Saturday, January 23, 2010

Choke Good Fun at Kaka'ako Park

The day started with me and Wendell going to Servco Toyota to look for a new car for me. We did end up getting a Rav4! Yay!! The process took so long though that I ended being half an hour late for an outing Erick and I had planned for tonight at Kakaako Park. I hate being late.

By the time I arrived Erick and Hiromi had already set up their tripods and were ready to capture sunset pictures. Marvin, CQ and Kaori were waiting for me by the parking lot. Although Marvin couldn't stay long, he still waited for me. What a pal, yeah!! One of the first things on tonight's agenda was to try and continue my quest for capturing the bursting balloon on camera. It wouldn't have been the same without Marvin.


We hurriedly filled a few balloons with water.
Several from-the-top approaches never seemed to work.
For this attempt Marvin tried a smaller balloon with a from-the-side approach.
Hoooo hooooo!!! Our best result ever!
One more try . . .
EVEN BETTER!!! YAHOOOOOOO!!!!! Thank you so much for coming, Marvin. Sorry you got all wet, and sorry to keep you waiting.
Marvin had to leave shortly thereafter, but Kaori provided me with more shooting ops with her bubble-making skills.
CQ and Kaori said that the secret to making good bubbles is in the dish-washing liquid. They said you have to use Dawn . . . um . . . something about the blue one.
As it got darker we tried our hand at light-drawing photography. It took me awhile to get going. At first I couldn't get the autofocus to work. It was too dark. Then I couldn't get the timing right.
Hiromi turned out to be a really good light drawer. This was one of her first attempts. Light drawing is hard because the drawer uses a flashlight to draw in the air and cannot actually see any picture. The picture is only captured by the camera.
As she got used to it, she got better and better.
Then Erick got the idea to fire his flash using second-curtain sync (something like that) where your flash fires at the end of the shot, so that we could capture Hiromi in the picture along with her drawing.
Previous pictures were taken facing the ocean. We turned our cameras around so that we could capture the vog-strouded city lights with Hiromi and her light drawing.
Soooo neat, hah!
Here's Erick's creation.
This is suppose to be a star. Hahahahaha!!
We finally packed up at about 8:00 and met up again at Asahi Grill for dinner. This is Hiromi's Chopped Steak. She said that it was very good.
Erick's Oxtail Soup. It was kinda intriguing watching him eat it. He had this system where he would put some meat, a little bit of parsley, ginger, and soup onto his spoon and then eat. Then he would put some rice, some parsley, ginger and soup onto the spoon and then eat that. It was mesmerizing.
This is my Miso Ramen. It was good except the miso was under all the noodles. I thought they had gotten the order wrong until I reached the bottom of the bowl. I still liked it though.

18 comments:

K and S said...

awesome shots, you should check out this video out on you tube.

jalna said...

Thanks Kat! I loooove that video!

Betty Townsend said...

Congratulations on your new wheels!! Post pictures! Those light drawing pictures are awesome!! Have to show Gerry the one of the bicycle. The food looks really ono too!!

jalna said...

Thanks Betty! Hiromi surprised us with her drawing talent. I like do that again! It was fun checking out our viewfinder to see her results after each drawing attempt. I'll post pictures of my car later. I had wanted to get a Corolla cause it was the easiest for me to maneuver, but Wendell looked all squooshed up in it. I tried the Camry but I couldn't tell where the back of the car ended when reversing. So . . . got the Rav4. I'm a totally sucky driver, so I've been really, really nervous driving it.

Leslie's pics said...

ooooooooooooh da neat!! Sorry I missed it, too busy stuffing my face! Can't wait to meet the new car :)

Hiromi said...

Nice capture of balloon! I checked Pikapika and gave me some idea of what I want to draw next. That was fun!!

Betty Townsend said...

Boy, I hear you about driving. We've had the van almost a year and I am still not comfortable driving it. I get nervous backing out of parking spaces although I have a thing in the back bumper that beeps when I get too close to something. Not working anymore, I don't drive as much. Bummer!!

Oh, I forgot to say too the shots of Marvin and the ballons are pretty awesome too!! He is such a willing partner!

jalna said...

Hopefully you can join us next time, Les.

Thanks Hiromi! Can't wait to see your light drawings again.

Betty, I test drove 3 cars and I made sure I tried reversing into tight stalls with each of them.

Yosh808 said...

Woo Hoo!! Yay! But aww man...da food looks good! Too bad I couldn't stay! Wah!

jalna said...

We finally did it, Yosh!!!

Randism said...

wow; da lite drawings are so kooool! iz it simply a matter of making a long exposure? an da wata baloon pics are cool too but yikes! i neva know your arms get so much hair!!! ha! ha!

celia said...

What a great post!
Your successful balloon shot is just awesome. I am so glad you were persistent. Unable to find words to describe the effect.
Hiromi's light art is so cool. That is talent.
From a fellow RAV4 driver - I am glad you have one.

jalna said...

Rand, yeah we used long exposure for the light drawings. Erick has a shutter cable so he could just set his camera on "bulb" and he just released when Hiromi was pau. I set my camera for 30 seconds.

Thanks Celia. I really want to do the light drawing again. Maybe you can join us next time.

Unknown said...

Wow! Hiromi draws awsome in the air! That is SOOO neat! The next day, Kaori figured out how to make the huge kine bubbles without POPPIN it! Damn, shoulda stayed.. Your food looks better than what WE ate afterwards! Can someone say McNuggets?!

jalna said...

I know CQ. Everytime we would look on our LCD of the camera to see what would show up we would go, "WOW!!!" I like do more bubble shots!

Erick said...

Wow, what an event filled day. New car, perfect balloon shot, cool bubble shots, fantastic light painting shots and the perfect ending, great food! A day to remember. I can't figure out how they shot the Pikapika video. We need to give it a try since we already have the light painting artist.

Jose Roces Photography said...

That looks fun. I love oxtail soup. Where's a good place to eat it?

jalna said...

Erick, it was a really fun excursion! We probably gotta put together still shots to make the video. Wonder if it's worth trying to figure out.

Jose, Erick really enjoyed his oxtail soup from Asahi Grill.