Time Travel

The population of a small island in the South Pacific Ocean have perfected time travel! The island of Samoa is planning a jump into the future by moving themselves west of the International Date Line. Perhaps the island's population have grown tired of being some of the last people on earth to celebrate the New Year? Jokes aside, the real reason relates to the economy. Currently Samoa loses two working days with it's biggest trading partners - New Zealand and Australia. Currently when it's Friday in New Zealand its Saturday in Samoa, and when it's Sunday in Samoa, it's Monday in New Zealand.

The International Date Line (IDL) is an imaginary line that runs generally north-south through the middle of the Pacific Ocean. It's function is to define the position on the Earth's surface where the date changes. Traveling east across the line means you repeat a day, while crossing it in a westerly direction means you jump forward a day!

The line follows the 180 degree meridian for the most part except where it goes around parts of continents or islands (no avoid a single nation have time zones in 2 different days). Samoa, lies just east of the line, and so the change in position will only lead to a small additional kink in the line on the new maps.

If you extend the IDL into the other hemisphere, the line is called the Prime Meridian or perhaps better known as the Greenwich meridian as it passes through the Royal Observatory in Greenwich in southeast London. This arbitrary line was agreed to as the zero position of longitude at the International Meridian Conference held in 1884. The same conference defined the "Universal Day" as midnight-to-midnight Greenwich Mean Time (GMT), but decided that countries could unilaterally decide how to measure time. It is for this reason that some countries like India choose to have 1 time zone that is 05h30 ahead of GMT!

What time is it?

This artificial line creates the Eastern and Western Hemispheres also creates some interesting time phenomena (although they are completely artificial constructs). For example, you can celebrate your birthday twice in one year by crossing the IDL in a easterly direction on your birthday. The clocks go back a day and you get to celebrate again!

Another strange phenomenon is that for 2 hours each day (between 10h00 and 11h59 GMT) three different days are observed in different places on the globe. At 10h30 in Greenwich it's Tuesday, while in Samoa it's 23h30 on Monday night, and across the IDL in Kiritimati or Christmas Island it's Friday morning 00h30!  

Samoa has a population of about 180,000. I suppose they will enjoy being one of the first nation's to experience the New Year at 00h01 on January 2012!

Why is there no petrol in Nairobi?

I experienced first hand the fuel shortage in Nairobi today. I was forced to work from home with an empty fuel tank. I heard via the grapevine that the Shell down the road had received fuel around lunch time and like many Nairobians joined the queues to get a full tank!

I queued for just under an hour for a full tank of fuel and a Jerry can - as a buffer for any further shortages.

So the BIG question is why is there a fuel shortage in Nairobi?

The government assures us that there is no shortage of petrol in Kenya, In fact according to Patrick Nyoike, Energy Permanent Secretary, there are approximately 17.3 million liters of fuel products at the Kenya Pipeline Company depots.

So the petrol is in the tanks, but not in the fuel stations. Finding an answer to this question is where the blame-storming begins. Here are some of the popular ideas/reasons/excuses:

There's no space to land it:
"the result of intense pricing battles over consignments that were to be shipped in mid March, but could not land at the port for lack of storage space"

It's corruption again: 
"dealers have refused to buy the petroleum because the importer, with the help of the Ministry of Energy officials, has pushed the prices up by up to $10 above the price quoted for the tender"

No money for guarantees:
"Some of these importers are very small and find it difficult to raise the guarantees"

They forgot to pay their accounts:
"the shortage is linked to delayed payments by the marketers"

Blame the logistics department:
"logistical delays resulting from the public holiday for the supply shortage"

It's KRA's fault*:
"the taxation and clearing paperwork required was not done on time"

It's KPLC's fault**:
 "A shutdown at the refinery caused by a power failure late last week has also been linked to the supply shortage"

It's the price's fault:
"the price regulation [is the cause] for the crisis"

It's on it's way, it's stuck on the high seas:
"attempts to ease the situation by getting approval from authorities for the discharge of a cargo ship in the high seas has not borne fruit"

It's the public's fault:
"said the situation was being made worse by panicking motorists who dash to the nearest stations where they see a re-filling truck"

Of possible excuses the only ones missing are: The dog ate it, and the aliens abducted it!

Let's hope that while the industry players are arguing and blame-shifting that someone is actually working to resolve the problem!

* KRA = Kenya Revenue Authority

** KPLC = Kenya Power and Lighting Corporation

Sources:

Capital FM

Business Daily

Made in England

Made in England, a photo by jdkvirus on Flickr.

This is a component on a railway wagon parked at the Nairobi Railway Museum. The museum houses rolling stock, locomotives and other memorabilia from the old East African Railways.

