动情 (Intimate Moment)

星期六晨跑后，带了相机到公园走走，无意中看到虫儿的浪漫与春光。

这两只长脚大蚊沉醉在交配的欢乐中，很轻易的就把它们醉生梦死的神态拍摄下来。

另一边，两只红蚂蚁神色匆匆的赶路，相见后深情的激吻一番。可惜来也匆匆，去也匆匆，尚未来得及找个好角度，它们又离开了。因为逆光的缘故，只拍摄到红蚂蚁激吻的影子。

上帝造物之神奇，凡是有生命的都会动情，以达传宗接代的目的。不会动情的生物，应该早已灭绝了吧。

Saturday morning, I woke up early and went for a half-an-hour jog in my neighborhood park.

After the morning jog, I felt fresh for the rest of the day and managed to find time to shoot some macro photographs, had breakfast out with my family, had some shopping, attended to my little aquarium that started to get messy, read some photography books and played with my kids, all done in a relaxed mood.

The new discovery during the photography session was the intimate affair of bugs, where I found two crane flies having their private moment, one on top of the other, and they clearly were enjoying the time.

In the other side of the park, two fire ants were moving in the opposite direction and met each other. They must have not met for very long time. Their kissing was so intense until my camera could not freeze their motion.

I think it must be mating season for the bugs…….

梦 (Dream)

每个人心里都有一亩田，耕种梦的种子。每个人的一生都在耕耘这梦田，有些种子茁壮长大，有些则不幸干枯了。

不管收成如何，人生就是关于如何耕耘这些梦的种子。洒下不同的种子，付出不同的努力，就获得不同的收获。

一旦梦醒了，没有了梦想，人生就枯燥乏味多了。

耕耘梦田的过程，也许比起最后的丰收更有意思。。。

Everyone has dreams. Everything that we long for but beyond our reach can become reachable in our dreams. It may be unreal, but until we wake up, they all are so real.

In life, if you have a dream, do not try to wake up. As long as you continue to dream on, the dream may come true one day. Life with dreams is much more interesting than life without dreams. Of course, you need to take actions and efforts in realizing your dreams.

Not all dreams will come true though. But never mind, as long as we try, we should be better off in the end compared with passing our days without any dream. And the process, the work and the effort that we put in along the way all make our life filled with passions and much more meaningful.

蜻蜓 (Dragonfly)

小时候，住家附近有许多蜻蜓。傍晚时分，我们都喜欢看它们自由自在的水沟旁飞翔。偶尔，我们会抓一两只来玩玩，但从不伤害它们。

社会不断进步，城市不停发展，适合蜻蜓繁殖的生态环境也越来越少了。

昨早在公园再次遇见这只蜻蜓，它就像遇见老朋友般，一动也不动的让我为它拍摄。遗憾的是它孤单的身影栖息在花枝上，异常落寞。昔日成群的伴侣已不知去向。

在人类发展的路途上，如果能照顾到自然生态环境的保护，就能确保下一代不需只从互联网上认识何谓蜻蜓或萤火虫等可爱的虫儿了。

During my childhood days, dragonfly and damselfly could be easily seen around our living place. As a child, I like to watch them flying around the ditch near our house. Sometimes, we would catch them one in each hand, hold them face-to-face and see them touch and interact with each other.

As we grow up and the country develops, I almost had forgotten these childhood friends until I picked up macro photography recently. The beautiful photos of dragonfly and damselfly in the magazines rekindle the thought of further encounters with these little playmates.

This Sunday morning when I had a walk in the park with my camera, I saw this dragonfly resting on a plant hence I stopped and took some photographs of her. She seemed to be happy meeting her old friend and stayed quiet throughout for me to take proper shots.

