Big Noggin

"When you wish upon a star, makes no difference who you are ..." - Jiminy Cricket

I am home now after spending the most incredible week with my family. We all went to Walt Disney World together for the first time. My wife had been there when she was a child, but it was the first visit for me and our kids. Our adventure would start with 3 days playing at the Parks and 4 days on a Disney Cruise ship!

One of the benefits of traveling so much is the frequent flyer miles. I have oodles, and used some of them to get of 4 first class tickets to Orlando from Toronto on American Airlines.

We departed early on Thursday, March 8 from Toronto. We were flying to Miami, then connecting to Orlando. The flight was great. The kids napped for part of it, and my wife and I enjoyed a mimosa and some quiet reading time. With about an hour to Miami, the captain announced that we were abeam the Kennedy Space Center. Oh wow, too cool. I brought my son over to my daughters window seat, and pointed out the VAB, the launch pads (39-A, 39-B) and the runway where the shuttle prefers to land. All the excitement awoke my sleepy daughter who strained to see these sights through sleepy eyes.

Right next to the KSC was Port Canaveral, and we could see our ship "The Disney Wonder" docked awaiting it's departure for the 3 day tour. It would return on Sunday.

We landed in Miami, and made the trek from Terminal A to Terminal E. Man, that airport needs some people movers or large moving walkways. I was carrying my camera bag (see the previous post), which weighs significantly more than my son when fully loaded. It took us about 25 minutes to get to our gate. After a quick bathroom break in the AA Admiral's Club, we boarded our A300 for the short 1 hour flight to Orlando International.

I always find it odd to fly on a large aircraft on a 1 hour flight. We had the same experience in Phuket on a 747 for the 1 hour flight to Bangkok. It speaks to how popular these destinations are for tourists. That said, it must be hard on the aircraft.

After a couple quick drinks and yippee! We're in Orlando. This is where the Magic of Disney started for us. Our bags were tagged with Disney bag tags which meant they would be picked up for us and deposited in our hotel room. The check-in at the Transportation desk was quick and friendly. We all got in line for our bus ride to our resort.

We arrived at our resort "The Polynesian" and checked in. There were lots of papers to review and reservations to confirm, but we were soon in our room. Unfortunately, our bags were going to take a few hours to arrive.

Thursday evening, Mummy had arranged for us to go to a special Princesses and Pirates party at the Magic Kingdom. Our little ones were dressed up in their costumes for the party, and we got on the monorail and headed to the Magic Kingdom. Oh, oh, there it is! Cinderella's Castle!

We went on a few rides. First was "It's a Small World", and then "Pirates of the Caribbean". The kids had a blast finding the 'X' spots where they would find their gold encased chocolate treasure coins. The evening ended with a parade of characters, and an incredible fireworks show. These pictures are from the next night because I wasn't happy with the ones I took without a tripod. In fact, I didn't have my tripod with me, so on Saturday afternoon I took a taxi to a nearby Walmart and bought one. What a difference it makes in low-light conditions.































It had been a very long, and very exciting day, and the little ones were starting to fade, so we left the Magic Kingdom knowing that we'd be returning the next morning.

Friday Morning:

After a great sleep, we had a good breakfast and headed for the MGM Studios Park. My son and I were very excited about the "Star Tours" ride inspired by Star Wars. We walked straight into the ride, thanks to my wife's superb planning and ability to somehow get a complete stranger to offer us his 4 fast pass tickets. The ride was awesome, and we left wondering how that robot pilot ever got his license to fly a ship.


We headed back before noon to the Magic Kingdom so that we could dine with Cinderella and the other princesses in the Castle. That was great. I was particularly impressed with Princess Jasmine ;) The kids' autograph books were filling up fast!

After lunch in the Castle, we explored more of the Magic Kingdom, and went on a great ride called Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin. We rode around in 2 person spaceships and had to use our laser guns to hit Zurg targets. You got points for every target you hit.
Mummy won that round!

After some more rides and exploring, we headed back to our hotel room by boat for a rest and to prepare for a special dinner. We were going to be eating while being entertained by dancers at the Spirit of Aloha show.




Saturday was to be our last full day on the Resort, and we had some special visitors coming. My wife's brother and his wife and 3 daughters were driving from Ontario and were due to arrive at our resort in the morning. So we spent the afternoon with them by the pool enjoying the sunshine and the beach. They left around 4pm and we had dinner and started getting ready for our visit to Epcot!

more to come later...
mJm

Labels: Disney, KSC, Wonder

I love to take pictures. I think one of the main attractions for me is the ability to do something artistic and permanent. Much of my professional effort is on things that are more ephemeral like organizations and product releases. Those things evolve very quickly and what was "new" and exciting is forgotten in as little as a year. Pictures are forever though.

I started taking pictures when we lived in California. We bought our first digital camera (a Kodak), and it went everywhere with us. Over time, we upgraded our digital cameras, but they were still fixed lens little jobs which mostly evolved around MegaPixel resolution and size of LCD.

In 2004, I decided to start researching DSLRs (Digital Single Lens Reflex) cameras. I had never owned a film SLR (aside from one I picked up in a Vegas pawn shop, but that's a whole other story). I looked at and read about all the latest cameras, and settled on a Canon EOS 2oD.

I'll offer some free advice on equipment. I think for the most part, I've made great choices, but there are some things I'd do differently. First off, I would recommend looking on Amazon.com or Adorama.com because they consistently have great prices and great selections. If you know what you want, look there first.

So, here's what I have:

• Canon EOS 20D : Review here
  

Great camera, and no regrets about the purchase. 8.2 MegaPixels, 1.8" diagonal LCD. It's been replaced with the 30D, which has a redesigned body and a 2.5" LCD. That LCD makes a big difference. Check out the 30D review here.

