the home of david tran (his second home, I guess his third home).
So I got back on Monday after a flight delay that left us in Hong Kong and Shanghai for a forgettable day. Apparently Iceland received record snowfalls this Winter, so we didn’t get to see the best of an Icelandic Winter, oh well I was expecting snow any way, and we did get a couple [...]
So, another year over, another one just begun, I spent the past four days up in the Westfjords, which were very scenic although I didn’t get to see much of them because of the weather, also I was kind of working. So I was stuck inside most of the time, and didn’t get to go [...]
Merry Xmas to everyone out there, hopefully you’ve had or are having a very peaceful time. I’ve had xmas’ away from home before, but this is the first one ever in the northern hemisphere, and I’m pretty far north. It really is Winter here, and a white Xmas as well, a little too white for [...]
It seems my beloved DA21 has failed me once again, after getting it repaired to fix an issue with focusing close to and at infinity, only a couple hundred snaps later and it seems the issue has reared it’s ugly head again. This time unfortunately, I don’t have the recourse to take it to the [...]
Iceland is in the Arctic right? Well, I’m off to Paris first anyway for my first taste of Europe and a properly cold Winter, New Zealand was cold but it was only really cold on top of the mountains. Well, I’m now here in Gay Paris, and it’s anywhere between 1 and 5 degrees celsius, [...]
I just got another request for use of one of my pictures from flickr which reminded me that I had a previous request a few months ago, so I had a bit of a google to see what ever happened with that. I did manage to find the site and picture with credit to me [...]
I got this box about a month ago now and have been testing it out for a while now, I haven’t gone out of my way to test the read/write speeds because it’s not a big deal as long as playback is fast enough. I’m not that nerdy to set up my own NAS using [...]
No, I have not renovated my flat, I’ve just repainted the study walls and given it a bit of pizazz. I was originally thinking that the colours would be somewhat grey with a slight blue tint. The end result is a much bluer colour than I originally imagined, we were using the colour of a [...]
Yes, I know it’s now the middle of October, but these pictures were taken in September, and I’ve only just finally managed to finish processing them and now to upload them. Anyway, the first is of Flinders Street Station taken from across the road in front of the church (it might be St. Paul’s I [...]
It was the Around the Bay Festival yesterday, and I signed up for the 210km ride, from Melbourne to Queenscliff, riding a ferry across to Sorrento, and then cycling back to the finish line in Melbourne. I’ll say that I was disappointed with the result, but in the end, thinking about the circumstances, the time [...]
Well, I haven't posted here for almost a month, and now it comes to this! Well, I'm not shutting down dtracorp.com, but I think that it's time to move on to something more substantial. I shut down the gallery last year, and now I've pretty much decided that I will not continue the blog, well, the blog at this URL anyway....
I've never actually ever sat down and watched one of the previous Planet of the Apes films in their entirety, I've seen bits of the original, maybe the sequel to that, fair sized chunks of the Mark Walhberg version, the Planet of the Apes musical from the Simpsons (an all-time classic, Doctor Zaius, Doctor Zaius, ohhhhh Doctor Zaius!), and I think that I've pieced together the storyline and plot pretty much. The planet (Earth) has been taken over by super-intelligent apes who have enslaved what remains of mankind. So with that in mind, I went to see Rise of the Planet of the Apes with the expectation of finding out how the apes became super-intelligent....
It's been Winter here the past couple of months and so that's been my excuse for not having gone out and taken more photos. These photos were pretty much taken in June, and maybe the start of July, I know, we're in the middle of August now, but it's been a bit wet, a bit miserable, a bit depressing, and I'm not that keen on chasing photos when it's a bit cold and dark. Hopefully the weather starts clearing up and getting warmer, and combined with the longer days I will be able to hit the roads again and find some nice locations around Melbourne to take some photos before the end of the year....
Man, I haven't posted anything here in a few weeks, and then I come and post something that I always dread. For the first time in almost two years I've had a scrape on the road and come off my bike, it was pretty much totally my fault 
. I was riding on the left hand side of the left lane of a two lane road, the lights had just changed green so I was expecting a bit of an acceleration....
In a battle of the bridesmaids (only just realised yesterday), the runners-ups of the previous four Tours de France went head to head in the time trial last night for all the marbles, and Cadel finally had everything go his way. The tour has been unbelievably exciting this year, even more so than two years ago when Lance Armstrong came back, and then last year when Andy Schleck was pusing Contador, it always just seemed like Contador would have enough. This year however, it just seemed to have that edge of uncertainty, Contador obviously didn't have the legs in the end, but you could never be sure, and then the Schlecks you thought would be the ones that could really take advantage, but they didn't seem as consistently strong as last year....
OK, so there's a lockout at the moment so no one really cares about this stuff (and probably no one cares about this anyway). But, I remember seeing this play as a highlight on some NBA web site, watching it, and just thinking, this is how NBA players are so good, they don't actually have to obey the laws of the game all the time.Now, this isn't anything as blatant as Lebron's crab dribble, but this is pretty obvious I would think to anyone actually watching the game. Now maybe the players don't get away with this kind of thing as they are growing up and playing in smaller leagues, but who knows, they get to the NBA, and all of a sudden, the refs don't bother, it probably is a part of the spectacle I guess, they don't want to stop games for strict rulings....