This railway line was referred to as the "lunatic line" by the British tabloids of the time when it was built between 1896 and 1901. At the time is cost 5 million pounds to complete, but it's cost in human life was enormous, with an average of 4 workers dying for every mile of track! The original line was built from the port of Mombasa on the Indian ocean coast of what is now Kenya to Kisumu on the shores of Lake Victoria. By 1931 the line had been extended to Kampala the capital of Uganda.

Two things attracted me to this rusting component on the railway wagon. Firstly, it is embossed with the words "Made in England", the second thing that caught my eye was the acronym E.A.R, implying that these components were manufactured especially for East African Railways.

We are all too familiar with the "Made in China" label. Take a look at your desk where your computer stands, or your kitchen. A fair chunk of what's before you was made in China.

In 2010, the US was the world's leading manufacturer contributing 19.9% of the world's manufactured goods. Its projected that the US will lose its long standing number 1 position to China in 2011. The US have held the top spot for 110 years, quite a record! Coincidentally, it was about the time that the lunatic line was commissioned that the US surpassed Britain as the leading global manufacturer.

At present England relies on manufacturing for 26% of it's GDP. This manufacturing is concentrated in aerospace, defense, pharmaceuticals and chemicals although the UK has 10 operational railway manufacturers.

Despite it's manufacture site listed as England, the pictured component was probably designed in the US. Timken is an American company founded in 1899 by Henry Timken and his sons. Henry Timken was a German born carriage builder who patented a tapered rolling bearing for freight wagons, which improved their handling during cornering. This patent was the start of then Timken business which still operate's today.The companies slogan "Wherever wheels and shafts turn", describes the widespread use for bearings. Timken bearings have been fitted to trains, aircraft engines and even the space shuttle's landing gear!

This component (probably a bearing of some sort) was manufactured under license in England following a licensing agreement in 1909 which gave the Timken company access to the global markets. I suppose in some respects this is similar to today's manufacturing being outsourced to China?

I have no way of knowing exactly how old this component is but I am sure it contributed to the economies of England and the US at it's manufacture. It contributed to the British East African economy in it's use, even now is contributing in a very small way to the Kenyan economy as part of the museum display!

Fork

Fork, a photo by jdkvirus on Flickr.

I captured the image above at the cutlery second-hand "store" down the road from our house in Karen, Nairobi. The store consists of several tables under a tree arrayed with cutlery, pots, pans and other assorted kitchen items.

This kind of shop finds it's roots in another Kenyan (perhaps East African) tradition called Mitumba. This is a Swahili term which literally means "bundles" and refers to bundles or bales of 2nd hand clothes donated in the west and then sold in bales to local merchants who then sell them on.

It's common place here in Kenya for people to go to the Mitumba for their clothes shopping. In Nairobi the largest and most famous Mitumba is Toi Market, located on the outskirts of Kibera slum. It is known as THE place to shop for cheap 2nd hand clothes. Almost all the big western brands are available here at very low prices (a fraction of the cost of the high street boutiques). The only real draw-back is that you won't necessarily find what you want in your size!

The knives and forks on sale down the road from our house have similar origins, the left overs from European and American tables. Finding matching sets is tricky, but if you're looking to outfit your kitchen cheaply, this is a good place to pick-up quality flatware.

Forks have been in use as eating utensils from the 2nd century AD, but only came into common use in Western Europe in the 10th century! I wonder what those early Westerners would have thought of these piles of 2nd hand forks? For an interesting history on forks be sure to read the Wikipedia entry.

The image above is one of the few black and white images I have produced amongst the tens of thousands of photos I have taken over the last 10 years that I have been taking my photography seriously. As an aside, I have always pondered the name "black & white" as its more like "shades of grey", but I suppose there is a sexiness to "black and white"!

One of reasons I take so few black and white images is that I am addicted to color! I usually find my inspiration in nature where color abounds, even at the most minute scale. The flower below is an example of the range of color in nature.

Natural architecture , a photo by jdkvirus on Flickr.

The first computer screens were true monochrome - white, green or amber on black. I remember my family's first PC was an XT with an amber screen. It was 1986 and I was one of the coolest kids on the block! Times have changed.

These early monochrome screens could display shades of grey, or degrees of brightness that emulated grey, but nowhere near as many tones required to display a meaningful black & white image. These days standard computer screens can display 16.7 million colors (or shades of them anyway). I wonder how they measure this? Perhaps a subject for a future blog? Even Apple's Ipad can display over 65,000 colors/shades!

