Transformation of Logos

Heiligenstadt

206 years ago this day, Beethoven felt so bad that decided to commit a suicide. It was October 6, 1802, in Heiligenstadt, a small village near Vienna.

But in a testament, well known as the Heiligenstadt Tetament, he wrote to his brothers:

For my brothers Carl and [Johann] Beethoven

O you men who think or say that I am malevolent, stubborn or misanthropic... how greatly do you wrong me. You do not know the secret causes of my seeming; from childhood my heart and mind were disposed to the gentle feelings of good will, I was even ever eager to accomplish great deeds, but reflect now that for six years I have been a hopeless case, aggravated by senseless physicians, cheated year after year in the hope of improvement, finally compelled to face the prospect of a lasting malady (whose cure will take years or, perhaps, be impossible). Born with an ardent and lively temperament, even susceptible to the diversions of society, I was compelled early to isolate myself, to live in loneliness, when I at times tried to forget all this. O how harshly was I repulsed by the doubly sad experience of my bad hearing, and yet it was impossible for me to say to men speak louder, shout, for I am deaf. Ah how could I possibly admit such an infirmity in the one sense which should have been more perfect in me than in others, a sense which I once possessed in highest perfection, a perfection such as few surely in my profession enjoy or have enjoyed.

O I cannot do it, therefore forgive me when you see me draw back when I would gladly mingle with you, my misfortune is doubly painful because it must lead to my being misunderstood, for me there can be no recreations in society of my fellows, refined intercourse, mutual exchange of thought, only just as little as the greatest needs command disposition, although I sometimes ran counter to it yielding to my inclination for society, but what a humiliation when one stood beside me and heard a flute in the distance and I heard nothing, or someone heard the shepherd singing and again I heard nothing, such incidents brought me to the verge of despair, but little more and I would have put an end to my life... only art it was that withheld me, ah it seemed impossible to leave the world until I had produced all that I felt called upon me to produce, and so I endured this wretched existence--truly wretched, an excitable body which a sudden change can throw from the best into the worst state... Patience, it is said that I must now choose for my guide, I have done so, I hope my determination will remain firm to endure until it please the inexorable parcae to break the thread. Perhaps I shall get better, perhaps not, I am prepared. Forced already in my 28th year to become a philosopher... O it is not easy, less easy for the artist than for anyone else. Divine One thou lookest into my inmost soul, thou knowest it, thou knowest that love of man and desire to do good live therein. O men, when some day you read these words, reflect that you did me wrong and let the unfortunate one comfort himself and find one of his kind who despite all obstacles of nature yet did all that was in his power to be accepted among worthy artists and men.

You my brothers Carl and [Johann], as soon as I am dead if Dr. Schmid is still alive ask him in my name to describe my malady and attach this document to the history of my illness so that so far as possible at least the world may become reconciled with me after my death. At the same time I declare you two to be the heirs to my small fortune (if so it can be called), divide it fairly, bear with and help each other, what injury you have done me you know was long ago forgiven.

To you brother Carl I give special thanks for the attachment you have displayed towards me of late. It is my wish that your lives be better and freer from care than I have had. Recommend virtue to your children, it alone can give happiness, not money, I speak from experience, it was virtue that upheld me in misery, to it next to my art I owe the fact that I did not end my life with suicide. Farewell and love each other. I thank all my friends, particularly Prince Lichnowsky and Professor Schmid. I desire that the instruments from Prince L. be preserved by one of you but let no quarrel result from this, so soon as they can serve you better purpose sell them, how glad will I be if I can still be helpful to you in my grave. With joy I hasten towards death... if it comes before I shall have had an opportunity to show all my artistic capacities it will still come too early for me despite my hard fate and I shall probably wish it had come later, but even then I am satisfied, will it not free me from my state of endless suffering? Come when thou will I shall meet thee bravely.

Farewell and do not wholly forget me when I am dead, I deserve this of you in having often in life thought of you how to make you happy, be so.

Heiligenstadt October 6,1802 Ludwig van Beethoven

For my brothers Carl and [Johann] to be read and executed after my death.

For a strange reason still unknown, he has left the name Johann blank throughout the text.

Ironically, this was my lucky day, 26 years ago... I married my lovely wife the same day Oct 6, 1982.

Vancouver Children's Choir

It was couple of years ago when I had a post introducing the stunning Vancouver Children’s Choir. I also wrote down the lyrics of their beautiful performance of the song “Can You Imagine?” The song was so touching that made me translate the lyrics into Persian then. Now, I’ve prepared a video clip of the song for you. Please watch:

Bokeh

Boke is a Japanese word meaning fuzzy. The spelling has been changed to bokeh since 2000, maybe to suggest the correct pronunciation to English speakers, in photography. It is now a photographic term referring to out-of-focus areas (generally background) in photos. Bokeh techniques are mostly used in the portraiture and flower categories of photography. A blurred background makes the subject stand out and making the image look like three dimensional.

