• Brazil - Jesse - Photos - Slide Show - Teddy

    Lagoa Park Photos

    10/11/2011 - By 

    Having lived in both Rio de Janeiro and the United States, it is safe to say that the two locations are the polar opposite on the issues of gay and lesbian people. In Rio, it is encouraged and in the United States it is thought to be an untreatable disease such as cancer. As I watched millions of these peoples marching proudly and happily, I realized that it is not possible for society to restrict the desires and passions of these people. I live in Rio de Janeiro, and the impact on my family of these people is NADA – ZERO. Maybe some Americans should come down here to analyse the impact on families.

    This week is the first day of a very unusual vacation for me. Historically, I have always travelled somewhere for my vacations. That’s for more than 30 years, but this time, I have decided to stay at home here in Rio de Janeiro, which is really one of the most beautiful places on earth.

    Today was a beautiful day here in Rio. It is getting a little hotter since October is the first month of spring, and there was not a cloud in the sky. We live on a very large lake that is called Lagoa. The lake is exactly 7500 meters around (4.7 miles), and is surrounded by the famous beaches of Leblon, Ipanema, and Copacabana. There is also a small but very popular park about 1/2 mile from our apartment. I run by it every day.

    Since it was so sunny, I took the kids to the park. A sunny day is absolutely the best time to take photos. You have much more options with a lot of light than not enough. So I took out my camera and put it in manual mode and started shooting the kids playing around. After looking at the photos, it gives a nice flavour how nice a view the park has.

    I am still amazed at the quality of photos that I can take with my cheap little Panasonic camera. I plan to buy another high end camera sometime next year but I want to learn more about my current camera first. Most of the photos are taken with a shutter speed of 1/1300th of a second and the ISO ranged from 100 to 300. I was able to do that because it was such a nice sunny day! I could never have pulled off these photos on a cloudy day with my camera.

    I am also trying to use the Rule of 3’s which I learned from my photography class but also numerous of my photographically inclined friends told about. It is essentially to NOT put your subjects in the centre of the picture. This gives the photo more context about what the subject is doing, or what they are seeing.

    Leave a Reply


  • Brazil - Photos - Rio de Janeiro - Slide Show - Teddy

    From the Eyes of a Four Year Old

    10/7/2011 - By 

    The last time I was in the United States, I decided to buy Teddy a cheap camera at Best Buy. It was certainly a gamble because the odds were either that he would love the camera or it would be broken in the first 30 minutes of use. After 2.5 months, I am happy to say that the camera is function well. We bought Teddy the cheapest camera we could find which was a Fuji that cost about $100.

    About a week ago, I dumped all of the photos from his camera to my computer. I made two discoveries. Camera technology is such that even a 4 year old can take pretty decent photos. Also, photos are a lot different and more interesting from the point of view of a 4 year old. It is also a pretty accurate slice of life of what our lives are like in Rio de Janeiro. Note: neither Solange nor I told him which photos to take. These were all from his little 4 year old point of view.

    Here are some notes to help understand the photos:

    1. * When we returned from the China and the US, Solange’s mother, Maria, and sister, Sandra were visiting us.
    2. * My good friend, Mike Brotherton, came down to Rio for his bachelor party shortly after our return.
    3. * Our maid, Cida, is very prominent in Teddy and Jesse’s lives and also in the photos.
    4. * Teddy loves playing with his jig saw puzzles.
    5. * Teddy’s favorite subject is his little brother, Jesse.

    Solange and I have just finished a photography class, and I am amazed at how many of the basics elements of photography that I struggle with and Teddy seems to get right. Maybe it’s luck, or maybe kids have a better natural sense for photography.

    One comment on “From the Eyes of a Four Year Old”

    1. That is impressive! I’m not sure I even realized he was taking photos of me, either.

      Reply

    Leave a Reply


  • Brazil - Photos - Rio de Janeiro - Slide Show

    Ativa-Idade

    9/2/2011 - By 

    One of the best things that we did for our kids here in Rio de Janeiro was to put them in a day care. We searched for the best and we finally found a place called Ativa-Idade, which means Active Age. Another huge benefit is that it is only about 1/2 a mile from our apartment so it is a quick and simple exercise to drop them off and pick them up.

    Since going to the school, they get along better with each other and they talk a lot more. Although it is preschool, we get detailed reports on the kids progress. Or the best they can estimate given their age.

