Sunny Valentine

I am wondering what Bangkok Immigration would do in a case where a person applies for an extension on permission to stay, who before this application resided in say Samui, but he tells the officer that he is about to move to Bangkok now. He shows a rental contract (maybe one week with option to extend) from a serviced apartment, explaining that he is currently looking for a more permanent residence, but hasn't made a decision yet.

I cant see that Bangkok would refuse the application? And what would happen if the applicant then later decides to change his mind, and return to say Samui?

I am using Gmail with IMAP with Thunderbird. Works like charm. Never got used to Webmail, and I cant see any reason why I should.

There is much more troubles ahead, leading to a segregation of users.

Imagine your Webmail page has an Arabic/Thai/Cyrillic/Whatever domain, and you want to access it on a public computer where the fonts are not installed ...

Very bad move ... and this post comes from a person who's first language is not English.

Link works fine with me here. The blockage by Loxinfo is obviously a technical glitch and therefore I see no legal reason not to use a Proxy. Remember: Proxys are illegal to circumvent legal blockings only!

Sunny

Yeah, that place and the store just across the aisle (forget the name, but posted a thread on it) offer the best deals hands down.

Enjoy the camera...

Thanks! After doing the research, I'm looking forward to using it.

Does anyone know where decently priced lensbabies are in BKK?

I have not even started looking...

I have a Canon mount Lensbaby 3G for sale in good condition. PM me if interested!

Sunny

There is one more thing to consider for some of us in case you buy a Canon 7D Camera imported from Japan in Thailand:

These Cameras have only the choice between English and Japanese Language in the Menu! And this is not depending on the firmware, the other menu languages are still missing in case you upgrade the firmware.

Might not be an issue for all, but for some.

Sunny

It would depend on your Embassy accepting it (and perhaps you paying the tax on it).

Well, I suppose these were taxable in Thailand. So, what hasmy Embassy to do with it? This would be income in Thailand.

Makes me wonder if dividends earned from the shares would count towards the income needed to be shown for extension of retirement Visas.

I.e., if I were to own shares of a company that pays me 800000 Bt. annual dividends, would that be sufficient for extension of my O Visa based on retirement?

Was at Royal Thai Embassy Vienna yesterday. No free Tourist Visas! Staff said they have received no official information.

Good and necessary move, and I hope it is true. And, I also hope that thePolice is informed by this decision and will refrain from deterring and extradicting overstayers they are aware of,as, after all, it is the law .... And we can see elsewhere that the Thai Police has nothing else in mind than keeping up the law, under all circumstances.

Confused as to location of the protesters...

Can I or should I come as planned, today and tomorrow for two nights, from Chonburi, to:

1. Shop at Siam Paragon and Siam Discovery?

2. Visit the nightlife venues known as "Nana Plaza" and "Soi Cowboy" and "Thermae"?

3. Use the BTS and MRT without any fanfare, going to Mo Chit from On Nut and to Chinatown?

Thanks in advance. The news stories never mention Sukhumvit, the BTS or MRT systems.

Hi!

The shopping centers you mentioned might be closed again, but Nana and Cowboy were business as usual in the last few nights, and I see no reason whythis should change today.

Give me a call when you"re in town, maybe we can hook up, as I am inBangkok til tomorrow.

Sunny

I too love my LX3. My first one was stolen last September, after having had a look atthe newer alternatives (Canon G11 and S90) I decided to buy a LX-3 again.

The lens is great, and the body just feels right.

Last December I bought a new one for 15000 Baht in Fortune IT center, new.

Wish to "freshen up before flying onwards" This indicates that you are arriving on a flight and possibly transitting with a 3 hour stop over. I really dont think the hassles of leaving (even if you arrive on a domestic flight) and returning through immigration etc would be justified for only 3 hours. In fact as aircraft tend to board 30 minutes before departure your three hour stop over is now reduced to 2.5 hours.

Not worth it, suggest you stay at swampy

Go to an airline lounge. You can buy access day passes at Plaza Premium if you don't have lounge access through one of your credit cards or airlines.

