N’s Sports Party at Abbey

Newly wed N is a web designer and keen cyclist, traveler and doing Kinetic-sculpture as well. (hence we met many years ago on an art event).   In fact, he had Stag-do in the south coast, doing canoeing etc with his old baddies weeks ago as well.

So, when I arrived to the Abbey, I was greeted by his fancy dancing.    😀

As I was warned, this party was not a kind of eat, drink and catch-up chattering but quite physical.     😀

I don’t know the name of this game, still, there is an almost identical game in Japan but played only by the kids.

Sports party though, it’s still a family occasion, N’s mum and dad and of cause his wife and her sister D were all there enjoying the company.

This game (photo above) said to be called “Sheep stack in the mud ” = may be Japanese equivalent of Oni-gokko”  🙂

On such sporting occasion, photographer shouldn’t be just an observer = gone to more pro-active. (or a bit naughty ? ! = to inflate size D to FF) — no, not me, lens did  😀

Then egg on the spoon race. Though, some confusion of the rules —– spoon on a hand or on the mouth ?

And the Prize giving ceremony = of Gold, Silver or Copper.    😀 

In the same time, yet another activity which was a bit more intellectual research and the interview was carried out by D as she was a student of London Uni’

Yet more Spoon race.  😀

And more common ball game. 

So, the party went on till sunset.  It was a fantastic day and a nice quiet evening.

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Waltham Abbey or its Garden

There was a party of the newly married friend in the Waltham Abbey garden.

Waltham Abbey was one of the Abbey destroyed by the King Henry 8th, situated just outside of north London, 15 min’ walk from the Waltham Cross station. 

Or just off the M25 by a car.  —– Despite its close proximity to the Capital, it is almost a forgotten place.   Hence, it was my first visit and I did it for a test of Nikon D810 (with Nikon Fisheye lens and their 85mm F1.8) too.  🙂

The  journey starts from the Railway Cathedral, Liverpool Street Station.

It was just a shot ride though, among a lots of train running on the same track, only few are stopping at Waltham Cross. (on the way back, only one train per hour ! )

Then from the station, walk straight down to the east, while crossing many creeks of River Lee ( —– I remember the image like this in a Belgian city of Bruges ).

Looks like the end of the road, there the Abbey is. —— and near by funeral parlor, a pretty well made model of the horse-drawn hearse !  

3D representation of What you are going to have  😀 

—– And Jesus is waiting for you with open arms !  How nice  😀  😀

The inside is a huge open space.

Other than the Rose garden etc, abbey garden is a sort of controlled wilderness. The grass was well-trimmed corner to corner though, rest was left for the wild plants to compete each other. 

—– still, I haven’t seen even a shadow of single fish in the water.

[]The camera, D810 worked well.  —– Though, go into the details of each point is not what Zen blog supposed to deal with = I’ll do it somewhere else.

—– still, it worthwhile to mention is = this camera might be in the point of no-return, in the aspect of the use of soft control of the imaging = departure from the pure optical image.   For example, professionals may no longer need to use wide-angle lens, instead,  resorting with  stitch-up photo = negates the needs of many specialized lens such as PC or TS lens, or ultra-wide-angle lens, even extremely large F-aperture lenses.  = (In fact, such special lens becoming perpetual [unsold] item in the show window, alongside  the huge dead stock of lenses for clop-sized image sensor camera. = such camera has been superseded by the compact Mirror-less system cameras) = Who want to carry heavy, big camera ?

And, when we can buy incredibly well designed small camera with the same money, who would buy expensive big old zoom lens ?  —–  Camera companies shot their own leg.

* Canon’s selection to use APS size sensor in their mirror-less camera, and selling EF lens adapter is to prevent their EF-S lens become obsolete and dead stock.  🙂

* Nikon’s 36Mp sensor may give higher resolution though, I found no difference on my same laptop screen.  = Any how the quality of  the image was limited to the optical quality of the lens = screen image shows the flaw of the lens even more.

And the Nikon’s heavy use of image processing program would make aware of thephotographers that [it is not the matter of the number of the pixels, but the after process].

Nikon seemed to be using variable gain control to amplify the out-put of image sensor = effectively act like a variable ISO setting and with the enhanced color-saturation of the image under dim light = the result looks brilliant.  = save the work on photoshop though —– I’m not sure, was that a correct approach to include the “Fan shot effects”  😀

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Is Charity Self-sacrifice ?