    They have also made a deal with a professional photography firm that takes tons of photos of the kids events and they make them available on the web site for the parents and the kids. Here are bunch of photos from that web site. There are three events. Mother Day, a day in the park, and then something called Festa Julina. It happens every July and they try and dress the kids to look like little adults. Not sure why but that explains a lot of the photos. Check them out.

    Leave a Reply


  • Brazil - Photos - Rio de Janeiro - Slide Show

    Parque Republica Photo Shoot

    8/21/2011 - By 

    Since my wife had the new camera, I had to go to the shoot with my little point and shoot camera. Every one in the class had a nicer camera than me. But that was OK. I figured that once I learn more about photography, I will buy myself a nice camera too.

    This was a fun experience because the park is called Parque de República, and I have never even known this park existed. It is located in the neighborhood of Catete and the park unlike many parks in Rio is very nicely done. It is about 2 city blocks big. It has a lot of very cool statues, and many of the statues have a common theme of little children strangling animals. Pretty wild! In addition to the statues, there are several large fountains, a water fall, a monkey feeding station, and a turtle station. we were also quite lucky because the weather was beautiful for a cool winter day in August. The place was alive with people of all walks of life. Lastly, there is a huge children’s playground which was packed the entire time.

    So our entire class basically start clicking photos in the park. I had no idea what to expect, and I just started. I know how to use my Panasonic Lumix more or less but I never really bothered to learn the finer points of my camera. So I asked the teacher, and she proceeded to give me the best digital camera advice EVER. The impact on the quality of your photos can be amazing. It is so important than I thought I would share it here.

    The key to great photos is to NOT use the automatic settings on the camera. Put the camera in manual mode. I had never done this before and she showed me how it worked. Once it is in manual mode, you can control two settings on your camera. The opening of the camera and the shutter speed. Both of these settings control the amount of light that enters into the camera. It makes sense. The smaller the opening the less light gets in. The faster the shutter speed (or the time the camera is open), the less light enters. So when you are messing with the settings, you need to make sure there is adequate light to take a picture. Luckily, the camera when it goes into manual mode has a sensor to tell you whether there is enough light. It is called the photometer, and you just mess with the setting until there is enough light and then snap the picture. That’s it! Mess with the two setting, and watch the photometer to make sure there is enough light!

    After about a couple of hundred photos, I must admit I got a little bored. All the other students were running around the park clicking photos, and the teacher came to me and told me other things to photograph. So I did. It was a great lesson. Another key to great photography is to take a lot of photos. When you got time, you should always keep on going. So I did, and some of my best shots were actually taken after she told me go get going again.

    When we were finishing up, she told us that next week, we needed to select 40 photographs and show them to the class. Here are the one that I chose. I am proud that I was able to get my cheap camera to take almost professional quality photographs. Thanks to the best digital camera tip of all time. I also did not crop and edit the photos because this is much more like pure photography. Here they are totally unedited.

    Leave a Reply


  • China - Photos - Slide Show - Travel

    Lost In Shanghai

    8/16/2011 - By 

    A big surprise about China Tours is that they control your schedule from the time you wake up to the time you go to bed. And they keep you busy, very busy. Finally, by Day 9 of our trip, they gave us a day off in Shanghai. Some people in our group decided just to stay in their hotel, because they were just tired. We decided to go shopping and see Shanghai with Özgür and Selin Tanriverdi our new friends from Dubai.

    Based on the recommendation of our guide, we walked to Metro City to purchase a new camera for Solange. Her point and shoot camera was slowly breaking, and I decided to spring for a professional SLR type camera during this trip. Metro City is a very different shopping experience than American retail outlets. It is a huge building with four floors of all things electronics. It is like 20 Best Buys all rolled into one. The problem is that it is possible to buy the same camera from over 20 different merchants.

    First off, we had no idea what we wanted as I have little experience with SLR cameras. Fortunately, Özgür is a camera enthusiast, and we finally settled on a Nikon 3000 with a 18mm – 200mm lens. It was no easy task to figure this out because there are so many selections by all the manufacturers. Then we wanted a good price but we had no idea. Finally, we found a place with a great deal, but when they realized we were tourists, the price went up. They wanted another $200 for a warranty. I felt like I had been slimed, like I could not trust these people. So we left and went to another shop where we found the same camera including warranty. Great! But now, they won’t accept my international credit card. In fact, they don’t accept credit cards at all. The price was about 9000 RMB or about US$1400. I had no idea on whether it was a good price but I was positive it was a better price than I could pay in Brazil.

