Just in case its difficult to pick up the chords
D, Em, G and A
great Performance by the way! 🙂
jQuery 1.4 released
My favourite Javascript library, jQuery has a new version, jQuery 1.4.
It features some of these
- Even better performance compared to v. 1.3.x
- Serialization like PHP, same param serialized like foo[]=bar1&foo[]=bar2
- Easy Setter Functions
- The performance of .css() and .attr() has been improved
- All Events Can Be Live Events
Google IME
If you guys are addicted to typing using Google’s transliterate tool and felt that you would’ve loved to have a desktop based tool, look no further, Google has got its IME. Google IME features a range of languages from Hindi, Marathi, Bengali to Arabic, Urdu, Nepali. It works with Windows’ input method / language bar.
Click here for Google IME
Harishchandragad via Nalichi Vat
Here is another blogpost about my Harishchandragad trek via nali chi vaat. I’ve kept a different idea of writing this blog post, its more of the thoughts zooming out as I jot down the trek. This writeup moves in and out of present and past tense.
This post is somewhere between the normal blog and far away 140 chars tweet.
Fri, January 8, 2010
* Karjat train for kalyan, sandwiches Mallik brought
* reached Kalyan about 9.00pm
* bus for Nagar , dropped us at Khubi phata instead of Savarne as both the conductor and the aspirants dozed off!
* took 2 trucks back to savarne, my truck driver advised to stay near the police chowki and be aware of the villagers at savarne
* almost 12.30 when we reached @ savarne, Mallik, Rajo and Vj followed after 10 mins
* decide to sleep near the police chowki, in our sleeping bags, till the alarm rang at 4.45
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| Ruturaj's Album |
Sat, January 9, 2010
* got ready, and started to move in the dark to find ‘Walivare’ or Belpada. Asked a old fellow in Savarne, continued towards a plateau like hill, crossed it, and down, to walk further following a white tank.
* at 7.0am Belpada well, also saw the concrete road that came around the plateau (could’ve saved our climbing efforts)
* refilled water bottles and cleared the ‘stomach bottle’, and started for the Nali by 7.45
Nali
* Meet a thane group, enroute to Nali
* our first stop is around 8.48 at the ‘Big step’, have boiled eggs, watermelon, yes Mallik managed that in his ‘super’ heavy bag
* the first group cross us till we have our food, Mallik is panicked! need to get ahead of them in the nali, otherwise we’re jacked
* nali.. starts soon
Rock patch #1
* rock patch one, a first group, from trekdi.com is seen ahead pulling bags, etc on a rope-line
* we soon reach there, Mallik climbs ahead, throws a rope, and pull bags
* others too climb ahead, Swati is a confident climber!
* the treacherous terrain starts, with loose crumbling rocks, no good hand holds or even foot holds, the base is full of small pebbles, sliding down
Rock patch #2
*the trekdi group is busy lining up their equipment and anchoring stuff. Mallik is quick to climb and go ahead, Rajo follows without a bag, the bags up are called up..
* I tie Swati a bowline, and she starts ahead confidently and moves up, next is me, I too tie a bowline and move ahead.
* Bad scree above, rocks fall one big one falls about 15cm in diameter falls on Rajo’s head, he ducks, but still scratches his spectacles and falls bang! on his right knee, more rocks follow, rajo runs towards me, I somehow manage to keep him anchored !
*Vj comes in at the last. All 5 of us are out while trekdi is just begining to start actual ‘people ferrying’. Advantages of a small group in such terrain.
Rock patch #3
* further moving up, and things get worst, extermely bad scree, loose footing! And we are at the final patch 3, trekdi’s local / village guide throws rope, Mallik climbs ‘commando’ style pulling the rope with the bag, sits, hoists our rope, and asks Swati to be next, Rajo is unable to tie the bowline or even a endman’s knot.. finally ask him to tie a ‘desi’ knot and Swati moves up! very confident. मल्लिक कि बहन जचती है!, Bags are ferried up. Rajo is next, then its me. Vj tries to come with the bag, but is difficult, so sans bag!
