PHIDONG.COM . 5.0

The top twenty drivers lined up and were eliminated in 5 rounds. From 20, the field went to 16, 8, 4, 2, then finally a winner was crowned.

I just got back right now. I'll be updating this soon.

UPDATE!

D1GP - Round One, Irwindale California

The day began with somewhat of uncertainty in the air. My ride and shooting partner for the day, John, didn't arrive at my house until 9AM, which might have been a good thing because I got an extra two hours of sleep. I still wasn't sure if I would be receiving a photo vest for the day. There would be a lot of media at Irwindale that day, but unlike the qualifying round the day before there would be even more spectators.

The presence of 11ty billion media meant that getting a photo vest for myself would be difficult and unlikely

I grabbed our charged batteries and equipment and we hopped on the freeway and headed out to the event, just in time to make the first round. It hadn't even been 24 hours since the clouds of rubber met our faces and we were right in the thick of things again. Luckily for us, the guy manning the photo vests gave us one after a little persistence.

Tip #21: Persistence will pay off . Thanks to the homie who hooked it up with a photo vest.

There was little time to play around though, D1GP round one had just begun and 20 drivers would compete in solo drifts to get ranked into a group of 16 who would begin tandem drift rounds to determine a winner. An American driver has never won a D1GP event and the Japanese drifters made sure chances of this this first occuring would be slim with their supurb drifting. Rhys Millen and his Pontiac sponsored GTO would be the only American continuing on into the first tandem drift round. After a day filled with crashes and mechanical problems, the first 20 went through nearly without a hitch.

That is, until the side story of this event, Orido, a judge of the event last year making his appearance for the first time in a competition in many years, took town a whole wall of banners and several hay stacks, cutting his day short.

Orido in his RS-R sponsored Supra knocks out a couple of hay stacks, sending him out of the competition earlier than expected.

After the first round, spectators got the chance to have a food break, where they could enjoy the $3.25 hotdogs and the overinflated price of $3.00 for cokes. The pits were also open for spectators to roam into and meet their heroes of drifting.

Over 10,000 filled the grandstands of Irwindale to see their favorite drifters duke it out in an automotive battle of finess and skill.

The 10,000 spectators would get a longer break than expected between the 20 and 16-best rounds because of a slight delay, but the tandem drifting would prove to be very entertaining. In the end, however, it would come down to Youichi Imamura in his Mazda FD and Yasuyuki Kazama in his green Nissan S15 going at it all the way into the final hairpin where Kazama would ultimately pass Imamura and secure a victory in the first round.

Overall it was a fun event. My excitement had worn off a little bit after shooting several events just like it before, but being in the midst of action rekindled a bit of the motivation within me. I forgot how exciting it was to be in a crowd of spectators, trying to work your way across the venue or be the first one to arrive at the winner's circle.

After the the "one more time" chants of the semi-finals, I prepared myself by putting my Sigma 20mm f/1.8 into my pocket, popping on my flash and battery and making room for the Canon 70-200mm f/2.8L IS in my bag. At the conclusion of the final round, I putthe 70-200 away and quickly turned my flash on and mounted my wide angle lens and sprinted to the winner's circle. Needless to say, I was thefrst one to arrive and capture Kazama's joy.

Tip #82: Always be prepared. Anticipate action at events and have the appropriate equipment ready

Note: The tips you will now find throughout my journal are a sneak peek from my upcoming DVD!

February 27, 2005 - D1GP Round One Competiton

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Last December (04) I had my virgin experience. Shooting press for the first time at a major event, JGTC/D1GP. This is my second time around and for some reason I'm not quite as excited. I guess the feeling wears away quickly after walking around in the sun for three days straight.

Today John came over and we went to Irwindale for the qualifying round of D1GP. I just wanted to pick up the press stuff and leave, but John (and my camera ) wanted to stay and take pictures. (I was using Loc's camera because he doesn't trust John ) Unfortunately for us, we only got one vest (access to infield) and it looks like we won't even be getting one tomorrow, which kind of takes away from the experience even more. I'm questioning whether or not I even want to go tomorrow The only reason I'd go is to build my portfolio which is pretty slim right now, but if infield access is out of hand, it seems almost pointless.

I'm spoiled.

Anyway, here are pictures from today, qualifying round for the First Round of D1 Grand Prix. Enjoy.

D1GP Round One - Qualifying

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Today the good people over at dreamhost moved me to a server which they claim has less load. Hopefully this move will help with the speed of the website, which has been really slow over the last week ever since my move over here.

Okay I have moved you to the server yoda. Please give it about a day before the change truly propagates through our system. Your scripts should load much faster as this machine is not a heavily loaded server. If you need any further assistance please let me know.

Thanks!
Ralph

The scary part is after the move, phidong.com upgraded itself. As of February 25, 2005 it has become self aware. Version 4.5..

It also added a bunch of new galleries.

uVSA - Tet Festival Day 2 and 3

Wedding Coverage

Roadracing

and a top secret one, which you'll have to find on your own!

