Australian Moto GP 2011

This year there have been some major changes at Phillip Island, some very welcome changes. First thing we noticed were the improved parking facilities. This gave as an introduction to the overall polish we would come to find with well prepared staff ready to facilitate us. Moving through the grounds we found improved paths to alleviate rain issues, and the corporate tents were completely segregated from the public with only two points of entry. This gave us our own toilets (awesome) and kept the unwashed masses away.
The weekend has been amazing with the weather, and only at the end of day two have we started to get a few drops of rain.
Incidents on the track have been few, but the historic event on day two in the morning provided a nice even spray of oil down the main straight and into turn one. The Moto2 class also had its share of excitement with a major rear end collision on turn three.
The crowds are already big on day two, and we’re all looking forward to seeing Casey Stoner start on poll tomorrow afternoon.
Race day gave us a mix of weather:sunny, then wet and windy, then sunny, then mayyyyybe rain… Typical Melbourne.
The Moto2 class was exciting as always with Marquez (causer of day 2′s rear ender) coming from his penalised position at the end of the pack to take a podium position of 3rd. Amazing stuff.
Moto GP gave us a battle of the Hondas with Casey leading the pack all the way and Pedrosa, Somoncelli abd Davisioso fight for second and third. Rain touched the track in the final two laps with riders sliding off on slicks as they tried to hold off calling into the pits. In the end Stoner came over the line winning the race. After a painful accident in qualifying by Lorenzo that removed half of his finger, stoner was free to claim the World Championship for 2011.
This gave him a win at home, on his birthday, and the 2011 crown.
Go Australia and go Casey on the Repsol Honda!

Newcastle Photo-Walk

On the 16th January 2011, I embarked on a photo-walk around Newcastle with my girlfriend and her daughter with ten themes to photograph (and one photo to submit of my own choice). The path was a fixed option, the themes were wide and varied, and here are the results of what I took. I hope you enjoy them.

Stop Shark Fin Soup

I have just finished watching Gordon Ramsay’s documentary on shark finning called Shark Bait. I highly recommend that anyone out there that has a thought for wildlife take a look at this documentary, and the website www.sharktrust.org. It depicts the unabated destruction of sharks in the world’s oceans by the Chinese as they satisfy their demand for shark fin soup. If you didn’t already know, the sharks are prized for their fins, without any thought given to the meat, to be used in a bland soup dish that holds a status amongst the Chinese people.

Gordon campaigns to stop the use of this item in restaurants in London’s Chinatown, and I ask that you only look at the website and refrain from ordering any dish that uses shark fin. If the needless slaughter of sharks doesn’t subside soon, there won’t be any to enjoy in the future. With our eyes, or in a bowl of soup.

Saraton Theatre Gets 7.1

Today I had the pleasure of being one of the first to experience Tron in 7.1 audio at a cinema that wasn’t IMAX. Yes, Grafton, my humble little hometown has recently updated the heritage listed Saraton Theatre into the 21st century.
We were told at the start of the movie that the cinema had been just updated to a 7.1 system with a 4k 3D projector for entertainment bliss. The audio was crisp and clear with almost perfectly balanced surround sound, and the picture was sharp and clear 3D. The seats were clean and comfy with a slight recline and plenty of leg room.
This is the sort of cinema that people should travel to, just because it’s so damn awesome. And the price for all this movie-going pleasure? $14 with a Coke and the glasses. $14!! That’s less than a single normal ticket at your rubbish Hoyts or BC&C. The same movie would be over $20 with a drink. Rubbish.
I’m glad they’ve renovated the cinema, and from talking to the staff, they’re very proud of what they’ve achieved. Check it out if you’re in Grafton.

LASIK Laser Eye Surgery

Recently I underwent laser eye surgery to correct an astigmatism that I suffered from in both eyes. This surgery happened a week ago (10th November 2010), and so now I thought I’d write about how this last week has been.

First off, the procedure is completely painless. Completely. You feel nothing, there are no needles, and it’s all done in less than ten minutes. I recommend watching a YouTube video of the procedure like I did after you have it done. It’s very interesting, but it won’t help you decide whether or not to have it done. It is cool to see what they were doing during the procedure though, as your field of view and perspective is pretty limited at the time.

So, the procedure is done, you’re walked out of the room (in some VERY cool blue booties, mind you), and sat down in a recliner to rest after it’s all happened. Straight away you can see, not well, but you can see. My vision was actually better right away than it has ever been without glasses. I had a friend (thanks Caz!) looking after me that day, and she was my chauffeur home. One thing to remember, after the procedure the sun is not your friend. Sunnies aren’t enough, I had a towel draped over my head to block the sunlight. Once I had sheltered my battered peepers away from the sunlight, I was able to finally see what I had in store for myself. Vision. No crystal clear, not yet, but a promise of things to come. Moments of clarity through a haze of healing.

My eyesight still isn’t quite 100%, and I’ve been told this is normal. It sort of feels like I have contacts in there, and sometimes my focus is a little off, but everyday I see it getting better and better. Computer screens and fluoro lights give me headaches with any real use, but I just try and take things easy, give my eyes a chance to heal, and try not to strain them. And I keep them moist with drops provided. The drops help a lot.