It's been a while since I've done a movie review, I haven't seen anything of particular interest so nothing worth reviewing I guess. Anyway, went and saw the latest in the line of X-Men movies, this one being a prequel to the trilogy that came out earlier. It is based around the meeting of Professor X and Magneto during the cold war....
Not sure if I will be able (or bothered) to process any photos that I have taken recently, though I do have a backlog for a couple weeks worth to upload to flickr at the moment. So in a couple weeks there will be a break from posting new photos, so I thought I'd post this now and get it out of the way. These pictures were taken over the Easter long weekend, a couple similar ones have already been posted to flickr, with one more to go, which I'll probably post tomorrow....
Decided to buy one of these while the Australian dollar was high, still is I guess. The main reason being that I can't trust my iphone to have enough power to run gps on some longer journeys (ie. more than 2-3 hours), and also for use overseas and in areas where the phone doesn't get a good signal....
Well, after a torturous four weeks (or so) without proper internet at home, I'm finally back, I do apologise for the lack of updates here, but that couldn't really be helped. Anyway, so I made the switch from the TPG offnet plan to the unlimited plan so I don't have to be watching the stupid clock all the time now, I can just go with freedom. Meanwhile, with all this time with no internet, I've been able to brood and to stew for a while about a few things that have really irked me, and so I thought what better time to vent than now....
So we went on the annual IT retreat last week, a changed venue for the first time in a few years, we went down to the home of Australian golf, Moonah Links. Fortunately, we didn't have to torture ourselves with a round of golf, I took my camera, but didn't get a chance to go down to the beach for some wonderfully generic, yet obviously beautiful sunset shots (and obviously I was never going to get up for a sunrise shot which would've been in the other direction so probably wouldn't have worked anyway)....
So the last photo I posted on flickr I also took in bracketed mode, after reveiwing the shots I decided that the silhouette shot was probbably the way to go. Even so, I thought I'd process the bracketed shots to see how they turned out. To be honest, I think the tone mapped shot is pretty good, just with a couple of issues....
As promised, I have uploaded non-HDR (well, non-tone mapped) versions of the last three pictures that I uploaded to flickr. They are single exposures taken from the bracketed shots I took last week. I processed them the same way I would normally, picking the one (from three) that would produce the best result....
It's a dtraCorp double hit! So I learnt this recipe while I was in Peru (not when I went to Mexico ha!), and from our tour guide on the Inca Jungle Trek of all people. We were pretty much at the last stop before hitting Machu Picchu, and had stopped for lunch before making our way to Aguas Calientes for the night (and Machu Picchu in the dark early morning)....
OK, so I've finally pretty much got all my furnishings complete, so I can post some pictures of my interior decorating. The idea is to keep it as simple as possible (I think), don't want to fill the place up with crap that I don't need. No pictures of the kitchen, I mean, who really cares what's in there (a borrowed fridge and dining table FYI), or the bathroom (normal stuff plus a washing machine), or the study (computer desk, and bicycles), or even my bedroom (bed and drawers)....
I was notified of the availability of davidtran.org a couple days ago, and jumped on it on the spot. It seems that I get three domains for free in my dreamhost package, I'll probably have to pay for it next year, but it's not much anyway. I've been wanting davidtran.net for a while, but it seems that that one is being hogged by some other David Tran....
So I rode in this last Sunday, it was just a 40km fun ride really, but it's for a good cause, to support people with Multiple Sclerosis, and the course was good. It was very busy which did take away from the day a bit, but at least the weather held up for the most part, only got rained on in the last couple hundred metres from home. Went over the West Gate Bridge again, which is fun, although the view is not particularly special....
It's been a busy period the past few days, so I'm only finally able to post my review of this film now. Starring Jeff Bridges, Matt Damon, and some little girl (I do my research well, don't I?), it's directed by the Coen brothers and is based in the midwest (I guess) of the US during the late 1800's (possibly, the wild, wild west period anyway). The gunslingers, cowboys and Indians, sheriffs, and US marshals abound in this one, some cool scenery, and interesting camera work, as well as some great acting, and direction (I guess) make this a really cool film to watch....
Yes, so I've finally achieved the true Australian dream of owning my very own hammock frame (with accompanying hammock), so I thought I'd post a bit about that. If you can actually believe that I managed to put this hammock frame together with my own bare hands, I don't have any pictures of me doing it, just the finished product, the hammock frame I bought last week to finally go with my hammock that I got in Mexico, but never had a place to put it. So, after pondering the situation, the likelihood of my getting a nicely shaded tree on my own property seemed unlikely, I decided to go for this hammock frame....
Again, it's been a while since I watched a new film at the cinema, and for whatever reason, it's another one based in Massachusetts, USA. It seems that a lot of these gritty, blue collar type stories are coming from that area and being turned into films, the last one being "The Town". Anyway, back to The Fighter, a story about a couple of brothers (Mark Walhberg and Christian Bale), boxers from the neighbourhood or Lowell, Massachusetts, chasing a dream....
