The waves rock our boat, turning our reef-hopping trip to an amusement-park feel joyride of sorts. Water splashes on the deck as we do a jump and a fine spray of sea water reaches my lips, blessing my tongue with its salty tang. An island, sun-soaked for everyone to see its lush, appears on the horizon. I take aim with my lens but, as I make sure that I have set the proper shutter speed to negate the wildness of waves, I acknowledge that, for the first time, my camera has proved insufficient for this adventure.
Don’t get me wrong. My camera performed as admirably as ever, taking shots as sharp as usual, limited only by the hands and eyes wielding it. But, as all cameras do, it could not record the feelings that made the trip impressible in memory. True, it recorded the beauty I saw of Palawan but it cannot capture the smell of adventure as we battled the waves, the flavor of sea-side air, nor that sun soaked smell served as my perfume for almost the whole time we stayed there.
I got into Palawan courtesy of the undergraduate research I am doing. Our project, Porites recognition, is part of a larger project in UPD. The researchers involved in the project went to Palawan to gather data. My role isn’t really field-related but I got included anyway.
Despite it being a research trip, it was adventure all throughout, from the waves to the food to the exploration of the city’s night spirit. The first day we rocked the waves, we ran short of fuel. We waited on a sandbar for further instructions. It’s beautiful, dreamy in quality, if not for the fact that it is a graveyard of corals damaged by dynamites. It is a peaceful spot in the middle of the sea nonetheless, as the resting place of innocent creatures should be.
I tried to travel as light as possible being that (1) it is generally a good idea to travel light, (2) pretty men travel light and (3) I did not want too much of my personal stuff to get in the way of the research equipment we brought along. As such I took a leap of faith and didn’t bring any medium to back up my photographs and I was too lazy and too much of a cheapskate to invest in a memory card more or two, to distribute my photographs across. It would’ve been fine until they took a fancy to my camera and I became an official photodocumanitarian of sorts.
I got all my pictures back to Manila safe and sound but I learned a valuable lesson nonetheless: the pictures I take belong to the people who made the shot, whether they are distinguishable/included or not in the final output, as much as it belongs to me. I should’ve been more responsible for our shared property. In my lapse of judgment I didn’t act like a photographer, even for a hobbyist, not even like the computer scientist I am trained as.
I am grateful for the trip. I am grateful for the adventure; heck, the last one I had was almost two years ago. But I am most grateful for the lesson on not cheapskating on the memories I hitch on my camera.
Another awesome way to start the year don’t you think? ~The Chad Estioco
I expected rain to fall, maybe like last year, probably worse. The week was weird weather-wise after all. I made it a point to bring my umbrella, for Getsurikai’s sake. Thank heavens I had no need for it.
I arrived at UP late by my standards. For the past three years, I’d usually arrive before lunch then hang out for some hours, reading a book I brought, until my friends start texting me, asking where in UP am I. I’d do that to avoid being hassled by the traffic caused by the Parade. For some reason the traffic-hassle didn’t give me enough incentive to get-up early this year. I was late but it was a nice start to the adventure as I got an opportunity to get a before-the-show feel for the event.
This horse is too camera-shy. Everytime I’d point my lens at him he’d turn his head the other way. Maybe he’s proffering me his best angle? Maybe he thinks my lens is some kind of a laser cannon*? This is the best of him I got: snout complete with matching calesa.
I was happily shooting around Oblation Plaza when I saw our ROTC squad advancing towards Palma Hall. I remembered that they will be one of the first parties to parade. So I hurriedly ended my little photoshoot, reasoning with myself that I need to conserve batteries as I don’t have any spare.
But not long after, the beauty of the Carillion took me in…
We decided to station ourselves in front of Melchor Hall being that it is at the last leg of the Parade. Last leg == night time (eventually) == more awesome for the lovely lantern lights.
That said, with all my hurrying, we still had lots of idle time when our group was finally completed. Idle time + SLR/SLT camera =
…rotating camera men!
And the attention of cuteness!
