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Date: Thu Nov 13, 2003
Tinkerbell at SanLinSee
Hi folks!
I am back with more photos of Tinkerbell that I hope
you will enjoy.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/shanlung/sets/695363/
But first, let me explain from the beginning. When I
was in Taroko a couple of weeks ago, I had with me
this camera tripod that I have been lugging around
since that trip in Australia that I never got to use.
I thought Taroko will be a nice place to finally
initiate that camera tripod of mine. After mounting
the camera on it, I pointed the remote controller at
it and pressed but nothing happened. So I thought it
must have been the battery. The battery in the remote
control was changed and yet, the camera refused to
take our pictures. I vaguely remembered the Olympus
semi SLR digital (RS-100) had some buttons that needed
to be pushed for the remote controller to be used.
After pressing and pressing buttons and switches with
no results, I told myself maybe reading the manual may
be useful.
When we got back and the manual finally hunted down, I
realized how educational manuals are after 6-7 reads.
I found out which button should be pushed and the
number of times it got to be pushed too, not easy to
discover on your own with your wife sniggering and
making snide remarks in the field.
What?s even more important than that silly remote
control feature is that the camera can and does rapid
multiple shots that I never knew about in the two
years of owning the camera. Well, well well, maybe if
I read more, the camera may even sing and dance for
me.
Back to this SanLinSee place that I hired a car to go
to. This is actually written as Sun Link Sea in
English here in Taiwan. Which made it sound like a
tacky amusement park that I can do without with which
was why while I went to the nearby Hsitou about 5
times, I never bother to go the extra 30 km to
SanLinSee until my new mountain hiking colleague told
me who wrong I was. What can I say? Judging book by
cover?
After a whole week of clear sky , the weekend was
almost predictable with clouded over sky. We drove up
higher and higher in drifting clouds with visibility
of 5 ?20 meters. But at times, the cloud broke to
reveal awesome sceneries making me vow to return
again.
We eventually reached SanLinSee at its elevation of
1700m. After checking in, we walked around with
Tinkerbell on my shoulder. I used only the reel of
60kg 0.6mm black braided fishing line without the
holder release. I still could not get Tinkerbell at
home to go on her flyabout as cued and I wanted to
limit her flights to simple recalls.
http://community.webshots.com/album/99325713glVSKY
In the webshot folder in the URL, the first three
photos are on my third alarm clock in the sleeping
nook that she love. I particularly like the 3rd shot
as that showed her beautiful translucent wings. I shot
her just as she decided to come to me.
After all the efforts in reading camera manuals to
activate the remote controller, the least I can do is
to shot a couple of shots of the three of us.
You then see a sequence of shots on what you think is
the same scenery. My camera is set on multiple shots
and taking Tink as she went through her recall to me.
If your browser speed is fast enough and you cycle
through the photo sequence quickly, you get a slow
motion of her in flight. Otherwise, maybe you can
download those shots on your PC and use your photo
browser (my favourite is ACDSee which I think is the
best jpg viewer) to cycle them faster. The two modes
of landing that I described in one of my earlier
emails can be clearly seen. The second sequence of
shots show her doing a 180 degree turn in flight to
land on my shoulder facing back the way she came from.
With the sky clouded over that afternoon, the light
was less than perfect. You also cannot see the line
attached to her, but believe me, it is there!
The next morning saw beautiful weather with the sky so
blue that it hurt.
The sun was good and the camera speed much faster
allowing better shots of Tinkerbell in flight.
Then more and more people came and Tinkerbell refused
to do her flights and refused to take treats from me.
I obliged her and joined the other people in walking
and checking out the scenery. Since I am allowed 60
photos for this folder, I added another sequence of
photos from the afternoon before.
I also found a good use for the tripod. When Tink is
happy, she will give a happy call sounding like a
metallic TIONG! Not a nice sound to have next to
your ear. Since I was already carrying the tripod on
the shoulder, placing Tink on that tripod allowed my
ears to take a break from her happiness.
Two hours were all we had before the clouds came
rolling back in and time for us to drive back home.
=====
With warmest regards
Shanlung
Joy - wife, Tinkerbell - CAG & surrogate daughter
earlier emails and photo links on Tink -
http://www.geocities.com/shanlung9