Do you have any details on the deals for buying lounge access? Where is Plaza Premium located?

Last Friday, parading on South Pattaya Road, on the way to Bangkok.

Reading the advise here, it seems that also in the case of a tourist that stays some time in Thailand on vacation, and during that time stays in contact with his job, answering Emails, and preparing documents, requires a work permit. Which obviously he won't get, as there is no legal entity which will apply for him.

Solution: Forget about the silly and unenforceable rules, or stop even thinking about your job back home, because even this could constitute working, based on the definition here.

It is not so much the bandwidth taken by torrents, but rather the number of connections, that can lead to a still-stand of other Internet connections.

Don't know which torrent client you're using, but try to experiment with settings like "Global number of connections". Set this to less than 100, see whats happening, and take it from there.

Sunny

The GF 1 has an electronic viewfinder, which actually is not bad, but still nowhere as accurate as any SLR viewfinder. But it is large, and takes the space of the external flash. The Olympus viewfinder for the EPL2 just sucks.

Maybe one day these viewfinders will produce acceptable results, also in low light, and then maybe become a replacement for SLRs.

So far, the viewfinder is an unresolved issue, speed is another one, sensor size (an APS-C sensor is massively larger!) and Autofocus (Again, Panasonic is getting quite good at it, but these results would be considered unbearably slow in any but the most basic beginners DSLRs.)

Don't get me wrong, I would fancy a GF-1 or EP-2, but not as a replacement for my DSLR. Maybe as a replacement for my Pana LX3 though, but not for the price.

Guess an ND (Neutral density) filter is exactly what you need here. Try to get good quality glass, as some cheapos really do alter the color apart from reducing the amount of light.

A GND filter is something slightly different: It has a graduated effect, going from clear on one side to a gray density on the other side, with either "soft" or "hard" (i.e. smaller or larger areas of graduation) in the central area in between. You need this for instance for landscape pix where you want to specifically reduce the brightness of the Sky, without touching the land part. Here you use a GND, and have the transition area at the horizon. Depending on the shape of the horizon, a soft or hard transition produces better results. Imagine a shot of the ocean with the sky above; here you have a clearly defined Horizon, and can use the 'hard" one. An alpine landscape where the horizon is ragged asks for a soft one.

Using a Polarizing filter is too much of a compromise, as it has other, most likely unwanted effects on the picture.

Sunny

I have a two entry Business Visa in my passport, granted by the Royal Thai Embassy in Vienna. Do you want a scan?

Sunny

But that is true of all lenses on the cropped sensor body?

My 17-85mm is in fact 28-135mm if it could be mounted on a full frame body.

Well doesn't that support my point? I don't think it's any coincidence if you multiply 1.6 factor to 17 - 85 it matches the focal length of the already existing EF28-135 (which I had some 15 years ago, way before Canon released its first dSLR D30). They came up with EF-S lenses BECAUSE existing EF or EF-L lenses weren't of exactly practical focal length (or field of view should I say) for cropped sensor body.

I don't think that the practical focal length was the reason for Canon to introduce their EF-S series.

Lets have a look at some Canon EF (L and non-L) lenses and their approximative equivalent in crop:

First the zooms:

16-35 and 17-40 --> 28-60 WA to Normal Zooms, equivalent to 24-70 or 28-70

24-70 --> 38 - 105, ok, a bit of a strange breed here.

70-200 --> 100 - 300 a fine mid to far tele lens. There is no such lens on the market with 2.8 for FF!

Primes:

24 --> 35

35 --> 50

50 --> 85

85 --> 135

135 --> 200

So the whole classic prime lens series just shiting into the tele range.

Crop brings advantages to the tele end, with faster equivalents than available on FF; or have you seen a 1.2 (or even a 1.8) 135 mm lens?

The problems are the Wide Angle, and a good balance in midrange.