If any of you out there have thought about whether or not t0 have it done because you’ve had doubts about its effectiveness, safety or long term effects. Throw those doubts away. It’s safer and cheaper than ever (my clinic charged $AU1350 an eye), and I have never been happier in my life than when I realised I would not be shackled to glasses any more. I didn’t do this for cosmetic reasons, I did it so I never again had to fear broken glasses and being unable to get to my spare, playing with contact lenses, being unable to read the time from bed, swapping out glasses when putting on a bike helmet, being unable to go SCUBA diving, and a myriad of other reasons. It’s freedom, it’s a physical disability gone, and it’s worth every freaking cent.

Moto GP 2010

It’s day one at Phillip Island for the Moto GP, and there isn’t a bit of blue sky to be seen. It hasn’t stopped raining since about 2am this morning and there is mud, slush and water everywhere. I’ve had a look through the display pavilion, bought some stuff, looked over the bikes, and managed to see Wayne Gardner give a speech on behalf of the Flying Doctors. Although I did find out a little more about his latest doctors checkup than I anticipated.
I’ll keep this blog updated as the weekend progresses, so please feel free to check back.

It’s race day today and the sun is trying to punch through. I managed to wander around the circumference of the track yesterday during qualifying to get some different angles on the bikes. Plenty of knee down action from the GP bikes, with Stoner taking pole position for today’s race.

I was planning on doing my usual run up Gardner Straight after the race has finished, but they’ve removed the tyre wall and created a mud filled moat with an Arco fence. I’m doubtful I’ll be able to get myself and my camera gear from the Honda tent, down the hill, over the fence and onto the track without making a mess of it. Maybe next year…

So after another Australian win by Stoner, and an amazing battle between Hayden and Rossi, the 2010 Moto GP is over. The sun came out for all three races: 125cc, Moto2, and Moto GP. This provided it’s own challenges, with a mixture of wet and dry patches on the road creating numerous issues for the riders. But the sun quickly dried the track to allow for some exciting racing!

I’m looking forward to next year, and taking the 2500km round trip on my little Honda. Pack light, enjoy the ride, and have a beer with mates at the end of a day in the saddle.

Facetime: Why can’t it be used over 3G?

Now, I’m not one of the boffins working as an engineer at Apple, but what I want to know is why the hell you can’t do FaceTime over 3G?
Yes, I understand the AT&T network is rubbish and suffers from dropped calls and overloading of their data network, but that’s for just one country. What about Australia, Japan, the UK, France and Germany? We don’t have the AT&T abomination that Americans suffer through. Just have a look at the graphs below…my 3G connection has a better upload speed than my WiFi! So what’s the limiting factor?
All I can put it down to is that AT&T is rubbish, and the rest of the world has to suffer for it.

WiFi Speedtest

3G Speedtest

 

 

Google Goggles On iPhone

Google Goggles has been released for the iPhone Google app as of today. This neat little feature provides visual search of things around you. While it’s not too crash hot on identifying things like plants and animals, it is brilliant at translating text, identifying landmarks, bringing up info on logos or reading text and providing search options. This feature has been on Android phones for a while, and is definitely a welcome feature to the iPhone. It’s free, so have a look-see at the Google App on the App Store.

iPhone 4 HDR Comparison

Apple iOS 4.1 was released this week after its announcement last week. It included a number of changes including Game Center (sic), a few bug fixes and surprisingly High Dynamic Range Photography, or HDR. No-one was really expecting this from Apple at all, but it is definitely welcomed. So what is it?

Well, put simply HDR is a combination of a number of different exposures that are blended together with the best features of each extrapolated to provide detail across the entire scene. Fortunately for us, our eyes do this on the fly constantly without us really knowing about it and adjust the amount of light they see dynamically as you look out a bright window, or back into a darker room. Cameras aren’t so versatile and need a little assistance. If you take a photo through that window you just looked out your camera has two basic options: Expose for the bright areas, or expose for the dark ones. HDR will take a photo of the scene with both of these areas exposed properly and meld them together so the entire scene is properly exposed. Clever, huh?

This is a feature that on my relatively expensive Canon SLR requires me to bracket the scene, set the camera to continuously shoot photos in rapid succession, put the three exposures into an image editor like Photoshop or Photomatix, get the balance right in the photo, wait for it to number crunch and spit out my HDR photo. Pretty time consuming? You betcha. This is how the iPhone 4 does it… Open camera application, make sure HDR is turned on with an on-screen button, take the photo, wait 3 seconds and review both the HDR and the photo the camera would’ve taken if HDR was off. Tell me which you’d rather?

Yes the SLR gives me a bucket load of options to configure this and that, but when you just want to get past the limitations of an already wonderful little point and shoot, this is a free addition that just can’t be beat. See below for my comparison shots of what you can now get out of a photo where the light in the scene just won’t play ball.

Non-HDR iPhone 4

HDR iPhone 4

Maitland Aroma Coffee And Chocolate Festival

Aroma Coffee And Chocolate Festival 2010

This video was taken and compiled on an iPhone 4 using Reel Director.

Aroma Coffee and Chocolate Festival from Dan Hall on Vimeo.