Aloha Everyone!

The above is a video of Sun Polyps corals captured by iPhone 4 with one photo per second. Since they move very slowly, I used 800 photos combined together for a 1 min time lapse video. The last 10 secs shows how they eat while I feed them directly. I think its kinda fun, but my wife said its kinda gross. No matter what, I hope you enjoy it and leave me comments as a support.

As you know, I like photography and keeping fishes/corals in a reef tank is my new hobby. Starting next week, I will start posting how I got the tank started (include unboxing videos + DIYs).

Photography + Reef Tank = Fun :)

Alohaeveryone, you may be wondering why I haven’t been posting as much as before. In the pass two months, I have been studying my new hobby – Nano Reef. The photos above are my first pair of clown fish that arrived yesterday. Once the fish tank becomes stable, I will start writing more about this hobby from a beginner’s point of view and hope you will enjoy it.

Following is a video I uploaded to youtube which has a sneak peak of my tank. I named it “The Beginning of My Reef Tank” which I hope you will like it. Thanks for the support and welcome to leave me comments.

The above photos are test samples from the new Canon 24-70mm f2.8 L lens I just got, while I also have a Canon 24-105mm IS L. You may be wondering why I bought the 24-70 even though the 24-105 IS is able to cover the range with Image Stabilization. Image Stabilization allows you to shoot at low shutter speed and keep the images fairly sharp. However, if you are shooting in a low light condition, the true 1-stop advantage from Canon 24-70mm f2.8 L is being able to freeze the motion of your  subject while Canon 24-105mm IS L just gets you a clear background.  The range of this lens is the most important range for a full frame camera user, and this is the reason I wanted to get the best lens Canon can offer at the moment.

After testing this lens for a month and comparing with 24-105mm, I found the following:

• The focus of this lens is faster
• Macro shots can be closer
• I like the Bokeh from this lens better
• Contrast is better
• I will need to get the Canon 70-200mm f2.8 to cover the 105mm range.  ; )

The 24-70mm does not come with IS, which is fine with me, since I don’t think I really need that function anyways. Because if I did need to shoot at a lower shutter speed, I can always use the trick I call “human image stabilization“.

Below is my unboxing video, in case you wanted know what come in the package. And if you wanna give this lens a try, you can get Canon 24-70mm f2.8 here for $1370 shipped

I didn’t post any photography related topics in the past 2 weeks and was busy with iPhone 4 & iOS4. I promise I will post more photography info right after this. By thy way, this is kinda related. Following is the iPhone 4 back camera spec in case you want to know.

• 5.0 Mpixels (2592 x 1936)
• 1/3.2″ back-illuminated CMOS sensor
• 4:3 aspect ratio
• 35 mm film camera crop factor: 7.64
• Low ISO 80 (or better)
• 3.85 mm lens focal length
• f/2.8 lens aperture
• Autofocus: tap to focus

The senors size is almost as big as the ones on a low end P&S and it is a back-illuminated CMOS sensor which helps with lowlight conditions. With this lens and sensor size, it corresponds to 35mm film camera equivalent lens of 30mm with f22.

Just a quick unboxing video with my 3Gs on the side. Just in case you wanna watch it.

p.s. the iPhone case you saw in the video you can buy from here.

Since the Apple iPad Case is in shortage at this moment, I am going to show you an alternative solution from Macally. The above video shows you the unboxing of the case and side by side comparison with the Apple original.

What I like
the Color
the better fold angle (horizontally or vertically) for viewing video or typing

What I don’t like
the front cover is too soft
get dirty easily due to its microfiber material
not able to cover the edges of the iPad 100%, it only covers the 4 corners

If you can’t wait for the original iPad case from Apple, you can get Macally for $40 Shipped here

p.s. I am really sorry I keep pronouncing Ma”cathy” instead of Ma”cally” in the video.

People talk about unlocking iOS4 on iPhone 3G/3Gs and a lot of sites provided instruction already. But I would like to show you how to fix the push notification if it fails after the unlock.

Following are the directions for how to fix your unlocked iPhone.

1, Make sure you’ve jailbroken and unlocked your iPhone 3G/3Gs with iOS 4.
2, Make sure you dont have any app which uses push function on your iPhone. If yes, remove all of them first.
3, Open up Cydia, and add this address to the sources: http://cmdshft.ipwn.me/apt as above
4, Once Cydia is done updating, go to the search field and type in: Push Doctor. Tap it, and then press install.
5, Wait until complete download and install.
6, Restart your iPhone.
7, After restarting, you may install any app which support Push function. e.g. Meebo
8, Run the installed app and it will tell you to enable Push Notification by Tapping Settings.
9, Tap Setting and enable it.

Push Notification should work by now.