Random Brain Dump

Last month, we took the kids down to LA for a spring break visit.

While Suzanne was paying a visit to her friend Ly and her newly born baby, I spent some time with the kids and their cousins. We had a little easter egg hunt in my sister’s backyard. The kids had fun looking for the left-over eggs that Suzanne had prepared for her class. The older kids were too fast for Allison as they were darting back and forth grabbing the hidden eggs. Not wanting her to miss out on the fun, I resorted to lead Allison to one of the hidden eggs. She happily grabbed one and put it in her ducky basket. Didn’t take long for her to realize that the other kids got more eggs than her, so she complained to me: “I have only 1 egg Daddy, I don’t even have two eggs!” I bursted out laughing and explained to her that there weren’t any eggs left.

On another day, we took the kids to Getty Center. My friend Allen recently showed us some pictures of his visit to the place. The museum recently opened after years of renovation; it sits on top of the hill next to UCLA campus and provides an expansive and awesome view of LA and the pacific ocean. Just the view itself was worth the trip. We didn’t get much of a chance to check out the art collections, as the kids quickly got rowdy. When Katelyn fell into the water fountain, we packed up and headed straight home. What a nightmare! 🙁

The highlight of the trip was a day visit to Disneyland which has become sort of an annual spring break mecca for us last few years. Suzanne got all the kids each a hat; Katelyn picked her own hat and wouldn’t take it off the entire day! As usual, everyone liked “It’s A Small World” and of course the Dumbo ride. The highlight for Katelyn was posing with Minnie Mouse who was her favorite Disney character. After catching the Disney parade in the afternoon, the adults and the small kids were exhausted and ready to call it quit. I decided to stay with Katelyn and my nephew Andre.

With only three of us left, we were whizzing from ride to ride the rest of the day. Andre was a great sport— the oldest kid and had to stick with the girly and kiddie rides all day.  So to make it up to him, I took him & Katelyn to a Buzz Lightyear ride, after which Andre proclaimed “that was an awesome ride! It’s all worth it!” The two cousins even braved the “Haunted Mansion”! After a late dinner of hot dogs and pretzels, we caught the fireworks. Katelyn loved it when Tinkerbell flew back and forth high above the castle. We didn’t leave the park until 10PM. Katelyn was a trooper as she walked all day long on her own two feet. I was totally exhausted when all was said & done!

Here’s some of the pictures from the trip.

We basically had very atypical California weather the last 2 months here in the bay area. But this past weekend was just simply gorgeous and so we took off to beach with the kids. After a lunch at the Santa Cruz Marina, we hit the sands & the surf. The girls spent hours playing on the beach. A great day for the family.

I lugged my camera bag out to the beach and quickly learned that was a mistake. Sands and lenses don’t play well together. I didn’t dare to change the lenses twice with the sand blowing everywhere. Here’re some of the shots…

Last Thursday, Suzanne had to hold teacher conferences at her school. So I quit work early and came home to take care the kids. It was a gorgeous evening, so we grabbed some food and headed to the park. We sat down on a field of grass and happily chowed down Baja Fresh burritos. Afterward the girls & I ran barefoot on the grass in the park, chasing ducks and each other… The girls had so much fun that they didn’t even nag me about taking them to the playground, like they usually do.

I brought along my big zoom lens and snapped a bunch of close-up shots. Of all that I took that evening, the one pictured here on the right stood out to me. A little sepia treatment and it’s become one of my personal favorite shot of the girls! I simply can’t help but smile when everytime I look at it.

We went to the Getty Museum when we were visiting LA 2 weeks ago; it was an utter disaster. Museums are generally inappropriate for young kids. But undeterred, we decided at another go at visiting a museum, this time without the kids. We drop Katelyn & Allison at my aunt’s place and spent last saturday in San Francisco.

The sun had burned through the morning overcast, revealing a beautiful day ahead of us. Our first destination: The Embarcadero. Mr. Sunshine added the bounce in our steps as we eagerly walked through the market place. Like us, there were many few people out lugging nice cameras & taking advantage of the nice weather.

We called ahead and made a reservation for a late lunch at Slanted Door, one of those restaurants serving Vietnamese fusion cuisine. We had a great lunch of perfectly grilled halibut, manila clams with bacon bits, celophane noodles, and delicious egglant in coconut sauce. I had a refreshing cocktail called Summer in Danube too. All very yummy! It was of those enjoyable fine dining we no longer get to experience all too often these days. 🙁

We then hit the Legion of Honor; well, we tried anyway since unfortunately the place closed for the day by the time we got there. Yet another failed attempt at visiting a museum! 🙁 Suzanne basically blamed me for spending too much time taking pictures. But, we at least did spent some time hanging outside of the Palace and Lincoln park. I was taking more pictures of course…

We then drove across the Golden Gate bridge to Sausalito, our first time back since we attended our friend Katie’s wedding there a few years back. We grabbed a cup of coffee and an ice-cream cone and strolled through the quaint downtown, window shopping (well it was really Suzanne since I don’t window shop). We saw this street performer making seemingly impossible stacks of big rocks by the water. Pretty novel way to make a buck!

