Lantern Festival 2012 @ Auckland

Every year for the last thirteen years Auckland celebrates the Chinese New Year with a grand lantern festival. This popular event is held over three nights at their inner-city park, the Albert Park.

According to Wikipedia...

Albert Park is a scenic park in central Auckland, bounded by Wellesley Street East, Princes Street, Bowen Avenue and Kitchener Street. From the entrance at the corner of Bowen Ave and Kitchener St, sealed footpaths climb steeply through native trees to the large flat area at the summit, where flower gardens encircle a fountain.

All these years we are in New Zealand, we NEVER been to the Albert Park or seen the lantern festival! This years it is going to be different, Le General exclaimed; we are going to see what this fuss are about, we are going to the lantern festival!

They Shoot Lo_Yusheng with P&S Don't They?

A reunion dinner is held on New Year's Eve of the Chinese New Year, during which family members get together to celebrate.

This CNY eve, thanks to Michael and Debbie Moon we (Le General and Ming) were invited to their family reunion dinner :)

I brought along two sets of Yusheng and we also bought two thick slices of fresh salmon to add more oomph to the mix ;)

Since most of the Moon clan has not experience "Lo Yusheng" before, I thought it will be a refreshing experience for them.

Yusheng come in different styles, this one was from Janet in Auckland.

Happy Dragon Chinese New Year!

Thousands of NZ Chinese will welcome the year of the water dragon on Monday.

Prime Minister John Key open the Chinese New Year Festival and Market Day at ASB Showgrounds today, without an incident.

I remember he fall off the stage at the same function in 2009!  He broke his arm in three places! 

He commended the extremely safe stairs set up by the organisers this year.

As a matter of fact, "If I fall off it I'll just be confirming I'm an idiot." ;)

Canon G1-X, the King of P&S!

The number "1" is suddenly very fashionable this year, Nikon launch their Nikon1 with J1 and V1 and yesterday Fujifilm’s beautiful X-Pro1 mirror less camera was announced.

However, the "1" camera that kept everyone waiting and guessing was launch by Canon. The G1-X, is a new G-series camera line and offers a sensor large enough to call king among all the point and shoot!

Like father and son.. the new G1-X beside the G-12.

The rear of the G1-X, just like a G-12!

Nikon 1 V1 - My Like & Dislike

 On the third day of Christmas, the little Nikon 1 V1 came all the way from Kuala Lumpur and now returned to where it came from.

I kind of missed the little snapper.

During our short acquaintance, here are some of my like and dislike of this new Nikon offering.

Like...

The incredible high frame rate of the electronic shutter, couple with the very fast focusing; and the compact 30-110 zoom, a great little camera and lens combo for shooting actions!

I re-look at the shots I took at the Karori Park...

This was the only opportunity I had for action shots, it was none stop rain the next five days!

All the shots were taken with the 30-110 at the 110 mm setting. Aperture priority at f5.6 and ISO 800.

Nikon D4 - DSLR King?

After a year of rumors, leaks and speculation; Nikon finally announced its new D4 DSLR!

Yesterday Nikon gave a detailed presentation of the impressive new D4 at a UK press event. They even provided a PDF download of the 45 presentation slides.

However, the PDF is a whopping 45MB download; so for the benefit of our readers, I have screen grab them below.

Itsy Bitsy Nikon SB-N5 Speedlight for V1

Unlike the J1, the more "pro" V1 do not come with a built in flash; to provide extra illumination you have to purchase the tiny SB-N5 Speedlight.

At NZ$328.00 a pop, that is a lot of money for very little light! You have no other alternative either, because the "hot shoe" on this camera only accept this itsy bitsy flash! Not that it is all bad... the combo look really neat!

A handsome match, the made for V1 SB-N5 Speedlight mounted on the left side of the camera.