Stephen's Ramblings on Life,Tech, Photography and other things...

Crying

2013-03-19T06:32:00.004+08:00

Usually i take happy pictures of my Kid, this has got to be the only shot when i capture her crying :)

Shot using a Seagull TLR scanned with a Epson V600

Cross post on my photography blog @ www.stephenleephoto.com

Chloe at punggol waterway

2013-02-22T06:58:00.003+08:00

The rare few times that Chloe asked me to take her picture. Most of the time when you want to take her picture she will just shy away from you.

She was dress in her Standard Chartered Kids Dash tee shirt that day and wanted to go jogging. Although on the way back i was carrying her most of the way.

For those who are interested. This was taken using a "Texas Leica" a Fuji GW690 Camera that produces absolutely fabulous negatives. (Yes NEGATIVES not digital files :) )

Source: Camerapedia

Chloe @ 3 Years old

2012-11-27T10:52:00.000+08:00

Chloe just celebrated her 3rd birthday in Oct, instead of showing some birthday pictures, these are some of daily life pictures that I took while bringing her down to the playground every morning during the weekends.

Every morning during the weekends i try to bring her down to the playground to run around abit, becuase the moment she wakes up she walks outside to the living room sofa and lies down and want to watch tv. So I let her lie down while I wipe her face, let her warm up for half hour before brushing her teeth and bringing her down to play then buy breakfast.

Quite interesting to bring her down and interact with the rest of the kids at the playground. She always calls them "her friends" even though she is meeting them for the first time.

Leica M2 (Copyright Camerapedia)

Had lots of fun taking pictures with me Leica M2 with expired Fuji NPS 160. Sometimes taking pictures with a simple camera like the Leica M2 really distills photography down to the basics, namely focus, aperture and shutter speed.

Funny thing about Chloe is that after playing at the playground for a while she will run to the adult exercise section and play with the equipment there.

Taking a break

Chloe: The biker chick

2012-08-15T07:16:00.001+08:00

Chloe the Biker Chick!

Haha thought it was always quite funny that when ever Chloe wanted to ride her skate scooter or her tricycle she always wants to put on her helmet.

Chloe's First Pictures! Through Chloe's Eyes

2012-02-21T06:44:00.001+08:00

I've bought a Harinezumi, one of those small digital lomo cameras for Chloe, intending to let her just run around and snap and see what comes out from it. Last weekend was my cousin's marriage registration (Congrat's Shumin and Micheal!) and these are what's seen through her eyes.

It's quite fun looking though those random snaps, most of the time she is just playing around with the camera pushing the shutter again and again while walking though the crowd at my cousin's place. Haha maybe i day i will make a photobook of her pictures and give it to her.

My colleague said I've gave her camera poison liao, for her 10th birthday she will ask for a D8 SLR :)

Australia Trip Part 1

2011-11-08T06:19:00.001+08:00

Well if you wonder why this site wasn't updated for sometime, it's because i went to Australia for some R&R. There are a few firsts for this trip.

It's the first time I..
Bought a camera at a duty free because my Ricoh decided to die on me when i reach the Airport
Been to Australia
Ride on Singapore Airlines Ride on the A380
Using my new luggage because my old luggage was missing one key and i refuse to go on a trip with only one luggage key
Rent a car and drove around and many more ...

The first stop was Sydney. The place we stayed was the Pensione Hotel on George Street, quite a small boutique hotel located quite close to Chinatown. My wife opted for the petite room and this is how small our room looked. To be fair, her friend's room was larger, our room is just "petite". And the window over there looked to a air well and on the other side was another room's window, so not much of a view.

Since Australian shops typically closed early we set off for Paddy's market near our hotel. Paddy's Market is looks something like the Army market in Beach room, lots of small stalls but in a bigger place, they sell every thing from nuts, vegetables, clothes, souvenirs, wigs to remote control helicopters.

A lot of the stalls are run by Asians, lots of Chinese mostly since this is Chinatown, i also saw some Korean stall owners too.

There are quite a few wigs and hair extensions shops here at Paddy's, seems like the trend.

Next we headed to another part of Chinatown which was more Chinese. There is a night market every friday night here, i see lots of different food being sold from bak kua (Chinese BBQ meat) which was quite expensive at $4 per piece, takoyaki, pan cakes, fishballs.

