Category: arts and letters

Statistics

As I mentioned before, everyone in my family but me is an expert at statistics. It’s hard to explain…

When my brother was angry that O.J. got away with it, my dad calmed him down by pointing out that in was a natural consequence of our legal system minimizing Type II error.

When my mom pointed out how unfair it was that her children were the highest rated teachers in their departments and she was the lowest rated in hers, my brother joked, “That’s just mean reversion, mom.”

I won’t get into how many times we’ve seriously argued about what the proper null for our discussion was…

Which brings me to last night’s dinner after Spontaneous Drinking Night, with my geek friends:

Statisticians

(Sometimes I think I’m living in an xkcd comic.) Also apologies to Benjamin Disraeli…and my family 😉

Posted on by tychay 1

Never ask a nerd for directions

“The front office is to your back that way and to your left,” someone says.

The delivery man walks a bit, gets confused, and looks at me across the floor, “Which way from here?” he points.

“It’s right of that.” I shout back.

He points in another direction, “That way?”

“No. Bisect the angle you just created.”

…blank stare…

“Errr…Or something.”

Mathematics is the universal language of science, not FedEx.

Posted on by tychay 2

GPS everywhere and in everything

My computer has a GPS in it using the same SIRFstar III chipset as my hiking handheld, which also doubles as my cycling GPS.

On the Mac, it appears as a “USB-serial” device whose driver is made by Prolific Technology which, coincidentally, makes the driver for my camera GPS receiver. Like all SIRFstar III GPSs, getting the acquisition took only a second, but a fix took a minute.

Great! Now what to do?

GPS + Google Earth = fun

[gps madness after the jump]Continue reading →

Posted on by tychay 1

UDMA and photography

I eavesdropped on a twitter discussion between Jim and Adam on UDMA cards. As outlined in this article, not all cameras can take advantage of UDMA cards, but my Nikon D3 (and D300) are among them. Also, the read speed means faster downloads.

So it’s worth mentioning that Mark Jen pointed out this deal on high speed card reader ($25) (you’ll need a computer with a Firewire 800 interface). As well as rebates on the 8GB ($90) and the 4GB ($33) UDMA CF cards.

[More about compact flash and purchasing photography after the jump]Continue reading →

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Faking long exposure

I hate feeling depressed…

Feathered death

Feathered Death
Baker Beach, San Francisco, California

Nikon D3, Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8G
1/60sec @ f/18, iso200, 14mm (14mm)

When people ask what sort of subject I like to shoot, I say, “nature,” but it’s been over a year since I’ve done any outdoor photography. I don’t know if my one dimensionality is an escape from or the cause of my mild malaise. In fact, I can’t think of a single good reason why I should feel this way since my life has become monotonically better, including living in a city that I love.

So I decided to wake up at an unreasonable hour, drive somewhere and try to convince myself why my depression is irrational.

Sunday hits San Francisco

Sunday hits San Francisco
Treasure Island, San Francisco, California

Nikon D3, Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8G
2 exposures, 10 multi-exposures, 1/100sec @ f/18, iso200, 14mm (14mm)

One nice thing about living in San Francisco is Treasure Island doesn’t cost you a Bay Bridge toll. I’ve seen a thousand shots of the city from here, but very few taken at dawn.

[Ultrawide lenses, and multiple-exposures after the jump.]Continue reading →

Posted on by tychay 13

Last Suppers

I was browsing hulu yesterday, when I saw this promotional ad for the upcoming restart of Battlestar Galactica.

Battlestar Galactica Last Supper (2008) via hulu

The full image is very impressive and instantly recognizable:

Battlestar Galactica Season 4 (2008)

Battlestar Galactica Season 4 (2008)

The image is normally a center figure with flanked by four sets of trinities. Therefore, there is someone missing in the photo. I guess the missing cylon? A possibly interesting thing is the missing spot is occupied by Judas in the Da Vinci original.

(The series recap is hilarious.)

It is, of course, a homage to Leonard Da Vinci’s The Last Supper fresco:

The Last Supper (1495-1498) by Leonardo Da Vinci

The Last Supper (1495-1498) by Leonardo Da Vinci

The symmetry, the center triangle, the grouping of threes, the expressions, the lack of halos around the holy figures. While this is the restored version, even the barely-visible unrestored fresco is a powerful piece. It deserves all the copies it inspires and more.

[More Last Suppers after the jump]Continue reading →

Posted on by tychay 4

Reading George Orwell

In my seventh grade English class, I got an opportunity to read Animal Farm by George Orwell.

My mom had read it once as a little girl during the brief occupation of Seoul in the Korean War.

“One day Ohma brought home fish for dinner, wrapped in paper. But it was too much paper—everything was scarce. I noticed that the paper was numbered and I put them together and that was the first time I read Animal Farm.”

“Did you know what it was about?”

“Of course! I really liked the part where they said, ‘All animals are equal.” and then it got changed to ‘All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.’ 😀 I loved it so much that when the war ended I read Nineteen Eighty-Four, but it didn’t make any sense. 🙁 I didn’t know what a ‘television’ was.”

[Politics after the jump.]Continue reading →

Posted on by tychay 8

nik Color Efex Pro 3.0 (and panoramic landscapes)

I finally upgraded my copy of nik Color Efex Pro.1 It has this new feature called “u-point” which allows you to do zone system tone masking a lot like LightZone. This means I can finally edit without masks. The other advantage is it finally works again on the Mac version of Photoshop. 😉

So I re-stitched an old panoramic of mine and then imported it into Photoshop to try out updated versions of my old nik filters as well as a new one.

Rock cave remnants

Greyhound rock
Santa Cruz beaches, Santa Cruz, California
Olympus C-2500L
(8 images, 1/250-1/1300 sec) @ f/5.6, iso 100, 9.2mm (36mm)

Please view large on black.

[nik professional filters and panoramic photography after the jump]Continue reading →

Posted on by tychay 8

Obama's 2002 speech

“Those are the battles that we need to fight. Those are the battles that we willingly join. The battles against ignorance and intolerance. Corruption and greed. Poverty and despair.

“The consequences of war are dire, the sacrifices immeasurable. We may have occasion in our lifetime to once again rise up in defense of our freedom, and pay the wages of war. But we ought not — we will not — travel down that hellish path blindly.”
—Barack Obama, Illinois State Senator speaking at Chicagoans Against the War in Iraq, 2002

Brent Budowsky reminds us of Barack Obama’s 2002 speech opposing the war.

The speech is classic. The constant use of word pairs (“Auschwitz and Treblinka,” “Richard Perle and Paul Wolfowitz,” “Pakistan and India,” “the Saudis and the Egyptians,” “Exxon and Mobil.” “ignorance and intolerance” “corruption and greed,” “poverty and despair”), the sentence repetition an and counterpoint (“I don’t oppose all wars.” and then “I oppose dumb wars” followed by, “You want a fight, President Bush?”), the use of quick powerful sentences (“A dumb war. A rash war.” and then “He is a brutal man. A ruthless man”); it even ends, in the final sentence with three references to another Illinois politician’s reference to the greatest American speech of all time.

Truly impressive word play and well worth a read.

Read the full text here.

Posted on by tychay 0