Category: Photography

The Hokkiens Are Having A Blast

It is called the Hokkien New Year in Melaka where the Hokkiens arrived some 500 or 600 years ago. The Pai Ti Kong tradition lives on. It will be a blast midnight tonight. Keep your pets indoor.

Tonight, the Hokkiens will set off enough firecrackers and fireworks to make the world think North Korea launched some nuclear weapons. It’s the ‘coming out from hiding in sugar cane plantation” syndrome.
Don’t let your cats and dogs out tonight as they may be bewildered and wander off until lost.

A girl waiting for the apex of the Pai Ti Kong Festival. At midnight, there’ll be a bonfire of joss paper and firecrackers to celebrate the Jade Emperor God’s birthday. In the meantime, three giant joss sticks
burn in front of a table laden with food and fruits. The home offerings were flanked by two tall sugar cane stalks.

Olympus OM-D, ISO 500, f1.4, 1/60 sec.

#paitikong #hokkien #fujian #culture #melaka #tradition #history #malacca #chinesefestival #taoism

That Face You Make

While rummaging through the old photos of Lap Chun from last year, I found some unpublished ones.

One of the monkeys who grabbed a balancing egg from me discovered raw egg is hard to swallow. The face one may make at the mamak when the “sentengah masak” (half-boiled) eggs are too raw.

The old world monkeys or macaques are mischievous and aggressive. Be careful around them as some may run off with your camera bag. This one eventually crouch forward and licked the spilled egg yolk clean.

Sony A7R, ISO 2500, f9, 1/250

#lapchun #lichun #monkeys #egg

Lap Chun or Li Chun

Every year the myth is propagated on Lap Chun or Li Chun. It is today for this year 2017. So expect to see many balanced eggs on social media today.

I tried it with the monkeys in Kuala Selangor during Year of the Monkey CNY last year. Not the best place to try. One of the curious monkeys grabbed an egg and ate it raw. It is a myth because you can balance an egg on any other day.

#lapchun #lichun #monkeys #egg

The Dog And The Sea

They always have a stray dog population that is out of control. Whether it is Pulau Ketam or Sungai Besar or here in Pantai Redang in Sekinchan.

Fishermen feed stray dogs with raw fish when the boats come in. The wharf area attracts so many mangy dogs. It is heartbreaking to see them. They are silent victims.

With Sekinchan becoming an affluent area, I hope some of the rich and educated locals will come back to start a shelter and NGO to educate the fishermen on responsible animal ownership or to take care of sick ones and to provide spaying and neutering. The vicious cycle can end.

Panasonc Lumix GM-1, ISO 200, f16, 1/320 sec.

#sekinchan #pantairedang #beach #sea #landsape #fishingvillage #animals #dogs #strays #ocean

Fixing An Old House – Using Photoshop

Many people I know stayed with their pirated installation of Photoshop when the new cloud version became available and when it required monthly payment. I understand that but there are updates and new functionality you may have missed out.

I won’t discuss the pros and cons of the new business model but like to point out that there are some useful features that will make life easier.

1. I saw a very old wooden house in Jejarom town. Original unprocessed image in 1.

2. The first thing to do was to do a quick perspective and distortion correction to straighten and level the building since I was using a wide angle lens in 2. The result is black borders on the bottom and lower sides that may have required copping previously. I also recovered the blue sky on that flat weather day. There are some water droplets on the lens and they can be easily removed or cleaned up too, if needed.

3. Finally in 3, I needed to remove the ill fitting or out of place modern satellite dish and the lamp post. The car was removed too. It took less than 10 seconds each to remove each element. Send me your pic if you have difficulty fixing or removing unwanted elements.

Whether you like it or not, post processing knowledge is an important part of a photographer’s skills. If there is enough interest, I may conduct a practical course at a local hotel. Let me know.

Panasonc Lumix GM-1, ISO 200, f10, 1/200 sec.

#jenjarom #smalltown #selangor #documentaryphotography #lndscape #photoshop #smalltown