Emperor Cream Puff - Lots of people queueing for this, the best way to describe it would be like fried cream puffs.

Every corner of Chinatown have these Chinese gates with different inscriptions.

Hong Kong's "yu tan" or just spicy fish balls

Tako Yaki anyone?

There are also a lot of Chinese restaurants here, things like Wanton mee, hot pot can also be found. Just don't expect Singapore prices and portions. The portions are generally big and can cost something like $10 SGD for a bowl of Wanton mee (and that is during their late night promotion).

Kuo Min Tang HQ in Australia?

Funny Things with Toilet Training

2011-11-03T12:56:00.000+08:00

Some funny incidents when Chloe is undergoing toilet training.

1
Chloe: I am going to wash backside liaoz
Me: Huh ? (Check backside, at first see nothing, then some thing long came out)
Me: Next time must give daddy more notice ah

2
Chloe: (While coloring at the dinner table) Daddy I wan to pee.
Me: ok
Chloe pees all over even before i got time to go get one

3
Chloe and Me seating on the sofa. Suddenly i felt something hot on my legs.
Me: Aiya pee on the sofa liaoz
Me: Next time must give daddy notice ah

4
Chloe sleeping with diapers on with my mum-in-law
Chloe tugs my mum-in-law, "Want shee shee"
MIL: It's ok you are wearing diapers
Chloe can't get back to sleep, flips around and turn and tries to sleep on the front.
Chloe tugs MIL again, "Want shee shee"
MIL: ok ok (takes potty and opens diapers, sees that Chloe pooed), Whao poo poo ah
Chloe nods sits on potty and pees

Apparently she don't like to pee in a dirty diaper

A tribute to my Ricoh GX200

2011-10-24T16:46:00.002+08:00

My trusty Ricoh GX200 for the last 3 years is dead. I dropped it and the next day and part of the CCD is damage i think, all the images taken with it has some black border on the top.And worse is that i found out about it only when i reached Changi Airport about to set off on my trip to Australia,unfortunately Ricoh did not have a GX300 out (it's been like 3 years) although they do have the GR IV that is due but that's a 28mm fixed focal length lens. So i got the next best thing an Olympus XZ-1 but that is a topic for a later post. But for now a tribute to my GX200 and why i think it's one of the best designed cameras not necessary the best quality but the best designed.

Notice the black semi circle spot at the top of the lcd?

The Ricoh GX200 is one of the better designed cameras out there as evident by how they keep the same look and feel consistent throughout the G series of cameras from the GR to the GXR.

The only really bad thing i would put it as the ISO performance , it is really quite bad, at ISO 200 noise is becoming and issue and 400 its really quite bad.

But that is the only bad thing and it's a shame that Ricoh didn't make the sensor better as compare with the Panasonic LX3 which came out after the GX200.

The other camera should learn from Ricoh in terms of the camera functionality and design. But of course I am looking at the camera from an enthusiast point of view.

Grips
This has gotta be one of the nicest grips that I have found in a compact camera. I have big hands and this camera though a bit small has rubber in the correct areas helping you to grip the camera nicely.

Wide Angle ! All 24mm of it!
It allows lots of self take shots of me and my wife. It was the perfect self take camera, lots of cameras at that time only have like 28mm or 35mm at its widest end. This one has 24mm so no only can you see you and your other half, you can also see a lot of the background too!

Self taken during our honey moon with the Ricoh, great 24mm lens

Custom functions
This is what sets it apart from other cameras of its class, there are 2 function buttons, a rock wheel that can access up to 5 custom menus, and 3 custom function settings that you can save your favourite settings. What i like about the 3 custom function settings is that no only it saves your camera settings, it also saves ur zoom settings! So you can have it set to 35mm or 50mm and it will remember it.

Notice the top left of the lcd, you can programmed those to functions that you use often.

Up to 3 custom settings can be saved, the zoom setting is also saved.

Step Zoom
You can make it zoom in steps according to traiditional focal lengths like 24mm to 28mm to 35mm to 50mm and 72mm. So you will always know what focal length you are shooting at.

The step zoom indicator is on the left of the LCD.

Auto-cap
I believe this is one of the very first camera to have an auto-cap for the lens. Nice touch although it also cost quite abit, think it was about 20-30 SGD.

