Photography on the road

Two years ago, I decided to start taking photography a little more serious. I bought a starter SLR camera that could photograph in RAW format. This was really cool because I was already quite adept at using Photoshop, and shooting in RAW would provide much more control when editing my pictures.

After getting this camera I quickly learned to shoot off of a tripod as often as possible. This produces photos that are clean and crisp more often. Unfortunately when you are on the go, a tripod can take up a lot of room and may be a little cumbersome to set up time and time again. So I decided to invest in a monopod.

Pretty much like it sounds, one third of a tripod. Very small and takes up very little room. They're great for museums where tripods may not be allowed, and people walking by won't trip over them.

Here is a picture I took of the El Capitolio in Old Havana, Cuba on a monopod. It was an awesome trip and I found the monopod made a big difference in many of my shots.

They are quite affordable, I bought mine for around $30 CAN.

Things to do in Houston

We did quite a few cool things in Houston so far. The Houston Zoo was really cool. A lot of animals and birds that we dont' have in Calgary.

There is just something really amusing about an Orangutan with a towel on its head.

www.houstonzoo.org

We also visited the Downtown Aquarium. They had loads of amazing fish. In addition they had alligators, ray fish and sharks. There were also 2 white tigers plus they had a few rides for the kids.

We ate at the restaurant there which turned out to be really good. The food was tasty and they had a huge aquarium with fish, sharks and ray fish. It was really impressive.

www.aquariumrestaurants.com/

Quick Look: The Geek Atlas

Geeks looking for inspiration for their next trip may want to check out The Geek Atlas: 128 Places Where Science & Technology Come Alive, published by O'Reilly.
Each entry in the book is about 3 or 4 pages long.

There are 1 or 2 pages that tell you the name, the city and country that is located in, as well its GPS coordinates, and the significance of the place. Another 1 or 2 pages give you a brief primer on a related piece of science or technology.

For example, the 15th entry is for Musee Curie in Paris, France, where Marie Curie worked with radioactive materials. The book tells you briefly what they did at the laboratory, as well as the artifacts that have been preserved there. The additional material explains how small radioactive sources in household smoke detectors detect smoke.

With so many places included, it is likely you'll find something worth visiting. There are some that are well-known, like the Kennedy Space Center, or the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone. There are also many obscure places for you to discover, like the Eagle Pub where James Watson and Francis Crick announced their discovery of DNA. Even if you don't have the chance to visit all of these places, they are almost certainly worth reading about.

Check back here in the future and I'll post a review once I've had a chance to read through this book.

There and Back Again

Getting ready to fly back to Calgary. This time I got some magnetic travel games for the kids, namely Checkers and Hangman. They were $5 from Target.


I got some new apps installed on my IPhone for the plane, I have a book and earphones for my IPhone ready in a bag. I got some candy treats also!

I have small bags of stuff to keep with me on the plane so I can grab them from my carryon easily.

My Flight to Houston with 3 kids and a full plane

As fate would have it I am currently in Houston visiting in-laws. My flight from Calgary, which involved travelling with my wife and 3 kids taught me some things about traveling. The first thing is that getting the Middle seat on a full plane is not pleasant.

Second, make sure you have apps on your phone(in my case IPhone) installed before you go.

Third, have a small pack or bag of stuff that you want to keep with you on the plane in your hand bag, so you can grab the one thing and have what you need. This goes for the kids too. It was really tough to be grabbing hand bags and trying to find the stuff the kids wanted in the aisle of the plane.

I think an IPAD would be a cool tech toy to have on the plane. Its not really convenient to use a laptop because of the limited space. But an IPAD would be ideal, giving you a bigger screen than a phone and access to lots of things to do, from games to books. Unfortunately, I leave Houston like 3 days before the IPAD comes out here, so I'm out of luck for my flight home.