Here’s the scenario:

- Given that you’re going to take 2 buses to the destination.
- Bus #1 is 30 minutes, bus #2 is 1 hour.
- Transfer time is 1 hour.
- Fare is $2.50

Here’s the problem:

- The trip to the destination is fine given that the transfer doesn’t expire when boarding bus #2. That’s 1:30 hour trip to the destination for $2.50 and you don’t get kicked out of the bus when the transfer expires.
- However you can’t make the return trip paying only $2.50. Once you reached the end of bus #2 trip the transfer expires. You’ll have to pay another $2.50 to board bus #1! Shenanigans!

After a long crazy 5-classes semester, I decided to reward myself with new gadget upgrades! Replacing my iPod nano and my 4 years old Zire 31 Palm PDA is 8GB 2nd gen iPod touch. How was my 4 years old Palm doing on its final day? It hard reset itself when battery went completely 0%! All data… apps, notes, contacts… gone! I can restore everything back, but I just don’t think it’s reasonable to limit myself to a 4 years old technology.

iPod touch

For iPod touch, I always think of it as a PDA… just like a Newton (that’s why I’m naming mine Isaac). It has everything that I used to have from my old PDA (including an anagram app for Scrabble) plus wifi that would let me do many stuff like listening to internet radio. Although I could’ve got myself an iPhone, but the whole risk regarding hacking (sim-unlocking and jailbreaking) just isn’t worth it when I already have a working unlocked phone.

Now comes the “woe” part of the entry.

- Incompatibility with clock rdio dock: I used to charge my iPod every night with it, now I can’t thanks to the restructuring of the dock connectivity. Even worse, I can’t even charge it when I plugged into the powered USB of my powered-off PC. That means I have to turn on my PC every time I want to charge it.

- Canadian app store not accepting iTunes giftt card: When I bought my iPod I also bought a gift card hoping to use it for apps. No dice. I later found out that I need credit card for paid apps. Luckily I got my US iTunes account rolling while I was down in Seattle visiting my brother, and it did work with app store purchase. But still… I’ll stuck at $15 until I got a chnce to be down in the States again.

- No tactile control: Now I’ll have a harder time skipping songs while keeping my iPod in my pocket. It was easy with iPod nano but with iPod touch I’d have to click home button twice then scramble for the on-screen skip button. Maybe I have to invest in remote to overcome this stupid downside of touch screen.

Pinnacle HD Ultimate Stick

I thought I could catching up to the HDTV revolution with it, but sadly… there are no over-the-air digital station in Victoria! I used to get many channels with great signal while I was with my brother but absolutely none here. Face it, we live in a luddite country. It’s like having a cell phone without a network to support it.

PC memory upgrade

I was down at Fry’s in Renton to get anything at reasonable price for PC upgrade, and I walked out with 2GB of RAM at only $25. I hoped this would make a great ugrade since I can’t run WoW and Firefox at the same time with 2GB on Vista. Woe? 32-bit Vista doesn’t support 4GB of RAM! 3GB is fine but I wish I could get something out of that idle stick.

I also bought a 8GB CF card at a bargain $20 that I’ve yet to test out. I hope my camera supports it or else making it 4-in-a-row for woes!

• Disneyland trip
• Lensbaby

How to avoid taking boring pictures at the most photographed place in the world? Go with unusual equipment! I really want to give Lensbaby a try at Disneyland. Result may not be crisp and pretty, but at least the trip will be more interesting, challenging and fun than usual.

In short, this theory is my own defense on why images on computer and LCD screen look better on dark background. This is where I found my images posted on Flickr and forums to look different from the same ones I posted on my photoblog.

Photography nowadays comes in 2 flavors: print and electric display (including lightbox display and slides). In the traditional form of print, the perception of imagery relies on ambient light source (such as sunlight) to reflect the image on the print to the eyes. For electronic display the need for ambient light becomes unnecessary as light of the LCD screen and slide projector substitute ambient light.

Now, how does this have to do with the choice of background color?

As light source already exists within the area of the image itself, any additional area of brightness on the screen wouldn’t be needed. This is why we always see lightbox advertisement or art display (for example, Jeff Wall) filling the whole lightbox as any white border will lessen the impact of the primary image. Seeing an electronic image on white background would be like seeing printed image while holding it up to the sun. Too much light from too many sources.

This is why dark background works. Dark area represent the edge of the lightbox that gives the image its full potential for visual impact as it helps our eyes to focus on the image.

Anyway, this is just another of my passing thoughts. I may have to revise this theory again.

Before I started my photoblog, Flickr was my photographic showcase. Whenever I wanted to show off my collection, I would point out to my Flickr site.

Well, not anymore.

This is perhaps my attempt to left my amateur self behind. After recent review of my own Flickr site, I was very disappointed to see works that don’t represent my current skills. Stuff like my Spirit Bears rampage that have no creative purpose but to be a record of my (rather embarrassing) obsession.

Apart from my own ancient collection that I dislike, there are so many other reasons to dislike Flickr.

• Invitations: That thing I always get instead of proper comments. They’re like plague!
• “Post 1/rate 3″: Another annoying plague! I know it’s good to get a recognition, but it’s useless when all people only rate and not providing any critical reason to back up the claim
• Pictures with too many tags/groups: Absurd self-promotion is disgusting.
• Shallow comments: “Great” is a synonym for “useless.”
• Favorites: I can’t manage them. I can’t hind them. It’s OK for personal use, but it’s never suitable for professional use. Lots of embarrassing stuff there.
• White only: I found pictures to look better with black background. Flickr On Black is a good complimentary service, but it’s not very practical considering that it’s not a part of Flickr.

To me, the bottom line is that Flickr is only good for casual use. It’s excellent for wide variety of communities and social connection. However, the lack of visual control and poor circle of critiques really sealed the fate for Flickr to be used professionally. I may consider Smugmug as my next move while off-loading my “epics” out of my Flickr.

Tough crowd! Yesterday I submitted my first photo from my photoblog to Onexposure, and predictably the first on got rejected without any comment.

Then I tried 2 more hopefully the miracle might happen. The second one got rejected even with a positive comment! Now, the third one passed the first phase of the screening process.

Guess what? I had to pull the best out of my portfolio material just to get that far!

So, I think I can call this a “taste test” experiment since I have no idea what kind of image people are looking for. I can see the artist-client relationship from this experience, and this scenario can definitely be used in the real world. I think I just started to love this site!

Update: All rejected! If this is compared to boxing it’d be like going from local ring to fight Mike Tyson. KO’d in 1st round.

Onexposure http://1x.com

Finally, I think I may have found the perfect place to get useful criticism for my photos.

Up to today, I’ve been lingering only in the world of snapshooters: people arming themselves with point-and-shoot cameras firing away shots hoping to get those shallow “amazing” and “wow” comments on Flickr. Sugar-coated candy maybe nice and sweet, but does it help me grow up and develop strength? What I really need are nutrition and medicine of the mind. They may be bitter, they may be hard to swallow, but at the end the bottom line is that I get what I needed to be better at something.

I may be intimidated to post there at first judging from many excellent examples found everywhere on the site. All I need is a self-belief that my works are second to none and I’m really proud of them.

Welcome back!

This should be the 3rd reincarnation of The Dreamer’s Journal. I really got frustrated with how Blogger shifted its focus from FTP development to their inflexible web-based system that shut out features for FTP blogs. I don’t have any idea how this incarnation will last (also depending on how busy I am with school) but I’ll try to keep it afloat whenever I got some time to write.

As for theme, I’ll stick with this for a while since I’m not totally familiar with WordPress platform in terms of layout design. Perhaps that should be my weekend project this week.