Rock patch #4
* then cross a kind of ‘dangerous’ traverse to the right, and back to left towards another side, move ahead and see which seems like another patch where ropes could be necessary.
* Mallik says, this is definitely land-slide, cause last time when he was with Mei and Sanjay, this wasn’nt a problem, either ways we move up again with the same pattern of ferrying bags and the people, that was patch 4, Mallik says that this is officially the end of Nali
Konakan Kada
* little ahead, there is another a little dicey maneuver, we adopt a similar pattern for Swati, while rest of us make with our bags.
* with that we are almost just below the final konkan-kada’s reach, but for that we have to climb a litle of 10 mins and we’re at the exhaustive expanse of the kada, we wait there rest for a while and move out to explore the kada, Vj and Swati the first timers for the Konkan kada and they need to see more of that than rest.
* Move up to the hole near the edge and enjoy some time over there.
Harishchandragad Temple and bath
* Finally leave for Harishchandragad, its another 20+ minutes in the hot sun, feels like we’re not really walking but as Mallik states ‘zombies moving’. Another small hill to climb, which is a big big pain!
* The pain pays off, when we finally reach the temple, its just 3.00pm, we’d started our journey around 8.00am, its been 7 hours since Belpada and around 8.5 hours from Savarne. The sole of my legs are really hurting, Mallik is tired to death, and nothing different for others.
* We keep our bags near the cave in the temple, and finalize that as our night-halt point. Then we leave for a dip in the cistern
* its extremely cold as we expected and I barely manage to be there for a minute inside, Mallik and Rajo do 3/4th round around the shiv-ling and come back, Vj is last for everything, after all of us are out, he finally goes in and stays there for about 5 mins
* All are extremley hungry, we decide for some tea first. Mallik cant have enough patience to wait for the tea and then have hot Maggi soup.
Food
* At the cave, Mallik prepares for the soup in the kadhai that Rajo got with Vj’s wax-stove. But we wonder how we’d have it,
* I decide to check if I can borrow some glasses from the tea fellow, and end up purchasign 5 plastic glasses from him.
* We start with bread, mayonnaise and cheese slices as we wait for the soup, after teh dip in the cold cistern, our bodies have cooled down, and the early Jan air is cold around 4.30pm. * The soup is read, me and Mallik gulp down it hot! aah ‘Bliss’ as we both agreed, Swati is wasteful in losing the ‘heat energy’ of the soup, while me and Mallik are gulping the hot liquid as it goes down heating our throats, inner linings of the gullet which we can feel and rather enjoy that feeling.
* also eat chocolate cake and chocolate cake roll, Most of us are kinda full, but me Mallik and Rajo are eager for some more heat down the gullet, and I make sure atleast 2 maggies or Top Ramen noodles are prepared to satisfy our lust for piping hot gulps. Vj is full, but manages to have some maggi, and soon all the maggi has met its destination, the stomachs.
* we move out again to wash hands, fill water bottles, when we see the trekdi public standing outside
* as opposed to inital plan, there wont’ be any dinner, this was all, All that we now needed was rest. Rajo had asked a local to arrange for some firewood, and he starts teh fire with Swati right in the cave ! A decision that all repented later as the cave is full of smoke, and everybody is tearful, we wait for about 0.5 hrs till the cave is warm, we wait around edge of the cave listning songs on the mp3 player, where its not that ‘tearful’ atmosphere.
* Finally around 8.00 we start preparing for sleep, while Swati curses us to be boring to sleep so early
* Rajo asks me if I’m interested in ‘paani maarke aanaa’, I agree and we move out to see a very beautifully lit starry night outside
* We call Vj outside and we try some snaps, before we finally go to sleep.
