Skillful Observer
Der andere Blick

Mehr Fotos aus Hong Kong. Zu Begin Fotos aufgenommen von der Aussichtsplattform am Hügel über Hong Kong. Nicht vergessen auf die Fotos zu klicken 🙂

Außerdem waren wir noch auf einer vorgelagerten Insel auf der man die größte Buddah Statue unter freiem Himmel besuchen kann. Die Statue ist allerdings auf einer Hügelkette und als fauler Tourist geht man da natürlich nicht zu Fuß, sondern nimmt die Seilbahn.

Gegen einen kleinen Aufpreis bekommt man sogar Kabinen mit transparentem Boden.

Und man kann den Fußweg auf den Hügel schön von der Gondel aus beobachten. Wir haben sogar tatsächlich Leute gesehen die am Weg nach oben und unten waren.

Oben angekommen muss man allerdings die letzten paar Stufen selbst erklimmen. Sieht von hier nicht zu schlimm aus, war aber richtig lang!

Als Belohnung kann man sich dafür ein High-Five von der Statue abholen und tolle Fotos schießen.

Beim Bearbeiten einiger Fotos von Hong Kong ist mir aufgefallen wie flexibel man bleibt wenn man von Anfang an die Fotos in einem RAW Format schießt. RAW ist die Sammelbezeichnung für die verschiedenen Rohdatenformate der Kamerahersteller. Die eigentliche Bezeichnung ist bei den Herstellern immer verschieden, aber gemeint ist immer das Selbe, nämlich ein verlustloses Aufnehmen des Lichtes welches durch die Linse kommt. Das hat den vorteil, dass man die Fotos nacher, speziell in Sachen Helligkeit und Belichtung, noch nachbessern kann. Wie wertvoll Das sein kann, sieht man an folgendem Beispiel aus dem Hong Kong Park:

Nicht sehr berauschend oder? Unten sieht man eigentlich nur Schwarz und auch der Himmel hat nur ein sehr mattes Blau. Zum Bearbeiten verwende ich Lightroom von Adobe, aber auch die Bearbeitungsprogramme der Hersteller haben sehr ähnliche Regler die in der Regel sogar genauso heißen. Also einfach etwas rumprobieren, dann kommt man schon dahinter.

Als Erstes wollen wir versuchen den Park unten etwas sichtbarer zu machen. Nachdem der Himmel aber ziemlich hell ist, wird es nicht reichen einfach die Helligkeit raufzuschrauben, weswegen auch noch den Kontrast etwas zurücksetzen sollte. In dem Fall wird es mit Kontrast -50 und Belichtung f +0,7 schon etwas besser.

Schon etwas besser, aber die Schatten sind immer noch zu hart. Wenn man wirklich mit so hartnäckigen schwarzen Stellen zu kämpfen hat, empfiehlt es sich etwas am Schwarzwert Regler (der oft nur mit „Schwarz“ beschriftet ist) zu drehen. Hier reicht es kleine Schritte gegen 0 zu gehen und man sieht sofort wie das Grün quasi aus den Schatten springt. Zusätzlich habe ich noch etwas Aufhelllicht dazugegeben, was aber zum Gesamteffekt nur wenig beiträgt.

Leider sieht das Bild immer noch etwas matt aus. Dagegen kann man schnell mal am Regler für die Sättigung schrauben. Das lässt Farben intensiver erscheinen und bringt sowohl den blauen Himmel, als auch das Grün und Rot der Pflanzen etwas mehr ins Spiel.

Ganz zufrieden war ich allerdings noch nicht, da ich den Himmel noch blauer in Erinnerung hatte. Abhilfe schaffen hier die einzelnen Regler für die Farbwerte. Einfach bei Blau den Regler etwas nach rechts setzen und schon wird der Himmel so wie man ihn sich nur wünschen kann. So einfach kommt man von einen quasi unbrauchbarem Foto zu etwas was man sogar schon in Postergröße an die Wand hängen kann.

Zum Vergleich nochmal das Foto wie es aus der Kamera gekommen ist:

Bonuspunkte an die denen aufgefallen ist, dass ich den Eintrag in Deutsch geschrieben habe. Ich werde ab jetzt wahrscheinlich fast nur mehr in Deutsch schreiben, weil ich in letzter Zeit gemerkt habe, dass mein Deutscher Wortschatz dramatisch schrumpft. Fast alles was ich lese ist mittlerweile in Englisch … ich brauch offenbar wieder etwas Übung in meiner Muttersprache.

There is an article on the „Computer = Brain“ metaphor on Developing Intellicence. In short, it is trying to debunk the „myth“ about the similarities of brains and computers. It does make 10 (11) very valid points, and you should read the article. Most of them are obvious or even redundant, but I disagree with fact 7. Synapses may seem more complex than logic gates. However I can’t think of any reason why synapses have to be more complex than logic gates. I know they are, but you should be able to emulate them with traditional logic gates.

This also marks my first post on my first own domain. Maybe this means this blog will see more updates? Also I still need to upload more pictures from last year’s travel to Hong Kong.

I’m finally here and setteled. I even have the laptop up and running, which means i can blog propperly.