有其父必有其子（Like Father Like Son）

自从染上摄影瘾后，每逢周末都花不少时间在摄影上。耳濡目染之下，两个孩子也学老爸东拍西拍。

孩子虽然年幼，但拍出来的相片却也不太差，甚至偶有佳作，老爸也险掉眼镜。摄影和许多其他事情一样，不能一成不变，墨守成规，偶尔不按常理极有可能获得意想不到的效果。

看着孩子们开心的摄影，心中有股简单的满足感。。。。

Ever since I picked up the interest in DSLR photography, I have spent quite some time on activities related to photography such as shooting, reading photography magazines and viewing, organizing and editing photographs in front of computer screen.

My previous Panasonic Compact camera somehow ended up with my two young children. When I go shooting outdoor, they occasionally join me and I leave it to their own creativity to shoot whatever they feel like shooting. Surprisingly even my 4-year-old son is able to operate the camera by focusing, zooming in and out, then view them later on and is clearly very satisfied with what he took. Shooting from the perspective of a child without following any composition rule sometimes yields refreshing and creative result, at least to the father.

My daughter was trying to take a close-up shot of a water droplet after rain but failed to get a clear image. After explanation she more or less understand that a macro lens and a tripod is required for a clear image of water droplet.

Update 20-August-2010: Photo shots from my little ones for sharing as suggested by Silent Moments.

捕抓（Capture）

与这黄衫小蜘蛛初次邂逅，虽风和日丽，徐徐凉风却把树叶与蜘蛛吹得缓缓的摇摆着，想把蜘蛛的容貌捕抓在镜头下，却苦于没带三脚架而不知如何下手。

没有三脚架，想把蜘蛛苗条的身段清晰的拍摄下来是相当困难的。为了不擦身而过错失机会，我把ISO调高，把光圈调宽，以超速的快门拍下蜘蛛可爱的模样。

这种拍摄手法，没能把蜘蛛从头到脚都拍得清晰，却总算把那悠悠的眼神给摄入镜头。

不在乎天长地久，只在乎曾经拥有。这是相当感人的爱情观，却也适用在摄影。

For macro photography, it is recommended to use a tripod for sharp images. However, sometimes the tripod may be inconvenient or not available hence we are forced to capture the subject hand held.

For hand holding shots, I normally use the widest aperture available (f2.8 on my macro lens), and try out a few ISO settings up to 3200 so that I can get a shutter speed fast enough to overcome my shaky hand and moving objects. From the few shots taken I then can choose the more satisfactory shots and delete the unusable ones.

High ISO yields some noise to the image and wide aperture leads to narrow depth of field hence part of the object will be blurry. These are the compromises I have to take so as not to miss the shots completely.

I guess we sometimes face similar situation in life, if we are too choosy and refuse to compromise we may end up missing the opportunity completely. An individual judgment may make the difference between a successful capture and a totally missed opportunity.

小仙女 （Fairy Tale)

星期天，天刚破晓，我在树叶下发现一些露珠。把三脚架拿出来，我正准备把露珠的清新与美丽摄入镜头。

在朝阳的照耀下，露珠闪闪发亮，清晰的倒影映入眼帘，仿佛把我的魂魄也吸进去。

进入梦境，四周有如仙境般，到处奇花异草，漂亮极了。一瞬间，露珠变幻成为可爱的小仙女，与我一同观赏山间花草。

言谈间，小仙女说：我们每天都在你身边，只是你们没察觉罢了。我们白天化成空气中的水分，夜里天气太凉，我们就化成露珠栖息在花草间。太阳出来后，我们再次成为水分飘扬在空中。每一分每一秒，我们都与你们同在。

我可以和你们拍几张相吗？我问。

当然可以，我们会穿上最闪亮的衣裳摆出最优美的姿势。

It was early in the Sunday morning, I spotted some very tiny dewdrops under a small branch of a papaya tree opposite my house. I set up my tripod and focus on the dewdrops to capture the freshness and beauty they exhibit.

The dewdrops under the morning sun looked stunning. I was totally amazed, and felt as if I had entered into the reflection in the dewdrops.

The scene was wonderful, with flora and fauna surrounded me. The dewdrops turned into fairies and walked around with me. One of them even called my name. Do you know me? I asked.

Yes, we all know you, your family and your friends. We are always around wherever you go. However, we transform from time to time and you may have not noticed our existence.

