Editing Gimmicks

How to convert this:

to this?

It's all explained in my other blog here: Click here

Put your comments there, let me know what you think !

The Book I am reading - III

I read two books lately.

Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse and Cat's Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut.

Apparently the classic books.

Let me just say I completely failed to see the point / message of the books if at all there is one.

1984 by George Orwell is next in line.

On second thoughts, I should just stick to comic books.

It's about the birds ...

Yep, It's about the birds.

Been a long time since I wrote anything here... Oh, well.

Recently went to Bandipur, though didn't see a tiger, I saw couple of magnificent birds.

Crested Hawk Eagle

Another shot of the same

And, then there was Crested Serpent Eagle

I had never seen these birds in the wild before !

Anybody ready to gift me this ?

(Clicking on the above pics will take you to my flickr pages.)

Quote for the day ...

"If you are so smart, why aren't you rich?"

So true, so true ...

Stolen from here...

My own website !!

Woohooo !!!

Everybody, go to http://mylittlefinger.in ! [UPDATE: Don't bother. It's not mine anymore :) ]

That's my site !! Although nothing much there right now, I promise I'll show off all my CSS/html skills there soon :-)

Woo hoo !!!

Did you know

this word?

"Ominous"

My client at the office used this on a conversation and I had to quickly google it to understand ...

:(

How to shoot lightning!

or to be precise, how I managed to capture lighting on my camera :-)

Okay, this might be a lengthy post, you've been warned ...

So, another weekend, and as usual I am wondering what to do. But today, Bangalore weather has been nice... It started to drizzle in the evening. And lighting ...

So I took my camera out, put my 18-55 mm lens on that, and set it up on my rarely used tripod.

Alright, lightning was predominant on east side and sky was full of clouds :( Once in a while I could see lightning clearly, but had no idea how to shoot it.

So, I set my shutter speed to max, ie 30 seconds and to compensate that I kept the aperture to low. f22 me thinks.

But, no luck. All I could capture was some light pollution from Bangalore night sky and some residual light from the lightnings. Even after 5-6 attempts.

Clearly, higher exposure was not going work.

And I started to lower the exposure gradually, still no luck. And now clouds were moving towards south. And it started to drizzle heavily.

Armed with an umbrella, I continued on my quest to capture the elusive lighting.

By now, I changed my tactics from longer exposure to very short exposure. Like 0.8 sec at f5.6

Then there was a silver line over the clouds. Literally !!

So, the trick I used is to click continuously, with highest exposure that is less than a second. Because, for exposure longer than a second, the de-noise mechanism on my camera starts. Ie, once a shot with 1 sec exposure is taken, it would not allow me to take another shot immediately. Though I can disable it, I didn't want to.


Finally after around 200 clicks I got my first shot with a lightning.

And after some more clicking, here is the best I could capture !!

All these pics are in my flickr page, which you can find here ...

If you know a better way to capture lightnings, please do let me know...

I am happy :-)

Tiny ant

There is was a tiny ant on my desk, and it looked like it was lost. It just went in cirlces :(

I tried to help, but I think I just killed it.

The Book I Am Reading - II

Well, I read 8-9 chapters of 'The Selfish Gene', and I am giving up.

I get the gist of the book, and it is too intensive for me to read :( Especially when the Richard Dawkins (Author) starts to argue about other experts' view.

Now I am picking up another book 'A Short History of Nearly Everything' by Bill Bryson. And its got big fonts!! Yay!! I just love the books with big fonts :)

The Book I Am Reading

Okay, time for some serious reading.

So, day before yesterday, I ordered few books from flipkart.com. This is my first ever online purchase ! Phew !

So, one of the books has already arrived today and I am gonna start reading today.

It's 'The Selfish Gene' by Richard Dawkins, I've already read some chapters long back, and by no means it's an easy read.

Well, anyway, once I finished reading this, I hope to put a post on what I think about the book.

Lady with Pretty Eyes - Part 2

Yes!!

My dear readers would probably remember this post Lady with pretty eyes...

I met her again in the bus today, and I spoke to her too!!!