There was a search term = [is Charity self-sacrifice ?] came to my blog.

I think I’ve talked about those matters many times yet, it might be better to clarify them again.

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In Zen, there is no notion of [Charity] or [Self], let alone [self-sacrifice].

They are the notions exist only in the Mind, away from the situation. (It was deduced

from the memories = stacked mind with accumulated knowledges from the past 🙂 )

Charity is not a separate notion from one’s deep mind (in fact, whether Mind itself is exists or

just an intellectual hypothesis = artificially abstracted idea —– is an interesting argument)

or in the subconscious.

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Lord Buddha explained “ Nothing stays = only appear to be there in a moment”

in the context of the entwined mechanism of the Dharma as

the Karma = relation of Cause and the Result resulted.

The reaction, which is away from the thinking and we call as a Charity = it is in fact “it is nothing

but a prevailing Dharma” was explained in the post [Compassion and Charity in Dharma] (link)

By reading it, you must be convinced that the Charity is not the act of the SELF, far from it,

it exists because of NO-SELF in the first place.

NO-SELF, still the one was acted in such a manner — Who acted it = Dharma.

This is the Core of the Buddhism. = Acting moment to moment in its best, as

the Dharma IS, hence create the life as total is, What the Buddhism IS.

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Not only the situation, (situation is a mare face or appearance of the Dharma driven by the

Karma concerned) but also ourself is dependent to the Dharma (or we are the Dharma itself),

in moment to moment = hence there is no fixed notion of the Self could exists.

As Self isn’t there, but the Dharma = There can not be the sacrifice of the Self.

The person was just acted according to the Dharma or as the Dharma IS. =

To help others is not a sacrifice of the ONE, but simply it was needed

by the Dharma. (hence, the Dharma acted using the hand of someone)  🙂

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Therefore, it must be clear, there couldn’t be Charity or Self-sacrifice. If any of

those kind of notion exist there, it is a pretense derived from the knowledges

and a Self-conscious vanity.

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So-called charitable act to donate money to the Sect is just a system of sucking.

In most of the case, so-called founder of the Sect is not a holy man but an entrepreneur.

= that how those Sects became so rich and the leader became a millionaire, driving Mercedes

while leaving the followers in poverty.

Yet still, if you need to donate a money, it is in deed self-sacrifice and the

waste of the money :-D.

Since, the fact shows, = how many years the Sect there ? === has they changed the world ?

Where the money donated by the peoples has gone 😀

—– to see and hear what the Dharma says or requested you, IS the matter,

not what the sect tells you.

And to see the Dharma, you need the eyes of Mushin = Mind of No-Mind )

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Do a charitable act in Mushin is easy, just do it = it’s your spontaneous reaction.

(If it’s needed to have second-thought = it is not the matter of charity but the business project

= you have to asses the return in comparison to the investment = this is not Buddhism  😀 )

___/\___

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Gig on the Ship / Stubnitz

The Ship Stubnitz is a German Art Venue on the sea (on this moment

at King George V Dock  🙂 )  And when they arrived to the Dockland, they asked

OWN (Open Wireless Network of SPC.org) to connect to the Internet.  Then, 5Ghz Wifi

connection was made between the antenna mounted on the ship’s mast to a node in

Deptford,  4 miles (6.5 km) away.  —–  And we were invited to their Gig on the Ship.

When only the weather is fine, it’s nice to be on the ship, you know  😀

And the day was that kind of nice day = (I have a good luck of fine day, when ever  :-))

The Ship, Stubnitz used to be an East German troweler fishing boat,  and when she was

decommissioned, she was converted to a floating art venue 20 years ago.

Being as a German Ship, operated by the German = don’t expect any fancy food  😀

It was their traditional Bokwurst (common sausage) Hot-dog.   (fit to Human consumption :-D)

And the music were pretty cool Jazz Quartet, and then,  German Punk ! 

In fact, it was pretty impressive !  

Punk despise to be serious though, German Punk IS SERIOUS, so serious to be a Punk  !

In the eyes of Zennist, this serious dedication = [Oneness] seemed to be the Zen.