And here the EF-S Series shine with a 10-22 which is on par in quality with the 17-40 L, and especially the 17-55 2.8 IS, a lens which equivalent is simply not available for Full Format, no matter what the price is. (The 24-70 L lacks Image Stabilisation, and the 24-105 lacks speed)

So, a crop lens setup should comprise of two EF-S lenses, the 10-22 and the 17-55, plus one of the four 70-200 L lenses. Add whatever Macro and Prime lenses you need, and you have a magnificient setup.

I see absolutely no reason why EF-S Tele lenses should be missed. Lots of full format lenses are getting blurry on the corners, and therefore most likely stay sharp to the corners of the crop

I myself have cropped bodies (7D and 40D), plus the two fine EF-S lenses, 10-22 and 7-55), and the 70-200 4 IS, plus 50 1.4, 85 1.8 and 135 2.0. Looking into the purchase of the 24 1.4 L, and the 300 4.0 L to complement, and maybe one day a Macro Lens again.

In case I ever go FF, I would miss my fantastic 17-55 2.8 IS, and I am not certain that the existing FF WA zooms bring the same Quality as my beloved 10-22. Plus, I would need to think (and most likely buy) again on the long end.

It's a fairly known and discussed issue (especially with Canon) and hence the facility implanted within the camera to fine tune alignment. Canon themselves will actually undertake this task but it means all the lenses and body going off to them and waiting!

I've been thinking of doing this for a long time and I was even recommended by the technician at Canon Service at Sathorn to do so. Any idea how much money and time it takes?

Done it last Year at Canon Sathorn. Took about 1 week, and the cost was 500 Baht per item (Camera and Body). Free within Warranty period when the items were bought in Thailand!

Definitely worth it! The Microadjustment works well with primes, but does not work with zoom lenses, as you need different factors for different lengths.

I have crop Canon Cameras (7D and 40D) and quite a few lenses ...

The 10-22 EF-S from Canon for Wide Angle.

The 17-55 2.8 IS as a standard lens. I tried a few others, but there is no replacement for the length among full frame lenses that is better. The 24-105 4.0 lacks Speed and Wideangle, and the 24-70 2.8 has also no wide-angle and is missing an IS. Also after trying out both, I have to say that my 17-55 is sharper and generally better than the 24-70.

Plus I have the 70-200 4.0 IS, which is a great lens, and not taht heavy and bulky.

Plus the 1.4 50 mm, 1.8 85 mm, 2.0 135 mm (Possibly the sharpest lens on the planet!) plus soon the 300 mm 4.0 IS.

And I love my Lensbabies!

I see no reason not to use full format lenses on crop cameras, only in the Wide Angle theere are limitations. Both the 16-35 2.8 and the 17-40 mm 4.0 are not that great, and on crop the Wide Angle is limited.

Heard from several bar owners that their way of contacting them was delivering flyers of the event to their doorsteps, about one week before the event ......

Hope the real estate company involved is a bit more professional in their own field of business, but I won't be holding breath here ....

There's a good argument for shooting Raw+Jpeg

Depending on the "accuracy" of your cameras Jpeg rendition it can avail you of a "guideline" to processing your RAW files.

I'm happy with shooting both in my GF1 and MKII (both of which which are incredibly accurate) and often shoot B+W RAW+Jpeg

Following the Jpeg rendition is sometimes beneficial.

To dismiss the benefit of Jpeg as a guideline is foolish

If you have a Camera that is supported by Adobe's Camera profiles, the default rendering in Lightroom is so close to the result of the InCamera conversion, that I wouldn't bother any more. Or, you can create your own profile in LR (kep WB as "as shot", and fiddle a little bit with the other settings, until you get pleasnt results. Then stoe the settings, and use them as default on Import.

For an SLR I try to get a lot of pixels. My compacts on the other hand are chosen on moderate pixel counts. On Micro Sensors the image quality tends to decrease with the number of pixels increasing.

Still unbeaten, but the Camera was unfortunately stolen: The Fuji 30: 6 Megapixels, more than enough, and the results, especially in low light, were close to contemporary SLRs.