Author Archives: Tedy Tirtawidjaja

Lenovo Idepad Y450 In A Glance

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Yesterday I just received this notebook, Lenovo Ideapad Y450. It belongs to my friend’s office. He asked me to prepare this notebook before being used by his employee. It was my pleasure to testing this gadget for the first time, start from opened the box and so on 😀 Quiet surprise when see the spesification listed on the box, I think it was very powerfull notebook. For the price around 8 million rupiahs, I think Ideapad Y450 can compete with other brand….at least in my mind I’ll choose this one for that price. With the elegant design and powerfull engine it serves the user with great computing and entertainment environment. Before touch the system, I prepare the photo session for this notebook. Trying how difficult the product photography :-p Only used Speedlite 430EX II and its diffuser, I shot and the result are like you see in this post.

Lenovo Ideapad Y450 has Centrino Duo processor, this type has 2.2 GHz Core™2 Duo Processor T6600 (with front size bus as big as 800MHz, and 2MB L2 Cache). Those CPU feel more fast with 2GB DDR3 memory. Very powerfull desktop replacement for standar office usage. For storage, Ideapad Y450 has large space 320GB hard drive installed. For connectivity reason, we can find many interfaces. Gigabit Ethernet for local area network connectivity (goodbye 10/100Mbps Ethernet), Wifi, Bluetooth, and plus the old type Infrared port. Very complete connectivity solutions.

I always like the keyboard on Lenovo’s keyboard. The same with its predecessor, IBM Thinkpad, Lenovo has excellent keyboard. I like to type using that kind of notebook. The buttons are soft and easy to press. The touchpad also good. Although almost all the body made by glossy material, Lenovo make the touchpad with textured material. I like the textured material, make me easy to handle the cursor. The other brand like Compaq, I’ve tested it before, has the touchpad with same material with the body. It’s not easy to use the mouse made with glossy material. Ideapad Y450 has two major colors, white and brownish black with a red striped at the edge of lid. The cover of the screen (back of the lid) has textured coating, very elegant. Its screen has 14.1 inch WXGA. On the top of the screen we can found 1 tiny 1.3 Megapixels webcam.

This machine also has dual layer DVD writer. There are also 3 USB 2.0 ports, 1 E-sata/ USB combo, and 34mm Express Card slot. There is also one 6-in-1 Multi-card Reader slot that support several types of multimedia card. I like the idea to put the dummy card to secure the multimedia slot, to open it just press the dummy card to open the slot. Above the keyboard, there are several shortcut button, not ordinary button but touch-sensitive slide bar. If we put Windows as operating system, Lenovo provide the software to configure those slide bar. I don’t test this feature yet, but see it on Lenovo website I see the slide bar will produce shortcut with animation effect just like dock bar in Macintosh operating system. Some part of the body will illuminate when the computer turned on. For example, the Ideapad logo in the corner (below the Intel logo) illuminate when the computer turned on.

For entertainment purpose, Ideapad Y450 has nice stereo speaker. By default, I can hear the nice welcome sound when I just powered the notebook up. I think there is a parameter in the BIOS to choose whether we want to turn on this welcome sound or not. Just a quick guess. You can see the logo Dolby sound system logo in the left corner, followed by “Home Theater” text. According to Lenovo website, this notebook designed for family entertainment, that’s why Lenovo put the nice speaker system in. The speakers (2 Watt each) are located near the screen hinges.

I don’t know how’s the battery performance. As far as I know, Lenovo has good temperature control which makes the bottom of the notebook cool enough although it works for several hours. Ideapad packed with separate battery, it wasn’t installed yet. But it is easy to installed the battery pack. After put the battery in correct position don’t forget to set the battery lock to “Locked” position to safe the battery position. With the battery, Ideapad Y450 will be 2.1kg in weight…quite heavy for me.