* 5.00am is the alarm time set
Sun, January 10, 2010
* Rajo’s alarm rings, he wakes up Mallik, Mallik is just ‘hmm.. uthgayaa main, still lying’ Rajo sleeps back
* 5.30 am Mallik’s alarm rings, and we finally wake up
* 6.45 we move off for Khireshwar via tolar khind, Rajo Mallik is just surging ahead, while rest of us are just following, Vj and Swati lagging behind.
* At the tolar khind rock face, Vj is angry that he still has to carry his load of ‘Maaza’. So finally Mallik has a sip or two and then he leaves us behind while he races ahead alone, he’d go to Hotel aishwarya and get ‘pohe’ prepared.
* we continue easy, a big DRDO group is coming up, Hi, Hellos, greetings fly by!
* around 9.00am we are @ the hotel, enjoying Pohe, Now I need to download
* after the ‘weight-lessner’ we take a very bumpy jeep ride to Madh, and then walk to Khubi phata where we spot a bus
* home is still not close by, as the ST stops @ Murbad probably for lunch break, my lunch was @ home when I reached at 2.45pm
Travelling Directions
- Get a train for Kalyan (Central Line) from Dadar (or where ever you are)
- Get a S.T.(State Transport) bus for Nagar, make sure its going from the Malsej Ghat (I don’t think there is another route though, just to be on safe side)
- Alight at Savarne, make sure you let few commuters know where you are going. Make sure u tell the conductor its NOT KHUBI PHATA
- Walk from Savarne towards Belpada, the base village
Defender Drain
Everytime Manchester United have a good defender, in-form defender, It happens that Real Madrid wants it. Rumours are going about Nemanjia Vidic, It happened with Gabriel Heinze, finally he left Madrid. Madrid didn’t allow him to settle peacefully.
Reminds me of a quote by Leonardo Da Vinci
Life is pretty simple: You do some stuff. Most fails. Some works. You do more of what works. If it works big, others quickly copy it. Then you do something else. The trick is the doing something else.
Madrid copies or steals, while ManU develops someone else.
Amateur photographs vs. Professional photos, Tips and tricks
I’ve observed the following in most of the differences of Amateur and Professional photography in terms of the photograph properties.
- Good Composition with the light
- Extremely good color captures
- Focus on lesser OR only on the most important object of the photograph
- Creative use of the rule of the 3rd
- Clarity in photograph, ie lesser ISO noise
- Good focus, lesser motion blur of the subject
- Use of post-production, ie using Photoshop. Which I hate
Here is a detailed explanation of above. Common tips for Amateurs like me to get a good snap.
Good Composition with the light
Most of us amateurs will simply ‘click’. Point and Shoot cameras are no wonder so popular. I assume atleast 90% of the point & shoot (P&S) cameras are used in the Auto mode. Few of us hardly think in terms of how the photo could be ‘bettered’ if the position of light, ie sun rays, shadows could be tweaked a little by adjusting the object or the camera.
Tip: Try to have the light on a slant on the face of the object, Not a direct perpendicular, but a slant, ie 45 deg. This shall help increase the highlights (lighter hues) and shadows which would enrich the image.
Extremely good color captures
I’m sure all must have observed this. Pros always manage to get out very rich colors or saturation in their images. How!? Its more than just a trick. Understand that light condition is not always the same. Sometimes its too bright, as in the tropical afternoon sun or low during sunset and sunrise. Every changing light needs to be understood. As the light changes, so does the default 50% gray (on which AWB or Auto White Balance works). So the same set of objects vary in color (as captured in the photo) during afternoon sunlight, or in Tubelights (Fluorescent lamps).