A well blurred background can be achieved with:

1. Wide opening the camera’s pupil (aperture)… the wider the opening, the more blur or, in photographic terms, the shallower depth of field.

2. Keeping the subject as close as possible to the camera with a long space between the subject and the background.

3. Using large focal length which simply means, in non-slr cameras, zooming in, and in slr’s, changing the lens to a longer one.

A combination of all three techniques above would definitely yield to much better results.

Method number one needs more clarification. The aperture (camera’s pupil) can be wider using small f numbers. By definition, f number is:

f# = Lf / D . . . . . (1)

Where f# is the scale used to control the aperture size, Lf is the focal length in millimetre, and D is the diameter of the opening in millimetre. Note that Lf in equation (1) is the real focal length and not the 35mm equivalent. As an example, let’s see how wide would an f/2.8 in an slr camera with 36mm focal length open the aperture:

f# = Lf / D . . . . . eq. (1)
2.8 = 36 / D
thus D = 12.86 mm.

This diameter is a very good size for a nice bokeh, assuming other factors are appropriate. Next, let’s calculate what f# could open the pupil of a point-and-shoot camera with 6mm real focal length that much:

f# = Lf / D . . . . . eq. (1)
f# = 6 / 12.86 = 0.47 say f/0.5.

Further, it would be of interest to know how effective (wide) could an f# of 2.8 in a point-and-shoot camera be compared to an slr:

f# = Lf / D . . . . . eq. (1)
thus D1 = Lf1 / f#1 and D2 = Lf2 / f#2.

Index 1 shows the p&s while index 2 shows the slr. We want to find the f# in an slr to open the aperture as much as that of f/2.8 in an point-and-shoot, so

D1 = D2
Lf1 / f#1 = Lf2 / f#2
6 / 2.8 = 36 / f#2
f#2 = 16.8 say f/16.

What does this calculation say? It clearly shows that f/2.8 in a simple point-and-shoot camera is equivalent to f/16 in an slr! Have you ever tried to get a bokeh with f/2.8 setting on your camera and not succeeded much? Well, this is the reason! With point-and-shoot cameras the best you can do for a nice bokeh is zooming as mch as you can or your camera lets. Zooming in zoom lenses dramatically raises the focal length. Assuming your regular (no zoom) focal length to be 6 mm, at 6x zoom you get a focal length of 36 mm similar to an slr, and this is the ground you can stand on with a real f/2.8 for instance.

Watch an interesting short video discussing depth of field:



Video taken from YouTube

Grammy Winner Vancouver Symphony

It was tenth evening of February 2008 when Maestro Bramwell Tovey and James Ehnes received the 2007 Grammy Award in the category of “Best Instrumental Soloist Performance with Orchestra” for the CBC recording of the violin concerti by Barber, Korngold, and Walton with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra. Later, in May, this award was completed with a Juno for Best Classical Album of the Year for the same compact disc.

Maestro Bramwell Tovey was born on July 11, 1953 in England. He was educated at the Royal Academy of Music and the University of London as a pianist and composer. His second instrument was tuba.

Tovey was the music director of the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra between 1989 and 2001. He was appointed the music director and conductor of the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra in September 2000. Meanwhile, in Europe, he was music director of the Luxembourg Philharmonic Orchestra from 2002 to 2006.

Tovey has conducted the “Summertime Classics” series with the legendary New York Philharmonic since the inception of the series in 2004.

James Ehnes was born on January 27, 1976 in Brandon, Manitoba. He started his music lessons at 5 with his father who was a trumpeter and music teacher.



Ehnes won the Juno Award for Best Classical Album of the Year in 2001 and was named Young Artist of the Year at the Cannes Classical Awards in 2002. He graduated from the Juilliard School in 1997. He mostly plays on a 1715 Marsick Stradivarius which belongs to the Fulton Collection. His recording of Paganini’s 24 caprices in 1995 was acclaimed as a fine recording of these difficult pieces. Ehnes also won the 2007 Juno for the recording of Mozart’s violin concerti.

Vancouver Symphony Orchestra (VSO), founded in 1919, is a Canadian orchestra performing in Vancouver. Each year, over 240,000 people attend the VSO concerts. The orchestra’s home is the beautiful Orpheum Theatre. VSO is the third largest symphony orchestra in Canada with 140 concerts per season and annual operating budget of $10 million.