Auto-cap = Never forget your lens cap !

Snap focus
Basically this is like hyper focusing, the camera presets the focus from 2.5m to infinity, great for street shooting. Heard the GRD IV has different step focus settings from 1m on-wards. And you can assigned one of the 2 custom function buttons to do this so you can just turn it on or off with a push of a button. No need for complicated menus.

Sadly its time to move on other cameras and even if Ricoh comes out with a GX300 it probably won't be on my shopping list anytime soon. Goodbye dear friend..

Mid Autumn festival @ Jingshun's

2011-09-13T08:37:00.000+08:00

Some shots taken during the Mid Autumn festival at my frinds Jingshun's House, it was just a nite with some good friends and our kids, although most of the time we were actually watching our kids more and the conversations often revolve around our kids and what interesting or funny things they did. We had some mooncake's (mm durian), chinese tea and those little pigs mooncakes (I wonder what's the correct term for those things?).

Chloe grew up really fast, this time last year she was still sitting in a stroller holding a lantern as we walk around my mother-in-law's neighborhood. Look at her now, she is walking on her own and carrying the lantern all by herself. I can understand why people say "Children grow up so fast". Sometimes I feel like I am missing out on her every time I go to work. She has come all the way from a small little baby who can only cry and smile to now someone who can actually express her thoughts and desires (who can also throw a big tantrum if needed).

While we try to teach our children all about life,
Our children teach us what life is all about.
~Angela Schwindt

Shot with my D7000 and 24mm F2.8.

Casey Jingshun's Daughter

Casey and Chloe

Chloe and Wifey staring incident

Sing Kai's son, Kenneth

Pomelo time!

Fishing together

New Blog ! stephenleephoto.com

2011-09-03T07:53:00.001+08:00

Hey guys I've started a new blog @ http://www.stephenleephoto.com, in that blog i will basically post photographs and write about stuff concerning photography (reviews , news and so on). There may be some cross posting between this blog and stephenleephoto especially if I talk about photos and family together.

Add it to ur rss readers!

Developing film again.

2011-09-02T18:47:00.001+08:00

Finally manage to develop my 2 rolls of film which have been lying around for at least half a year or more (Most likely more :) ). They are HP5Plus and Trix, develop them both in DDX. Whenever i develop old films you always get a surprise at what you get since you can't remember what's on each roll of film. Anyway for those who are into developing film, TRIX in DDX is fantastic, i did 6 minutes @ 23 C.

haha seen here is her struggling against my sis. Its quite hard to take a picture together with her properly even now. Probably between 6 months to a year old.

Just pass one year old I think, playing around with handphones is one of the things she picked up quite early one. she will pick a handphone up and put it to her ear imitating us, now she can hear the phone ring and run over to pick up the pho ne and sometimes say "Hello". Now she will imitate us especially in talking quite well, she will hear something new and repeat it quite accurately. Like my wife one day say "MY GOD !" and the next thing you know she was saying "MY GOD !" too. Gotta be careful nowadays about how we speak.

She has develop an interest in books, her favorite is a nursery rhymes book and her favorite rhyme in that book in "Humpty Dumpty", when ever we get to the "have a a big fall", she will imitate falling down and make a "pom" sound like that of hitting the floor.

10th Anniversary! - Taking the plunge at Universal Studios Singapore

2011-08-30T22:50:00.003+08:00

This year on August 31st will be the 10th year that me and Wifey got together. She asked me to take leave on Friday (26th Aug) to celebrate our anniversary but she refused to say where only saying that parking will be expensive.

Well the day started off really gloomy with slight drizzling when we left, only when in the car she told me we are going to USS to spend the day.

This is our second time to USS, the first time the Battle Star Galactica Roller coaster was still undergoing testing so we didn't have a chance to try but this time round hopefully the weather clears and we can go try it out. The roller coaster wasn't running when we were there i guess cause of the rain, so we went off and took the other rides that we didn't try or wasn't there when we were last there.

We took the Madagascar kiddy ride, quite fun as the ride was all about the story in the first Madagascar retold in a ride form.

Next we went over to the Shrek section where we took a picture with Puss in Boots and saw the 4D show, the last time Chloe was around with us and Wifey had to leave the place cause Chloe wasn't too keen on staying inside the theater. Wifey was enjoying the experience very much with all the water squirting and the creepy air blowing from your back.