Woohoo!! :D

Well, we had both changed the bus route to office, and today I was trying my best to sleep in the bus. When I opened my eyes , I saw a lady was sitting next to me. And she was none other than the same lady with pretty eyes !!

I opened my earlier post in this blog on my cellphone, then I asked her if she used to commute on the older route we both used to take. She said 'yes'.

Then, gathering all my courage, I told her that I had written a post about her in my blog and gave my cellphone to her to read the post.

As she started to read it, I blurted 'Please don't slap me' ...

Sheesh!!

She read it, with a smile on her face, then I apologized to her if I had offended her, she said no !

:)

Then she asked if I used to get down at Domlur bus stop on earlier route and said she had actually noticed me (Big grin on my face ... he he he)

Now I know her name, where she works ...

We then spoke about weather, politics, cricket and life in general...

Rest of the journey , neither of us spoke :(

And I even forgot to say 'Bye' when I got down from the bus :(


Well, any way, I am happy :D

You can bet that I am going to take the same bus tomorrow.

It's time for

some whining ...

Somethings I noticed while commuting to office in BMTC buses lately.

* I can read a 200 page novel in just 4 hours or so.

* Reading a P.G. Wodehouse novel while listening to some rock/metal song is quite a multitask. I noticed that a long trance/downtempo track makes reading easy. Especially when it has no lyrics.

* I can not read more than two P.G.Wodehouse books back to back. I'll just end up skipping all the description and just follow the story :(

* BMTC air cooled buses are uncomfortable if you end up sitting on seats where the AC ventilators are broken, and there are quite a lot of them (broken AC ventilators)

* All the FM radio channels in Bangalore suck, none of them play any western music or decent Hindi music, (Except Radio Indigo, but none of the buses put that channel ). And the drivers have no idea about volume controllers.

Well, that's about it, please tune in to this for more whining.

Is there

something wrong with the lifestyle when you spend half of your monthly income on pair of headphones?


I guess there is.

Blame it on 'Impulsive shopping'

No more cycling for another month :(

Well, that's what doc says :(

I hurt my right knee, a weekend off-road ride of about 60-65 KM proved little too much.

This is exactly what I am going through, and there is no medicine other than resting. Apparently.

Now, back to BMTC buses, and some good old P. G. Woodehouse P. G. Wodehouse books.

Any recommendations on good books that I should read? I get about 2 hours everyday in the bus to read.

oh me !!

Tomorrow is Sunday, that means cleaning lady will come and clean the apartment I live in. That means, I will spend good amount of time cleaning the apartment myself before she arrives, so that the apartment is at-least in a presentable condition for the cleaning lady.

meh.

Well... but why ?

It's been 4 days here in London, and still I haven't taken my Camera out yet.

And I just have to stop comparing London with New York. These are just different cities. Very different.

Am I ?

So there was this calf at my home when I was a kiddo ... I loved it a lot.Then it died. And nobody did anything. And I cried. Then afterwards I stopped liking those calves anymore. Always kept them in a distance. Afraid that they'll also die one day and I will again have to bear the pain.

10 more years later.

My sister got a dog. Small puppy. Man .. I just couldn't avoid loving it. It was like my best buddy.

I was doing my engineering then. Whenever I go back to my house, it would jump up my my neck and play around ... Then. It got lost. Yep. Fully grown awesome dog. Got lost. sad. Again I cried.

I learnt something. You love something, then you lose something. Just like that. And there is always pain.

So, I'm afraid of that pain, pain of losing. So I just don't love anything these days.

They call me "Chicken"

I wonder

if I will ever be able to love something / someone with all my heart ...

I guess not ...

Why .. Why ...

stopped running in the morning for few days, and I am back to my old self again ...

Why Why :-(

"On every occasion I am ready for the funeral ..."

Another day .. another song ...

