vincentkong.com

Bloor-Yorkville Holiday Lights

Vincent Kong — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 15:22:09 +0000

Last Sunday, group of friends and I went to Bloor and Yorkville to shoot some holiday light decoration. The decor was anything but impressive, however was I still able to make use of my 50mm f/1.8 cheapo lens to take some delicious bokeh shots!

Toys I Want for Christmas

Vincent Kong — Tue, 30 Nov 2010 02:28:19 +0000

Christmas is less than a month away, and for this year I’ve decide to make a list of all the toys I would like to have for this holiday season. Maybe Santa will stumble onto this blog and get the message. =P

Small Factor Desktop

I’ve been looking for a small factor desktop replacement since my K45 Shuttle died (the motherboard overheated). The first option that came to mind is the Mac mini. This compact system can be used as media center while showcased as an attractive piece of decor in the living room. My only hesitation is it’s an Apple device; something I don’t want to get into yet as I’ve seen the addictions you can have: buying one thing from Apple will lead to buying everything else from Apple. An alternative would be the Dell Zino HD which looks almost as nice but costs less than the Mac mini. The only thing I’m skeptical about is the AMD processor, since I’ve always been an Intel guy.

The Dell Zino HD starts at $449.99 at Dell.ca

Android Tablet

When the iPad came out, I was thought it was a great concept running the iPhone OS inside a full size tablet. The 10″ screen was large enough to work as a e-book reader and surf the web without squinting my eyes, but also portable enough to carry around. The best part is, like the smart phone, it turns on instantly when I want to use it. No more waiting for the stupid OS to boot up!!

Unfortunately, the 1st generation iPad was missing some critical features e.g. Flash, and multitask, as well the price of $499USD for a 16GB is a bit pricey for me. Recently, a lot of companies have announced that they will be bringing Android tablets to the market. My choice is the Archos 101 internet tablet. It has all the features I want, and cost $349USD for the 16GB version. Yes it lacks 3G, but adding another data plan to my monthly expenses is something I want to avoid.

The Archos 101 (16GB) is available at B&H $343 USD.

Compact Digital Camera

It’s not all the time I can or want to bring my DSLR with me. This is where I missed having a compact digital camera. The Canon PowerShot S95 is my choice with a wide 28mm focal length and aperture range of f/2.0-4.9, make it a small camera that packs a lot of punch. Why not get the Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX5? Although the LX5 is the better camera, it’s not very pocketable, and that’s the first reason I wanted a compact DC.

btw I got this already at The Source for $379 but it still counts in my wish list.

Lenses

My list won’t be complete if it didn’t include any new glass for my Canon T2i DSLR. I’m already an owner of the Canon EF-S 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6 IS, and the cheapo Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II

Here are 3 more lenses I would like to add to my artillery:

Wide Angle

I like taking shots of architecture buildings and landscape, and the Canon EF-S 10-22mm f/3.5-4.5 USM will do the job for me perfectly.

The lens is available at B&H for $720USD; photoprice.ca

Macro

Taking shots of things up close and personal is also something I like to do, and the Canon EF 100mm f/2.8 Macro USM can definitely do that. The 100mm focus length will let me take very close up shots of subjects without actually being very close to it.

The lens is available at B&H for $509USD; photoprice.ca

General Purpose

The Canon EF-S 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6 IS was my first lens that I got along with the T2i body. I really like the lens for it’s versatility, working incredibility well as a travel/general purpose lens. However, the aperture range of f/3.5-5.6 is sometimes not enough which is why I’m considering an additional lens for general purposes. My considerations are: Canon EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM and Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM. This is pretty tough choice since for $300 more gets me a L lens. However, the 17-55mm f/2.8 is no slouch and takes very high quality pictures, as well comes with IS, which is lacking on the L lens. Lots of rumors are flying about a version II coming out for the 24-70mm f/2.8 L which includes IS. I’ll probably wait on this to see what happens.

The EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS is available at B&H for $990USD (photoprice.ca) and the EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM is available for $1280USD (photoprice.ca)

Bonus

With Windows Mobile 6.5 lifespan coming to an end, moving to an Android phone would make the most sense for my next smart phone and I have my eyes on the HTC Desire. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still very happy with my HTC Diamond 2, that’s why I’ve mention this as added bonus. So why the HTC Desire and not the HTC Desire HD? While the 4.3″ screen would be nice to have, but probably won’t be necessary once I get my hands on the Android tablet, as well due to the large screen battery usage for the HTC Desire HD is absolutely terrible.

So, dear Santa if you are reading this, then these are the toys I want for Christmas this year. Thank you and Merry Christmas!

DigitalRev TV Video Reviews

Distant Worlds: music from Final Fantasy

Vincent Kong — Mon, 29 Nov 2010 04:15:21 +0000

While some people were attending the 林峯 (Raymond Lam) concert, I was at the Sony Centre with two of my geek friends enjoying the Distant Worlds: music from Final Fantasy. The concert was performed by the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony and conducted by Arnie Roth. However, it was Nobuo Uematsu who got the loudest applause as he was in house as well!

The concert was definitely a very enjoyable experience for me, and brought back many memories of my days playing FF. The concert was so good that I was motivated to buy “Distant Worlds II: more music from FINAL FANTASY” CD; something which I haven’t done since high school!! Ha ha

Enjoy some of the quick snapshots I took!

No related posts.