So why so few black & white? Well perhaps it's in celebration of the ability of technology to reproduce the amazing spectrum of God's creation?! Nevertheless, enjoy the rarity of this black & white image - at least on this blog!

Ghost in the machine

Ghost in the machine, a photo by jdkvirus on Flickr.

Of late several of my Flickr photos have made it to Flickr's Explore Page. Flickr Explore is a measure of Interestingness - a word coined and copyrighted by Flickr. It's basically a measure of how interesting your photo is in comparison to all the other photos uploaded on Flickr. Each day Explore selects the top 500 interesting Flickr photos for Explore - creating the Top 500 photos for the day.

It's estimated that about 2 million photos are uploaded daily, so making the TOP 500 is quite an achievement. On the useless information front, Flickr currently has over 5.6 billion images in it's database!

To date 33 of my photos have made Explore, and one of the images has made it to the Flickr Explore Front Page. To determine  whether any of your Flickr photos have been in Explore, use the Scout tool at BigHugeLabs.com.

I have been looking critically at some of my photos that have made Explore in an attempt to inform future photographs. There are blogs out there that suggest ways to get your photos into Explore, although in reality you have to start with a good image.

The bulk of my Explore'd shots are macros and most include flowers.

Looking at the non-macro shots, like birds or insects, one of the common denominators seems to be an appealing background.

With this in mind I have specifically shot my latest photo (the one at the top of the page) with what I hope is a visually appealing background! Now the work begins of getting this image noticed with the hope and aim of it being selected for Explore!

Nakuru Photo Blog

I have visited Lake Nakuru National Park three times since we moved to Kenya in 2008. As a whole it is one of my least favorite parks, perhaps because it is so small. I much prefer the wide open spaces of the Masaai Mara or Tsavo, however for a day visit it allows one to see a large number of animals and birds. I visited the park again on Tuesday 19th April with my family.

The park's focus is Lake Nakuru, one of the Rift valley soda lakes. There are 2 great vantage points to see the lake - one is Baboon Cliff look-out which is to the north of the lake (from the main gate travel to the right). The more spectacular of the two is Lion Hill Lookout. This is a bit "off the beaten track" but well worth the drive. The access road is just before the Lanet gate.

Lake Nakuru National Park's claim to fame has always been the hundreds of thousands (even millions on some occasions) of Flamingos that feed on algae on the shores. Unfortunately this is no longer the case, with the bulk of the Flamingos having moved to Lake Bogoria and Lake Simbi Nyaima. We did see small groups of Lesser Flamingo and even fewer Greater Flamingo as well as large numbers of Pelicans. We saw about 25 species of bird in total as well as Lion, White Rhino, Buffalo and assorted antelope.

Hope you enjoy the photos below (you can click on them to see larger versions on flickr):

It's a lens, baby!

A couple of months ago I bought a new lens for my camera, its called a Lensbaby Composer. When I tell people about my purchase I usually get one of two responses; either "That's cool, is it as nifty as they claim!" or "What's a Lensbaby?" I hope to answer both questions in this blog post.

In most cameras (an exception would be a pinhole camera) a lens is used to focus the incoming light onto an image sensor - either the photographic film (light sensitive chemical emulsion) or CCD chip (digital photocell). Most lenses are rigidly coupled to the front of the camera in such a way that the focal plane is parallel to that of the image sensor.

This means that the "slice" of focus (whose depth/thickness is dependent on the aperture and lens) is parallel to the image sensor. This parallel slice of focus is for most cameras and their users simply the way it is, and is a very powerful creative tool on its own. For example, by using a large aperture (i.e. a low f-stop), a narrow focal slice is created meaning that the areas on either side of the slice are blurred. The image below demonstrates this perfectly.

 

In contrast, a narrow aperture (or high f-stop) produces a broad focal slice. This is useful for landscape photos where you'd like as much of the photo to be in focus as possible. The image below was shot at f/10.0 which produces quite a broad focal slice, but even narrower apertures like f/22.0 or f/32.0 will produce images where almost all the visible image is sharply focused. A pinhole camera (which doesn't have a lens, but just a pin-prick size hole for the light to enter) has a very narrow aperture (my pinhole camera has an f-stop of 177! and practically everything is in focus.

The Lensbaby Composer (as well as the Lensbaby Muse and Control Freak) is a creative lens system that creates a circular "sweet spot" of focus surrounded by a circular blurred zone. Furthermore, the lens can be tilted allowing the "sweet spot" (think of it as a circular focal spot) to be angled versus the image sensor.