The stop in Dubai was … well it was long. We landed just before midnight and boarding for our connection flight started 8:40 in the morning. Of course we didn’t want to spend money on a room we would just sleep in for a couple of hours so we stayed at the airport like all the other people whose connection flight didn’t leave until the morning. We set ourselfs up near one of these LG power chargers that were scattered through the hall, i started uploading photos and Niki went on shopping in the duty free stores. After finishng our business we looked at the clock and it was like 1 in the morning. Nowhere NEAR boarding time. So we started watching the Bourne trilogy, which Niki hasn’t seen up to that point. She did watch all 3 movies through the night while i got like 90 minutes of sleep. Exhausted and bleary-eyed, we boarded our flight to Hong Kong.

The picture was taken shortly after sunrise facing east from the airport.

I don’t remember much of the flight. Just that i slept alot and watched bits if WALL-E when i was awake. I also was a bit dissapointed that not only the entertainment system on our 2nd flight featured only 4:3 screens and pretty blurry video, but also the movie i didn’t finish from Vienna to Dubai wasn’t in the media library. Now i have to get „The Box“ so i can see how it ends. THANKS Emirates Airlines!

The picture was taken shortly after sunset.

After arriving in Hong Kong somewhen during the night, we took the bus to the city. MAN that was a ride. Niki told me the busses drive more agressive and they shake much upstairs (most of the busses in HK are double deckers). But what i got was almost steeper than a rollercoaster ride. The bus circled around the airport buildings passing so many rotary traffics i almost puked. When it finally left the island where the airport is on it became much smoother, but heavy rain was still crackling against the windows making it difficult to see anything outside.

An hour later we made it to the city and were greeted by Niki’s relatives. We stay at the apartment of one of her uncles right in Wan Chai. Despite the heat (AC was off), i fell asleep pretty fast and slept well. We went out shopping today and one thing i learned already is: Look out for puddles on the sidewalk and DON’T STEP IN. You will know why when you do 🙂

I took the picture somewhere near the causeway bay subway station. Lotsa people.

Shopping was fun. The markets sell all kinds of strange stuff. And after the bird flu, the only live food they sell is fish. Makes for a pretty hefty smell, but no doubt tastes great. Also we shopped for our first field trip. We will be in Seoul, capital of South Korea, from 12th to 16th September. Oh yeah, and all the trams in HK have different ads on them. Starcraft II beeing one of them.

Took the picture somewhere in dowtown. Obviously a tram 🙂

Stay tuned for more.

Another thing that struck me as rather odd at the airport in Dubai were the toilets. Well not exactly the toilets, just the possoirs were a little interesting.

It had like 33°C (100°F ?) when we arrived there, but the chain of air conditioning was so perfect that we only felt like 22°C all the time. Now imagine standing in front of a urinal ready to do your thing when suddenly you are hit by a hot stream of air right in the face. Nobody seems to be interested in cooling the sewers of the complex! So from the drainage there are exhausting vast amounts of unconditioned air, hitting guys taking a leak right in the head.

Not the most pleasant way to relief youreself, i can tell you that!

We arrived save and sound in Dubai late yesterday evening. Our connection flight leaves just in about 2 1/2 hours. This resulted in a almost sleepless night full of trying to get the wireless connection up and running, drinking some Mountain Dew and watchng movies om the laptop.

The picture i attached might not catch the atmosphere, but at least it is something for now. If you want to see more you either have to wait or you can add me on facebooo where i already uploaded some pictures i have taken with the „real“ camera.

That’s about it for now. See you in Hong Kong.

Oh yeah and by the way: we are also making a pit stop in Bangkok. We won’t be leaving the plane, but maybe i can snap some pictures from the window.

As promised, here are some of the better pictures i took in the recent past.

I will leave Vienna tomorrow afternoon and should arrive in Hong Kong  late Friday. We have a 6 or 7 hour stop in Dubai, so maybe i can even post pictures from there.

Sooooo.
Quite much has changed, but not so fast.
First off i will be in eastern Asia almost all of September. Setting Hong Kong as a base, i will most likely visit Seoul and probably Beijing too. Everything beyond that is just speculation right now.

I will try to do live posts from there with some excellent tools i acquired in the past 18 months.
For pictures i will use my trusty Sony Alpha 300 with 2 tamron lenses (17-50 and 70-200mm) each f2.8.
For videos and the actual text i will hace to rely mostly on my cellphone, but never fear as it is an almost brand new Google Nexus One.
To post process some of the photos and as a backup for text i will brong an old laptop too, but most posts will come from my phone.

Now this is only possible because the cellphone carrier i am on offers free roaming in Austria, Italy, Sweden, the UK and Hong Kong. So as long as i stay in HK i will actually be charged the same rates as back home. This includes unlimited data traffic! Gotta love the possibilities of new technology 🙂

Check back tomorrow for a peek into the best photos i took in the past year and more updates on my travel during the September.

… that there are no dumb questions. All the time in school. But today i learned … there are.

But it aren’t the questions per se that are dumb, but your motivation to ask them. Basically, if you have no idea what answer to expect, the chance your question is dumb is pretty high. You gotta think of „why“ you are asking your question because if you have no general idea of what the answer would be you can’t get information out of it.

This episode is really just about nabi chasing after doki. She left of to the airport after her little pet hedhog got killed in the 4th episode. At the airport a big showdown happens. Prepare for a massive influx of happy endings.

The original video can be found on Sambakza.net.

Click here for the video.

See also Forbidden Love #1, Forbidden Love #2, Forbidden Love #3 and Forbidden Love #4