This afternoon I got a call from Uwe asking for some help. As always I went out to meet him.
We met in shum shui po. First stop was to find a light box for Ulrich. What a disaster. No luck, and bug and Jing were getting bored so they headed off to the restaurant to order dinner and wait. Uwe and I went on a wild goose chase until Jing called and told us dinner was getting cold. In our hunt for th exit a nice young man told us where we could find the light boxes. So after a nice dinner, we went back and found them.

So what does this all mean? Well, now that I have a light box, my puzzle photos should be much better-well as far as my camera will let me. Or at least they should be museum ready-ish.

I took a few photos tonight, and they really are nice. I just need to learn how to use it properly. Give it time Rox, give it time.

Is it a box which you may put a cube in it with surround lighting? I always hope to find one because I don't have a good camera.....

No otis, the light is only on one side, but the other sides are reflective so yes. It's very nice.
HK$500 on Ap Liu Street.

Wait, Uwe lives in China? I always thought he was European. I'm confused now

Congratulations on getting your expensive photography equipment!

I'm just curious, have you read any back posts at all? It would seem that you have lived in a bubble your entire puzzling life if you did not know this. It has been posted many times in many threads.


HK$500 only sounds expensive. It's about US$64.

Sample photos: Time machine


From a new builder


Dingdong puzzles:


The background paper on all of these are white. So is it my camera that makes it look greyish, or something else? The instructions for the box were in Chinese of course! So I have no idea what I'm doing here.

Haha, the machine itself reminds me of some sort of science fiction teleporter or something.

Also, the second puzzle there from a new builder, its that a custom puzzle, or something we're going to see mass-produced?

Wait. Is that a... I was going to...

Why is it that the vast majority of the time when I scratch something off of my list of things to do it is because someone else did it?

Beautiful pictures, by the way.

How do you define European? If you mean someone who lives in Europe, I'm pretty sure he stopped being one of those before I was born. If you mean someone who is from Europe originally, then you're not wrong but the fact that he isn't there now shouldn't be too confusing.

Custom-It's in new puzzles somewhere. Kid (are you?-well, to me anyway ) from HK made it, asked if I wanted it so, yes! But only with a John Hancock says I.

But that doesn't help with my grey question.

And, can I ask, Do I become Chinese simply because I have lived here for 18 years? Do I cease to be American because I move country? I don't think so. Uwe is German, and always will be.

Very nice toy. I have a setup with a softbox and two lights but I still need sunlight to get decent pictures. Yours are really nice and evenly lit.

I guess to get a completely white background you'll have to use photoshop and edit away the background to a pure white. You can also play around with the contrast/white balance/brightness to get a purer white from what you have now.

In my opinion people are not defined by their location.

As such, the idea that it would be confusing that a European was living in China would not be confusing in the least. It actually took me a little while to figure out why it might be confusing to Goomba.

Of course "European" is a bit of an odd identifier for a person my way of looking at things anyway. Am I a North American? I suppose I am, but I doubt I'd ever identify as such and I'd be genuinely surprised to hear anyone describe me as one. I'm an American which is different than being a Canadian or a Costa Rican. My French relatives are ... well my French relatives, I don't think of them as my European relatives.

I don't think of Uwe as European any more than I think of myself as North American; I think of him as German.

That's probably going further afield than is warranted.

-

The only way I would consider you to have become Chinese is if you considered yourself to have become Chinese. I think you're an American unless you tell me otherwise.

I don't think moving makes one any less of what they are.

Off topic in an off topic thread: I do not know, how German Uwe feels nowadays. I am German, but whenever we communicate, it is done in English (or what we Germans consider English )

Hey Roxanne,

You should re-read this post by TomZ: http://www.twistypuzzles.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=245223#p245223

He actually edits his grayish backgrounds to make them white.

Skarabajo.

Thanks Guys, I'll play around with the camera.
@konrad: Uwe still says hello to me in German, and he and Jing only use that when they speak to each other. So I laughed when I read your post.