Unfortunately, Dockland area is huge = just walk back to the nearest DLR (Dockland Light

Railway) station took more than 20 min’ still, it wasn’t a bad walk under the moon 😀

Remote corner of London night street doesn’t mean to have robber, mugger or rapist.

(They knows where to look for rich pickings.  Ha ha ha  😀 )

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Ship in a Dock / Stubnitz

I went a Ship moored in the King George V Dock with my friends.

In fact, to see (and hear  🙂 ) a gig performed by German Jazz, and Punk Rock band.

I went there with my Canon 5D Mk2 with only 8-15 Fisheye Zoom since

the other lens is a bit too big and heavy  😀

(Though, some of the picture, the auto-focus was failed)

And some of the photos were taken using LED Ring Light)

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Olympic Opening

The evening before, I asked my neighbor “ Are you going to watch Olympic Opening ?”

as he got fancy satellite receiver and big screen TV.  He said, “may be, but shall we go to a pub to

see it in their big screen”. —– So, we went to a pub round the corner.

This is the first time to go into this pub since I moved to this area 11 years ago.

(As I don’t drink alcohol I rarely go to a pub, except a meeting took place in a pub).

The TV was there though, nobody was watching.  The next day’s news said nearly 27 million

people did watch the Opening program = out of 65 million in the UK = it was far less

than half of the population ! = this is the first fraud, the government and the media

have to juggle 😀  (Instead to say 40%,  27 million sound a lot to the most of the people’s brain)

So-called Democracy is based on the support of the majority = popular support

= populism.  While forcing austere measure to the people, still spending £9.5 billion =

In order to justify its spending,  government had to create an impression

“ Everybody excited and support the Olympic”.

In this populism concept, this Olympic Opening must be the most Politically

loaded and choreographed event in the recent history. (Of cause I don’t know all

the details of another Opening of such as Beijing, Soul, etc —– yet still, most others seemed

to demonstrates the power of the Nation = Government and Military. (such as exactly

synchronized mass demonstration of Martial-art play, performed by the soldiers,

and the mass game of the top beauties gathered from all over the country, kind).

Instead, London Olympic Opening avoided to go this kind, while pretending

GREEN and Politically Correct. = Hence, the people appeared there got to be looks like

just a man or girl next-door, and especially from ethnic minority.

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In this Political Correctness, there was no single Hero to light-up the

Olympic-Flame, but by the group of athletes. —– And the Flame-burner, its

head was a Copper piece brought by each country. (A girl or boy walking with Flag-bearer was

carrying looks like urinal shaped metal piece = it was for this purpose  😀 )

(In certain extent, I think it was a brilliant idea ! = Forget PC blah blah, here 😀 )

—– PS: My friend found the Info’ of the Olympic Flame in this link  —–

http://www.bdonline.co.uk/comment/the-flaming-dandelion/5040489.article#.UBaj-FBTs30.facebook

—– As the Info’ says, the Olympic Flame was built in 10 story mechanism, having more than 200 stems in

8.5m long = it can not be made with rotating shafts but be done only with linear air actuators (like a piston

cylinder to push-up) = still, more than 200 gas pipes, 10 pressurized air pipes crammed into small space,

and they  moves, while carrying combustible gas = what a task !  —– still,  I was surprised to know, it got

16 tons all together ! ? ? ?  —– couldn’t be done in 4 tones size ?

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Yet Populism has to have popular figure = David Beckham, Mr. Bean and James Bond may not

have an argument from the mass audience (along side the inventor of WWW = though how many

people knew his name, and the author of Harry Potter’s ).

And draw the Queen out of her holy residents and made her jump from a chopper

(in fact a stunt-man with Queen’s costume and her mask over his face, doubled her) must be

an Extreme-left-wing  Anarchist’s dream.

Still, it had made only eye-catching stories of the tabloid paper = not fool the population for whole. 

= The unsold empty seats are the evidence. (May needs the same measure of Beijing Olympic to

mobilize local school kids to fill the seats to COVER-UP).

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What-so-ever the COVER-UP story of this country’s history, the fundamental structure were

never touched. = Land owing system, hence the concentration of the wealth.

= Queen as the top landlord, and its status-quo of the Class-system.

Let Tory and Labor fight each other, is the traditional [Divide and Rule] tactics

of the Empire.  Top of the Government = Prime Minister is just a hired manager of the estate

= let him manage the people to keep status-quo in good order, while work hard to produce

enough revenue to run the estate.