It's from a band called "Band of horses", song title is "The Funeral" [youtube link]

Lyrics:

I'm coming up only to hold you under

I'm coming up only to show you wrong

And to know you is hard and we wonder

To know you all wrong, we were

Really too late to call, so we wait for

Morning to wake you; it's all we got

To know me as hardly golden

Is to know me all wrong, they were

At every occasion I'll be ready for a funeral

At every occasion once more is called a funeral

Every occasion I'm ready for the funeral

At every occasion one brilliant day funeral

I'm coming up only to show you down for

I'm coming up only to show you wrong

To the outside, the dead leaves, they all blow (alive is very poetic)

For'e (before) they died had trees to hang their hope

At every occasion I'll be ready for the funeral

At every occasion once more is called the funeral

At every occasion I'm ready for the funeral

At every occasion one brilliant day funeral

I have no freakin' idea what those lyrics are supposed to mean ... But I like this song :)

Lyrics stolen from here

Riding Down The Stairs ...

ps: No balls were burst during making of this video ...

Rohan and me tried these stunts at our office yesterday!! and Dheeraj took the video :-)

And ride back home was much more eventful :D

I did this poster :-)

For details check this page !

It will be super awesome!!

Well, here it is ....

All this action happened in couple of seconds!

The baby Bulbul was very courageous and let me go very near to her (or him, I have no idea )...

Here is one of the cute shots of her I have:

(Clicking on these pics will take you to my Flickr pages ....)

I can lift my front wheel like 4cm.

Watch the video, then read the title. :-)

Commuting to office in Cycle in Bangalore!

(update: latest post on the same topic is here)

is easier than I thought !!

Okay, here are the facts:

♦ The distance I commute in cycle: little more than 15 Kilo Meters (one way).

♦ Time I take: 40 Minutes (+/- 3-4 minutes)

♦ I commute mostly during rush hours, I leave at around 8:30 -9.00 AM in the morning, leave at around 7:30 - 8 PM in the evening.

♦ Root I take : Srinagar / Hanumanthanagar -> Ashoka Pillar -> Diary Circle -> Koramangala -> Inner Ring Road -> Old Airport Road.

♦ How long I've been cycling to office: last 12 days.

♦ What bike do I have: Trek 4300, It's a nice mountain bike.

♦ Where did I buy the cycle?: From Bums On The Saddle, the coolest bicycling shop in Bangalore!

Some comparison:

I've commuted on Motor bike, Public buses and now, a cycle.

Time taken to commute on motor bike is around 40-45 minutes for 15 kms, but I am at the mercy of traffic. Time taken on bus: more than an hour and 15 minutes. Again, I am at the mercy of BMTC. Not every time I get a bus as soon as I go to bus stand.

On cycle, it's always 40 minutes +/- 3 minutes. Always. Yes, Yes, I do jump traffic signals, ride on footpaths. But I try my best to be not a nuisance to public and traffic.

How is the experience so far? Absolutely FUN! Feels like I've gone back in time to my high school days :-)

Some interesting stuff that happened:

♦ I went through McDonald's "Drive-Thru" on my cycle!! The guy at the counter was kinda shocked to see me on cycle :-)

♦ An old lady and a cute kiddo gave me "Thumbs Up" !! Awesome!

♦ Almost fell from bike when I jumped from footpath to Road more than one feet deep :-)

♦ Did more than 50 Kilo Meters on a Sunday, didn't feel tired at all ...

Okay, Here is what I feel:

Cycling around Bangalore in heavy traffic is not really tough or dangerous. Just keep some common sense, and you will be fine. Things like a good helmet, hand-gloves and a air mask/filter are a must.

Cycling to office ...

Yep, that's what I did today!

I cycled to office on my new bike :D

Though my legs are screaming, I am happy!!

Guess what!

Bought a Brand New Bike!!

It's a Trek 4300

Bought this beauty at Bums On The Saddle

I am already commuting by public transportation for last 6 months or so. Now, I plan to commute on my new bike...

So, "Carbon Free Commuting" part 2 begins!!

Isn't it?

[web comic stolen from here]

And ..

eating a medium sized watermelon completely on your own doesn't kill you.

"cause I am still alive and kicking :-)

Current Status: Update

Still screwed up :(

Current status:

screwed up.

