The PenFan's PhotoBlog

Is there a Tokyo Street in Kuala Lumpur? Not really but there is a Tokyo Street at Pavilion Kuala Lumpur. It's just a name created by some  marketing genius from Pavilion shopping mall to boost more shoppers and visitors to  the mall.  Tokyo Street at Pavilion Kuala Lumpur is located on the 6th floor of the mall. Giant Lantern at Tokyo Street Pavilion Kuala Lumpur. - A570 IS 1/30S f2.8 ISO200 Based on the advertisement they put up and the write-up by the press, I got the impression that the Tokyo Street occupied a big portion of the 6th floor or at least half of one wing of the mall. I also imagined all of it are Japanese shops or shops dealing with Japanese products. Actually,  Tokyo Street Pavilion occupies just  the end corner of the Mall on the 6th floor. There are 32 shops at the time of writing but some are really tiny. Maybe the lot size and the rental rate follow Tokyo properties as well. The entrance i...

To take a perfectly sharp photo the tripod is the best tool for any photographer. However the tripod can only be as steady as the platform it is standing on. If you are standing on a hanging rope bridge or on a cruise boat the tripod is just as wobbly as the boat or the ropes. The solution is usually higher shutter speed or high ISO setting. High ISO will be a problem for smaller sensor cameras.  However we don't normally bring bulky and heavy cameras to dinner cruise or high hanging rope bridge. The answer is Image stabilization or IS. There are three types of IS  -  a lens base or Optical Image stabilization, the second one is sensor base image stabilization. These two are highly recommended and the results are equally good. The last one is called electronic image stabilization which is not as good as the other two but is better than none. The photographs below were taken by my better half when she was on a Zhujiang dinner cruise in Guangzhou,...