Putrajaya Hot Air Balloon Fiesta 2009..

One of my most tiring weekend. All for the sake of this non-profitable (yet) hobby of mine. I went there three times. Saturday morning i went alone. Saturday evening I met up with Faiz and Kak Aja, and on Sunday evening, with my Eita and Nidal.

All in all, it was ok. I got to take a lot of pictures (amongst the pros strapping 2 Canon 1Ds each.. scary), met with old friends and take Nidal out for a much needed walk.

Nidal, like Nadal (Eita's remark ya..) is always late to appreciate. We reached there at 4+pm but it was still to hot. So we waited it out amongst the goverment building. I let Nidal walk around, chase birds and drink before we head on to the fiesta site.

The first thing Nidal saw was the promo balloons. Soon he saw the kites, (which he was not really interested in). The thing that caught his attention was a boy riding a bicycle (the same kind that Atuk and Wan just bought him a day before) and he was screaming!!! When the hot air balloons starts lifting off, he wasn't bothered (except for the orange balloon and another balloon that flew really low).

Once all the balloons lifted off, we set our way back to the car, and thats when he starts appreciating the balloons, waving at em and asking us to look at them too. Thats when Eita said "Macam Nadal.. lambat panas.. " hahaha. Nadal is our favourite tennis player.. and like always tends to start slow in his game against new unseeded players (and sometimes mid ranks too) which he usually wins as the match proceeds.

Nidal's name was not picked because of our love towards Nadal.. but because of its meaning. Nidal means 'a fighter'. I strongly believe that what you name your child plays a big part in his personality development. I want him to be strong and never give up easily. I want him to be a fighter when things are rough.

Anyhow, here are a few of the pictures taken. The rest you can view here.

KL... and around, in HDR.

Its an amazing creation our eye is. It is able to cope with different objects at different range effortlessly. Another reason to praise Allah SWT. But a human creation (a camera lens that is) is not capable of such range. If it focuses on a subject, then everything else will be out of focus. Even at minimum aperture, a lens still can't give you what your eyes can see (and appreciate).

So here i am, trying a 'not so old' technique called High Dynamic Range Imaging (HDRI or HDR for short). These are pictures of the KTM HQ building in KL, and also the Pusat Islam building. Taking pictures of the Pusat Islam do bring back memories as my advance diploma convocation ceremony was held there. That was one of the highest moments of my life, and for the first time i felt accepted by Eita's parents.









And here are two of my earliest attempts. One is the picture of my office building, and another is a stop sign at KESAS on the way back home from work. This HDR is rendered using Qtpfsgui, an open source HDR workflow tool. It produces high impact images, especially with its Fattal tonemapping algorithm. Too bad the office pictures are not taken in true HDR settings (EV-2, EV0, EV+2). Thas why it turned out like a drawing huhuhu. Owh.. my camera can't do this range of exposure bracketing. I have to change the setting manually and take different shots. *a reason to upgrade perhaps..