Tip: Try not to always work in ‘Auto’ mode, but switch to ‘P’ mode and then always tweak the ‘AWB’ setting. Change during sunlight, indoor (fluorescent), etc. I’ve also observed this in Canon (DSLR vs P&S). DSLR’s auto color capture is equivalent to P&S in cloudy with Vivid color mode. Yes for P&S guys try using higher color modes (Vivid Red, Blue, Green, etc typically in hazy conditions). You will have to test u’r camera’s color capture in various WB settings to get a good saturation. Try to add more color of the object that you are trying to capture, eg. if its the sea, Vivid Blue 🙂
Focus on lesser OR only on the most important object of the photograph
This is another of the most easily noted effect in Pro vs Amateur snaps. The pro snaps always have some object highly focussed while other parts of the image are blurred or bokehed. Read more about Bokeh. You need to understand what is Depth of Field required for your photo. This is very creative, what could be considered good for you may not be good for others. Mobile phone cameras and cheap P&S may not have ‘Aperture P’ modes.
Tip: Under normal conditions, eg portraits, etc. Try using the ‘A’ mode or ‘Aperture Priority’. Try using the least F no. ie F-2.8 will give u more of the Bokeh effect as compared to F-8.0. Macro and Super macro will always result small F nos. So try getting a little background (which is farther away from the object and not just the object. This will add some Bokeh and the image will have blurred colors with the sharp image of the flower itself).
Creative use of the rule of the 3rd
This is something that comes naturally to all, but if not let me explain. An object in deep center of the image may not look as beautiful if taken in the 3rd part of it. Read more about Rule of 3rds
Tip: Atleast my Canon S3 IS has a setting while capturing that will display 2 horizontal and 2 vertical lines dividing the image in 3 parts horizontally and vertically respectively. Enable that feature by clicking ‘Disp’, then align objects, horizons using that feature. Also make sure the horizons are always horizontal and not inclined, unless creatively you want it so.
Clarity in photograph, ie lesser ISO noise
Most of the P&S photographs have Auto ISO, which enables high ISO even 800+. Which gives an overall lighter image but very very high noise (colored dots all over the image). P&S dont’ have good image processing to remove high ISO noise as compared to DSLRs
Tip: Always try forcing the camera to use lower ISO. Keep ISOs less than 200. If you are working in low light condition, use a tripod, decrease shutter speed or decrease F no. and use a tripod to capture the image.
Good focus, lesser motion blur of the subject
All good Pro snaps have their objects sharp and clear. Most of our amateur snaps have objects which are slightly blurred, thanks to our use of ‘Auto’ modes and shaky hands.
Tip: Keep your hands very very still while capturing, don’t move camera back quickly to review the image, go slow, easy. In low light conditions always try to use a tripod. For most of us amateurs Tripod is not an option, but pre-focus is. ie. most of the times, I pre focus (half click) and keep the focus ready. I use a non-moving object close to the actual object, pre focus and wait for the actual object’s activity. This helps to plan and focus a good shot.
Use of post-production, ie using Photoshop. Which I hate
All most all professionals re-touch their photos, or as they ‘creatively’ call it ‘post-process’ their photos. I find it nothing more than just removing errors or re-applying their aesthetic skills to something that they couldn’t capture. Most of us amateurs care less about ‘post-processing’. Once the image is on the Hard disk, its just waiting to go on Facebook and Picasa for our friends and families.
Tip: If you have time, do it. Otherwise forget it ! 🙂
Quote
I was reading Mark Shuttleworth’s blog, and found Leonardo da Vinci’s quote too good not to have on my website.
For once you have tasted flight you will walk the earth with your eyes turned skywards, for there you have been and there you will long to return.
– Leonardo da Vinci
Days drawing closer for Benitez
With a disappointing Portsmouth 3 – 0 Liverpool, Liverpool not only lost again, but this time to the lowest member of the league. Benitez blames the red card, but I’m sure his days are starting to get numbered.
Manchester united too lost against Fulham 3 – 0 Man Utd. With all of their premier defenders out with injuries except for Patrick Evra.
This season it seems there is gonna be a good fight for the league
Brian Aker on NoSQL