Reviews

1.8 Prime

This is a short, side-by-side video comparison of the two affordable EF 50mm lenses from Canon: the 50mm f/1.4 and f/1.8 lenses. I had them both, set them on a table, and compared them to each other, looking at their weight, size, lenses, and handling. You might find this interesting if you’re into photography. My conclusion was that both are great, but if you haven’t got the money for the f/1.4 lens (and I’m not even going to mention the f/1.2 lens, because that’s out of my budget), then get the f/1.8 lens, it’s a great bargain for the price.

You can see the video on blip.tv or on YouTube. Believe it or not, I shot this review back in November of 2007 and only got around to posting it now. I’ve got quite a backlog in terms of processing and editing some of my media…

I used the 50mm f/1.4 lens extensively. I have almost 11,000 photos in my library taken with it. I used it to take landscapes while in the Austrian Alps, and even though I complained about it afterward, it’s still my go-to lens for lots of tasks such as portraits, still life, night shots and more. Here are just a few photos taken with it.

These two 50mm lenses are available for purchase from Amazon or B&H Photo:

Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 USM Standard & Medium Telephoto Lens for Canon SLR Cameras from Amazon
Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II Camera Lens from Amazon
Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 USM Lens from B&H Photo
Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II Lens from B&H Photo

Video Log

The toy train

Updated 11/02/2018: This video now has over 25,000,000 views. Thank you!

My wife gave me this great little train set as a Christmas present a couple of years ago. I thought it’d be fun to film it in action one day, and when I edited the video, I looked for the right kind of music for some time. The end result was worth it though, and it sets the mood for the upcoming holiday season. Enjoy!

You can watch the video here or on YouTube. The soundtrack for the video is called “Choo Choo Train” by Daffy Dave.

Events

The June rainstorm

I happened to have my video camera with me one June day as the sky darkened and it began to thunder loudly. Birds, scared by the noise, took flight. Soon, rain began to fall, in buckets. Everyone who didn’t take cover got drenched to the skin in seconds.

see this on YouTube — see this on blip.tv

This video was recorded in Grosvenor Park, North Bethesda — a beautiful community near Washington, DC, USA. I have lots of photos from Grosvenor Park in my photo catalog. Some are posted below, but feel free to click through and view all of them.

Lists

Condensed Knowledge – December 6, 2009

This is a summary of articles I read and found interesting during this past week. The list is shared from among my feed subscriptions. I only share a certain number of articles in each of these posts, so if you'd like to see more, visit my full Google Shared Items list.

World's Craziest Dictators – Oddee.com
The Real Story of the Von Trapp Family
Scientists Respond to "Climategate" E-Mail Controversy: Scientific American
Suplimente Jurnalul | Antimonden | VIDEO: Meduze uriaşe au invadat coastele Japoniei
Climate change: this is the worst scientific scandal of our generation – Telegraph
– Via Trevor Carpenter on FB (http://www.facebook.com/trevorcarpenter?ref=nf)
Slashdot Your Rights Online Story | Sprint Revealed Customer GPS Data 8 Million Times
– Via EricaJoy on FF (http://ff.im/chKUc)
Durf.org » Archive » Et tu, Barack?
– Great article on human vs. machine translation and cost pressures in translation industry.
Where's the next Dubai? – Dec. 1, 2009
AUDIO Ghidul şpăgii în maternitate
– Very pertinent article vis-a-vis my own review of healthcare in Romania and the endemic corruption in the state healthcare system, where you’re required to bribe virtually everyone in the hospital if you’re to get any care. More details here: http://www.raoulpop.com/2009/10/21/healthcare-in-romania/.
FEC Guts Post-Abramoff Reform — Making Government Transparent and Accountable – Sunlight Foundation Blog
Cairo practice | The Economist
Fined for stranding passengers | The Economist
Obese air passenger in economy seat has picture taken – Telegraph
Moarte sigură în ţară, viaţă nouă la nemţi
How Will You Die? | GOOD
– Via AJ Batac on FF (http://ff.im/cdyRL)
FOTO: Oraşul Veneţia a fost inundat de maree | Adevarul
The D.C. power lunch: where Washington's elite go to eat – CNN.com
BBC News – Swiss voters back ban on minarets
iMac G5: Troubleshooting when your computer won't turn on
Squared 5 – MPEG Streamclip video converter for Mac OS X

Events

Ligia’s first art show

This past Thursday evening, on December 3, 2009, my wife, Ligia, had her first art show, at Casa Schüller, an art gallery in the city of Medias, Romania. This is the same show she talked about during her interview on Radio Ring. She was also interviewed about it on Nova TV last week, and I plan to post the video from the TV interview after I get it sometime this week.

We were very happy with the turnout. There were over 100 people in attendance, all of them thrilled to see her art and to attend the opening. She displayed 36 original large-format quilling creations, and 70 greeting card-format pieces.

The show was hosted and critiqued by Adrian Matei, a local artist, art critic and writer of international renown. The mayor of the city of Medias, Teodor Neamtu, came by and gave a wonderful speech congratulating Ligia, which you can see and hear in the video clip posted below. We had a short Christmas concert, where a choir from our church sang Christmas carols, and a group of youth played musical bells. Unfortunately I didn’t get to record everything on video, as I was part of the choir and was also taking photos of the event (you can see the whole set of photos here). I’ll see if I can beg some video segments from someone, and once I get them, I’ll put together a more complete video of the event.

Until then, enjoy the photos and video clip posted here, and if you’d like to congratulate Ligia directly, please head on over to her blog and do so. You can watch the video on blip.tv, SmugMug, YouTube and Vimeo.

➡ Updated 12/6/09: Got more video clips this afternoon, and pieced them together for a 30-minute video which you can see below or on Vimeo. Many thanks to Claudiu Ciucor, a 7th-grade journalism student from Scoala Generala Nr. 2 in Medias, for providing me with the footage. All of the 16:9 format video from the following clip was recorded by him. The 4:3 format video is recorded by me.