Cherating, Pahang

My masterpiece: The Funky Lizard

I went to Cherating, Pahang recently to attend a 4 day course. It was a refreshing change compared to my daily 8-5 job. The course consists of motivational and team building element and it had some pretty interesting outdoor activities which I enjoyed very much. Firefly watching, mangrove river tour and batik painting were the main outdoor activities. The batik that I painted were drawn earlier by using a technique called canting where a wooden handheld tool with a tiny metal cup containing melted wax attached to tiny spout were used to draw an outline of an image on a white cloth. The drawing can then be painted using watercolor-like paint without worrying the color spilling over to the other sections of the drawing.

The mangrove tour was fun too as I can see the mangrove forest up close. I encountered monitor lizards and snakes relaxing at some of the branches. Luckily I didn't came across any Predators moving on top of trees with their active camouflage :) Anyways, the mangrove trees are important part of coastal areas as they protect it from erosion as the mangrove roots are very efficient at absorbing wave energy.

The fireflies living at the mangrove areas flew to us as the tourguide mimic their light transmission pattern using only a flashlight in the darkness of night. I managed to get some of them to land on my palms and watched it flickering.

Sofea Zahra

Sorry for the lack of updates recently. My wife & I were busy preparing for the arrival of our new member of the family; Sofea Zahra. She was born on July 8th, 2009 and she weighs a healthy 2.96kg. She was delivered normally. My wife entered Labour Ward at about 2pm and Zahra was born at 3:12pm. Zahra & mom are now at Opah's place in Perak for a period of 2 months nursing and recuperating before coming back to KL

She sleeps during the day and wakes up at night :)

Cool time-lapse tilt-shift photography

Metal Heart from Keith Loutit on Vimeo.

Look at what I found from the web; Tilt-shift lens. Pretty cool stuff as it will cause people and objects in the picture look like miniature! Tilt-Shift as explained from Wikipedia :

" Tilt-shift photography refers to the use of camera movements on small- and medium format cameras; it usually requires the use of special lenses.

"Tilt-shift" actually encompasses two different types of movements: rotation of the lens relative to the image plane, called tilt, and movement of the lens parallel to the image plane, called shift. Tilt is used to control the orientation of the plane of focus (PoF), and hence the part of an image that appears sharp; it makes use of the Scheimpflug principle. Shift is used to change the line of sight while avoiding the convergence of parallel lines, as when photographing tall buildings.

In many cases, "tilt-shift photography" refers to the use of tilt and a large aperture to achieve a very shallow depth of field. "

Tridax Procumbens

As I was closing my front gate, I saw this little flower from a weed beside my front gate. I decided to take a macro shot of it. It is the same flower as my post "View with a different prespective" about a year ago. Some info from Wikipedia :

"Tridax procumbens is a species of flowering plant in the daisy family. Its common names include coat buttons and tridax daisy in English, cadillo chisaca in Spanish, herbe caille in French, Jayanti veda in Sanskrit, ghamra in Hindi, Dagadi pala in Marathi, Thata poodu in Tamil, and kotobukigiku in Japanese. It is best known as a widespread weed and pest plant. It is native to the tropical Americas but it has been introduced to tropical, subtropical, and mild temperate regions worldwide. The plant bears daisylike yellow-centered white or yellow flowers with three-toothed ray florets. The leaves are toothed and generally arrowhead-shaped. Its fruit is a hard achene covered with stiff hairs and having a feathery, plumelike white pappus at one end. The plant is invasive in part because it produces so many of these achenes, up to 1500 per plant, and each achene can catch the wind in its pappus and be carried some distance. This weed can be found in fields, meadows, croplands, disturbed areas, lawns, and roadsides in areas with tropical or semi-tropical climates."

Things you'd probably haven't seen in detail

I got myself a "Macro Extension Tube" last Thursday so I can snap pictures close up using my existing lens. It was very hard taking pictures as the depth-of-field was very shallow. One technique I learned from a book to help me take the pictures were to snap in bursts so that at least some of the pictures turns out OK.

Water droplets on a leaf after an afternoon shower. My lens and the clouds can be seen on the droplet's relection

Water droplet on the edge of a leaf

An insect emerging after the shower


Hibiscus pistil and stamens

Rosemary leaf closeup

The flower is 1cm across and the ants are about 1mm in length

Another magnificent view of the Hibiscus

Jamiroquai F1 concert + Malaysian F1 Grand Prix

I went to Sepang yesterday to see the Formula One Petronas Malaysian Grand Prix. The race was cut short (only 32 laps) due to a heavy downpour. The podium finishers were:

1. Jenson Button (Britain) Brawn - Mercedes 1h 10m 59.092s
2. Nick Heidfeld (Germany) BMW Sauber +00:22.700
3. Timo Glock (Germany) Toyota 00:23.500

Felipe Massa's Ferrari only managed 9th place. Sigh :( Anyways, I snapped some pics of a fan there to cheer me up :) Have a look-

I'm OK!

Safety car's out

Malique @ the essentials

Naturally 7

Jay Kay's gig was supported by 2 bands.

