Vuvuzela; like it?

For those who are following worldcup in SA, you might have definitely heard the 'b' tone coming out of vuvuzela's and some might find it irritating, and there has also been some criticism.


Most of the criticism is comming from european media,especially one UK media giant is driving a campaign against these. whats the point in taking the world cup to Africa and then trying to give it an European look and feel?Iam in complete love with this sound. I personally feel this adds some local flavor for the host nation.


In-spite of its controversy , An iPhone application that mimics the blasting of the African trumpet, has been released and it seems has been  downloaded more than a million times.

Ironically, the iPhone application as  was developed by a Dutch programmers. And its the Dutch who have been the most vociferous against the horn, with their coach banning them from his team's training sessions and Dutch striker blaming vuvuzelas on his inability to hear a referee's whistle.


President of FIFA Sepp Blatter commented, "I have always said that Africa has a different rhythm, a different sound. I don't see banning the music traditions of fans in their own country. Would you want to see a ban on the fan traditions in your country?"


like it or not vuvuzelas are here to stay!

Photosent

After reading numerous reviews, blogs, news; watching videos, 'Finally' I bought a new Canon 550d.This blog is not focused on why I bought this camera, but its more focused on research I did in last few weeks about cameras and lenses before laying my hand on this one.

Canon cameras 550d, 500d, 450d,1000d and  Canon lenses 18-55mm, 17-55mm.17-85mm,18-135mm,18-200mm,55-250mm,70-300mm,USM, lower F, high end, lower end, all kind of cannon lenses were considered.
Nikon Cameras D3000, D5000 were also considered, 
For any 'to be' serious photographer, this is should be the starting point!

-- Past(point and shoot)tense -
I was an Avid Fan of Nikon, anything Nikon in camera, I would assume that it is the best !, infact my first camera was Nikon coolpix.

When I saw the pictures from my friends using Canon/Sony / even Olympus, all those yielded much better results than my Nikon., my Nikon yielded good results in full day light , in night it 'sucked'(sometimes even in day light IQ were bad) , where as Sony /Canon Point and Shoot yielded much better results.

I don’t know to this date why did I like Nikon, was it because every Hollywood movie I saw, protagonist using Nikon (Jurassic park for ex)/the brand name or whatever, for me Nikon was "THE" best camera brand. I now feel, only reason one would buy Nikon point and shoot is because of the pre-store hype, it was/ still could the best film cameras (Remember the days when we used to buy films for our old cameras? Take photos, give them to print and only when we had prints in our hands we would realize how god / bad the snap was ). We are taking about digital, and as far as point and shoot goes, there is no comparison to Canon. Image quality of Canon Point and shoot cameras are much better than the competition around. So if you are buying a point and shoot, go for Canon.

-- Photo (present) tense or what I would like to call it Photosents--
So Canon Point and shoot cameras are good, Is this the only reason why one should buy canon DLSR? - Definitely No.
There are 4 types of DSLR’s (broadly classified)
1. Entry level – Canon 1000d and Nikon D3000
2. Mid Level  – Canon 450d,500d,550d and Nikon D500
3. Semi Pro – Canon 50d,70d etc and Nokin D90 etc
4. Pro (these are very costly ones) – like Canon mark 1D


Iam an amateur photographer so did not even look at high end cameras.
1000d and d3000 are both good entry level cameras and there is nothing much to choose between them, based on your brand loyalty, one can be picked. But these being entry level, don’t give much control over the images.


Next step is Mid level, A year back Nikon was the leader here, with its d5000, canon had 400d and 450d but feature wise Nikon d500 was ahead, I would have picked d5000 today if these were the only choices. 
But today, in terms of mid range dslrs, Canon is ahead; Nikon is still 2 generations behind canon . Canon has 500d and 550d now.
Though I must agree there are places where in Nikon(2 gen old) scores much more than Canon like fps (frame per seconds), but Canon is a full package ' cannot not say same about Nikon.
Some of the features about 550d are
• 18 MP APS-C CMOS sensor
• DIGIC 4
• ISO 100-6400, H:12800
• Full HD movies
• 7.7cm (3.0”) 3:2 Clear View LCD with 1,040k dots
• iFCL metering
• Quick Control screen
• Ext. Mic socket
• Movie crop
There is not much to choose between 500d and 550d but 550d has full HD movies and 18mp CMOS sensor and scores much ahead of all mid range dslr. Infact it’s almost as good as a semi pro. ( I would say almost coz semi pros have some better features)


-- Lenstense--
Finally after deciding on Canon 550d, I was about to buy it, but hold on .. Which lens? There are various of these available with startup kit.,
In a nutshell Lens is what makes DLSR what it is today.


what I read is no lens is all in one. (or may be companies want it this way), its best to have multiple lens. What’s the point in having a dsltr and thinking about not changing lens? the whole point in having dslr is to have better image quality and this can be achieved by having different lenses for different  situations.
so what to buy now ? for me it was simple, I wanted to buy something which suited my budget., for from the searches , I found 55-250 to be the best cheap lens around so, didn’t wait for much time and bought 550D with 18-55mm and 55-250mm lenses.


-- Future ‘tense’? --
May or may not be ?
But I simply Love what I have
@ end of day, no matter what lens/camera you buy, it’s the person behind camera which counts and not the other way around.

Forgetting is good :)

Came across this wonderful article, Couldn’t stop myself from sharing it.

"

Forgetting is actually both necessary and useful. Imagine remembering every single second of every single day of your life. It would be very difficult to keep all the information organized and to focus on one thing at a time. There is just too much information to be remembered. We automatically forget most of the sensory information we take in without even realizing it.

A Perfect Memory ...

There was a man who did not forget. Solomon Shereshevsky was a Russian journalist with a perfect memory. He never took notes during his interviews, but his articles were detailed and accurate. He told his editor that he didn't need to take notes, because he never forgot anything. His editor sent him to Aleksander Luria at a local university for testing.

Over the course of the next 30 years, Luria would carry out an extensive series of experiments examining the journalist who would become his most famous case.

During the research trials, Shereshevsky was able to recall extensive lists of words, numbers and even nonsense syllables without mistakes and with only occasional hesitation. He could also report the numbers or letters in reverse order. Not only this, he remembered them years afterwards, as well as the clothes Luria had worn on the day he had first learned them!

Even events from early childhood could be recalled, including things that happened when he was still in his crib. There also appeared to be no limit to his digit span, as opposed to the seven to nine items that most humans can manage.

... May Not Be So Perfect

Unfortunately, Shereshevsky's gift was a serious handicap. He was unable to block unwanted memories. Also, he had a terrible memory for faces because he memorized them so exactly. People's faces change with time, lighting, mood, and expression. Shereshevsky had difficulty recognizing faces because they looked so different to him from the ones he had completely memorized in the past.

Shereshevsky had trouble understanding abstract concepts or figurative language. Luria wrote about him: "He was not able to read poetry or fiction easily, as each word or phrase would blossom into an intense visualization that might be contradicted by the next one... Shereshevsky's pathological memory interfered with his ability to hold a regular job, enjoy literature, or even seemingly to think in the abstract without being distracted by sensory association."

Shereshevsky gave up his journalism career and became a professional mnemonist giving regular shows to paying audiences. Despite his success, he never had great satisfaction as a performer and gave it up after a while. He then became a taxi driver in Moscow but his life faded into obscurity afterward. Aside from a possible death date in 1958, there seems to be little else available.

"