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I woke up today and my mom came into my room and told me the internet is down. I swear, my parents use the internet way more than I do. I checked the router and modem. It was working yesterday night, so my analysis of the problem led me to the conclusion that it was a SBCGLOBAL problem. No time though, I was running late so I told my mom just to let the router try to connect and try it later.

I get home at 1:15 and the internet is still down, so I tried swapping some cables, then connected my parent's computer straight to the modem and decided to call sbc global and ask them what was wrong. After like 40 menus (please say what best fits your choice out of the 7 choices ) I got put on hold and then THEY HUNG UP ON ME . So I had to go through the 40 menus again to finally speak to this lady who mumbled and kept breaking up. It was my only option though, so she asked me what kind of problem I was having and I specifically told her:

The internet just went down. I checked the router and now I'm connected directly to the modem and it still isn't working. It doesn't work on any of my computers, so I'm pretty sure it isn't a software/hardware issue since none of my systems were altered while I was sleeping..

She says ok, so your internet is down? Then continues to tell me to unplug my modem, restart the computer, change the settings, turn the computer and modem off, etc. for 2 hours! . At the end of the 2 hours I reiterate that I'm almost certain it is a problem on her end, so she puts me on hold for 20 minutes to "run tests" and then returns saying that one of the tests shows a problem....

What a complete waste of time.

On the bright side, things are working again. My dad came up to me and gave me a key to the deadbolt after my mom locked me out of the house for the millionth time (coming home from late night bowling). So I guess I can stay out late now

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yeah.. i'm probably going to get another one today.

edit:

I got a replacement card, $10 This is actually my third ID card I elected to take a new picture since I rarely have my head shaved. That camera always trips me out because it's coming at an angle and they say look into the camera, not turn your head, so I'm looking at a weird angle. Meh. Theres a reason why I'm a photographer.. I'm never in front of the lens, always behind it.

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Every photographer dreams about the golden light. They try to reproduce it in the studio, but what if you could build a light so even it came at the subject from all angles, effectively eliminating all shadows? Could this be done?

The answer is yes. I bring to you.. the ring light!

The idea behind it is very simple. It is a ring of wood with 12 flood bulbs attached on it (evenly spaced). The lens is placed in the center of the ring (thats why it is cut out), which means that the light coming from the ring should cancel out each other's shadows, producing a dreamy looking image and awesome looking catch lights.

Me and loc decided we should build it. The Third Party Brigade needed one, so we bought the materials and have been sitting on them since December.

First, the base of the bulbs:

The live wire will run to the copper screw on all the bases. We bought 12 of them. We wanted black, but brown is all they had. Each was about 1.80? Next we have our bulb.. a 90w flood lamp, capable of lighting your porch or when combined with 11 of it's close friends, the greatest light any photographer has ever found!

Now wiring it up sounds simple enough. Take a cord, a switch, wire, bases, bulbs, done, right? Not if you're me and you buy a 2-way switch instead of a 1-way. But it's ok, you SHOULD be able to use a 2-way in place of a one way with the right wiring.

Then you make it a bit more complex by wiring 11 more in parallel.

Mount it to your board (which is cut from two sheets and connected by hinges for easier transport.

Note: yes, i drew all the schematics

And.... finally for samples of the ring light in action. ...

Well, to be continued.

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So it's finally the end of my 5 day vacation It's kind of bitter sweet though. I'll admit that the last 5 days were more or less pretty uneventful (except for the reception, which was pretty cool). Yesterday I wanted to go bowling, hell, I want to go bowling today, but President's day has managed to ruin all of that.

I don't get it. Barely anyone goes bowling on the weekend, but during holidays they all come out in packs to fill up the entire alley? On Sundays Concourse charges $1 and on Mondays Linbrook charges $1.75, but during holidays it becomes $4 game or $20/hr and all the people come out and make me wait an hour. Oh well. Maybe I'll bowl tomorrow.

It's not too bad though. I managed to get quite a bit done this weekend. A lot of picture processing, some tv watching (nba all-star wknd), and :drumroll: I cleaned my room.

Hah.. so clean. I need to start studying again. I'm sure I have another midterm coming up in one of my classes.

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I decided to post up some of my old graphic design work. The latest work is the uVSA Tet Festival backdrop that never materialized (most have already seen it). Theres a bunch of vector work I did thrown in there too. Nothing too spectacular, but I added some behind the scenes and special edition stuff.

Graphic Design Gallery

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I went to the post pageant reception today (a little late because I overslept after processing pictures the whole night! ) Unfortunately, the girls didn't get the pictures I processed because of technical difficulties, and not even all the girls went , but all of that was put aside when Chris came up to me and said, "DUDE IT'S OPEN BAR"

The lesson of the day, of course, is that when you put food and drinks on someone else's tab, it tastes a lot better. I'm sure the $28 filet mignon we ordered tastes good all the time though. It was seriously some of the best meat I've ever tasted in my entire life.

Post Pageant Reception

I apologize for some of the shaky pictures. It was really dark in there (if you look at my shutter speeds they're like 1/10 sec ), plus it was open bar. What else can I say.