The Parade started with UP Offices. I saw some personal acquaintances like…
UP President Alfredo Pascual
Okay. I kid. I saw some personal acquaintances like…
The CRS team, most of which are people from DCS.
Come to think of it, the deeper I got into the CS curriculum (and knew more teachers/people from the Department), the better my fate during batch runs became. Hmmmm….
And then came the UP ROTC in their distinct guardia civil outfit,
I wonder, if a lightning storm ensues, will those hats act like lightning rods? Are the wearers safe from brain-frying and related phenomena?
Ironically followed by College of Arts and Letters float honoring Rizal and the Revolution,
Above pictured is Sir Wystan de la Peña, head of the Department of European Languages and my Professor in a GE coded European Languages 50 (EL 50). Take that course under him. I personally learned a lot from Señor de la Peña’s lectures. It is one of the most worthwhile courses I ever took.
The parade was scattered with awesomazing lanterns (duh!) and acquaintances that it is pointless to just blah on with words. Visual overload here we go!
Like last year, there were gaps in the Parade, most likely caused by people like yours truly who are so keen on taking pictures. And it was starting to get dark. Perfect for pictures like these…
At this point, I learned/realized a few things in photography.
You really can’t do much if a scene’s lighting is poor to begin with. Not unless you have your own lighting equipment. But (a) I don’t have that and (b) that looks too out-of-place, space-taking, and inconsiderate for an event like the Lantern Parade.
Unlike a point-and-shoot’s flash, which fires the lights straight at your subject, an SLR fires flash upwards, assuming there is a ceiling to bounce the light downwards, diffused. This results to a better effect/less glare. There obviously isn’t a ceiling equivalent in outdoors, Lanter Parade set-up. I had to use my hands to direct the flash to my subjects (hood it over the flash like a “ceiling” which will quickly catch the lights and bounce it towards your subject). Thank goodness I realized this quickly.
So, as it was getting dark at this point, it became harder to get decent shots. Lighting was no longer on my side as I was already relying on flash. Otherwise, it’d be too dark or too orange depending on where I decide to shoot.
Above pictured is Eng’g’s Wall-E, one of our lanterns, and the DCS/Cursor contingent of the Parade. Like last year, Eng’g scored with a particularly awesomazing lantern followed by a—wait for it—boring march of Eng’g orgs and banners. My sister, who majors in Broadcast Communication, likens it to dead air i.e., awkward and should-be-avoided pauses in radio productions. Unlike the last three years though, they, at least, weren’t wearing orange. Plus points for the fashion factor!
I took this shot from one of the torches of the Beta Sigma frat men. Their first number was the human chain/snake which I believe is part of their initiation rights. Even if it is my second time seeing this, it was still kind of chilling especially with their chant. I heard someone (was he from βσ?) call their second part kata which is the Karate equivalent of Taekwondo’s poomsae or forms. While their formation and synchronicity might look watch-worthy, it didn’t really catch my attention (maybe ’cause I’ve seen better during my TKD days). So, my eyes were wandering off to better photo-ops, their torch flames in particular. It, however, amuses me that Beta Sigma has their own blend of martial arts.
A few more lanterns and it was finally the turn of my most anticipated college ever. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the ever-fine stars of our lantern show, the College of Fine Arts.
Judging by the number of pictures in this post, I’d say that I’ve really had a good time with my camera this Parade. I even exceeded my 300MB monthly upload limit at Flickr that I had to hijack on a new account to fit all these shots in!
That’s all for now. Hope you have a Merry Christmas! ~Chad
*This imagery was inspired by an episode of Pokemon, Bulbasaur-Charmander-Squirtle(-Pikachu!) era. Brock was making rice cakes when Ash noticed a camera lens (wanting to take a picture of Pikachu) appear from behind some bushes. He over-reacted, imagining it to fire a laser projectile of sorts, and ruined their little rice cake picnic. I’ve never been able to shake that episode from my mind since I watched it as a kid.
