Christmas in Hawaii is a beautiful thing.  I think it's the best time to visit because the weather is warm but not too hot, and it's by far better than any place in the continental US.

The vacation began with a small hitch when we missed out departing flight, but we eventually had it sorted out, thanks to all customer service people who had to work during the holidays.  Everything was as expected once we arrived.

I brought a 28-50-90 setup, but ended up not using the 90mm much at all.  Quite understandable, now looking back.  Most of my shots were made with the 28'Cron because there is so much scenery to take in.  The 50'Lux was perfect for low light and intimate settings.  Maybe 90mm could come in handy if I was to do some bikini stalking :D

Along with the regular family vacation snaps, I also tried to take some street shots.  The full set can be viewed in the personal gallery [HERE].

Just another nothing-to-do Saturday morning... While my wife went shopping at the nearby farmer's market, I decided to take my son to checkout the architectures of the Cerritos Center of Performing Arts, which was right next to the market.  While processing the photos I realized that shooting tiles can mean a lot of work because you have to carefully adjust the lens distortion to force them back to perfectly straight lines.

It's nearing the end of a year, and I've been reflecting back what I've learned this year, since I've gotten my M9.  I'm faster with the rangefinder manual focus, yes, and no doubt my lens collection has grown, but I think the most important revelation was that photography has brought me to a higher state of awareness.

In fact, this is probably unrelated to the M9, or any specific gear.  Once I'm hook on photography and have the desires to take better photos, I started seeing things differently in everyday life.  With or without a camera in hand, my eyes are more alert to my surroundings, looking at things I normally would not have noticed, drawing an imaginary frameline within my sight, and most importantly, seeing beauty everywhere.

Just walking or driving to any place, I would often tell myself: "Oh look, that would be a great shot."  I start to see light, shadows, composition, and angles... in some way I feel I've been half blind in my prior life.  To actually take a photo is just a way to share that instance of time with others, and it's almost secondary because I know I'm seeing more, appreciating more, living a fuller life.  For that, I'm thankful.

And now... some recent photos of my son:

We are now season tickets holders to the happiest place on earth.  We thought that today was a good day to go since there are slight rain in the forecast so there may be less crowded.  Wrong.  Of course, I took a bunch of family photos that can be found [HERE].  I also use the opportunity to shoot some strangers.

It's nice to have a break from the rains... just in time for a visit to the local farmer's market.  As usual, colorful fruits and vegetables, yummy smelling foods, and bundles of fresh flowers are just waiting to be framed and shot.

As we're walking, I noticed an older Korean gentleman was noticing my camera.  We chatted and it turns out that he owns an M8 and we talked gears for a bit.  There isn't a lot of M-shooters around, so it's always nice to bump into other like-minded people, who we would have never met if it wasn't for our interests in Leica.

This week, I had to fly up to the Bay Area to get my Hadoop Administration Certification.  I hesitated a bit about whether I should bring the M9 or not, but decided to bring it just in case, with a single lens: 35'Cron.  I flew in Tuesday and landed in the San Jose Airport.  The training class was hosted at the Seaport Conference Center in Redwood City, but since it's was pretty much all cloudy and rainy all week, the pictures all came out pretty moody.  On Wednesday night, had dinner in San Francisco and tried to capture some street scenes.  Tonight, I had about 3 hours to kill in the San Jose Airport because the class ended earlier than I expected, so I tried to experiment a setup where I zone-focus the camera and place it on my lap and pointed at the general direction in front of me.  Then as interesting people walk by, I simply tap the shutter and see what kinda of pictures I can get.

Well, here are the pictures from this week, sorry for mixing different type of processing which make them look somewhat disorganized. But since they were taken throughout the week, I tried to apply the processing that properly express the mood I felt when the shots were taken...