365 Day Challenge Day 7- Window Seat

If a flight is longer than 5 hours, I always get the aisle seat and the window seat for anything less.  The reason is to take pictures next to the window, but if the flight is too long, I'd rather sacrifice photography for comfort.  Normally, I'd never do this but I've been on a plane enough times (my passport is 2 years old and it's almost half filled) that I usually don't see anything new outside, so comfort it is.  But on a rare occasion, I do see something new and pleasant.

Scene from an airplane, near Hong Kong International Airport.

p.s. Between a window aisle seat and the middle aisle seat in Boeing 747, middle aisle seat is slightly better.  On a window aisle, two people will need to pass through you, while only one person will do that on a middle aisle (the seating arrangement is 3 window - 4 aisle -3 window). 

p.s.s. I do remember a 747 with 5 across the middle, but I don't see those any more.

365 Day Challenge Day 6

Albert performing near Japanese Cultural Center, Little Tokyo.

A never been seen footage of Albert.  If he becomes a superstar, I hope this picture will be worth tens of thousands of dollars.

365 Day Challenge, Day 5

My classical guitar.  I've played all types of guitars (trust me, when I say all types, I mean it), and it never occurred to me that I should try classical.  Currently, it's my favorite instrument.

I've been living for 30 years, and even if I live for 300, I will never be able to understand music.  Why is it that major chords sound so happy?  Why is that you change a single half note, to a minor chord, and you suddenly feel dejected and melancholy? 

For most of you, 100% of music that you've ever heard, from twinkle twinkle little star to the most complicated jazz piece to Justin Bieber, involves just 12 notes.  Just 12!  And most of those songs only use 7 of those notes.  What kind of prose can you write with 12 words?  How many foods can you make with 12 ingredients?  Music is incredible.  And sometimes, it's more prudent to enjoy something rather than to try to make sense out of it.

365 Day Challenge, Day 4

Hong Kong skyline. 

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I got rid of title picture because I thought it was distracting the pictures from 365 Day Challenge. 

365 Day Challenge - Day 3

Where my heart is so many times throughout the day.

365 Day Challenge - Day 2

Traveling is one of those things that are almost always romanticized and seldom seen as what it is - a physically and mentally draining experience.  But since I am no longer exhausted, I can start spinning my globe in search for the next destination.  Let's romanticize again.

365 day photo challenge, here we go.

I know I shouldn't do it, because I'm probably gonna update for about 3 days and call it quits (aka fail).  But you know what, that is why it's called a challenge - because it's difficult.  And it's not in my character to shy away from something due to fear of failure.  Actually, that is precisely my character, but if I tell myself that it's not, then someday it might change. 

Anyways, here are the rules:

I will NOT take a picture everyday.  That is simply impossible.  Heck, I won't even update once a day.  But what I will do is:

1.  Publish a new picture that has never been seen before.  

2.  Publish one picture per day, though it will be updated every 2~3 day or a week.

3.  Write a short caption about the picture - about the content, my philosophy towards photography, or whatever is on my mind. 






Day 1:

I usually know whether a picture is going to be good or not before I press the shutter.  When I saw this - or this section - I knew I was seeing something special.

But after composing and taking the shot, I felt like something was missing.  It was intuitive.  I didn't really know what was wrong, but I knew it was.  After about 10 more shots, I finally had what I wanted, which is what you're seeing.  The two people have what my previous silhouettes lacked - a human trait that differentiates black shadows on a bridge from a human being.  The woman is briskly moving, perhaps to a meeting, perhaps to pickup her children, I don't know.  The man, on the other hand, has the weight of the world pressed onto him.  Stressed out from work, getting a divorce, who knows.  May be he has a gum stuck on his shoe.  But it must be a big gum, because he looks quite worried.

On the bottom, there is the reflection of a gorgeous model.  She's the type of person that you never see in real life, only in fantasy.  I actually like the fact that it's a reflection of the ad and not the real thing, because it makes the ad look more dreamy.  The top portion is the complete opposite - pure boredom. 

Did all this go through my head when I took this picture?  Of course not.  But intuitively, I knew it.  That is why you gotta act quickly in photography.  Ideas are fragile, and you better capture them before they're tainted.