People in KL

A bank holiday in any big city means that it's quieter and a lot nicer to walk around and that's what I've done.

Armed with my new Olympus TG-4, I wanted to give it a try and figure out how it works and where it struggles.

I found the controls to be pretty easy and the handling quite decent overall. While I considered a GoPro for my use in the rain and on a motorbike, I found the image quality of them to be very por and the handling really bad for anything other than mounting it on a helmet.

The TG-4 at least works well as a camera first and also offers the ruggedness I wanted and managed to put to a bit of use in a rain shower today.

Given, so far all photos I've taken with the TG-4 and all situations I've used it in the GR would have done a much better job and survived the rain, too.

I was tempted to get the wide angle adapter for the TG-4 but it makes the camera too bulky and the lens is actually much wider than 25mm thanks to the distortion but if you use the RAW files you can get more in your frame.

On a side note, I honestly wanted to post a more diverse set of photos and not just street photography to show off the TG-4 but I did end up liking these more.

In Kuala Lumpur

After arriving in Kuala Lumpur last night, I had to go to the Vietnamese embassy in the morning but before that I met up with Björn.

After enjoying a chat and sorting stuff out at the embassy, we've checked out a camera store where I ended up buying a new camera.

Much has been said about what the best camera is and usually people always try to improve the image quality when they buy a new camera. For me it was different this time round.
After being in Asia for 3 months I realised that my needs and requirements on my cameras have changed.

So instead of buying a Sony a7 type camera, I went for an Olympus TG-4 instead. My most used camera ended up being the Ricoh GR thanks t the small size but the only drawback was that I didn't want to risk it out in torrential rain or rick dropping it while on my motorbike.

The TG-4 seemed the ideal camera for this use and after using it for the first half day I have to say it's doing a good job and it's a nice camera without even having to rely on the waterproof and shockprof features.

In the Clouds

Since my Vietnam visa expired today, I had to take a trip somewhere so I decided to go to Kuala Lumpur for a few days. It wasn't quite the ideal time to go but on the other hand a holiday is never a bad thing.

Rainy Drive to Da Nang

A rain soaked and cold drive from Hue to Da Nang still provided for some nice photographic opportunities and was still fun.

Street Seller

OPO, f2.0, 1/17, ISO 5285, JPG

Hue Roundabout

GR, f6.3, 1/320, ISO 1100, RAW

Coffee Time

OPO, f2.0, 1/33, ISO 1088, JPG

Pen

OPO, f2.0, 1/33, ISO 1188, JPG

Sitting on the Steps

OPO, f2.0, 1/17, ISO 5285, JPG

Walk Along the Beach

R-D1, f5.6, 1/250, ISO 200, RAW, 42mm (Ricoh GR f2.8 28mm LTM)

River Music

OPO, f2.0, 1/17, ISO 5286, JPG

Hue Panorama

OPO, f2.0, ISO 100, JPG

By the Lake

R-D1, f8.0, 1/119, ISO 200, RAW, 42mm (Ricoh GR f2.8 28mm LTM)

Street Corner

R-D1, f2.8, 1/125, ISO 1600, RAW, 42mm (Ricoh GR f2.8 28mm LTM)

Brickworks

This is just a bit of advertising next to some photography to show the nice bokeh of the Jupiter-8 lens.
Just showing some progress on my soon to pen coffee shop in Hue. So if you're in Hue come and visit from mid. November and check out the Facebook page for more updates here.

Construction Machine

GXR A12-M, f5.6, 1/3500, ISO 200, RAW, 75mm (Jupiter-8 f2.0 50mm LTM)

A Drive Around Hue

I finally had one day off and time to go for a drive around Hue on my motorbike, I really missed that after being busy or it's been raining in the past weeks here.

I did take my Epson R-D1 along to get a change in cameras although the GR is easier to use when driving.

It's been a great drive on some small dirt roads in the middle of nowhere before heading to a park overlooking the river to get some photos of the sunset.

I will have to take more drives like this in the next weeks and take more photos around Hue.

University Concert

GR, f2.8, 1/125, ISO 1600, RAW

Mid-Autumn Lion Dance

When you hear drumming and see traffic jams everywhere in Hue, it's not the daily rush hour as you would think coming from London but the Mid-Autumn Festival.

The Mid-Autumn or Moon Festival gets celebrated in quite a few countries in Asia but in Vietnam it mostly means Lion Dances everywhere. There is also Moon cake of course but mostly it's about Lion Dances.

People drive around in small lorries with all their gear ready to hop off and perform their dance routine in front of shops and restaurants.

This means that as soon as they start dancing it will cause a traffic jam and even the police trying to regulate this is not very successful.

It's pretty cool to see overall and good fun. It's funny how many different Lion Dance groups there are and you see sometimes 3 or 4 different teams all around the same area.