I missed snapping sunset pictures as I originally planned, but we drove up to one of the hills anyway and staked out a place to take some pictures of the Golden Gate bridge. This time I blamed Suzanne for taking too much time checking out the boutiques. 🙂 We waited and it got windy and really cold. Finally, dusk came and the skyline was dark enough for long exposure shots. I knew the wind and my cheapo $15 flimsy tripod in particular wasn’t going to get me sharp photos. I got a few okay shots, I will have to go back one of these less-windy days and try my luck again with a better tripod. It was pretty exciting for me as it was my first time trying my hands at long exposures.

We originally planned to dine at Ti Couz, but it was yet another plan foiled thanks to my spending too much time photographing… So, we headed straight to the Punch Line for a 10pm show. Greg Proops headlined and he basically “killed.” We found him to be hilarious on “Whose Line Is It Anyway?” and he didn’t disappoint. The odd thing was there was a party that left the show because I guess they were offended by Greg’s materials. I don’t know why people easily-offended go to these comedy shows. Greg kept referring to them as the Donner party the rest of the show after they left. Pretty funny…

We didn’t get home until 1am. I can’t remember the last time we were out that late together. All in all, it was an enjoyable day playing local tourists– good change of pace doing adult stuffs without the kids. Plus, I was happy to shoot some photos. I got my chance to really try out my new Canon 30D. Suzanne was again my reluctant model for the day and was patiently accomodating to the shutter bug in me. Thanks babe!

All in all, it was a great day out in the city.

Here are a few of the shots posted.

I spend this past Final Four weekend with a few buddies in Vegas. Planned this months ago without knowing UCLA would do well in the tournament. So the fact that they made to Final Four was just sweet, especially some of my buddies were my room-mates back in the UCLA days.

I expected that most people would root for UCLA since LA is only 4 hours away from Vegas. But it turned out there were more LSU fans; I guess folks were going for the favorites. I spent Saturday afternoon watching the 2 semi-final games with Jake & Vince. Most of us bet on UCLA and won!

I lugged my camera equipment around Saturday and managed some decent shots along the strip. The highlight was the night shots. I don’t normally get to shoot outdoor after dark. Plus, I got to try out my new monopod with the night shots. It’s definitely less of a pain than lugging a tripod. The combination of monopod & an image stabilization lens, I was able to shoot to 1/15 exposures using natural light. Cool…

I also managed to snap shots of a guy proposing to his girl in front of the fountains @ Belagio. I thought about offering to email them the pics. But decided not to, figuring that they would either be very grateful for capturing the moment or chew me off for “invading” their private moment. Sometimes, it’s just better to capture a moment with a memory, and not have proofs… 🙂

A few weeks ago, Suzanne & I got a rare chance of spending a weekend without the kids. Along with Wati, we headed to Yosemite Saturday morning and spent the afternoon snowboarding at Badger Pass. It was Suzanne’s first time on the snowboard; it was my first time in probably close to 10 years. We had fun but Suzanne’s knees were black & blue by the end of the day.

After spending the night with Wati’s friends at Bass Lake and we drove into Yosemite Valley Sunday morning. We had never seen it in the winter time. This winter hadn’t been generous as the last in terms of snow, so it wasn’t as a winter wonderland I’d imagine. But it was still absolutely gorgeous nevertheless. Snow covered Half Dome was breath-taking. Suzanne reluctantly agreed to play the role of my model as we spent the morning driving around the valley snapping pictures. Unfortunately, there was a heavy overcast that day so everything was very grey, wasn’t best condition for long nature shots…

Too bad the entrances to the campgrounds were closed too, I’d love to hike up to Mirror lake and take shots. I wanted to retake some of the pictures taken last summer when I didn’t have a wide angle lens. Oh well, there’ll always be next time. We stopped by the village store and grabbed some souvenirs for the kids and hurried home– guilt had started to weigh on us… 🙂

It was a fun and relaxing weekend… Here are some shots from the trip.

A few weeks ago, my dad & I took an early morning hike at Rancho San Antonio. After a good hour of hike, we got up to an open meadow with a great vast view of the entire bay area. We saw buildings from downtown San Francisco, the bay, the east bay hills. I managed to take some panoramic shots of the valley. I didn’t do a good job of keeping the metering constant across the photos so the stitching wasn’t as smooth as I wanted, but it’s still pretty cool. I’ll try again next time.

