Lumix LX3

Yesterday I just pulled the trigger on a new gadget : a Panasonic Lumix LX3.
This a digicam compact not DSLR. Being the geek that I am : before buying it I have asked around and anybody that loved photography was hard pressed to find anything bad about it. Plus all the professional’s reviews around the web were more than positive that this is the best cam in the compact category.

I mean the LX3 got fan groups around the web and blogs dedicated to it.

Expect more and better pictures to be posted soon (now that I begin to know my way around Adobe Lightroom too).
Here are a few LX3 dedicated blogs:
Panasonic Lumix Lx3 Blog
The Lumix Lx3 blog

And here is a flickr group about pictures taken with that camera:
http://www.flickr.com/groups/843626@N22/

See you soon!

PS : The only problem is that you can’t change the language of the menus on the jap model … so it will take me a while to fully master it. Or does anyone has a hack around that?

Zen is painful in Kamakura!

On Saturday 14th (right before the bday party) I went to Kamakura with some other international students (and the MIFA volunteers) to experience Zazen and visit some temples.

Well it was fun and beautiful (and apparently I parted way with my Karma thanks to a small Jizou Bossatsu). By the way sitting for 30 minutes in zazen hurts!

here are some pics. HERE (a cortesy of MIFA)

Karaoke for first festivities.

Here are the pictures. And they are telling way more than I can remember (I should slow down a little). Anyway the timetable was :
- 8PM meet at my place
- 11PM go to karaoke!
- 5AM go to sleep with no voice.

It didn’t go as planned since I had a little voice left at the end.

Thanks to Yusuke for the pics : Ed’s BDay

I think I will do something tomorrow since it is the real day. But I don’t know yet what to do.

My first lesson about … Ray tracing.

I am kind of proud to introduce you to my first lesson in front of a class.
Be reassured I will not turn into a professor just yet. It is just that I really liked the subject and – even though only 3 persons in the classroom were able to follow me – it was satisfying.

Here are the slides:Ray Tracing Now

In my next post I will talk about the week end …. but now I am just sleepy.

See you all!

It’s a cold cold day.

I am sorry that I did not post some updates sooner. But it is just that I was lazy. It took me too long to edit my photos from Halloween (do not leave a Canon Powershot in the hands of a drunk guy with a Gorilla costume … or else you will have 1000 pictures to edit in the mornings to come).

If you want to see the pics from our trip to Roppongi in Halloween … just go on Facebook … if you just can not go then I will had some pics on this post. It was fun and it made me realize that going out in Japan is much cheaper than every other country I went to. Plus once Japanese people are getting crazy … they go all the way, no half measures here.

The day after Halloween we had the most incredible idea : let’s wash away all the booze we guzzled yesterday by going at the sento (public bath). IT WAS AMAZING. Absolutely the most relaxing thing I have ever done. We went to one of those modern sento – with sauna, bubble bath, outdoor bath with TV, … – in Azamino (3 stations away from the dorm). I felt like I was brand new. I think this will become a monthly or twice-monthly tradition for me (some people like my Scandinavians friends would go everyday if they could afford it).

From Sunday to Monday the temperature dropped a rough 10 to 15 degree … it is crazy. One day I was going out in shorts and the next day I was popping flue pills like a freaking junky. I will have to ask my landlady for a second futon soon (luckily I shipped my winter clothes right before departing from Italy … so they are already here).

That is it. Not much stuff because I have been trying to not spend too much money … so I limited the “crazy fun times”.

I just looooove non-sequitur!

From Harajuku to Shibuya

Yesterday (sunday 25th of October) I decided it was time for me to find some closes (I need a few stuff). So where else is there to go except Harajuku (famous for its clothes shops and accessories and overall crazy styles).

Here is the pics (with comments if you click them).

Results : A belt, a pair of sandals, 2 t-shirts (a bit small but looks good anyway), and a bag.

That’s all for today.

School festival!

Today was Tokoudai’s school festival at the Oòkayama campus.

So after my training (amefuto again) I went around the stands. Here is a synthetic review of the festival :
- Pakistanis kebab : GOOD
- Yakitori : GOOD
- Takoyaki : GOOD
- Hiroshimafu Okonomiyaki : GOOD
- Fried ice cream : GOOD
- Crepes : GOOD
- Hotdog : average (the japanese mustard sucks)
- Takoyaki 2 : GOOD
- Beer : GOOD
- Vietnamese Noodle : GOOD
- Banana coated in Chocolate : GOOD
- Stand about the nikoniko community (my lab was participating) : A BLACKHOLE OF PURE GEEKNESS!

What is the niko niko community? I have no idea but my laboratory supervisor is really into it. And it seems all of japan’s geeks are too.
Should I prepare for a zombie invasion?

So I will go to bed hoping that my muscle’s pain will be a bad memory by tomorrow morning. I know : it sucks to go to bed at 10PM on saturday but I don’t have nor the energy nor the money to out tonight (-. -)

How to ray trace pain?

First of all, my supervisor finally gave me something to do (beside going on facebook all day long at the lab). I have to do a 40 minute presentation in front of his class in 3 weeks. It will be about the current state in software and hardware research about real-time ray tracing. If you do not know what this is : ray tracing on wikipedia.
That is going to be cool. (Does that sounded as geeky as it seemed to me?)

After Wednesday’s practice I must say that I still feel a lot of pain today (24 hours later) but at least my neck is not totally immobile from pain. In fact I think it already got bigger (if that is possible), some of my t shirts fill tight in the neck and shoulder area (or is it only inflammation?). This time I actually could go “boom boom” on people (that’s how I say it in my head once I put my helmet on), in scrimmage AND special team training (I call this “loud boom boom”). That was a truckload of fun for me.

Today I went and visited the training room of the suzukakedai campus. Well the training room part is really good … the problem are the showers : those are a shower version of the biological construction field toilets. The two temp showers are outside because of some works at the building the training room is in. sucks.

That’s it for today.

Great game

Just a quick post about sunday (yesterday) game : the buffaloes won a really nice game against the Toyo Univ. Vikings.
30 – 23 but I am not sure of the score anymore (it was an exiting game).
A few things I have noticed:

• Japanese college do not seem to understand the benefit of “taking a knee” … like avoiding injuries for example.
• They do not know how to manage the clock (like spiking on 1st and 3rd downs for no reasons).
• And they think the goal-line defense is to apply pressure (hence using it anywhere on the field).

Anyway here is some pictures. This is one really dusty ground. (Click “more” at the bottom of this post)

I am thinking of buying the Canon EOS 1000D or EOS 450D (Kiss X2 in Japan). Advices? What optics do you like?

Last note : I should participate in a Zazen seminar soon (if you dont know what zazen it just google it).