Naruto Soundtrack “The Raising Fighting Spirit” Guitar Cover
by vixidem on Mar.09, 2010, under Guitar and Music
Finished forensic medicine’s ‘extra’ test this evening. Still have final examination for the semester, and it is just around the corner.
I have received two offer from my friends to do a wedding/engagement photography, but the date of the event prevent me from accepting it. And the other thing is, I am not confident with myself to do a wedding photography yet. I have never tagged with anyone to know how a wedding photographer do their work even once, and I have no experience of doing such job. I am afraid that the artwork then will be sub par. For me, wedding is such a beautiful thing that the job of documenting it in form of meaningful photos is a very serious matter and it should not be ruined by a a work from hobbyist photographer like me. To my friend(s) if you read this, I am so sorry to not accepting your offer.
During my time as a child, as a teenager, I have always struggled to get what I want. There are nothing that can withhold me from achieving things I’ve wanted. The principle had brought me a lot of victorious moment and I hungers for more. But, the principle was defied during my time at Matriculation, it was a mistake to over enjoy it. It was more than frustration that overwhelmed me quite for a long of time. But now, I am right back on track, and it almost halfway through. I don’t want to ruin this opportunity.
This is a video of Naruto Soundtrack “The Raising Fighting Spirit”. Originally composed by Toshiro Matsuda. In this video, I have recorded three tracks for the guitar, a lead guitar, another one to harmonize the lead guitar, and the rhythm guitar for backing. This song dedicated to [anis] which is now struggling with her clinical years. Busy, tired, lack of time for ownself, and this song is to enlighten you :p
Enjoy 
Laman Seri Business Park
by vixidem on Mar.06, 2010, under Landscape and Nature, Potraiture
I just changed my guitar strings yesterday, means that I will be in good mood to play guitar for a while before the strings become rusty. I have to change my guitar strings at least every 1 month (usually it will be much earlier) as I have hyperhidrosis.
“Hyperhidrosis is a medical condition in which a person sweats excessively and unpredictably. People with hyperhidrosis may sweat even when the temperature is cool or when they are at rest.” (definition from MedlinePlus). Google it yourself to find out more.
Sweaty palms cause the guitar strings to become rusty faster than usual, and the string bright sound diminished earlier than it should be. It is very very frustating, not only when I play guitar, but also in several other conditions such as shaking hands,playing badminton and even when writing during the exams. I still remember that I use a handkerchief to prevent my OMR paper from soaking in sweat from my palms during PMR and SPM. Luckily, examinations in MSU is carried out in rooms with aircond (if unlucky, I have to do the exam in hot rooms and experience the same situation).
I went to Laman Seri Business Park this evening with Aziq to shoot some photos. Yesterday Aziq saw some photos of Laman Seri Business Park at Lim Zifan’s facebook, and he asked me whether I want to shoot it too. So, here it is ,the photos from Laman Seri Business Park together with Aziq as shooting partner (merangkap model sambilan 
).
Shoot with Aperture Priority mode with Aperture set variably from f/1.8 to f/16. I forgot to reset my camera ISO setting so some photos were shooted with a higher ISO than needed. ISO 200 was used most of the time. 50mm f/1.8 and 12-24mm f/4 were mounted on camera with no flash. White balance used was Kelvin, set at 5300. Adobe Photoshop CS3 used for post-processing (reverted back to CS3, CS4 is freaking heavy, with annoying interface)
Enjoy.
Ozielzinho’s Isabella Cover by VIXIDEM
by vixidem on Feb.28, 2010, under Guitar and Music
I have played guitar seriously since I was 11 years old. I have taken a classical guitar class during the earlier days, but halted as I have to continue my study at Sekolah Menengah Sains Teluk Intan (SEMESTI). During my time at SEMESTI, guitar is forbidden. You can’t bring your guitar to dormitories. However, I managed to play in a band during an event after PMR, which the band is a complete disaster with all tuning problems, lack of confidence, lack of knowledge and lack of everything (at least for me..hehe). But, from there, I manage to get a position in the school’s orchestra (which became a group of clowns being laughed at during the Wind Orchestra Competition at Sekolah Dato’ Abdul Razak). I played bass guitar in the orchestra.
But the most important thing that I want to address here is how a person (Mr. Mastor Jarkaseh, please google him), despite of the major lacks in instruments at the school, managed to made a huge leap for the school’s music field. Everything about music back then were related to Mr. Mastor such as nasyid’s minus one, rock band’s arrangement, orchestra, kompang arrangement, piano accompaniment during “Negaraku” and so on. He never get angry when we do mistakes during practice (usually music teacher is so fierce, which is the reason I hated music lesson at primary school). And there was one time where Mr. Mastor replace our drummer for our orchestra practice session, and everyone stopped playing, stunned with the sounds he made from a broken drum-set with teared cymbal, torn snare and everything you could imagine. By the way, he is very-very-very good at drums while he can play the piano and guitar as well. Once in a while, I learned how to read sheet music from him (there was only one class that take music lesson during that time, and it was not my class).