Second semesters. You’ve always held a special place in my heart for being more enjoyable and memorable. For some reason, despite having managed my time better, I felt so tired and exhausted after last semester that all-break long I didn’t do anything as originally planned. I had to recharge by doing nothing and watching my first concert ever, starred by the Jason Mraz.
An amusing aspect of this second semester is how I encounter my past teachers. Imagine casually meeting your first math teacher in college ever, remembering that his subject was your baptism by fire, and wondering if he remembers you or if you should maybe greet or wave or something. Even after Math 17 I didn’t really become that awesome in math. But, if anything, Math 17 gave me the tenacity I’d use during those countless times I went on the brink of failure. I still have to encounter a non-theoretical application of the complex plane, numeric progressions, and root finding but Math 17 was most worthwhile taking even if just for the mindset I gained.
It’s only been four years and yet it all seems so long. Maybe it’s because I’ve actually had eight sets of subjects just for the past four years? And that’s not counting my summer semesters.
Another amusement: my candidate last semester is host to a number of firsts in my life. It is my first underloaded semester, being that all those summers spent in school has finally paid off and I’m only 13 units away from my diploma (15 to around 21 is the range of normal load, variable depending on whether you have laboratory units). But wait, no, it is also my first semester taking a Master’s class. Out of curiousity and a desire not to slack off/underload, I added a further three units to the missing 13 units of my undergraduate curriculum.
I’m closer than ever to closing this volume of my life, but it’s not a clear coast yet. I still have an obstacle course and a thesis to finish. But hey I’m already here. So just you wait.
See you!
P.S. Greet the blog a happy birthday! It’s been five years!
(Note: This entry was supposed to go up at my DeviantArt account but then I found out that DeviantArt only allows images in the journal entries of Premium members. So I’m putting it up here.)
Meet my new gear/gun/wand/zanpakuto/(kindred/familiar) spirit/camera. A Sony SLT-A35 whom I have decided to christen “Getsurikai”. Bought with the advice of Joseph Cheng (from DeviantArt). Note that it is different from an SLR.
This is, incidentally (and probably), the last picture from my old Kodak C913 (whom I haven’t bothered to name) which I’ll post online. It is pictured below.
And this is the first picture Getsurikai ever took (so of course it isn’t really one for aesthetics), barring those which it took when I tested it upon delivery. But I didn’t insert the memory card then so they don’t count *wink*.So long buddy. I’ll miss your compact feel, how I can carry you everyday, except when my bag is too crowded already.
I’m not really a fan of anime but I’m quite a huge fan of BLEACH!. Those who know their BLEACH! will know from where did I pattern the name “Getsurikai”. It isn’t very clean Japanese from what I’ve been told but hey, I like the sound of it so I’m taking artistic license. And oh, it literally means “moon grasp” by the way.
These past few days, I’ve been busy trying to get the feel for it. So far, the biggest adjustment I had to make is the placement of controls. Whereas my old Kodak has all controls at the right-hand side, Getsurikai has it both in the left and right-hand side. Kodak has its shooting mode settings on a dial around the shutter button but that is where Getsurikai has its on/off switch, the shooting modes being in a dial at the left of the viewfinder. Imagine what happened the first time I (instinctively) tried to switch modes? Hooha.
But I quickly got over that problem and I’m pretty comfortable with where all the controls are located now. What I’m currently doing is trying to learn all its features before December’s Lantern Parade, which is, if you need to be made aware, a photographer’s idea of a shooting feast.
They’re not much yet but here are some of the results of my test drive.
Just experimenting with aperture settings…Art found in the construction. We are having house renovations right now (with all this mess, I’m affectionately calling the affair “Voluntary House Demolition”). Interestingly, the carpenters used this amazing artwork to cover a hole they’re digging. I don’t know where did their boss, the Architect, got it though.
Thankfully, my room is not involved in the action. I can keep my stuff clean without much effort. Imagine all that dust in my laptop, my external hard drive, and my brand-new camera!.
My room got pretty crowded though, since my parents moved in some stuff (like the old desktop which no one uses now except for printing).