Watch a short video of Maestro Tovey conducting the orchestra at Orpheum:



Video taken from YouTube

Persian Ballet

The art and culture society “Ballet Afsaneh” is a professional non-profit performing arts company based in the San Franciso Bay, California. This dynamic group presents performances and activities featuring dance, poetry, and music of the Silk Road—the historic trade route that stretched 11,000 kilometres across Central Asia from the China Sea in the east to the Mediterranean in the west.

The group performed a Persian ballet at the San Francisco City Hall last year during the Persian New Year (Norooz) celebrations in March 2007. The beautiful dance was accompanied by stunning Iranian music performed with Ney and Daf, Persian classical music instruments.

Watch a short video of the program:

Canon S5 IS

Canon S5 IS is the best prosumer high end, SLR like camera available.

This little S5, 120mm long, 80mm wide and 80mm deep, 450g camera (550g with batteries) is flooded with fantastic features. Let me list a few:

- Remote control of the shutter from pc; you can control the zoom lever, aperture and shutter time, and many more controls from your pc
- Amazing face detection; detects up to 3 faces
- 12x optical zoom combined with 4x digital zoom with a very efficient image stabilizer IS up to the far tele end of the zoom; also effective in video recording, thanks to the super silent zooming motor of Canon; both optical 12x and digital 4x (48x total) can be used in video recording
- Stereo sound in video recording
- Stereo sound recorder
- Aperture and shutter time(1) priority modes for professionals, full automatic mode for beginners, and also a full manual control of everything including focus for professionals and creative amateur photographers
- Two levels of macro, regular effective 100 to 500mm from the lens, and super macro effective zero, that’s right, 0 to 100mm from the lens
- Flash with 3 levels of light intensity (output) up to 5.2m effective
- Easy to use menus with each and every control at the finger tip
- Exposure bracketing with 3 shots at the compensation levels you define
- Focus bracketing with 3 shots at the focus levels you define
- Dedicated scenes mode with amazing preset controls for indoor, snow, fireworks, and many more situations
- Live light histogram which shows the light condition before shooting the photo
- Focus check right after the shot
- Red eye reduction in the camera needless of a software
- Swap colours mode, lets you switch the colour of the subject to whatever colour you’d wish!
- Dedicated rotating LCD and excellent electronic view finder EVF

When investigating the tons of reviews for this camera along with a competitive model, Panasonic FZ18 with a seducing 18x zoom, I noticed two major complaints about S5, the lens cap pops off very easily, and the noise is not acceptable in ISO settings over 400. It should be noted, this camera is not a professional SLR and it can be assumed the user of this S5 will never need prints larger than 4”x6” and very rarely up to a letter size 11”x17”, and in such sizes noise cannot be noticed even with ISO1600 for the 4x6 print and up to ISO 800 for the 11x17 print. Actually, the noise can only be clearly seen in what professionals call 100% crop in their reviews. Besides, everything should be paid for; reducing noise equals losing details on the other side! So, clean details versus noise should be balanced at some reasonable point. And about the lens cap, I really can’t imagine what pressure would have been on the motor if the lens cap did not pop off easily! You—just like myself—will definitely forget to take off the cap before turning on the camera more than 50% of the times, I assure!

The 18x zoom announced for a few other cameras including FZ18 works mostly on the wide side, say from 28mm equivalent focal length. Also, the IS does not work well on the tele side and you will have issues with your hand shake anywhere above 12x!

Bottom line… I highly recommend this magic Canon S5. I would suggest adding a set (possibly 2 sets) of NiMH batteries and charger along with a lens hood and adaptor. You can also add a UV filter to leave in place all the time to protect the lens, only, you’ll need a larger bag for this system.

Lions Gate Suspension Bridge, 2km away, full wide 36mm, 2sec, f4.0, ISO100


Same bridge, same vantage point, full optical zoom 12x, 432mm, 2sec, f4.0, ISO100


A coin almost zero distance from the lens at super macro mode, 6mm, 8sec, f2.7, ISO100... please note, when you cover the subject with the large 58mm diameter lens at zero distance, there will not be enough light for the shot, and this is the reason for this long shot with shutter time of 8 seconds! A tripod is a must in such super macro cases.


Watch a video introducing Canon S5 IS:


There are a few more samples on my photoblog. Also more professional reviews can be seen on Steve’s Digicams and Digital Photography Review.

(1) Professional photographers use the term "shutter speed" but this term stands for the length of time that the shutter remains open to let the light pass the aperture, and the unit of this quantity is seconds; so, I would rather call it "shutter time".