Rambling on…

Michael Schumacher and family were on their way to the airport in a taxi. They were running late and Schumi decided to take the wheel.

…the former Formula One ace, plus his wife and two children, caught a taxi back to the airport they were short on time and, after a polite request, cab driver Tuncer Yilmaz watched in wonder as Schumacher took the wheel.

I bet the taxi driver woke up thinking that his day would be as usual as the rest. And he even got a tip for it!  AFP has the full story.

I was over at Bukit Jalil doing some photography (okay, okay… it was more like drooling) for the Xtreme Nights car show. As it was night event, the lighting conditions weren’t ideal. At one point, it was even threatening to rain, but thankfully, it stayed dry while I was there (apart from the puddles of saliva). Anyway, back to the point of this post, I realised a couple of things about the behaviour of my Nikon D70s while taking the pictures. Two things are particularly interesting for me:

1. Exposure Bias (EV) does affect Manual (M) mode

I always thought EV doesn’t affect the manual meter, afterall, you’re in FULL control. You decide what you want the camera to do, and you look at the exposure meter to decide how you want to expose the image. But actually, it does. Setting an exposure of -0.7EV and dialling in the controls for shutter speed (assuming the aperture is not changed), the shutter speed will be higher if you’re bringing the exposure meter to 0EV. This is confirmed in page 86 of the user manual.

2. Slow/Rear Flash Sync doesn’t limit your shutter speed

I always had the problem of the D70s hitting the 1/60s shutter limit set in the menu (in Aperture priority mode) when lighting conditions were difficult and a flash had to be used. This meant that the flash was always going to be the sole light source and that the resulting image wouldn’t be natural in its lighting. Setting the flash to either Slow sync or Rear sync solves this problem. Although now you’re faced with a longer shutter speed and steady hands (or a tripod) would be required.

Although I’ve used this camera for almost 2 years now, I’m still getting to grips with it. And I still love it to bits!

p/s: Yeah.. the pics will be coming soon.. once I get round to processing them. I went with tango, so go here for his shots…

Capcom’s still keeping hushed about the details of this new installment of Street Fighter, but at least they have teased us with a screenshot…

Ahh… returns me to the days where my friends always went to the arcades to play Street Fighter.. and I had to go home… sigh. Then I got my Sega Megadrive… and I could play it at home! But by then, they were playing Street Fighter 2 in the arcades….. SIGH. Anyway, more info at 1Up.

Michael Schumacher is coming out of retirement… but to test for Ferrari in their upcoming test in Barcelona, Spain. According to Ferrari, “It’s half for pleasure, half for technical reasons”.

Whatever it is, it will be interesting to see what his lap times are, after a year on the sidelines. Whilst he was driving, he was always known to drive at 101%.. and nothing less.

Michael Schumacher and Mika Hakkinen have really endeared themselves to their respective teams. I wonder, which of the current crop of drivers are going to be as well-liked by their teams when they retire. So far only Lewis Hamilton comes to mind…

The best driving sim just got better, with Top Gear stuff thrown in!

“We at Polyphony are great fans of the world’s best motoring programme, Top Gear, so we’re delighted to be collaborating with BBC Worldwide to deliver Top Gear content via Gran Turismo,” said Kazunori Yamauchi, President, Polyphony Digital, “We’re sure that players will be as thrilled as we are when they get the chance to put their own driving skills to the test on the Top Gear Test Track in GT5, as well as enjoying classic episodes of Top Gear via GT TV.”

More info at FinalGear.com.