• EF-S 17-85MM f4-5.6 IS USM : Review here

This is one of the 2 lenses that I keep on my camera. It's the 2nd lens and I bought, and I've found it's a great general purpose lens. I've used it for close-ups of people, as well as wider shots. It's a very good lens, and I recommend it.

• EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 USM : Review here

This was a mistake. When I bought the camera, instead of just getting the body, I decided to buy it with this lens. Well, the lens feels like a piece of plastic. There's no mass to it, and the few times I've used it have produced uninspiring results. I'd recommend you pass on this. There's a reason it's bundled with many bodies, and that's because I doubt anyone would actively seek out this lens.

• EF 17-40mm f/4L USM : Review here

I just bought this lens recently. I've been looking for an ultra wide angle lens for large landscape shots as well as group shots. This has become my other "go to" lens. It's a great piece of glass, and I used it extensively in Phuket. I rarely took it off my camera, and was very pleased with the results. It's a substantial feeling lens, and the optics are fantastic. When I bought this lens, I decided to protect my investments by putting a good UV filter on them. I did this for my 100-400m zoom. I liked the results that the filter gave me. I haven't tried putting both the UV and the Polarizer but I'm curious to see what happens (and how much light I lose).

• EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS USM : Review here

This is a very heavy lens. But I'll happily lug it around for miles because the shots I get with it are very pleasing. It's certainly not my fastest lens, but for outdoor sporting use (like my F1 trips) it's amazing. If you're going to get a lens like this you must invest in a decent monopod. The stabalization in this lens is pretty good, and suits the task of horizontal panning with a car very well. I've put a UV filter on this one as well to protect the glass. It gets crowded in those great spots for F1 shots, so better safe than sorry. This is the glass that gives folks some lens envy. In fact I recently spent time with someone who insisted that "his was bigger".

• EF-S 60mm f/2.8 Macro USM : Review here

This is also a new lens for me. I have had great fun taking extreme macro pictures of insects, flowers, and anything else that strikes me as interesting. I need to get a better tripod than the one I have because this is a lens that will require great composition and preparation in order to get the best results. But in the limited experimentation I've done gives me high hopes for some great results with this lens.

• CompuTrekker Plus AW
  

Now all this equipment isn't light. And I haven't yet developed the discipline to leave some glass behind (well, actually, I do leave the 18-55 behind regularly). So I have lenses, body, filters, cables, extra batteries, extra flash cards, external flashes etc. It's a lot of stuff. I also have my 17" MacBook. It would be great to be able to carry all this stuff in 1 bag. Well, this is the one! It's not a small bag, but it will carry everything you need and then some. I carried this to the other side of the Earth and wasn't bothered by it. It was heavy to be sure, but when you carry it the right way, it's not a problem. I was worried that I'd have problems with Thai Airways because it is big and heavy, but nobody batted an eye. So it's carry on luggage.

• Manfrotto 679 Monopod
  

This is the companion for my 100-400mm zoom. It's light, very sturdy and collapses to a size that makes strapping it to the back of my bag easy. It's a definite must-have for anyone with a heavy lens.








I have a few assorted accessories as well. I bought the battery grip because I like the shape of the camera better, as well as the longer life I get because I'm doubling up the batteries. I have a Remote Switch for macro shots and a few extra batteries. I shoot with an 8GB fast CF card, and have 2 2GB backups.

Finally, one thing that was driving me nuts was sensor dust. No matter how careful you are, sooner or later, you're going to get dust on your sensor. It's not going to be visible with your lens wide open, but when you shoot something at f/22 or higher you'll see those dreaded blotches in your picture. They're especially clear when you're shooting with a bright homogeneous background like the sky. Well, I did some tests, and my sensor was seriously dirty. At f/22 I took some pictures of a white sheet of paper, and it looks like someone sneezed on my sensor.


I did some research, and found a Canadian company VisibleDust that sells both wet and dry sensor cleaning kits. I ordered one of each, and can state confidently that these tools work very well. Cleaning your sensor is an intimidating task, but if you follow their instructions it's pretty simple.

Well, that's all for now. I'm sure I've missed something, but I'll fix it later.

mJm

Labels: Canon, Photography

I'm on my way home! My work in Texas is finished (until Monday, when I have to be back). I'm at the Admiral's Club in Austin Airport awaiting the departure of my flight home. I'm connecting via Dallas and I'm hearing on the TV running CNN about a "severe weather warning" for the midwest/northeast.

I called home and my wife told me to expect to be driving home through a snowstorm. Well, I at least like her optimism that I'll be able to land in Toronto this afternoon. We'll see. You gotta roll with the punches on the road, and realize that you can't control things like the weather (or mechanical things like the altimeter).

I've been trying desperately to get iChat working from the 2 hotels and airport lounges I've been at on this trip. No dice. Funny, it worked like a charm from Japan and Thailand, but as soon as I get back to the US it starts failing. Maybe it's all the latency caused by the NSA monitoring every packet moving around the Net.

I've just downloaded Skype in an attempt to have a "plan B". Apple clearly has some problems with iChat video. Just do a search on 'ichat error "-8" ' and you'll get the picture. It's pretty much my only criticism of my beautiful MacBook Pro.

Hey, it's 1 week until we all leave for Disney World! Can't wait! Unfortunately, there was a hail storm over the Kennedy Space Center, and the External Tank was damaged, scrubbing the upcoming March launch. I don't think we had a chance of seeing it launch, but my wife's brother and family had a shot at it. Such is the schedule predictability of the space program.

Well, it's almost boarding time, so I shall pack up my troubles and get to my gate.

mJm