I've been a HUGE fan of Jamiroquai since I watched Godzilla and heard the song "Deeper Underground" and when I heard that he's coming to Malaysia, I knew I can't miss this chance to see him live! The rain was still falling but it stopped when Jay Kay started to perform. Cool. I was snapping pictures like mad (at least 500 shots) and the 'Live View' function really helped me to 'rise' above the rest. The shots were taken by me using Canon EOS 450D with EF-S 55-250mm IS glass. ISO was set at 1600.

The man

The songs that he performed on stage were :

Use The Force
Canned Heat
Little L
Love Foolosophy
Cosmic Girl
Traveling Without moving
High Times
Alright
Black Capricorn Day
Space Cowboy
Seven Days In Sunny June

The Kids

Deeper Underground

P/S: I'm pleasantly surprised that my post has been linked from Jamiroquai's official site here: http://www.jamiroquai.com Cool :)

More of Jay Kay's concert pictures at my flickr page!

My Photoshoot

Finally, a picture of my car. Its a Proton Satria GTi.

Proton Satria, (also called Proton Compact in the UK) is a sporty 3-door hatchback based on the Mitsubishi Colt. Proton gained a lot of valuable engineering knowledge from its takeover of Lotus which ultimately led to a special Lotus badged version of the Satria being produced; the Proton Satria GTi . This was Proton's attempt at the sporty, performance hatchback market. Very popular in Malaysia and has a large following in Australia and the UK.

Here are some of the performance mods:

• Mitsubishi Evolution III engine swap
  
• HKS F-CON V ECU
• HKS 272 deg camshafts
• HKS Slide campulley
• HKS titanium valve springs
• HKS Super Fire Racing iridium plugs
• HKS SSQV sequential BOV
• HKS 1.5bar boost meter
• HKS full auto turbo timer
• Sard fuel regulator
• Sard thermostat
• Sard magnetic oil sump nut
• Tomei 1.5mm metal head gasket
• TiAL 38mm wastegate
• Brian Crower titanium retainers
• Brian Crower +1mm valves (16)
  
• Apexi Power Intake air filter
• Bored valve seats
• Evo 3 oil cooler
• NGK ignition cables
• Power Enterprise kevlar timing belt
• Blitz Nur Spec 3inch muffler
• Custom 3inch exhaust system
• Samco intercooler connectors
• Thermo Tec thermal wrap
• Custom turbo manifold
• Custom intercooler
• Custom intercooler pipes
• HKS Kansai aluminium strut bar
• HWL Shocks
• Project Mu brake pads
• HWL Springs
• Mitsubishi Evo III slotted brakes
• Mitsubishi Evo III gearbox

More of my Satria GTi HERE

Sunday photoshoot

I had a chance to snap some photos yesterday. I almost nearly canceled it because it was raining heavily. Luckily the sky cleared up somewhat around 6+pm to reveal beautiful orange rays during sunset. For this photoshoot I invited my friend as the model (the car, that is). Shots were taken on a Canon EOS 450D using Canon's EF 50mm f/1.8 lens. Here are the pictures in HDR glory.

Aqiqah at Bidor, Perak

My sister in-law held an aqiqah for her baby recently at her hometown in Bidor, Perak. The ceremony was attended by the local village people. It was a pretty hot day but it all ran fine without a hitch.

One of the family members start cooking the old-school way the night before the ceremony.

Mmmmm... Donuts!

When I was buying groceries after work, I saw this donut place that my office mate told me about. Went into the place and wanted to order 3 donuts but I ended up with 6 donuts instead. In case you're counting the donuts in the picture, there's only 5 there. The 6th donut (Snow White) has been devoured by me :) It's a nice and cosy environment to relax and enjoy the donuts and boy, the donuts tastes real good! Good stuff...

Azlin & Hakim Happily Married on the 17th of January 2009

Went to Muar Town (also referred as Bandar Maharani) in Johor with 3 of my friends to attend a 'Kenduri Kahwin' of my long time friend, Azlin whom I have known since 1992. The ceremony was very lively with traditional Malay dancers entertaining the event. Azlin and her husband looked very elegant in their traditional Malay dress.

The Malay dancers with their colorful clothes and elaborate jewelries.

After attending our friend's wedding, we went to Tanjung Emas where we took some pictures.

The Sultan Ismail Mosque at Tanjung Agas.

We had some light snacks before heading for our early dinner.

Amy (left) and Miss J (right) posing for a glamour shot at Muar estuary :p

After the photoshoot, we went for 'Murtabak Singapura' located on the other side of Sungai Muar (Muar River), Tanjung Agas.

Amy (left), Miss J (center) and Naz (right) in front of Murtabak Singapura restaurant.

Moments before digging in... Murtabak originated in India or possibly the Middle East. The one we're having was made of minced beef, onion, garlic, lotsa eggs and some other spices.

The cook preparing the Murtabak. Note the ketchup dippings in front of the pan.

New Shoes For My Baby

It's been long overdue but finally I got to change all my baby's tires last week. I was glad I did so as I found out during the installation, one of the tires was so badly worn out that steel wires were showing!

My previous tires were Dunlop Direzza DZ101s which performed ok. This time around I went for Yokohama S.Drives 205/40/R17. The performance was even better! The ride comfort was better and felt my car attack corners like it was on rails. I haven't tried it in the rain though. So far I've clocked close to 1000km and I'm very satisfied with the performance.