This is my bedside window. Though dark, you’ll still see my bedside lampshade, accomplice whenever I read a book just before going to slumberland. The orange glow comes from the street lamp just outside.
For so long, I’ve wanted to get that shot. I don’t know when I first wanted it though. I first moved in to my room when I was in Grade Five but I only started taking an interest in photography around Fourth Year high school (four years ago!).
Another shot which I’ve wanted to take for so long. Also in my room.
This is my ceiling, just after I hit the switches off at night. This is the sight which I sleep to every night. It doesn’t change depending on the time of the year, nor depending on anything else actually but it can be quite lovely, especially when the lights just turned off and those luminous trappings are fully-charged.It’s not much of a shot (just experimenting with ISO settings) but I’ll re-do this one once the Voluntary House Demolition finishes and I get more space.
My old Kodak actually has pretty good ISO settings; it can go up to 1000. But even with that, all you’ll see is a black screen when you try to take my room @ night pictures.
I remember, four years ago (!), back in Fourth Year Highschool, when I used to keep a dream journal in my (then-GeoCities) website. I had a particularly refreshing dream involving side walks. I’m pretty sure this one came from that dream.
That’s all for now. I hope I can get some more practice before the Lantern Parade. And with a schedule like this, I’m pretty optimistic. Click to enlarge:
Yep. Assuming I pass all my subjects this sem (oh pleaseeee!!!), that’s it. They’ll surely give me a CS199 and a CS196 (else, I will raise hell…hehe). Note that CS196 is a one-unit class—I either take it on a Wednesday or on a Friday—so I total 13u away from an undergrad diploma.
Ah Paradise…I shall be with you soon. Just give me time to kick the hell out of the coming hell weeks…
There is one productivity trick that I’ve learned from my internship which I’ve continued to apply even well after I’m out of it: plan ahead not what you want to do but what you want to achieve. This has been largely responsible why the past midterm season went by me without much hassle on my part. Ever since my internship, I’ve started my weeks planning ahead what I want to achieve and then tallying myself. I try to achieve at least 70% of the goals I set weekly and I’m pretty good at it; I usually get my 70% done, until recently, that is.
But before I proceed telling you about what’s been keeping me busy this past few weeks, allow me to backtrack a little and relate an interesting event I forgot to relate and that happened all because of my birthday last month. In an age where Facebook has kindly been reminding everyone of everyone else’s birthday, I pusposedly set my account to tell no one when my birthday is. As I expected, I didn’t get much greetings on my birthday. I had maybe around 3, all coming in at the last minute of August 8, two through Facebook and one via text message. And then the next few days became quite amusing, as people learned that I celebrated my birthday on the 8th. People wrote me uber-interesting greetings, starkly personal, if I may say, even if not by Facebook standards, going well up to a week after my actual birthday. True enough, I didn’t get as much greetings than if I allowed my birthday alarm to ring but I’m pretty sure that I got the better deal by receiving messages that is not the generic “Happy Birthday Chad! <maybe insert smiley here>”.
Anyway…so, what I’ve been up to. These past few weeks, my 70%-goal-achievement productivity saw a sharp drop as I found myself alternating only between two interesting projects: my thesis and my EEE8 project. This is my second take on EEE8; I don’t think I was able to tell the blog that I failed it last year largely because it was eclipsed by more personal failures, which took center stage in my posts. Back then, I never thought I’d ever even be remotely interested in breadboards, integrated circuits, and wires. But well, here I am, thinking of how can I build a robot to automate the cleaning process of my room.
As for my thesis, I must admit that one of the many reasons I wanted to join UPD’s Computer Vision and Machine Intelligence Group (CVMIG) was because I knew that I’d probably be working on image processing, which was, back in high school my idea of the pinnacle of programming. Well I got my wish, but that is not to say that I am not having a hard time in the task set to us. For some weeks now, I’ve been contemplating over the Gabor filter and I must say that I’m still pretty far from what I hope I’ve achieved with it already.
Well, that’s all for now. Wish me luck and see you soon in Paradise, wherever or whatever that is…~Your Skymeister.