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LYNA!!! I WANT TO TALK TO YOU

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After months and months of preparation for the Tet Festival it went down pretty much without a hitch. Ok, I'm kidding about the months and months of preparation (at least on my part) and I guess the going down without a hitch isn't absolutely true either. We met one of our great friend's laws last weekend. Murphy states that anything that can go wrong will go wrong.

It's always a fear for photographers to have their equipment fail on them. It isn't a matter of if as much as when. It just happened that last weekend was the time for everything to go wrong (although things did go right). Our computers crashed, usb ports failed, laptops wouldn't turn on, power generators overheated under the massive load, flashes stopped refreshing, and cameras err99'd. True greatness comes from your accomplishments but also triumph in the presence of great obstacles. Despite encountering Murphy's Law in full effect, the Justice League of Media managed to fully cover the event without any major problems.

Thanks to Duc for taking this.

I managed to shoot around 8gb of photos during the 2 and a half days of the festival. It'll probably take me three weeks to fully process through all of them. But then we had a post pageant reception today and Loc and others demanded the girls get photos by today (Saturday), so I spent most of yesterday processing photos. The reward of course comes when we get to Le Petite Paris Restaurant and find out that it's open bar using uVSA's tab.

Sorry to all the JLM and pageant girls who decided they were too cool to show up because that filet mignon was the best dish I've ever eaten in my entire life. Anyway, here are the pageant pictures (updated gallery).. I'll post the other stuff.. later..

uVSA Tet Pageant 2005

Oh yeah, and about my webserver. I moved to dreamhost this week and for some reason the servers are initiating the scripts VERY SLOWLY. I sent in a service request, but it might not speed up so bare with it. I'm trying to find a new webserver if anyone knows of a good host, let me know.

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I might be moving. Details pending.

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My custom camera poncho!

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My hellish week is finally over (Econ 20A and MAE 80 midterms) but there isn't any time to sit back and relax. After 5 days of studying, it's off to shoot the Tet festival in Westminster for three days straight.

Then next week I have another midterm. It seems like I'm always wanting to take breaks, but my life says . If it stops raining for long enough for me to take pictures, I might actually enjoy the weekend though, even though, so far, it has started off on a horrible foot.

Last week Loc and the Justice League of Media commissioned me to work on a backdrop for the Tet Festival. I spent 10 hours drawing leaves only to find out that the politics behind uVSA wanted to alter, well.. butcher, my work. I wanted no part of it, so I spent another 2 hours trying to appease them and at the same time preserving my hard work. They apparently took offense to me wanting to do my own thing or well, I suspect the guy who was working on the backdrop in the first place wanted his work to be included in it.

So I pulled out. Behind all their efforts to convince me they wanted to "promote collaboration" between uVSA members and offer "more choices" for backdrops, I saw their blatent selfishness and hipocracy. In the end, the guy who was working on the backdrop before redid his with my general idea. Well, he tried.

1280 paths, 16,455 points, 472 transparent objects, 321 gradient objects - 14+ hrs

Well, here it is. The backdrop that never was. Don't get me wrong either. They wanted to put Ai Nam Quan (building) on the backdrop and I understand the significance of it and everything but this wasn't the issue at hand. The fact is he drew his own Ai Nam Quan (which doesn't match my style) and wanted to tack it to my work (which makes it look like a horrendous afterthought). I have no problem with working with people, but if they wanted Ai Nam Quan to be the focus of the backdrop, they should've told me last Friday instead of telling me to design leaves in the dark, then taking my work and butchering it to pieces.

I'll post pictures of their backdrop soon. I had to reimage my computer, so I don't have them on hand.

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It looks like it is going to be another busy week for me. I have two midterms coming up (Econ 20A and Dynamics [MAE80]) and of course the Tet Festival this weekend. After months of not attending IT meetings or pageant practices, I geared and picked up my best friend, the 20D again. I spent the last couple of weekends shooting pageant practices. Loc says I'm his all-star photographer, but I'm going to go ahead and dismiss those claims by posting all those pictures in the gallery Seriously though, this past weekend has helped me get back into my groove and used to my equipment again.

Hopefully I go out there next weekend and get good pictures, but more importantly have fun. Theres a lot of really talented guys on the IT team, so I don't really feel any burden or pressure on my shoulders (even though I'm going to be shooting all three days. )

I hope the backdrop I spent like 10 hours on turns out nice (or even gets printed on time) as well. The girls better appreciate my hard work! jp I'll post a pic of the backdrop if Loc gives me permission

So my February is more or less pretty packed. I have three midterms in the next two weeks, the festival to cover from the 11th-13th, and then I'm going to be attending D1GP again on February 28, 2005. If you're interested in coming along, I'm getting pricing on tickets for 16.50 through Imports@UCI, so just hit me up on aim or something and we can work ticket payment out.

Oh yeah. Thanks to whoever picked the t-shirt color for the festival. First baby blue t-shirts for Imports@UCI, now pink t-shirts for TET! I'm probably only going to wear this shirt on Saturday (day of the pageant) because Cathy said it was cute.

Time to recharge. I'll need all the energy I can get. It's going to be a long week...

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Life isn't meant to be taken so seriously.

I'm participating in a bowling tournement tomorrow. Wish me luck.

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