The only character we took a picture with. Puss In Boots!

Next we took the Mummy's Revenge, the indoor roller coaster with an interesting twist, it actually slides backwards at one point. This time somehow we were seated in the front and it is really quite different then when you are seated behind somehow the forces acting on your body seemed much stronger.

Then Wifey spotted the BSG roller coaster running and we made a bee line for it. Haha Wifey very on. We tried the Human one. In short it was quite scary and shiok at the same time, you know the climb up before the drop, the BSG ones instead of slowly climbing up, it accelerates up the slope pretty fast before dropping down. The drop was so long you wonderd when it was going to end, then it was turn after turn and soon it ended, Wifey even commented that it ended abit fast.

After the ride my stomach felt quite weird like everything topsy turvy liaoz. Haha Wifey wanted to immediately go for the next one, but i told her i wasn't feeling too good in the tummy. Think Wifey more brave than me in trying out the roller coaster.

The customary photo at the end of the ride.

The rest of the day was quite peaceful, we had lunch at the Shrek area where we ate wraps and went for the Steven Spielberg special effects show, (It's quite good, must stand on the first row) and the Monster Rock show before calling it a day.

At the cafe near the entrance of USS

Super Mum Award

Super Dad!

I like Choclate Syrup

Wife prefers the Strawberry

More photos at my Flickr account.

Chloe and the Saxaphone

2011-07-28T07:52:00.000+08:00

The Nikon F Story

2011-07-15T16:48:00.001+08:00

Got this from Invisible Photographer Asia: The Nikon F Story, interesting how the Nikon F was designed and the history of it.

Reminds me of the various Nikons that I had.

F65

credits http://classiccameras-photography.blogspot.com/2010/12/nikon-f65.html

The first Nikon camera that I bought. Nice little camera, light body, easy to carry around. Lacking many features in more capable cameras but hey it served me well for a long time. It's the only camera in this list that i sold off.

FM2

credits, Wikipedia

FM2 was the second camera I got after seeing the one my friend had. Nice little heavy thing, shutter makes a loud "thud" sound. I still have this camera around. I mostly shot black and white film on this.

F80

credits, Nikon Imaging

The third Nikon that i got, bought it second hand too. Basically bought it because the guy was letting it go quite cheap, think was about 180 with kit lens. Shot black and white on this camera, because i was taking a Black and White course at Safra.

D70

credits, Nikon Imaging

First step into DSLRs, nice camera with a great grip. But compared with my film camera it was abit heavy. Didn't really took out much because of the weight, by the time i got my D7000, it has only seen about close to 8k in shutter count (Which is quite little).

Mainly because i was still bringing almost even single piece of equipment (tripods, 2-3 lens, cleaning kits, filters...) when i go out. When I choose to just using one lens (and using a SunSniper strap), i realise I begin to enjoy photography more, since i was not worrying about what lenses to use, i was just concentrating on capturing the moment.

D7000

credits, Nikon Imaging

Got this recently after having my D70 for 6 years, the first impression was.. whao so many buttons, they have buttons for everything! From selecting AF points to bracketing to shooting options. Much much more than what my D70 has.

Quite impressed with the 3D tracking autofocus, useful for taking pictures of my daughter when she is running around. Still meddling around with the functions, love the dual SD card thing, although it means all my CF cards from my D70 is now rendered useless. Gotta try out that Full HD movie shooting too.

That's all the Nikons that I have .... for now

Chloe and Playgroup (Update!)

2011-07-15T13:53:00.000+08:00

Chloe not happy at going to playgroup

Well its the second week liaoz... Chloe still cry when we approach the playgroup place. But now she is better liaoz after the initial crying, once she is inside the classroom she will stop crying.

After class when we picked her up, don't know if she is hungry or what, she see other kids got food from their care takers, she buay paiseh will run up to them and try to eat their stuff. One lady was quite kind gave her a packet of those small little white biscuits, then she happily munch on them.

Cute picture of Chloe in her uniform

Saw one of my St John seniors at the playgroup, his son is enrolled there also. Chloe also dont know why keep wanting to hold his hand and walk, but he didn't want to hold. haha Chloe also again buay paiseh keeping wanting to hold his hand.

