Scavenger Hunt Sunday | 032413

I wasn't able to join last weekend because the prompts proved to be difficult for me to hunt (as we don't celebrate St. Patrick's Day), but I am back this week. :)


Asian
{Canon Powershot SX130is}
23 March 2013

This should be an easy prompt for me because I am Asian... but it would be difficult to explain if I take a picture of myself, my family and/or my surroundings. We do have some Chinese vases here at home, but showing Chinese related pictures might be too typical, so I just took a picture of this.

I was already in college when McDonald's introduced the Happy Meal (as far as I can remember), and one of its toy collection that got the family hooked was this set of Snoopy toys in traditional costumes. My dad, my brother, and I would hop to different McDonald's outlets just to buy these toys, and because this comes with the meal (at that time they only offer the burger and a regular cup of drink), it would mean eating as much as 5 burgers in one day. I practically had to give away the burgers when I purchased 5 toys at once.

All in all, there are 28 toys, and these are just 5 of the many Snoopy figures wearing Asian costumes. From left to right - the Philippines (my country), Japan, Korea, Singapore, and Taiwan.


Wavy
{Canon Powershot SX130is}
21 March 2013 

Last Thursday, my brother and I went to the Manila Diamond Hotel to attend the launch of Mega Creations Premium Sardines. Held at the Pisces Hall, located at the 27th floor of the hotel, I was able to see awesome view from the window (check my last post) including this. Nice to see a curvy/wavy designed pool rather than the usual rectangle ones...and the tiles on the floor of the pool provide a wavy effect on the water.


Draw
{Sony Ericsson K800i}
07 July 2012

This is from the archives, as I wasn't able to hunt one within the week. I took this while walking along the streets of Colinas Verdes, and the one who drew this used a stone. Quite impressive, I must say... I just hope in time it will be washed away because no one would want to have any kind of graffiti on their side of the road.


Soft
{Canon Powershot SX130is}
21 March 2013

Wasn't able to eat anything soft... wasn't able to photograph any soft object, so I will go for this, taken at the Manila Diamond Hotel (again). When I was still using the old point and shoot camera, I love freezing the water by photographing it using a forced flash. Over time, I got to see images taken by many photo hobbyists and was amazed at how they turn water as if they were soft clouds. I learned that one should go for 1/4 of a second to produce such effect, but going for this in the middle of the afternoon when the sun was super bright and shiny was very difficult. For me to produce this, not only did I go for 1/4 of a second, I also lowered the ISO and set the exposure to -2. I think it made the water soft... how I wish I can try this on a real waterfalls next time.


Texture
{Canon Powershot SX130is}
21 March 2013

The pollens of this Stargazer did provide textures. :)

The FiFi Showcase

As I have shared a while back, my old cell phone - the Sony Ericsson K800i (which I named Cysho, taken from "Cyber Shot," the line of cell phone's model) died last week of February. Prior to its death, I have hoped of buying a Smart Phone because I felt so disconnected whenever I leave home. I know I shouldn't be online wherever I will go, but as a blogger who attends events every now and then, staying connected is very helpful to share certain things from the event on real time. My old phone lasted more than 5 years and I found it pretty durable - have dropped it way too many times, so I dreamed of owning a Sony Xperia, most specifically the Arc S because it's waterproof, but it was just too expensive. When my phone died, I had a few days to decide which phone to buy.

During the Baguio trip with fellow blogger friends Jen and Iris, I got to see them use their own smart phones - both carrying the My|Phone brand. I wasn't able to ask them their opinions about their phones, but I liked the images they shared on their Instagram pages. I don't know why... but one thing I considered about what smart phone to buy was its camera. I wanted to buy the same phone as theirs, but the stores at the mall near our place don't have stocks for that specific model.

I was exchanging text messages with my cousin Jayson (who's such a gadget guy) asking for his opinions as well as asking him to check online reviews of whatever smart phone model I think looks good, and in the end, he suggested I get this:


Cherry Mobile Flare. Weeks ago, one of my Facebook friends posted her picture of this same phone and when I asked if it was a good buy, she said it is, considering its price. Standard retail price for this phone is 4000 pesos (approximately 100usd), but I bought mine at 4500 pesos...but that's because it comes with a spare battery. Battery life is this phone's main problem, so I thought it was a good thing to have a spare one on stand by.