If any left-wing dissident became a prominent figure, make him (or her) Sir

(like Bono 😀 ) and integrate into the Imperial SYSTEM.

(like the former director of Liberty, John Wadam is now a part of the establishment, and the

another member of Liberty, Shamira Chakrabarty was carrying the Olympic-flag.   😀

= Honor cost nothing still, the most powerful tool to coax the noisy dissident).

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Organizer might have thought that the approach of Politically correct Populism can give an

illusion of Democracy though, in contrary, it highlighted the deception more. = This irony is

exposed also in the history of the Industrial Revolution = “Where the industry started in this

country has gone ?” —– And the same was repeated again = the WWW was  invented by

Tim Bernard-Lee though, “Where the Industry using WWW, such as Google has gone to ?”

So, it was not the display of the Glorious Briton, but more of the sawer grape of own failures.

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——- So, it was an interesting program or political farce to watch. 😀

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Snap shot in Greenwich

Greenwich is a pretty small town even in an area having rather rough industrial and

naval history behind.  May be because of the reflection of the psyche of sea going people.

Unlike earth bound Army people, Naval people who knew the different world and the

navigational science had much open mind hence less bound to the old tradition.

With this reason, other than the Royal Naval College and the Royal Observatory,

the town itself doesn’t looks like an old town. = pretty smart and  posh place where no

bad tasted humberger shop in sight, despite of the millions of visiting tourists.  😀

Those dogs are  Siberian Husky, said to be a half Wolf though, it seems very well tamed 

gentle dog.  —– And to see two of them in one day in the same place was very unusual.

Seemingly, the Greenwich is having quite number of Russian population.

(Probably rich Origark.  😀 )

May be because of our far far ancestors came from the sea, we are attracted to a water,

and like to keep watching the waves.  Its mesmerizing movement is quite therapeutic.

(Its endless repeating movement vacates the brain = same as a Buddhist’s Mushin ! )

Reflection of the Cutty Sark.  One of the last Tea Clipper Cutty Sark must be the  Icon of

the British Empire.  Unless otherwise, Brits wouldn’t be bothered to restore the burnt

down ship spending hundred of million pounds.

I like this ground design.  Just a half inch deep water filling the striped shallow trench

which is giving the opportunities to the small and the grownups alike to play  🙂

Good old Telephone-box is a star these days. = though, the telephone machine itself is

not old = far from it, it is a broadband connected internet machine  🙂

And, the hottest day (so far in this year) is going to have a peaceful Sunset. 

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What ??? Olympic in Greenwich ?

WW of OWN (Wireless Work-shop or Wednesday’s Work-shop of Open Wireless Net-work )

was held every Wednesday at Greenwich = I walked around there and discovered that the

Equestrian game of Olympic was held in the Greenwich Park.  (in fact, I knew that  😀 )

So that, two days before Opening, the town and the Pubs everywhere were filled with

those officials and each team members, and the access to the park was blocked to the

public. —– still, chat with those “Hose People” was a fun   🙂

Yet the tension of the security was very high.  Especially, the failure of G4 Security

company to recruit enough staffs, and the last minutes drafted in thousands of

soldiers giving rather stiff impression to the atmosphere.

M m m m ! ?

And the officials and the staffs of quasi organization are filling the town.

Advertisements of sponsors are every where and the news paper, magazine articles were

all about Olympic, though, for me, unlike in the old days when I had a Press-pass, and

bought no ticket at all, I have no access to anywhere. 

Anyhow, as I don’t watch TV, Olympic seems so remote = I’m in another Planet   😀

Never mind, Sun still rise and set. 

I just say Good luck to all the people competing in the game.  🙂

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HUMAN CIRCUS (of Piccadilly, LONDON)

— ( To take this picture, I’ve jumped onto tarmac, click, jump-back before hit by them —– focus was

—- wrong, and having camera shake as well. Never mind, you can see the atmosphere  😀 ) )

To pick-up a Japanese visitor, I went to the Piccadilly Circus. —– like a tourist. 😀

I don’t remember when I did the same, how many years ago ? ? ?