When you breathe, you draw in the air and we are there in the form of moisture. At night when the atmosphere cools down, we transform into dews and we rest on the surfaces of plants, grass and flowers. When the sun comes up and the temperature rises, again we evaporate into the form of moisture and we move around with the air. We’re always there wherever you are.

Do you mind I take some photographs of you? I asked.

We would love to. We will put on our most sparkling dress and the most graceful pose for you.

蜘蛛结网 (Spider Web)

今早拍了些蜘蛛的微距相片，想起了小时候听过的蜘蛛结网的寓言故事。

蜘蛛结网所需的毅力与恒心不小，尤其是大风雨中结不好的网轻易就被风吹破。蜘蛛结网也许不易，但一旦结成一副坚韧的网，就能让许多自动飞上门的美食手到擒来，蜘蛛也因此得以生存。

蜘蛛结网的恒心与毅力，是我们生活的好榜样，成功失败许多时候就看我们有多少恒心与毅力。

I took some macro shots of a spider and its new web this morning, and this reminded me of the phylosophical story of the spider's making the web.

Blogger Ryan posted the poem that tells the legendary story of how "The Bruce," Robert I, King of Scotland, after six successive defeats by the English armies, was a fugitive in a lonely cave, and there saw a spider try six times to cast his thread from one beam to another and succeed on the seventh try. Bruce took courage from the spider's perseverance, fought a seventh time, and won.

I could recall that in my childhood day I had read about similar story about the spider. While the spider had to try many times until it successfully make a tough web for survival, there is no difference in our life, we need similar determination and perseverance to succeed in our endeavor.

户外活动（Active Lifestyle）

原始时代，人类必须长时间走动寻找食物与居所，随着文明进化，人们休闲的时间也多了。

时代的进步，却也产生了一些文明病。许多高血压，心脏病等病例都与生活习惯有关。长时间上网或看电视而缺乏户外活动对健康有一定的负面影响，应该给于适当的调整。

多运动多走动反而能松懈神经，保持状态。通常周末我都爱去打打球，或游泳，或做些户外活动，或打扫屋子等，让身体得到适当的运动。

从中年步入老年的路上，希望能保持健康的体魄与思维。

In the old days before civilization, men had to constantly and actively move around in search of dwelling and food. As we became more civilized, we have more time for rest, leisure and relaxation.

This is a positive change as long as we have a balanced lifestyle. I believe that too much internet surfing/ gaming, too much television time etc. and too little outdoor activities, over a long run, can be very harmful to our body and health.

With a reasonably active lifestyle, we feel fresh, less tired and constantly rejuvenated. Personally I’ll try to find time to go for badminton game, swimming, jogging, gardening, outdoor photography and helping in house work.

Hopefully I can maintain reasonable fitness and active mind in the process of aging.

模糊 (Blur)

人生无常，所以不应该太执着。分得太清楚的世界，也不见得是最好的。有时候，隐隐约约，如幻似真，反而更显朦脓美。

黑白对错本来就非绝对，放下成见，用心去感受人生，爱你所应该爱的，分享你的快乐，凡事别太认真，也许获得更多。

有时候，家长对儿女们要求太高，造成双方不必要的压力，甚至发生口角，离家出走，若无意中伤害了至亲的人，是很可悲的。

与至亲一起走过对错的路，一起欣赏途中清晰中的朦脓，或朦脓中的清晰不是更好吗？

The photographs here were taken with the aperture set to the widest and using auto focus. My objective was to get some photographs having a mixture of sharp and blur images, and hoping that the morning sun will help in forming some nice bokeh with the out-of-focus light.

In general I am quite satisfied with the final images even though I think that if there was heavy dews in that morning before I took the photograph, the images should have been better.

I started to appreciate photographs having combination of sharp and out-of-focus areas more and more. In fact, our life could be better if we do not distinguish too much about who is wrong and who is right, instead we can walk through the journey of life with our loved ones, enjoying the nice scenery along the way.