Chloe starting playgroup

2011-07-07T07:47:00.000+08:00

Chloe is starting her play group today. Wonder how it would be like,although i didn't attend a playgroup. I sort of remember my first day at kindergarden, haha think i cried on the way to class cause i need to take a school bus. I lived at West Coast at that time and my kindergarden was at the Blessed Scarement church's Damien Centre Kindergarten.

Ah although I was not there but wifey told me that she couldn't sit still, cause it's a new place so she keep wandering around touch here and there, but the teacher was nice, say nevermind cause it's a new place so let her explore lah.

The second day she was quite well behaved, the she rubbed her hands when the teacher squirted the sanitizer, put her bag where the teacher told her. All in all good, but about 1 hour later, one of the new student's cried think she scared she also cried, wifey said she cried quite badly so gotta take her back.
My mum commented so cham, send her to school during weekdays and send her to play gym on weekends. My view is she can't learn much staying at home, cause all she do is play by herself. I want her to learn how to interact with other kids because so far she is the only child so she tends to have a view that she needs to share and hopefully find that learning can be fun.

Wonder how would she be today?

Sun Sniper Pro review - A father's perspective

2011-07-01T21:09:00.000+08:00

When you have kids, you want to take nice pictures of them (If not they blame you for having nothing interesting to show at their wedding :) ) most parents probably bought DSLR's for this purpose. And when your baby starts being more active and moving around, the DSLR becomes a burden, its too big, heavy and clumsy to handle.

Traditional camera straps (I like OPTECH ) all hang around the neck and shoulders but you will soon realize that it becomes cumbersome and even dangerous both to the camera and to your child.

My super lousy picture of when you bend down and hit your kid using your camera.

If you hang your camera around ur neck, when you bend dow you risk hitting your lids n to carry or you risk hitting the camera when you need to bend/squat down to carry.

If you hang from you shoulder you risk the camera slipping off.

Enter the camera sling strap. They seem like a feasible alternative to the traditional straps, and when you sling it sideways you also reduce the strain on the neck since your shoulder can take a heavier load. You also seemed more maneuverable.

Credits - Sun Sniper

I choose the Sun Sniper "The Pro" Steel & Bear? Why? Because it doesn't have a carabiner to attach to the nut so the it should keep the scratches to the minimal.The camera attachment it's just one whole solid piece and it rotates really well so I think it won't be easy to twist off during normal use.

I heard stories of the camera attachment unscrewing itself so i added some additional protection, I use the clips off my OPTECH straps and attach one side to the camera and one to the Sun Sniper so in the event if it really un-screws, the line will prevent it from dropping to the ground.

Optech Clip attached to the tripod attachment.

Optech clip attach to the camera

All put together (Pardon the lousy background)

I also added a carabiner to the OPTECH strap near the top, this is so that i can clip it to my belt when i need to bend down or do some weird movement so that the camera can't slide along the strap, but at the same time it's easy to unclip it. Maybe I will try to tape it up so that it can't scratch my camera body.

On my first outing with the strap with Chloe to my blocks playground, it's pretty good, i can follow her around playing with her, taking the occasional pictures. It's really a vast improvement over the neck strap, with the carabiner clipped to my belt, i can easily bend down and pick her up and the camera will not slide.

The optimum length for me is when I squat down the camera should not touch the ground and when you sling to your side, the camera is at my waist.

These are the 2 cons that I can think of after using the Sun Sniper
1. Your camera can't still flat on the table
It the camera lies at an angle supported by only the tripod attachment and the lens. But it looks stable enough not to roll around.

2. The attachment takes time to take out
If you want to attach to a tripod, you need to unscrew it which can be cumbersome. But I seldom shoot with a tripod anyway, when taking pictures of moving kids, a tripod is basically useless.

Meeting and Waiting

2011-07-01T21:05:00.003+08:00

Some met who they are waiting for and some are still waiting

Chloe and Casey

2011-06-30T22:38:00.001+08:00

Casey in my good friend Jingshun's daughter, she is about half a year younger than Chloe and just learnt how to walk. It was quite interesting watching them interact, or the lack of interaction. I guess it's because they are both the only child (for now at least).

But i guess they do warm up abit, cause Casey was just learning how to walk so she not so good at getting up yet. So Chloe being the helpful jie jie decided to help her.... by pulling her hair, of course Casey started to cry, then Chloe started to cry too cause i think she knows she did something wrong. Haha to be frank it was quite funny.

