the boat you want to be at. All of us get the blue ponchos. It’s like a boat full of smurfs.:)

Below: There are really two falls here: One is known simply as the American Falls, and the other the Horseshoe Falls. The Horseshoe Falls is the much larger one, but it’s also just about impossible to see anything because of the huge water mist the crashing water throws up. The boat brings you right to the falls edge.

Below: Another boat passing by ours just about to reach the American Falls.

Below: They are so about to get drenched.:)

Below: The American Falls as my boat passed beside it. The boat goes quite close to the rocks.

Below: The Horseshoe Falls. This was one of the very few good pictures that came out of it. It’s impossible to see anything.

Below: Just to give you an idea of the scale of the thing. On the left is the American Falls, and in the backdrop with the huge mist is the Hourseshoe Falls.

The million-dollar question: how was it possible I got any of these pictures or video (see later) to begin with, what with all the water crashing down on the boat? I didn’t use plastic bags or waterproof equipment. And short of using waterproof cameras or equipment, it’s next to impossible to take good actual footage or imagery of the experience without ruining your equipment.

I did think of a novel way: a lot of shrinkwrap and scotch-tape! I couldn’t wrap up the D300, so the Olympus E-PL1 got nominated for the water dunking, alongside the Panasonic HDCam for video. Now, whether both equipments will survive the experience long term I’ll know soon enough in the weeks to come. But at least I got some nifty pictures and video of it.:)

Videos next – after I’ve processed them.:)

Matt was pretty sure he’d come over from Missouri when I was in the country, but we were largely undecided as to what to do when we hooked up in Boston. We initially toyed with the idea of visiting Niagara Falls, but dumped it as too much traveling time would had been involved just getting there and returning. Not really time well-spent.

So, the idea of a road trip came up. There are three directions we can spring from Boston: North, South, and West (East would see us driving into the ocean). Westwards: places of interest would be far in between. So, Matt suggested driving up North towards Gloucester: here’s a selection of pictures from our trip there on Saturday.:)

The car rental agency was located right next to the Central Square T subway station, and the rental office was manned by these two American guys who looked like they were US Marines with their crew cuts. We toyed with the idea of booking a humvee, but figured we’d probably not be able to park the damn thing into a lot then. So, it was a Hyundai Sonata:

One thing about driving in the States is that you’d easily get lost + in the middle of nowhere with a GPS-enabled navigation computer.

One thing I was keen on trying out during the road trip was to get arrested by the local police for whichever. No such luck though: this police car just ahead of us completely ignored us:

Our Ang Mo dude on the wheel. No way I was going to try driving. Not on roads which drive on the opposite side than we’re used to:

No road trip experience is complete without a visit to Walmart just to see how Americans shop – which Matt remarked is a very sad state of affairs. We ducked into a Walmart store in Peabody for supplies:

Matt observed that this was a pretty small store by Walmart’s standards, though it looked plenty big to me:

Picking up on sugar grub, candies, chocolates, root beer, and water. All the sweet stuff would later melt into liquid form real quick in the summer heat though.

Gloucester and Boston is linked by Interstate highways. I was on Dramamine, so was half-conked out for the outbound trip.

It took us about 60 minutes to get to Gloucester, the seaside town being about 60 km away. The roads in the town was lined with many houses, all very pretty:

The summer sun was all up, which made for great pictures albeit in a moving car.

It’s a very different general feeling about the place, with plenty of spaces between residential unit to unit. Nothing like the high density living of Singapore.

We spent 30 minutes looking for parking lots in the town. Apparently, car towing – or minimally parking warden awarded fines – are a big thing in this part of the world. We finally found a spot that was available for public parking:

But then again, some things just remain the same no matter where you go:

We popped into the town’s Chamber of Commerce to get some visitor information, and to ask about interesting places to check out while in town:

Continued in the next post.:)