I named the phone FiFi - taken from Flare and WiFi. True, its battery doesn't last 24 hours when you're using it, but because I still haven't bought a memory card (therefore I haven't downloaded a whole lot of apps yet), battery life goes about nearly two days for me.

Camera? I can say I am satisfied, too:


 All SOOC images - I want to show its real photo quality.

I still haven't tested its ability to take images under low light environments, but it does an awesome macro! Unlike my old phone which I have to turn the macro function on, the camera of this phone requires a tap on the screen to focus on what I want to highlight. For example, when I took the sunset picture, if I tapped on the pool area, it will wash out the sun and give more light on the pool area, but because I tapped on the sun, I came out with this image. Back to the macro function... crazy focus it created on the second image - it was able to highlight the mold (was it? I don't know... I just saw it in the garden growing on the iron rods) and blurring the rest! Ahhh... I love this phone! :)

It was just recently that I discovered it has a panorama function, too, but I still haven't used it. Although, comparing it with my old phone, it doesn't have the White Balance function and it cannot create straight up Black and White and Sepia images (but you can edit your picture and turn them into sepia or black & white), but it does have a night and action modes.

Challenges I have with using the phone as my camera...it was a little sensitive with movements, and I admit the first few images I took were all blurred! Well, it's still new and I am still learning the ropes of using a touch screen phone; in I will get better in taking pictures using this phone.

Hopefully by next month I will be having my own Instagram page, too! :)



PS - I bought the phone using my own money. :)

Skywatch Friday | Floral Friday Fotos

Friday Favorite Things | Favorite Photo Friday | Photo Art Friday 

Baguio Pictures From My Latest Trip

I am used to travel at night, but during my last two (or three) travels up north, I tend to be so sleepy and tired... that even if I slept on the bus most of the time, I still felt sluggish and out of focus when I get home. I wasn't able to update my blogs while I was away, so in my efforts to update this blog, let me share these pictures, taking cue from Ashley's Scavenger Hunt Sunday prompts.


Red
Second day in Baguio City with the family, we decided to welcome a new day by visiting the Strawberry Fields at La Trinidad, Benguet. I was thankful having to meet a nice taxi driver, who took a different route going to the area as the main highway was very busy. We didn't pick any strawberries, but the farmers and vendors were also kind enough to let us take pictures to our heart's content.


Orange
This picture marks the "premiere" of my newest soldier, FiFi... my new smartphone. After eating lunch at the 50s Diner, my camera's battery drained, so I was left with no choice but to use my phone to capture images from our next destination. I still have to train myself using this phone as a camera (and I have to buy a memory card should I want to capture more images), but this one turned out good - giving me more reasons why I loved choosing this cheap affordable smartphone.


Yellow
This I took at the Mines View Park, which is also a good place to shop for souvenirs. Among the many things for sale are different kinds of plants, and since we didn't plan to buy one, I just took the pleasure of taking flower pictures.


Green
A shot from the taxi's window (taxis in Baguio and nearby towns don't use air conditioning system as the weather is fairly cool) on our way to Tam-Awan Village. Aside from the strawberries, farmers here also plant different vegetables - lettuce, cabbages, leeks, and broccoli among others. This is a shot of the lettuce fields. Looks like these are bound to be harvested real soon.


Blue
Interestingly, I wasn't able to photograph "blue" pictures... so stretching this prompt a bit by sharing the blue-lighted chandelier I photographed at the lobby of Eurotel Baguio, our first choice of hotel to stay at. We arrived in Baguio around 9:30 am and Eurotel won't allow us to check in until 1pm, so we decided to leave and find a different hotel.

Hope you are all having a great week so far... happy hump day!

Holidays / Christmas (SOOC)

Christmas is my favorite time of the year! Everyone seems to be kind, sweet and generous... and everybody is always in such a happy mood. When I found out this week's Good to Wow (Shoot and Edit) prompt is Christmas / Holidays, I just knew I had to participate.


This was taken last December at the nearby mall. Every Christmastime, every SM malls have their own Christmas decor set up for mall goers to have their pictures taken. I am not sure if it's the same with every branch (SM is such a well known mall, they have branches all over the country), but for their branch in Fairview, they had the Gingerbread House as the theme.

I took this picture using my cell phone while waiting for mom. That time, I still didn't have my camera because my old one (Canon Powershot A1000is) just died, so I relied on my cell phone to capture moments while I was waiting for me to have enough money to buy myself a new camera.

I will do very minimal changes for this image; although I still have to think of a way to deal with that lower right side of the image.