DigitalRev TV Video Reviews

Vincent Kong — Tue, 26 Oct 2010 03:59:17 +0000

When looking for camera reviews, I usually go to dpreview.com. Unfortunately, when I was looking for a review on the Canon PowerShot S95, there wasn’t any so I had to look else where. When searching, I stumbled on to DigitalRev TV which does video reviews of cameras. The reviews are about 5-10 minutes long and in no way in-depth, but for me serves as a good starting point. The videos are filmed in Hong Kong, and presented by a Chinese dude with a British accent. With his exaggerated facial expressions, body language, and silly comments I found him quite entertaining to watch. Finally, not all the videos are about cameras, in fact some of most entertaining are “challenges”. The idea was probably stolen from Top Gear, but regardless are still funny. Some of my favourites are:

My Honda Fit Wallpaper

Vincent Kong — Wed, 22 Sep 2010 02:19:50 +0000

About a week after my car photo shooting with my friends, I decided to make a wallpaper from one of my photos. Inspired by one of Douglas’s photos I came up with the following:

I’m not familiar with using Photoshop for apply effects so most of the effects was done using Picasa.

Creating an HDR Image

Vincent Kong — Sun, 05 Sep 2010 05:07:54 +0000

Last week I had a chance to take a picture of the sunset during our annual fellowship BBQ. The first time I attempted to take a picture of a high-contract scene of the sun, the results were quite disappointing. In hopes of producing better results, I decided to shoot the sunset using the Auto Exposure Bracking (AEB) function and then merge them together using a High Dynamic Range (HDR) software.

To shoot, I set the camera at Aperture-Priority (Av) mode at f/8.0. Then I activated the AEB function to take 3 shots with an exposure difference of 2 EV (exposure value). I got 3 virtually identical images: one normal exposure, one underexposed, and one overexposed.

To merge the images together I used Adobe Photoshop CS5:

“File” → “Automate” → “Merge to HDR Pro…”
Select the 3 images to be merged and click “OK”
A preview of the composite image will be generated, I checked the “Remove ghosts” check box and click “OK” to complete the HDR image with other settings at default.

Below is the composed HDR image without using much effort.

Launch wiki.vincentkong.com

Vincent Kong — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 04:58:14 +0000

It’s been several months since I’ve finally updated my blog. The fact is, I found that organizing my notes and thoughts to write a clear and precise entry takes more time than I sometimes anticipate. However, when I stopped my notes started getting disorganized as I had no place to put them. As well, I often learn about some quick tips which are useful, but not worth blogging about.

This is where the wiki site comes in. It can quickly allow me to add, and organize my rough cut notes, and tips, as well, give me access to my all information online.

The wiki software which I decided to use is MediaWiki, which was original developed and used by Wikipedia, but now has become one of the most popular wiki software.

You can visit my new Wiki site at http://wiki.vincentkong.com

Refer to my wiki page for information on how to install and configure MediaWiki.

Virtual Deskops for Windows

Vincent Kong — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 04:19:27 +0000

My computer desktop in the office is always clutter with many windows of open applications, and since I couldn’t get a second monitor I decided to go for an alternative solution: virtual desktops. The concept of virtual desktops is not new, it’s available on many operating systems such as Mac OS, and Ubuntu, but for some reason Windows doesn’t have this feature.

VirtuaWin is a virtual desktop manager for the Windows operating system. After installing VirtuaWin, I configured it with the settings displayed in the screen shots below.

To navigate between virtual desktops (also called ‘workspace’), I simply drag the mouse to the edge of the screen.

Tabs for PuTTY

Vincent Kong — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 03:02:08 +0000

A lot of people including me uses the free PuTTY application as a SSH client for Windows. However, the most annoying thing about it, is the lack of tabs; making me having to manage multiple PuTTY windows for multiple SSH sessions.

PuTTY Connection Manager is a free PuTTY Client Add-on for Windows platforms uses tabs for managing multiple PuTTY instances!

When PuTTY Connection Manager is first started, it’ll ask you to enter the location of where your PuTTY is installed.

And finally, you can start using a tabbed version of PuTTY!

Tonkatsu Curry Rice

Vincent Kong — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 02:56:55 +0000

The first time I made tonkatsu with udon, it wasn’t real tonkatsu because I cheated by using Shake ‘n Bake. I remember watching a Japanese cooking game show a few months back which demonstrated how to make tonkatsu, and since I had some time Friday night I decided to make tonkatsu curry rice.

Ingredients:

cut pork loin
1 egg
bread crumbs
Japanese curry sauce mix
white rice

I began by marinating the pork loin with salt and pepper and had it sit while I prepared the white rice. While waiting for the rice I prepared the pork loin. I poured oil into a pot, ensuring there was enough so that the pork can submerged, and started to boil it. I whipped the egg inside a bowl and dipped the pork loin inside so that the entire pork was covered with the egg mix. Then I placed the pork onto a separate plate and evenly spread the bread crumbs on both surface of the pork. When the oil was boiling I submerged the pork inside. Once the breadcrumbs looked brown I removed the pork and dried the excess oil with a paper towel. Once everything was about ready, I microwaved the Japanese curry sauce mix and served it with the tonkatsu and rice.

If you noticed there was only one tonkatsu at the end, but I prepared two pork loin in the beginning. Well, to be honest the first one didn’t make it… oops! The challenge was to find the right amount of time the pork should be boiling inside the oil. If it was too long the breadcrumbs would be burned, and if it was too little the pork inside won’t be done well enough. It would also have helped if the pork loin wasn’t as thick as the ones I used. Maybe next time.