“Belajar elok-elok, awak ada peluang belajar yang bagus. Saya dulu tak ada peluang, terpaksa mula lambat”
“Kalo awak nak baca muzik, awak kena baca pelan-pelan, jangan hafal not-not yang awak nak main, awak kena baca”
“Saya ada rm50 je ni, awak makan la berempat, saya tak apa”, kata Cikgu Mastor sambil hulur not rm50 kepada budak-budak band.
And he taught me how to play the “Hati Emas” guitar solo, one of the first guitar solo that I’ve learned and improvised by myself.
This guitar cover was made for [anis] for her birthday. I like the melody of the song, so I studied the song for about a day, then I recorded it. There are mistakes here and there. I recorded 3 takes for this song, but I gave up as there was still mistakes done on the 3rd take. hehe. Sape suruh malas praktis.
Enjoy. Thanks Mr. Mastor.
Wallpapers as a Wall
by vixidem on Feb.25, 2010, under Photo Manipulation & Digital Art
Upgraded my OS to Windows 7 Ultimate 2 days ago, and impressed with the performance. No more laggy and buggy Vista. Vista used up my 3Gb RAM to the max, and simultaneously raging my laptop’s processor, heated it like crazy especially when using demanding softwares such as Photoshop (worse when dealing with RAW files), Illustrator, and Ableton Live. I am squeezing all the functionality of my laptop totally, editing photos, recording guitar, tracing works, shirt’s designs..my laptop should be proud of the service given to me
By the way, I am no longer using Ableton Live to record my guitar, as I find a better solution for the recording, Adobe Audition 3. It was not a full blown professional DAW, but the interface is much better to handle compared to Live. Wait for guitar update as I am working on some guitar recording, but the guitar string is rusty, and it is not worth recording with such strings. Have to wait for the guitar strings to break before changing it,hehe…
The photos in this post are not photography. This is some of the wallpapers that I have made for my laptop since 3 years ago. All the photo composite and the editing was done in Photoshop ( PS7-PS CS4). Actually, I have known Photoshop much earlier than knowing a camera. I started to use Photoshop in 2001, Photoshop 5 if I’m not mistaken. It is an advantage as I don’t have to struggle learning about photography post-processing. Some of the wallpapers were made with reference to tutorials I’ve founded across the website especially wallpaper no.2. Wallpapers 4,7 and 8 is totally my imagination, during boring time.
Enjoy.
Class Canceled
by vixidem on Feb.23, 2010, under Potraiture
Supposedly I should have a class this morning, which was cancelled right after I manage to prepare myself (rushing of of course).
Played the guitar throughout the morning, which suddenly I was interested in Naruto’s anime soundtrack composed by Toshiro Masuda entitled ‘The Raising Fighting Spirit”. I have heard the song since about 4 years ago, but never made an attempt to study the song, but this morning when I browse through my MP3 folder, I played the MP3 and played along with it. The reason why this song was interesting is the composition is comprised of several Japanese traditional musical instrument, notably shamisen and a kind of flute( I can’t remember the name) mixed up with modern instruments. What makes it more interesting is the shamisen was played with a modern pentatonic scale (I am not sure if some of Japanese traditional musical scale is identical to pentatonic scale, I am sorry if I made the statement wrong). The riff is pretty simple, and the melody is catchy. Maybe I will make a guitar cover soon.
Cats never failed to fascinate me. [anis] with her cat Loba posed and I was there to capture some of the moments. The lighting was not very good, at about 6p.m. the sky was cloudy. [anis] always muttering about missing her cats (she has 3 cats at the moment), and I couldn’t say much because the cats are super-cute and adorable. Loba even made an attempt to touch his nose to front of my lens during the shooting :p
I miss [anis] too.
Photo’s EXIF data…malas…
Enjoy.
Lata Kekabu (I love bantal kekabu, I hate bantal sumbat span)
by vixidem on Feb.19, 2010, under Landscape and Nature, Potraiture
Being busy for a while. Plus there was nothing to shoot. Playing guitar on all free times.
Went back to Ipoh a few days back, Chinese New Year holiday. The journey back to Ipoh was smooth, but on my way back to Shah Alam, the highway packed with cars heading back to KL. Usually it takes about 3 hours at most to travel from Ipoh to Shah Alam , but this time, it took 5 1/2 hours to reach Section 17, Shah Alam. The most annoying thing that happened on that bus was that I realized Malaysian peoples tend to slow down their car whenever there is something at the side of the road, just to watch what had happened, which most of the time, was just a car breakdown. Consequently, the highway jammed, for nothing, as cars slowing down caused the slow traffic. Plus, selfish driver that use the emergency lane made it worst.