If I want to buy notebook, I’ll pass this beautifull notebook because of its white body….it will be dirty fast 🙂 White body has elegent look but it need more clean handling unless your white keyboard will turn to yellow soon :-p In the packaging, Lenovo only provide Windows Vista driver only. Some of the drivers work on Windows XP too. Some part need Windows XP spesific driver, VGA card is one of them. I can download the driver from Lenovo official website.

Same like other new notebook, by default Lenovo Ideapad set the harddrive in SATA AHCI mode. I’ve experienced this issue some time ago, I wrote it here. So when I tried to install Windows XP, I got the blue screen when installation begin. But I was happy to know that on BIOS there is a menu to turn off SATA mode and switch to SATA Compatibility (IDE mode). Windows XP installation process ran well after set that to IDE mode.

Overall in my opinion, this is the best choice for buyer who has 8 millions budget.

Hunting With Professional Photo

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Sunday morning I went to Kota Tua Jakarta to join photo hunting. Hunting held by Professional Photo studio July 13, 2009. Kota Tua is a famous location in Jakarta for photographic activities. Kota Tua means “old city”, it’s a conservation district in Jakarta that has many colonial building, heritage from Dutch when conquered Indonesia over 350 years. Leave my home at 6 am and arrived there 20 minutes later. In Sunday morning, Kota Tua area was so busy, many people went there to many purpose. Some of them did sport activity (soccer, badminton, cycling, etc), the others just walking around, and some others like me taken photos.

The centre of those activities is Fatahillah Museum’s front yard. Fatahillah Museum was Hunting finished around 9 am since the sun start shined too bright. I only used 50mm lens during photo hunting. Since I only used 50mm lens, I must chose the unique object that fit to the frame 😀 It was my first time going to Kota Tua to take pictures. I’ve heard (and read) about Kota Tua regarding the photographic activities. My friend Fendi also recommend me to go there. Not like him who go hunting regulary, I never go photo hunting at Jakarta. Too lazy to go hunting 🙁 The only photo hunting that I did (before today) was last December at Singapore. It was the first time I used DSLR camera just after bought it at Sim Lim mall Singapore. Here is the result of my hunting :

I’ve upload the rest of the photos at Flickr. Hmm, I don’t know yet how to integrate my album at Flickr with my blog 🙁 I should find it out immediately, because it’s very stupid to upload the photo twice….on at Flickr and also at Picasa as well. Until now I only know how to put the picture in blog from Picasa, but I like Flickr as well. Ah forget one other place : Facebook. I’ve also put some of my photo at Facebook, never change the wall post or wall status but only upload some photo there. Not like many people I know that very addict to change wall post (status) :-p Ups….out of topic, just want to tell you about my photo hunting activity not to share my opinion about Facebook 😀

Shadowless Photograph

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Have a lot of time today, I tried to shoot my pocket camera Nikon Coolpix L14. One year old camera which has been accompanying me when travel to a lot of places. I bought this camera last year (February 16th, 2008). It always hangs on my belt every time I go, even when I go to the office.

To shoot my camera I’ve no mini studio yet. I just want to explore my external flash, Canon Speedlite 430EX. So I prepare the environment before shooting. I just used a sheet of white paper. It was laid on the a pile of books closed to the wall. Some part of that paper reclined to the wall. Placing my Coolpix in certain angle and shoot it with my EOS 1000D with Speedlite 400EX II too. I used Lambency flash diffuser as well. I arranged the Coolpix in such position so that only white floor & background seen. Using the external flash with diffuser, I can get the minimum shadow below/beside/behind the object. Maybe my next experiment will using the other light source on both sides of the object. It will minimize the shadow much more. I don’t know why the result of background is not white enough, a little bit grey I think. Some possibilities there : the paper is not 100% white, my diffuser spread the light with some color effect, I used incorrect white balance, the room light gives those color effect, or maybe my picture style was not correct.