As it is the most famous place in England, and the Olympic is coming too, there are lots of tourists

and they are enjoying a rare opportunity to have a sun. (UK having too much rain in this year =

Japan, China had too = seemingly the Global freak weather.)

—– nearly 40 years ago I was one of them.   But not as noisy as them today.   😀

I don’t think those photos needs any explanation. = So, I leave them without it.  😀

M m m m  😀

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Thought over LIGHT (and its visual effects)

You may feel strange though, there is no black and White

image in the Nature.  🙂

May be Monochrome image yes. = Pure B/W image is, in fact human

invention, in other words, it exists only in the brain, or a product of

the brain. = Simply because, there is no [no-colored light] exists =

all the light, even if it looks WHITE, it is just well balanced

mixture of the colors.

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So-called Color was created by the vibration of the Photon =

if you divide the distance of a Photon travels in a second in its

literally the speed of Light, by its number of frequency of the vibration = you get the wave-length.

The light-sensitive cells in our Retina called Corn cells (named from its shape) having the colored

pigment which selectively absorbe and stimulated by the particular wave-length, emits the nerve-

signal to the brain. = Hence the brain interpret those different signal created by each different light

as each different color. —– So that, when those Corn cells sending-out all the color signal evenly =

our brain think it is white and if they are less intensive than the white, the brain think it is gray.

But when the light level is very low = in the dark, the Corn cells couldn’t work well.  Instead, only

the Rod cells which doesn’t have color sensitivity, works. = hence, the visual image which lack the

color information were created in the brain = we feel (some what) B/W image. —– ghostly night

scene of grave-yard was conceived like a bluish B/W image = simply because, only the available

light source came from the stars (provided no Cine-light, or Torch-lamp there) = hence,

the Dracula film is the best in B/W = (it is closer to what actually we have seen) 😀

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As long as there is lots of light which is having all the spectrum of the light, we see

white as white and able to see a colored objects as its own color without color-shift.

Therefore, mirrors in the dressing room of a theater back-stage having many light valves fitted

around. = natural Ring light effect. = no shadow and no color-shift = it is essential for the make-up.

(still, even a white under tungsten-light is shifted to much warmer color of about 3000k)

—– yet still, it is often the case, the white is determined by its relative brightness.

Our eyes were adjusted to see the over all brightness or by the brightest object while varying the

size of the pupil.  And among the objects, see the brightest and relatively having all the spectrum

of the light as the white. = Hence, seemingly the yellow sun is so bright, we feel it is white in the sky.

In fact, all the photographers know, even a dark colored object will become

washed off white if it was over-exposed 5~7 stops more.

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In the natural environment, we are not necessary seeing the surroundings with ideal neutral light.

= not only the color-contribution of the light-source (such as Florescent light has Green cast due

to the Mercury atom) , but also the light was colored by the reflection of other object nearby.

—– May be it is the reason why we feel nicely lit image in a photo = too artificial.

While using color-corrected artificial light (Xenon discharge Solar-Light kind) or Studio-type flash

light, which is giving 5500K color temperature.   The more photographer worked to make every

corner in the scene within 2 stops of exposure difference, it become even more unnatural.

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=== So that, in this occasion, as I’m dealing with LED Ring Light, I’m experimenting

“How to design Non-ideal light source to create natural looking image”

= to make Colored Ring Light. 😀

(I’m going to show its result soon)

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PS :  If you’d like to experiment with LEDs, and try to connect different type of them parallel,

you need to connect a register to each types.   Such as; 

[3~4 Batteries (4.5V~6V) +] —> [100 ohm Register]—> [Blue or White LEDs]—>[Battery – ]

[ ———————– same  +] —> [100 ohm Register] —> [Red LEDs] —–> [same Battery – ]

[ ———————– same +] —> [100 ohm Register] —> [Green LEDs] —> [same Battery – ]

( Those Registers are to limit the current to the LEDs = may need change to such as 47 ohm =

If you connect 10 LEDs parallel, which needs 30mA, x10 of them mean, you need 300mA)

(Exact value is [Supply Voltage – Forward Voltage of LED / Resistance = Current  —– where,

Forward Voltage of Blue or White LED is 3.5V,  Red is 2V, Green or Amber are 2.5V ===

6 – 3.5 / 10o = 0.025 = 25mA  ——- As long as the Current is 50~20mA each, it would be OK)

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