There were many signs from nature that spring is coming– greenery was everywhere and flower buds ready to bloom. I’m looking forward to do more hikes and take more photos.

By the way, when viewing individual photos, you should see “View Panorama” command link for each panaramic photo. Clicking it will launch an applet for viewing panorama, which allows for panning left & right– simple but pretty cool.

If you frequent this blog, you know that I am a shutterbug. I know, I know… You’re thinking: "gee whiz, what gives that away." My main subjects are my two daughters. (Again, I’m stating the obvious.) If you view their pictures here, it’s really easy to spot how different my 2 models really are in front of the camera.

Katelyn loves to be in front of the camera–always flashing a smile, even when she was a little toddler. She’s a willing subject, posing for her shutterbug dad without asking. She is easily excitable. And she’s photogenic (well, her dad likes to think so), most of her shots come out great. It’s very easy to shoot Katelyn. She’s a pure joy to shoot.  

Now that’s not to say Allison isn’t photogenic or a joy to shoot for me. But she’s different. She’s more shy of the two, the serious one. She’s still a bit uncomfortable in front of the camera. She’d pose or smile if I ask her to, but she does it in the most uncomfortable fashion. She’d always lean her head to one side and say "cheese"; and breaking a half-smile once in a while. That’s her pose and it’s her only pose. It’s become a habit too. Now everytime she sees a camera, she breaks into her ackward pose. It’s rather funny. A perfect example is pictured here. Note the contrast of the two poses, the smile on Katelyn and Allison’s signature head tilt?

So I learned to shoot Allison differently. Most of the good shots I got out of her when she isn’t posing. I try to shoot her when she isn’t aware of the camera. Natural shots suit her more. I call these "private shots" because I feel like I’m stealing her private moments with these kind of shots. Now if only she’d smile more frequently, because she usually looks serious in some of these "private" shots. Allison is also a joy to shoot, abeit in a different way.

 My daughters provide me the motivation to learn photography. They’ll be my excuses for buying expensive equipments in the future when I become a better photographer. Now, if I can only coax my wife into a willing subject as well. 🙂

We spent this past Christmas in Lake Tahoe with our parents, my sister’s and my uncle’s family. The 3+ families crammed into a nice cozy cabin we rented for a few days– crowded but fortunately all relatives got along. If you’re ever looking to rent a cabin in south Lake Tahoe, I highly recommend the place we rented from this lady; conveniently located, clean, roomy and rental is very reasonable. Had I not with kids, I would normally prefer a more rustic place though :). Good thing, I bought one of those cargo boxes that go on the roof on my Dad’s van. By head count, we had 14 and we even lugged most of the kids’ presents with us. Luckily everybody & everything fit into the 2 mini vans.

It didn’t snow at the lake basin when we got there, so I was disappointed for the kids. But we all woke up to a snowfall the morning after xmas with the kids (and the adults) jumped for joy in excitement. A white after-xmas! Everyday, we hit the snow parks. The older kids were hitting the slopes non-stop. Even the toddlers and one grandma braved the snow and snow-tubed with the rest of us. The grandmas, my uncle & my niece had not seen snow before, so it was especially exciting for them.

I bought a new camera lens in preparation for the trip, figuring there’d be photo opportunity aplenty in Tahoe. But with so much things going on, I didn’t get to take as many photographs as I had hoped for. A few photos I did get with the new Tamron lens, I was impressed. The new lens performed well in low light condition and was sharp overall; it’s extremely sharp at aperture of F/8!

Our last morning there, I got up before dawn, packed my equipment and head out to Emerald Bay, figuring it would my last opportunity for some nice pictures of the lake at sunrise. I hiked through the woods in the dark, with gusty winds and heavy rain/snow. Good thing my new camera back pack is water-repellent. Last time I hiked in the dark was at Bryce Canons in Utah with Suzanne. More than once I thought: “man, I hope these pictures will be worth it!” Well, they weren’t. The rain, snow and wind mitigated my efforts– I could only get in a few shots (most of them not very usable). I did got one that Suzanne really liked.

Our drive home by was interesting, through a heavy snow storm. With chains on, we were crawling about 15 MPH through the mountains. The kids didn’t mind that we were driving slowly, getting a kick out of the snow storm. It was sure pretty!

Here’s the photo gallery from the trip:/trips/tahoexmas05

I was testing my new lens the other night by taking random shots with low light conditions. I took this quick shot of Allison without flashing. The only light source was our table lamp. Considering that I had to bump the ISO up till 1600, the noise level is remarkably low. This random shot turned out to be one of my favorite shots of Allison. I just love her composure and in general how this shot turned out.

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