I went to Kuala Kangsar, to my grandmother’s house at Sauk, near Jenalek. That was the place where I lived during my early childhood time. Back then, when I say ‘Sauk”, peoples like to ,” Sauk, where? Tempat jin mesyuarat?” (humans are the only creature that love to quarrels with each other), but after the Al-Maunah incident, Sauk became a little bit popular among Malaysians, at least to peoples that read/watch news. There is a lake just behind the house, Tasik Chenderoh, where I like to go during my childhood for a dip. But humans are destructive and ignorant creature, the lake polluted with all kinds of non biodegradable materials, made me doesn’t realize now that there was a beautiful lake there, back then of course.
So, the only option now is going to a reserve area of Lata Kekabu, about 10 minutes drive from Opah’s house. I was delighted when my uncle ask whether we want to join him to Lata Kekabu, as I haven’t shoot anything for a while. We went there, parking was a mess (a lot of peoples are there, Malaysian kind of holiday, multiracial). Luckily, I managed to get some decent photos (at least they are decent to me). Frankly, I never know that Lata Kekabu has a very nice waterfall, as before this, I never go as far. I enjoyed the short trip.
For the camera setting, ISO 400-1600 (I just don’t prefer to use flash). Aperture priority at most of the time except for the waterfall photos. Aperture set variably, as the natural lighting was not consistent. ….. (it is boring to write about the camera setting…and I am lazy)
Enjoy. Think. Do.
The Curse of The Castle Dragon
by vixidem on Jan.18, 2010, under Guitar and Music
Paul Gilbert influenced me a lot in my guitar playing. This is one of my favourite Paul Gilbert’s song. Lots of melodic shredding (I cannot really appreciate music with least melody, but there is always an exception to some type of songs).
I started to like Paul’s playing when I saw how he has this kind of picking styles, which is rhythmically super-accurate, and the pick sounds is very obvious, which I like very much. Besides that, his tutorial videos never let me down, because he is also good at teaching (it’s not like some tutorial videos with the guitarist showing off , speeding like there’s no tomorrow, and no real kind of teaching happened).
In this video, there are some flaws in my playing besides my playing is not as accurate as Paul Gilbert’s playing. I kind of realized that my playing is very sloppy when I see my own video. But, who cares? I am pleasing myself, not anyone else.
The Curse of The Castle Dragon. Am I cursed? ” No, its me myself.”
Enjoy.
*UPDATE: I have changed the video host to YouTube because Flickr cannot play the full video, somehow it play the video halfway and the video finished there. Adoi…
Splash!!!
by vixidem on Jan.03, 2010, under Landscape and Nature, Potraiture
2010. A new year. No feeling towards it though. It’s just the starting of the first month out of twelve months in Gregorian calendar. By the way, 1431 Hijrah had been around almost three weeks at the moment.
I am 23 this year? Gilaaa… Still, there is a lot to accomplish. Huge things around the corner. Responsibilities are on my shoulder.
Photos were taken at Sungai Congkak, Hulu Langat. I’ve faced a huge risk of dropping my camera into the water, but the results from the shooting were awesome. I really love it.
The camera setting was almost the same each time. 50mm f/1.8 mounted on camera, at max aperture with ISO around 100-400. Aperture Priority mode was used and Exposure Compensation was adjusted from -1.0 to +0.3 to suits the lighting condition. No flash was used, the lighting is all from The Almighty. For photo no.2, I bracketed 3 different exposure with bracketing increment of +/-1.0, and blend it using Photomatix (I am not a fan of excessive HDR though). Photos of myself were taken by Rizuan Ali, with my camera.
Enjoy!
A Long “Holiday’
by vixidem on Dec.26, 2009, under Gallery, Landscape and Nature, Potraiture
Wasted time, boring, guitar, on the phone, back to guitar, games, guitar again, wasting another hour, guitaraaaaaa, on the phone, eat, on the phone, guitareeeeeee, jog, eat, guitar, on the phone, guitarrooooooooo, sleep.
Am I the only one who are suffering from this kind of boredom?
Photos are from Selangor Ria Carnival at Shah Alam Stadium compound. Nothing special. Cute animals are the only thing that interest me.
EXIF data? Sorry la Macha.. Seriously lazy.
The Forbidden Space in the Heart
by vixidem on Dec.09, 2009, under Guitar and Music
The time moves at a very calm pace at the moment. Nothing to rush, nothing to be finished but it was so boring.
I have made another track, which is slightly longer than the last one that I have posted. This track was much influenced by In Flames. Heavy melodic backing track with simplistic guitar solo. In the initial part, the licks was done with some Wah added to the sound which the Wah was from my Line 6 POD XT Live.
Recorded just like before with me on everything (no bass guitar though).
Photography? Wait till I have new photos, no photography outing at the mean time.
‘F’ word for Streamyx for being such sluggish and slow. The only thing that I adore Streamyx is that they have the distinctive patience when being cursed like crazy by me. It was tiresome for me to make this post.
Enjoy.
