Wonder if its a good decision to have. Earlier in the week I was expecting to spend the new year in Taipei, hoping to find some time to escape work to go to Taipei 101 to catch the new year mayhem (stages are starting to be built, including a largish PS3 stand), but meetings were postponed to the end of the first week of January, so I’m on the next flight back to Shanghai. When I got to Taipei’s Taoyuan airport, the Cathay Pacific counter put me on an earlier flight to Hong Kong, meaning that I will have about 2 hours in Hong Kong for lunch, and a little bit of blogging before I get back behind the great firewall of China.
They’re setting up a large stage over at Xintiandi as well, but facing away from my apartment so I don’t think I will see much of it from the balcony like a lazy ass. I’m sure its Hong Kong entertainers coming over. No idea who they are, but posters are everywhere. Doubt I’ll bring my camera to the live variety, and it will be interesting to see the temperature drop below freezing like the meteorologists said it would. As usual, blame it on the Siberian winds.
That’s it, I’m going to spend the next 30mins scouring eBay.
Meeting with the customer in Taipei seems to be postponed to end of the week ‘next year’. So now I need to find a way to call up Cathay Pacific and get a ticket to Hong Kong and then to Shanghai. All that on a Sunday. Since its impossible to fly tomorrow on Sunday with the short notice to pack up and all, I should have a day off in Taipei! Not sure where to go though. Taichung?
Woke up this morning feeling the effect of Huashan! Both legs are not moving as it should, equivalent to last year when I ran the 20km in Paris. Got a little internal bleeding in my right thumb so Mr Twiddly Thumb here can’t type that fast nor accurate anymore. Maybe its from too much phone typing in the last couple of days.
The flight is at 1845hrs this evening. And plan to spend roaming the streets of Xian. Starting with the south gate just a km from the hotel and then the grand mosque. Why not?
Continue reading 'Shaanxi Province: Day 5 (27 Dec)'»
Checked out of the sparse hotel up Huashan at 11am. Don’t think I will continue upwards anymore. Vertigo!! Even going down will be a test of nerves, especially when my foot is size 12 and the steps were carved for smaller footed chinese. Tried to refill the flask with some hot water but they seem to be very very stingy with them hot water. So no water for the instant noodles. Weather has been very clear this morning. Not too much colours, so its time for b&w film only. Burnt through a few rolls of film already.
Continue reading 'Shaanxi Province: Day 4 (26 Dec)'»
The master plan today is to get to Huashan and spend the night there. Yes I did left my torch light in Shanghai, but mobile phones nowadays should be bright enough to shine my way thru. Changed to a day pack with an extra change of t-shirt, socks and underwear of course. Brought 2 packs of instant noodles just in case, other that taking some space it weighs next to nothing.
Continue reading 'Shaanxi Province: Day 3 (25 Dec)'»
On the agenda today is the obligatory Mr Qin’s terracotta army and probably a tomb or two. Its still dark at 0820 and I’m already in a taxi going to the train station to look for a bus to the terracotta site. The air is still misty. No provia photo opportunities here today neither.
Bus 306 seems to go to the terracotta place and costs 7 rmb one way. When facing the station, its on the far right of the train station.
Continue reading 'Shaanxi Province: Day 2 (24 Dec)'»
Its tough to wake up today. Just got back from Taipei last evening, and now I’m at Pudong airport waiting for domestic flight MU292 for Xian. Original plan was to fly there and back by train. But I think I should maximise my time at the destination.
I’m travelling with relatively light amounts of gear. A 45 litre backpack, with a smaller 20 litre backpack inside taking up a third of the space. Need the smaller pack for the night stay up Huashan. So thats checked in. Bringing 2 small camera packs, one filled with nocturnal optics and packed with 10 rolls of film, GPS and other little accessories. And the waist pouch with the D2H and M6 with their default lenses. Nothing more than a 40mm f2 ULTRON for the Nikon D2H and 35mm Summicron ASPH for the Leica. Its already starting to be quite heavy! Was hesitating between the D2H and Ricoh GR Digital. Oh, and the lonely planet guide book stuffed into my Carhartt Arctic Duck coat. This time I will bring along a thermos flask, made the mistake the last trip into a cold region. Temp estimated in the low single digits, maybe even below freezing at night. I’m prepared.
Continue reading 'Shaanxi Province: Day 1 (23 Dec)'»
Crap. I though I’d never join this facebook thing, but I joined up today
after 6 months of staying away! Dammit.
I’m currently thinking of switching my default Konica-Minolta scanner software to one of those third party system, primarily because I find that the default program seems to want to do strange things on the autoexposure function. My black and white photo scans are usually lacking in dynamic range. While testing out Vuescan this week I realised that I was able to adjust the scan so that I get maximum details out of it and then adjusting the exposure in something like Lightroom in order to have a balance between detail and exposure.
So excuse the slightly darker looking photos in black and white.
At the same time I’m thinking of getting some IT8 targets to calibrate my digital camera and photo scanner. I think some of the colour photos just don’t look right in terms of colour, even on a calibrated monitor. So that’s the next project coming up… I have already found a reasonable priced vendor for the targets. URL below.
http://www.targets.coloraid.de/
These photos were taken at the airport, Saturday 8 Dec, when I had 1 hour to kill at Terminal 2 Narita Airport Japan. Shot a roll of Neopan 400 with the Leica so that I can process it with another roll that was shot earlier in the morning at Tsukiji.
This shot looks a lot better full sized. Was framed with the photo book “Photography in Japan” as the central subject. By the way, the curved book shelf was to blame for the ‘distortion’ at the bottom, the lens was perfect! (Leica M6 + 35mm Cron ASPH + Neopan 400 + HC110B)
The other picture I took of this “hole in the wall” was taken at an angle instead of head on. Didn’t work as well as this one. Beer and octopus ball… Nice… (Leica M6 + 35mm Cron ASPH + Neopan 400 + HC110B)
Continue reading 'Narita Airport, Japan'»
Waking up early this morning for my obligatory fish breakfast at Tsukiji. Its at 7am this morning. Could wake up earlier like a typical tourist, but you get the same thing later in the morning since its not possible to watch the tuna auction anymore. The first problem is getting there. Staying at the Sheraton Miyako this time, it involves taking a metro over on the Mita line and then changing to the Hibiya line to get to Tsukiji station.
Continue reading 'Morning at Tsukiji'»
If there was a place to see swarm theory at work, China would be it. The train this morning is at 0615hrs, early in the morning, in fact so early even the sun is not up yet. D404 is a bullet train going to Nanjing. Finally on my way there for a day trip. Journey should take almost 3-ish hrs. The train is full as usual, seems to be the best way to do business here. Its always full. I still have no idea what to look for there yet, I have my guide book but will take a look at it later on, first priority is to get some sleep at this ungodly hour. Plenty of walking coming up.
Gear-wise, same as Suzhou last week. D2H with 40mm ULTRON SL, and Leica M6 with 35mm ASPH. Brought my GPS along and the Nokia E61 for blogging. Films: 1xProvia100, 1xProvia400, 1xPortra160VC, 2xTriX, 2xFP4+. Plenty of film, type depending on the availability of colour at destination and weather. Ok time for a nap. Train about to start moving, as soon as the swarm settles down.
Continue reading 'Stroll in Nanjing…'»
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