Me and my Darth 90

First there was darkness...and then.. there was the D90!!!

They say that the nikonians are the dark side of the force, I dont know what the hell that means I have surely fallen to the darkside and thus taken an apprentice named D90 or Darth Nine-T

Not the first...

Well to be honest, ths D90 was not my first DSLR, my first DSLR was the Olympus E-420 bought ealier in 2008. Its not that I am a gadget luster (maybe just a little bit) but it's truly after you have bought your first DSLR than and only then you would know what are the limitations and features that you really need or miss. To tell you the truth I really wanted to get the D50 or D70 about 2 years ago way back in 2006 but putting it on hold, nikon came out with the D40/40x and D60. I was crushed to find out the these 3 entry level DSLRs could not autofocus with some AF-d lenses. Other hobbies of mine like mobile phones and laptops made me brush aside my desires for a DSLR. So I got a Prosumer a sony V3 and used it for awhile to brush up on my manual skills first.

The darkside poison...

The biggest poison was when I bought a nikkor AF-D 50mm f1.4 lens. via an adapter, I used this lens on my Olympus E-420 body and it produced amazing results. So I thought, err what if I wanted to autofocus with this lens? I need a nikon body, so I sold off a few of my stuffs, gathered money and went looking for a nikon body. The choices were down to a D80, a D90 or a D200.

Climbing down from mount Olympus...

After using the olympus I was used to a few features, one of it was live view!! and the other was sensor autoclean since I dont have a dust free room :P. The D90 had all these features and a bit more. Compared to the E-420 I appreciated the nice grip and the built in AF assist lamp an the availability of a wide range of lens and third party accessories.

What I started with...

I chose the body only option when I got my D90 because I already have the wonderful nikkor AF-D 50mm f1.4 for amzing bokeh and lowlight. The kit lens set was around RM1300 more expensive and came with the nikkor 18-105mm VR lens f3.5-5.6 getting the body only option I spent the money I save getting a 55-200mm VR zoom lens for my street sniper shots and also an 18-70mm f3.5-4.5 lens for wide angle. Later I bought a crumpler neck strap just for fun and being trendy. With these three lenses I was ready for anything, wide party shots, zooming and spy mode outings and low light and nice portraits.

sample photos















































My Darth Nine-T needs a lightsaber....after all what is a sith lord without a light saber...

DLSR WARS!!!

There are a lot of choices nowadays when choosing a DSLR, among the contenders are :

*Nikon
*Canon
*Olympus
*Pentax
*Sony Alpha (used to be minolta)
*Fujifilm S Pro series
*and.. I cant remember the rest...






































Each of the above have their own strengths... The nikons and canons are considered the giants of the industrie but the others like Olympus and Sony are really catching up.

I prefer nikons better than canons mainly because interms of digital sensors the crop factor on a
nikon is a bit wider at 1.5x compared to canons 1.6x. If you are wondering what crop factor is all
about, its the actual frame size whether wide or telephoto that you would get when compared to a 35mm film camera format. For example 35mm is standard view less than that at 24mm-28mm is considered wide and for telephoto 70mm is 2x zoom (2 X 35mm) and 105mm is 3X zoom and so on and so forth.

So comparing kit lens like a 18-50mm on a nikon DX you would get an equivalent of 27-75mm but on a canon you would get an equivalent of 29-80mm less wide but a bit more zoom.

Olympus has really good colours maybe from thier liveMOS sensor. If you are mostly shoothing
telephoto then you might appreciate that the sensor has a crop factor of 2x. so if you get a 50-200 zoom lens, you are actually getting a 100-400 equivalent zoom!!! Olympus also have the outstanding lens quality if Zuiko although a bit expensive. Some olympus bodies have an Image stabilizer built-in.

I have not tried a pentax but the advantage that pentax has against other rivals is the lower power consumption technology making pentax DSLRs able to use standard AA size batteries. You can get a good pair if NiMH AA batteries and chargers for a really cheap price. and if you are in the field and if you battery runs out, just pop in some spare Alkaline AA's that you could get at 7 Eleven.

The sony Alphas are priced really competitively and armed with the latest technologies such as built in steady shot and Live view with tilted screen for crowded photography. The new Sony Alphas A200-300-350s have come a long way since the A100.

Other DSLRs out there are the Fujifilm S Pro, Leica, Panasonic, Samsung. FUjifilm S Pro uses nikon F mount lenses, Leica's are really expensive, Panasonic uses leica lenses and the olympus 4/3s format. while the samsung DSLR is just a Pentax DSLR with a Samsung Badge.

Nasik Lemak...an all time Malaysian Favourite

I must say that Nasik Lemak(coconut rice not fat rice ya?) is one of my most favourite local food here found in malaysia, for under RM 5.00 you could get ample amount of rice with all standard issue sides like sambal, anchovies, telur rebus, and cucumbers plus either extra chicken, fish, beef rendang, squid, shellfish, fried egg or go nuts and get them all muahahah!!!




One particular place to get really good nasik lemak if you are ever in Kuala Lumpur is a little shop called "Nasik Lemak Seri Wangi" located in the 8th mile of Jalan Gombak, Gombak, Setapak. To get there just take the cab and ask him to take you to Pasar Besar Gombak. The little shop is located opposite the Pasar Besar Gombak.

If you intend to go on weekends please reach there before 9:30 am. This is NOT exaggerated as all of the nasik lemak be gone by 10am. (very popular and getting customers as far as from Klang)

The place opens 6 days a week from Tuesday to Sunday and any public holidays 7am to around 10am. The chef takes a day off on Monday (or Tuesday if Monday is a public holiday)


The local concoction of drinks are great too. My favourite would be "Milo Ais"

Families could also have the rice and accompaniments served seperate on the table "hidang style" or in individual plates.

Among the chioces :

* Nasik lemak biasa (sambal, ikan bilis, telur rebus and cucumbers)
* Ayam Goreng (freshly fried chicken)
* Rendang Daging (Beef in coconut gravy)
* Ikan semilang (freshly fried small cat fish) my personal favourite
* Kerang and sambal sotong (shellfish and squids)

Allow me to make your mouth water....