In the Composer model, this is achieved using a ball and socket design. Aperture is controlled by using metallic discs with varying size holes in them which are placed over the lens optic. Like traditional lenses, the aperture also controls the depth of the focal spot. So a large aperture gives lots of blur, and a small aperture gives little blur. Before we look at some actual Lensbaby images (I think in this case the pictures will speak a 1000 words), I should also mention that Lanesbaby is a lens system, with interchangeable optics. This means that different lenses can be plugged into the lens body allowing for different visual effects. Below is an image of the Lensbaby Composer from the side showing the unit tilted, and also 4 of the optics I own (from left to right: Single Glass Optic, Plastic Optic, Pinhole/zone plate optic, Double Glass Optic). Other optics are also available. I will cover all the optics in more detail in a future post.

So, onto some sample images! The image of the tree below has the lens centered (no tilt), and uses a f2.8 aperture (maximum blur). As you can see the center of the image is focused, with a radial blur extending outwards - almost like a motion blur. You can see a bigger version of the image by clicking the link above.

In the daisy image below, the daisy in focus is off-center. This is achieved by tilting the lens so that the "sweet-spot" is centered on the daisy. As you can see the whole of the daisy is focused, and not just a slice of it! Had this photo been taken with a normal lens by changing the aperture, the whole of the daisy could have been in focus, but the focal slice would have crossed the entire image. Here we see the rest of the image is blurred.

The orange daisy is another example of the creativity offered by the Lensbaby system.

The Lensbaby system also allows the addition of screw-on macro lenses, allowing for close-up shots. As a photomacrographer myself, this is a great option. I will share my experiences using these accessories in a future post.

Old wine

Archeologists in Armenia have discovered the remains of the oldest known wine-making facility. The findings included a shallow basin believed to have been the wine-press which drained into a deep vat. They researchers also found grape seeds, remains of crushed grapes and some dried vines. Read the full story here.

In one of my earlier posts on Habit Forming, I commented on how the consumption of alcohol has long been intertwined with human -  this discovery suggests that wine has been influencing human endeavors for some time.

The oldest bottle of wine was discovered in Germany in 1867. This Roman glass amphora is believed to date to 325 AD. The bottle contains two liquids - the "wine" and a layer of what's believed to be olive oil - used instead of a cork to reduce oxidation and evaporation.

In episode 12 of the TV Series White Collar, the FBI and their ex-con forger investigate the sale of a bottle of wine believed to have been given to Benjamin Franklin by Marie Antoinette. While such a transaction may have occurred, the writers and producers on this episode probably drew inspiration from the sale of a bottle of 1787 Chateau Lafite believed to have belonged to Thomas Jefferson. This bottle was sold on auction in 1985 and fetched price of $160,000.

Last year Sotheby's sold three bottles of Châteaux Lafite-Rothschild 1869 on auction in Hong-Kong for the hammer price of $232,692 per bottle making this the most expensive (recorded) bottle of wine.

While I am an oenophile, its highly unlikely I will ever have the means to buy wine worth more than a couple of hundred South African Rand. The oldest wine I have ever opened and drunk - I separate the two as some old wines when opened are awful and cannot be drunk - was a bottle of Uiterwyk Cabernet Sauvignon from 1974 - my birth year. 

A wine as old as I am!

I was so impressed by the quality of the wine after so much time, I tracked down the producing wine estate in South Africa and contacted them:

"Uiterwyk Cabernet Sauvignon 1974

Dear Sirs,

I had the pleasure of opening (and drinking) a bottle of Uiterwyk Cabernet Sauvignon 1974 this evening. I live in Nairobi, Kenya. The bottle was given to me by a fellow South African who was heading back to SA and couldn't take any of his wine collection with him.

The cork was brittle, but I managed to get 90% out of of the bottle in one go - the remains were pushed into the bottle. We poured it straight into glasses through a fine sieve. The wine had a purple-red colour - unlike other old Cabernet Sauvignon's I have opened, which are usually brown!

As for the taste? It improved with some air, but was complex yet completely smooth. Very hard to describe actually - the smoothest (and oldest) Cabernet Sauvignon I have ever drunk, yet retaining complexity,

The wine bottle (i have photo's if you like copies) states that the wine maker was a D. De Waal. If he/she is still alive, I'd like to congratulate them on producing a fine wine! And a fine wine that was good after 36 years!

Keep well

JK"

Pieter de Waal, the current MD of the wine estate responded as follows:

"Thank you for taking the trouble to send us such a complimentary letter.

 

My father, Danie de Waal (Snr) is still alive and well at 90 years of age. I have printed your e-mail and will take it to him - he will be delighted, I'm sure.