Below are some photo's that i took.

Father's Love

You wan Bear Bear?

When the father is not looking

I want to read also

barney = Ah Meng

2011-06-28T22:19:00.000+08:00

Chloe loves Barney, so much that she even gave him a nick name. Ah Meng (Not Ah Meng as in the orang utan, more like Meng as in 猛).

She has to have a Ah Meng show at least once a day. If she is upset just the sight of Ah Meng on tv would calm her down.

When she bathes Ah Meng goes with her and she would clean Ah Meng with soap and ask me to wipe Ah Meng dry before going out of the bathe room.

She can watch the same Ah Meng show over and over again... until we can't take it and gotta buy other Ah Meng DVDs so that we wont have to watch the same thing over again. Until we realized, the songs are pretty much the same.

We went to watch Ah Meng at Marina Square one weekend after her class at Gymboree. The moment Ah Meng came out she looked blankly at him and started waving her hands to say "Hi". Think she was abit shocked to see Ah Meng so big and live.

When the show ended (after 15 mins) she cried, she didn't want it to end. We bought a Ah Meng water bottle to make her happy.

What amazes me was after the show. The show ended at about 4:15pm, the next show was at 7pm and parents were already queuing up for the next show, the first 50 get a change to take pictures with Ah Meng but unfortunately for Chloe her parents were not crazy enough to do that.

Drinking and Sleeping

2011-06-06T23:41:00.001+08:00

Drinking and Sleeping, a photo by Stephen Lee on Flickr.

Babies are just amazing, they can sleep and drink at the same time.

Waiting

2011-06-02T16:14:00.002+08:00

DSC_7410_stitch, a photo by Stephen Lee on Flickr.

A lone person waiting to cross the road.

Chloe 19 months

2011-05-31T10:44:00.000+08:00

Some more photo updates.

She is getting quite attached to her little Pooh bear, she use to be v-attach to the Stitch but i guess the Stitch is a bit big and hard to carry around. Now she loves to hug her Pooh bear and wants to go every where with it. Sometimes when we go out we need to convince her that Pooh needs to stay at home and rest haha.

Chloe feeding Pooh

Chloe likes to cook also, at my mum in laws, she will bring out all the pots and pans and play with them, in my house we bought a set of ikea kids utensils for her to play and in my mums place there is a small kitchen set that my sis bought.

She will cook up a storm and ask people to drink tea, eat and that includes feeding her soft toys.

Chloe with her sunglasses and picture book.

Chloe started having an interest in books, she will ask you to take a book and point to different pictures and ask you to read out to her. You must be very attentive when you are doing that (that means no peeking at what's on the tv ah), or she will get cranky and make lots of noise until you give your attention back to her.

Sometimes looking at how Chloe seems to learn things from around her, I worry sometimes that I am not letting her learn enough.

Chloe likes to take pictures with her little camera! (Like her daddy hehe)

This was a little toy that we got from Shokudo Changi Airport when we went there to eat (think it was Mother's day) we ordered a kids meal and this was the little toy that came along with it.

Chloe also likes playing the xylophone.

Chloe's 18mth Birthday

2011-05-14T10:05:00.000+08:00

Yeap it sounds weird right 18mths, haha wifey was thinking of getting a cake just for Chloe to eat and have a mini celebration just the 3 of us at our new house.

We tried to get her to blow the candle but think she was more interested in observing the candle, haha quite a few times we gotta stop her from touching the thing.

Anyway we blew out the candle for her, gave her a little spoon and let her enjoy the cake. To top it off we gave her a bottle of Yakult (She can nowpoint to the fridge and say "kult kult" hehe).

Share Share!

Thank You!

Yakult!

Chloe in Pink at Punggol Park

2011-03-04T14:09:00.001+08:00

These shots were taken at Punggol Park one evening after visiting my mum. In punggol park there is a big pond, where Chloe saw it, she keeps pointing to the pond wanting to go towards it and play with water!

trying to take pictures of her running around and not staying still was quite siong, haha more siong then running 2.4km. After the shoot all quite shack out liao. She fell asleep in the car on the way back. But alas i was driving so no shot of her sleeping.

All shots taken with a D70 and 35mm F1.7 lens