Ahoy!!

I've started another blog, where I am trying explain some of editing I do for my pictures.

Here it is.

See you all there ...

This blog will remain as it is. Prime place for all my ramblings :)

Exactly ...

"I realized something. I'm just the vibration of a few atoms that happened to clump together, an impossibly unique combination that will eventually dismantle, and drift apart forever. And then I'll be gone too, into an unimaginable void, where even sadness can't exist."

Stolen from here : http://www.daisyowl.com/comic/2008-12-10

AeroIndia 2009

 

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

Clicking on the slides will show details...

Clicking here will take you to my Flickr page ..

(rss readers, please visit the blog ...)

Gonna see the planes again ...

I wrote about my first visit to AeroIndia show here ...

I am going again tomorrow!

Only one difference, I am going with my camera, hopefully take some good pics :-)

Oh, I am going along with flickr friend Digital Monk, meeting him for the first time ...

Now, to figure out how to take pictures of planes ...

Got tagged!

for the first time, by her :-)

Well, I am supposed to post the 6th picture from 6th folder in my comp.

But, 6th folder in my laptop happens to be folder with source code of my project in office ... So I am taking 6th folder in my "Pictures" folder  :-)

Here it is :

Man, this brought some nice memory !!

This is taken in September 1st, 2008 in Adirondacks Mountain range in New York ...

Oh boy, didn't we ( Me + 3 of my colleagues ) walk that day! At least 20-25 kilo-meters I think.

A really nice, exhausting trek ...

There should be a name for it ...

The other night I couldn't sleep. At all.

So, I started to count sheep ...

Then another fear took over ... I was afraid that I might run out of numbers ...

:(

I don't understand ...

How Twitter manages to be down once in a while :(

He said ...

"The world is nothing but an illusion"

And I am thinking about it. Generally when I think, end result is a blog post ...

Quote for the day ...

"Eventually I won't need anything"

!!

I bleed but wait like nothings wrong ...

another copy-paste ...

This song is stuck in my mind these days ...

Times when I just can't
Bring myself to say it loud
'Fraid that what I'll say comes out somehow awry

That is when it seems
We move in circles day to day
Twist the drama of the play to get us by

And it feels like fear
Like I'll disappear
Gets so hard to steer
Yet I go on
Do we need debate
When it seems too late
Like I bleed but wait
Like nothing's wrong
...

Lift by Poets of the fall ...

Optimism ...

"Optimism" - It's not just an attitude anymore ...

It's a survival tactic ...

Stolen from here

Everything I had to know

Your eyes told me when they met mine in that fraction of a second ....




Or so I assume ...



Man, I'm all fucked up :(

Would it be a happy ending?

You are a story.

I am full of contradictions.

If we get together,

It would be a story full of contradictions.

What do you do?

So, you go to Shimoga, attend your buddy's wedding, come out of marriage hall at around 2 in the afternoon and your bus back to Bangalore is not until 11 in the night. What would you do?

Well, we asked around, figured out that we could go to Mandagadde, where there is a bird sanctuary :-) We've got a camera, lot of time and a full tummy! Camera hasn't got more than 3X zoom, but hey we've got a camera at least!

Can you see the bird in the above pic?  Yeah Yeah, that's about 'Bird Photography' I could do :(.  Apparently wrong season ...

So, we head to Sakrebailu to see some elephants :-)

The monkey in the pic is closest to the elephant species we could see. Apparently wrong timing :(

Public is allowed to see Elephants only in the morning :-)

Hey, but we met couple of kids who promised to let us see Elephants if we gave 10 bucks ...

We didn't dare going to Gajnur Dam :-)  You see, we were already disappointed !!

So back to Shimoga bus stand and a lengthy discussion about 'You, me and a bunch of Neurons'

Yay!!

Text only Ads:  Do check my Flickr photos here

What's the point ?

"The point of asking a question in spite of knowing the answer is to let other person know that you've thought of the question"

aha .. One more Year gone!

And I am still alive !! yay!

May you all have the balls to do whatever you wanted to do in your life, in this year!