    But they didn’t accept international credit cards. In fact, they wanted cash. So they ordered a young man to take me out of the building and to get cash at an ATM. The problem is that the ATM had a ceiling of 2000 RMB per day. It was quite the experience but I was able to max out 3 ATM cards and get 6000 RMB, plus I had 1000 in my wallet. So I bring back 7000 RMB and count it out for them. Note: All the money would not fit in my wallet because they only come in 100 RMB notes. But I am still 2000 short. So they finally relent, and they allow me to put the final 2000 on my credit card. So it took us over 3 hours to buy the camera, but now it was time for sight seeing.

    A friend of mine told me to visit the top of the Grand Hyatt which is over 100 stories tall. We were also told to avoid the Shanghai Metro by our guide, so we took a taxi. Problem was that the taxi did not know where it was. We left, and got another taxi and we got there. The elevator was amazing. I think it was going faster than 20 meters per second. We arrived on the 88th floor of the building in less than 30 seconds.

    We took a bunch of photos, and we looked at the map. This was a map that Selin had from a guide book she had purchased in Dubai. Based on the map and our previous bad experience with Shanghai taxis, we decided to take the subway to People Square on of the ritziest areas of Shanghai. Contrary to what our guide told us, there was no problem navigating the Shanghai subway. In fact it was easy. Everything seemed like it was new and all the signs were both in English and Chinese. After a short while, we arrive in People Square.

    After 9 days with China Tours, Selin, Özgür and Solange were all wanting to eat something other than Chinese food. So we went to the McDonald’s in People Square. I went out on the street and bought some of the street food which was totally delicious although it was embarrassing since I knew the name of the food in Chinese, but not how much to pay. I brought my food back to the McDonalds and it was a great meal for everyone.

    Then we decided to go back to the hotel. We checked the map, and we figured we had to walk about 3-4 blocks. We walked and walked, and the hotel was not there! We gave the address of the hotel to more than 10 people and no one knew where our hotel was located. We hopped into two taxis, and neither one knew our hotel. I am sure that the language barrier was a problem but we were totally lost in Shanghai, a city of 33M people.

    All we knew was that we could walk from Metro City to our hotel, but Metro City was not on the map. We knew where we were, but we had no idea where we were going. Finally, we decided to go in the subway and find Metro City via the subway. We hit the subway around 7 pm on a Tuesday evening – rush hour. The subway in Shanghai is huge. There are large rivers of people going in various directions. With the help of Özgür and good signs, we found the right train going in the right direction. We were about 8 stops away but we finally

    2 Comments on “Lost In Shanghai”

    1. :)) Rob, I’m having a “deja vu” right now :)) God, that map had literally become a part of my body that day- an extension of my right hand maybe 🙂 I think, not finding “Ramada Hotel” on that street caused me psychological damage for I can’t help noticing all the Ramada Hotels wherever I go now!
      The snapshots are beautiful- even the ones we were caught without knowing. That was really some day where we put our survivals instincts to the test and it was a real pleasure to experience and finally pass it with you guys 🙂 By the way, we were really craving for something “not Chinese” to eat…I guess our hamburger picture with Ozgur when we were fantasizing about biting a huge burger on a poster (how pathetic!!!) tells it all 🙂 That McDonald’s meal – or shall we say the long and rich dinner- was one of the tastier we had in a long while.
      Thanks again for your company and all the work you’ve put into this blog entry.

      Reply

    2. Hi Selin:

      I was intrigued to see you are from Dubai and were visiting in Shanghai when the blog entry Lost in Shanghai was entered. I have been trying to find a US citizen who I think was in Shanghai teaching english maybe (city of 33 million? Wow!)and latest word is that he is living in Dubai. Haven’t been able to locate him. Of course I have no access to local phone records and can’t see online either…anyway would you like to help find this guy? His name is Leo Moore. Full name Leonanous A. Moore and he was a lawyer in Georgia, USA until 2009. I am just trying to find out his address. Thanks.

      Reply

    Leave a Reply