Lo-fi photography

Wikipedia has this definition: "(lo-fi photography) refers to unconventional photographic practices, chosen for aesthetics, which to give an impression of low quality. Popular techniques include the use of toy cameras or pinhole cameras for their distinctive stylistic effects."

In today's context, it refers to the use of effects ("FX") in mobile phone apps like Instagram, Pixlr-o-matic, etc., to create the old look. This article in dpreview gives a good introduction to what lo-fi photography is all about: http://www.dpreview.com/articles/9771282693/digital-lo-fi-photography-part-1 . Some of the effects have found their way from smartphones into conventional cameras, albeit the lower entry-level ones.

My thoughts on this:
Even an amateur or a professional photographer can engage in lo-fi photography. It is not about the person, it is more to do with the practice of how the photo is taken, processed, and published. The thrill of lo-fi photography is the unexpectedness of it. After a picture is casually taken, one filter after another is applied to it. Then an unexpectedly eye-catching image appears, giving him the adrenalin rush. The image is immediately shared on a social website.

Incidentally, lo-fi photos are often published alongside other photos casually shot with the smartphone but not modified with effects.

Whether lo-fi will eventually emerge as an established genre in its own right remains to be seen, but I seriously doubt it. I think it will always be a loose aggregation of ad hoc point-and-shoot work with no direct commercial value. The good ones are like well-drawn graffitis (no negative connotation intended). The bad ones are simply kitsch.

An amateur and a professional photographer takes years to hone the craft of photography. A lot of effort and costs go into setting up a shot. Equipment is top notch, or at least they get increasingly more sophisticated as he ascends the learning curve. In fact, his shots are often post-processed to give it a less-than natural look. In that sense, it is akin to lo-fi photography but the difference immediately stops there.

Melbourne camera expo 2012

This year's camera expo in Melbourne is called The Digital Show. What I enjoyed most in this year's show is the photo exhibition section. The images in the AIPP section are the cream of the crop. The images are all highly creative and they are all tastefully photoshopped. An image straight out of the camera will not make it to the very top of the heap. It must be tastefully and artistically improved to give it the cutting edge.

I took some of the images at random with my mobile phone in order to display here, just to show what I mean by "tastefully photoshopped". They almost look like paintings. I dare say almost all of those in the AIPP section are not created by simply adding run-of-the-mill effects (I can't say the same for some of those in the less competitve sections).

Plagiarism on the internet

You would think that the ease of publishing something on the internet will spawn creativity. Ah, people would at last find an easy outlet for their creative juice to flow. People could be using email to write more often to one another. People could be writing blogs, putting up pictures, and sharing short video clips.

Well, it seems that while all of the above is true, the internet seems to be the place to push jokes and other people's writings around; often without acknowledging the authors or the source. Plagiarism is no longer a dirty word. I have seen jokes resurfacing after months or years. I have very often  received other people's writings from more than one email source at around the same time. I have seen beautiful prose being nonchalantly reproduced on somebody's Facebook wall, seemingly assuming that the reader knows it has been "borrowed". Likewise, beautiful pictures are shared on Facebook and other social media without informing the reader as to the source. Recycled literature just keep churning through the internet. It seems that the distinction between original work and "borrowed" work has blurred.

Unbelievable true love

1 Corinthians 13:4-5 says "Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs."

Here is a video clip I've just watched, shared by a friend in Facebook. It is about a girl who had dated a guy for 10 months before he met with an accident that left him brain damaged and unable to fend for himself. Earlier, he had plans to marry her. So despite his condition, she got married to him. See true love in action: http://www.godvine.com/The-Story-of-Ian-and-Larissa-Shows-Unbelievable-True-Love-1518.html

Think: is true love only to be demonstrated by extreme adversity? I don't think so. IF the man in the video had fully recovered from his accident, I bet that the woman would still be demonstrating true love to her man, simply because she is capable of such love. The video would not have been made then. And somewhere in the world, this one couple would be living a life of unbelievable true love.

Most of us are fortunate enough not to be put through such a test. Yet without this difficult test, many already fail before sitting for the "exam"! Paraphrasing 1 Cor 13:4-7 in the negative, this is what is happening in many of today's failed or frail marriages:
Non-true love is impatient, non-true love is unkind. It envies, it boasts, it is proud. It dishonors others, it is self-seeking, it is easily angered, it keeps records of wrongs.

(You don't need to marry a quadriplegic to show true love to the one you marry!)

Chinese dining culture?

I was away in Adelaide last weekend. While there, I went to my favourite steakhouse in Hahndorf (a resort town) for dinner. I noticed that about half of the clientele were Chinese, unlike when I first visited the place. Back then, about 6 years ago, the customers were mostly Ozzies.

I can tell that the restaurant is now used to serving Asians. Back then, if we came in a group the waiter would write down what each person wanted to order, asking one by one in turn. We rarely finished the entire servings as they were enormous. This time when I placed the order, the waitress did not check to see if everyone had placed an order each. She just assumed that we would share everything. Looking around, I could see that the other Asian groups all share their orders (and they were still enormous servings), instead of ordering one meal per person.

I also ordered one soup for my mother. The waitress immediately brought bowls for all of us, assuming that would be sharing the soup. To cap it all, the waitress started talking to me about a popular Chinese actor. No doubt about it, Chinese clientele has pervaded Hahndorf.

Debutante ball in Australia

This is not a wedding scene. It is a group of students going to the debutante ball. My daughter is one of them. This picture is taken in front of my house. The black Hummer limousine was hired by the participants to take them to the ball. By definition, this event signifies a young lady's entry into society.

Australian high schools have a tradition of holding the debutante ball for their Year 11 students (i.e 16 year-olds). The girl get to invite a boy from the same school year and in the same school to be their partner for the ball. For this year, thirty-four debutantes participated, which is about 20% of the students in my daughter's year. What happens if a boy wants to participate but is not invited by any girl? Too bad for him; he can only go as a guest.

For more pictures (very interesting!), go to the professional photographer's site:
http://digitalworks.onpix.com/pro/propList.asp?1272836749

Some of my own pictures are posted here: http://holidayshotsbyymhow.fotopic.net/c1844380.html

A Roman courtyard

Early this month, my wife and I made a visit to the Melbourne Museum to see the Pompeii exhibition. Walking through the exhibits did give one a sense of being in Pompeii during the first century A.D., thanks to the displays and exhibits, and of course, the lighting. One of the things that fascinated me was a computer simulated walk through a Roman house. You can use the computer mouse to wander though the different rooms (everything you see is on the computer screen).

The point of interest is this: in the middle of the Roman house is an open courtyard. The courtyard was meant to collect water for use by the household. This was how many houses in Malaysia were built in my childhood days. I grew up in one. I do not know to whom do we owe this credit. Neither a traditional Malay house nor a traditional Chinese house are designed in this way for rain water collection. It could be a legacy of the colonial masters. In any case, the idea is similar to the Roman’s. The central part of the roof slants down into the courtyard area. Gutters run round the roof to collect rainwater. Just shows that we can learn a lot from history.