 

Thanks again

 

Kind regards

 

Pieter de Waal" 

I guess my letter made D. De Waal (Snr)'s day, just as the fruit of his labors - some 36 years past had made our day!

What's the oldest bottle of wine you have ever drunk? What did it taste like?

Making the most of what you have.

We just returned from a 4 day safari in Samburu National Reserve in northern Kenya. Usually when we go on safari we choose the "self-drive" option. On this trip we decided to treat ourselves to a fly-in package - we flew from Wilson airport in Naiorbi to a small airstrip in Buffalo Springs National Reserve (adjacent to Samburu) and were collected by our lodge (Elephant Bedroom Camp). We were then treated to 2 game drives a day in an open sided (and open roofed) safari vehicle, and all meals (3 course lunch and 4 course dinner).

I will be writing a full "travel blog" about the safari itself over the next few days. For this posting I'd like to reflect on some curious behaviors and habits I observed amongst the wildlife over the last few days.

One of the biggest advantages of one of these "all-inclusive" safari packages is that you are provided with a vehicle AND a driver. In the self-drive version I am usually the driver which can really cramp my photography style, so having a large vehicle with open sides and top was a great aid to getting some good shots. In Samburu (as with most parks in Kenya) the proportion of people on "self-drive" safari's is very low, with most vehicles we encountered driven by professional safari guides. Many of these tourists were on photographic safari's - game viewing with the primary purpose of photographing the animals.

Elephant Bedroom Camp Landrover

On the morning of our third day we encountered a Southern Lesser Kudu doe with her calf. We also encountered 2 photo safari vehicles. The two safari vehicles each had 3 photographers, each person sporting a long lens of between 400 and 800mm of zoom. As we sat watching the buck (and as I tried to line up the best shot) amongst the sounds of nature I heard the click-click-click of shutters firing at 4 to 6 frames per second. I realized in that moment that we were Wildlife Paparazzi candidly capturing every movement the buck made.

Lens envy is defined (by me :-) as "a feeling of discontent or covetousness with regard to another's photographic lenses", and I for a few brief moments felt it! Many of the people were using the same lens that I have - Canon 100 - 400mm, but there were a few with even longer lenses - I saw 2 people with Canon 800mm lenses (they cost about USD 11,000). I could just imagine the images I could snap with a nice long lens like that in my camera bag (although a lens that long usually has its own bag :-)

Some of the lenses in question

Later in the day, when we encountered a small pride of lions and still later when I had a very close (photographic) encounter with a leopard I realized that the secret to good wildlife photography is not dreaming about the shots you could take with a better lens, but actually taking the best photo that you can when the opportunity presents itself. You might have the longest zoom and the best camera set-up, but you could be parked with a tree or bush in front of you!  

For all of the big cats, we had the best photographic spots - no obscuring trees or bushes and with the cats either looking at us or facing us! We were in the right place at the right time - something that money can't buy you.  

Happy Lionesses

Cheetah cub

Lounging Leopard

A new blog?

Hi All

Growing up I never managed to keep a diary. I tried once or twice, but it always failed. The failure wasn't a spectacular nor catastrophic one, the diary just kind of faded away. Perhaps self-discipline was a cause, but in all honesty I never really saw the value in writing to myself - isn't that a bit like talking to yourself after all?

Blogging I suppose shares some elements of diary writing (especially if like this new blog you have no followers ;-). My previous blogs have gone the same route of my diaries - faded to black somewhere in a desk drawer. If I couldn't sustain a diary, will I manage to sustain a blog? Time will tell no doubt, however I think I have the necessary elements to make it work:

1. Something to say (I'm older and wiser).
2. A love (perhaps just a like) of writing.
3. Access to blogging technology.

Hopefully over time I'll add Number 4 - An audience! (otherwise I will be talking to myself again).

The next question you're probably asking is, what is this Blog about?

As an avid photographer (to see my work go to my Flickr page), I love to change the way I look at my world by fiddling with the focus. As I have got older and matured as a person I have come to realize that my world view, my area of focus differs from everyone else around me. I'm not suggesting that my view is special or peculiar in any way, just that it's my unique view point.

The word Bit has many definitions. I mean "a small piece or quantity of anything". Another meaning of Bit which is also appropriate for this blog is a binary digit, the basic unit of information in computing and telecommunications.

This blog - The Bit in Focus will be my narrative of my journey through this life. It will definitely contain examples of my photographs and the journeys I take to capture them (some physical, some metaphysical), there will be cooking (and eating). There will be fun and laughter, but also the occasional sad and somber moment. In short, I intend it to be a snap shot of my life, but since I am the photographer I get to choose what you see!

Join me on the journey?!