Overall, I’m satisfied with the result. It makes me know better about the importance of lighting in photography. I can get a shadowless photograph with correct lighting. No matter what kind of light sources we used, the angle of the incoming light should be in perfect ways to achieve best result. How about my picture on that picture? Ah it’s just a simple touch using GIMP (Photoshop-like software in Linux). I crop the LCD part of the Coolpix picture and put my picture as a layer behind the main layer. The idea of this composition taken from Ken Rockwell’s website. Of course my picture is not comparable than his pictures :-p

Soal Potong Rambut

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Foto ini diambil tadi siang oleh rekan kantor saya, Bu Timmie. Ceritanya hari ini saya bawa kamera DSLR ke kantor karena permintaan manajer saya, Bu Titi. Beliau punya ide untuk memotret semua karyawan Eservglobal untuk dijadikan album foto. Album foto itu nantinya akan dijadikan hadiah kenang-kenangan untuk Laurence, salah satu karyawan Eservglobal yang kena perampingan karyawan, bahasa halus untuk PHK (lah kalau PHK itu bahasa halus untuk apa?). Sayang tidak semua karyawan datang ke kantor, sebagian pergi ke customer sementara yang lain sedang cuti. Jepret sana jepret sini, tapi tidak ada yang memotret saya 🙁 Bu Timmie berbaik hati memotretkan.

Karena saya upload di Flickr, Jennifer teman saya berkomentar tentang foto ini. katanya sudah saatnya saya potong rambut. Ah iya rupanya cukup banyak orang yang memperhatikan kalau rambut saya sudah mulai gondrong. Pulang ke Cirebon akhir pekan lalu pun tidak sedikit orang yang berkomentar soal rambut saya, kenapa belum potong rambut. Terakhir saya potong rambut 2 November 2008 lalu, lebih dari 8 bulan lalu. Kok ingat? Soalnya saya masih simpan fotonya, terdokumentasi dengan baik kapan saya potong rambut di 2008 🙂 Tahun lalu saya beberapa kali potong rambut sampai botak. Tidak sampai botak licin, tapi cukup “memalukan”, tapi saya pede aja tuh botak juga. Keliling Indonesia juga berbotak ria. Foto ini misalnya, masih botak dipotret di Surabaya Mei tahun lalu. Tahun 2009 ini saya malah belum pernah potong rambut. Alasannya simpel….malas pergi potong rambut. Bukan pergi ke Jhonny Andrean atau Joni Danuarta sih, cuma pergi ke tukang pangkas rambut di Pasar Timbul (beberapa ratus meter dari kos saya). Murah meriah Rp8000,- daripada ke Jhonny Andrean harus bayar Rp50.000,- :-p

Beberapa hari lalu saya jadi iseng berpikir bagaimana jadinya kalau 2009 ini saya tidak potong rambut sama sekali. Seumur-umur saya belum pernah memanjangkan rambut. Pasti ada saja yang menegur, entah guru di sekolah atau orang tua di rumah. Di kantor saya sepertinya tidak ada larangan memanjangkan rambut. Mungkin ada tapi sebatas etika sopan santun dan kepantasan. Eh tapi apakah berambut gondrong itu sama dengan tidak sopan? Ah tapi rasanya saya masih rapih…masih rajin pula menyisir rambut, meskipun ketombe masih di mana-mana =)) Let’s see…akankah saya bertahan tidak potong rambut sampai 31 Desember 2009 nanti.

Wedding Shoot

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Ceritanya akhir pekan lalu saya pulang ke Cirebon. Sepupu saya menikah di Cirebon. Kesempatan memotret bagi saya, kesempatan juga mencoba Speedlite dan diffuser-nya juga 😀 Tidak gampang memotret momen pernikahan. Apalagi saya hanya bermodal lensa fix 50mm. Untuk zoom in saya harus mendekat ke objek, untuk memotret beberapa orang sekaligus saya harus mundur jauh ke belakang. Untung mundur-mundur tidak sampai terjebur kolam…ah emangnya filmnya Dono Kasino Indro :))

Sebenarnya saya agak segan memotret di tengah acara seperti itu, karena sudah ada fotografernya. Untungnya lensa 50mm saya punya aperture cukup besar, sehingga saya masih bisa memotret tanpa harus menggunakan flash. Agak ragu juga saya menggunakan flash, takut mengganggu fotografer aslinya. Saya kan bukan fotografer resmi acara nikahan itu, malu mengganggu mereka. Untung juga lampu sorot milik fotografernya cukup kuat, foto di samping ini misalnya cukup menggunakan f/4 dengan ISO 800. Hmm niatan awal mencoba flash eksternal jadi dialihkan untuk memotret kerabat yang kebetulan datang di acara resepsi. Motret pengantinnya (seperti foto di samping ini) malah hampir semuanya tidak pakai flash sama sekali.

Ngomong-ngomong soal mengganggu fotografer resmi, tadi malam saya tanpa sengaja membaca postingan di forum fotografi (Fotografer.net) tentang keluh kesah salah satu wedding photographer. Ceritanya dia sebagai fotografer acara pernikahan merasa terganggu dengan adanya fotografer-fotografer lain yang ikut memotret di tengah acara. Ramai juga diskusi di forum itu, beberapa komentar juga mengiyakan pengalaman mereka memotret acara pernikahan dengan “selingan” fotografer tidak resmi. Fotografer tidak resmi bisa saja yang amatiran, fotografer beneran yang dibawa sebagai tambahan oleh pihak keluarga pengantin, atau bisa juga kerabat/saudara yang ikut memotret. Walah saya jadi berpikir, jangan-jangan apa yang saya lakukan kemarin mengganggu fotografer resmi acara nikahan kemarin itu (padahal paragraf pertama dan kedua sudah saya tulis di draft sejak hari Senin tapi belum selesai-selesai)

Flash back sebentar saya ingat-ingat apa saja yang saya lakukan. Hmm rasaanya saya motret pengantin tanpa flash, flash saya pakai juga sih tapi saat si fotografer tidak sedang memotret, rasanya saya berdiri tidak menghalangi area jepretan (frame) si fotografer….rasa-rasanya sih saya tidak mengganggu. Gak tau juga kalau ternyata fotografernya dongkol lihat saya motret-motret :-p Tapi saya penasaran juga dengan topik ini. Jadi saya putuskan untuk coba melemparkan topik di forum tentang apakah bolehkah memotret di tengah acara pernikahan. Sekadar ingin tahu pendapat mereka yang sehari-hari berkecimpung sebagai wedding photographer. Hampir semua komentar yang masuk mengatakan boleh-boleh saja seorang pehobi foto seperti saya mengambil foto di tengah acara pernikahan, tentunya dengan etika tertentu. Salah seorang anggota forum yang berprofesi sebagai wedding photographer menuliskan seperti ini :

  • Sudah mendapat izin dari yang punya hajat dan atau EO nya
  • Adanya komunikasi dengan fotografer utama, jika ada termasuk mengikuti aturan yang diterapkan fotografer utama.
  • Tidak menghalangi atau berdiri berlawanan dengan fotografer utama
  • Tidak mengganggu jalannya acara & mengganggu fotografer utama (mis. pemakaian flash yang malah mentrigger flash fotografer utama, jika ada slave flash)
  • Dapat menghargai fotografer utama dalam menjalankan tugas
  • Hanya mengingatkan kembali bahwa fotografer utama mempunyai tanggung jawab hasil foto yang baik utk klien nya sedangkan kita hanya sekedar ikut motret
  • Walaupun kita di minta bantuan / di sewa oleh salah satu mempelai, tetap harus komunikasi dan menghargai fotografer utama nya

Rangkuman yang bagus dan cukup menjawab pertanyaan saya. Dari sekian banyak daftar etika tadi, satu yang kemarin tidak saya lakukan : berkomunikasi dengan fotografer utamanya. Hmm mereka sibuk & saya segan untuk ijin motret (segan atau malu ya? 😀 ). Jadi pelajaran buat saya kalau memotret liputan yang punya fotografer resmi kudu ijin dulu sebelumnya.