Sony DSC-HX1 Digital Camera Review

World s first digital still camera with Sweep Panorama. With Exmor CMOS Sensor, powerful G lens and 20x Optical Zoom, achieve an imaging excellence that will change the way you shoot.
In photography, timing is everything. With the ultra-fast, 10-shots-per-second speed of the Cyber-shot DSC-HX1, its easy to capture a swinging bat just before it hits the ball. Remarkable Exmor CMOS technology even makes it easy to capture photos in low light while maintaining smooth color gradation and crisp detail.
Especially useful for beautiful landscape shots or shooting skyscrapers, the Sweep Panorama mode takes seamless 224-degree shots with breathtaking 9.1 megapixel resultsjust press the shutter and sweep in a horizontal or vertical direction. And don’t miss the 20x optical zoom or the Intelligent Auto mode that eliminates the guesswork by automatically adjusting camera settings for you. Got a shaky hand Optical SteadyShot image stabilization has you covered by reducing blur for sharp, lifelike images.

Sony DSC-HX1 Digital Camera Specifications/Price.

Price PKR Rs. 42400/-
















Mega Pixel
9.1
Optical Zoom
20x
Digital zoom
40x
LCD Size
3.0 Inch
Built In Memory
11 MB
Memory Type
DUO PRO
Battery Type
Rechargeable
LCD Resolution
230400 Pixels
Battery Life
390 Images
Dimension
114.5 x 82.8 x 91.8mm
Weight
453g

Sony DSC-HX1 Digital Camera Review

World s first digital still camera with Sweep Panorama. With Exmor CMOS Sensor, powerful G lens and 20x Optical Zoom, achieve an imaging excellence that will change the way you shoot.
In photography, timing is everything. With the ultra-fast, 10-shots-per-second speed of the Cyber-shot DSC-HX1, its easy to capture a swinging bat just before it hits the ball. Remarkable Exmor CMOS technology even makes it easy to capture photos in low light while maintaining smooth color gradation and crisp detail.
Especially useful for beautiful landscape shots or shooting skyscrapers, the Sweep Panorama mode takes seamless 224-degree shots with breathtaking 9.1 megapixel resultsjust press the shutter and sweep in a horizontal or vertical direction. And don’t miss the 20x optical zoom or the Intelligent Auto mode that eliminates the guesswork by automatically adjusting camera settings for you. Got a shaky hand Optical SteadyShot image stabilization has you covered by reducing blur for sharp, lifelike images.

Sony DSC-HX1 Digital Camera Specifications/Price.

Price PKR Rs. 42400/-
















Mega Pixel
9.1
Optical Zoom
20x
Digital zoom
40x
LCD Size
3.0 Inch
Built In Memory
11 MB
Memory Type
DUO PRO
Battery Type
Rechargeable
LCD Resolution
230400 Pixels
Battery Life
390 Images
Dimension
114.5 x 82.8 x 91.8mm
Weight
453g

Winter ROX!!!!!

Okay, just so this is clear, this is NOT a post about rocks. 8D

Winter is my absolute FAVORITE season!
I luv it,
Luv it,
LUV IT!!!!
I mean, come on.
There are so many reasons why it is positively AWESOME!!!!!
1. Girls don't have to shave their legs.
8D
2. One word: SNOW.
I can't get enough of that cold little white fluffy stuff.
8D
3. Ice, ice, and more ice!!!
Come on.
How many of you out there DON'T luv sliding around on those little icy patches?
*crickets chirp*
Yeah, thought so.
8D
4. SNOW DAYS
I don't think I could live without snow days!
WE
NEED
BREAKS!!!!
(Well, and we need time to do our neglected homework. 8D )
5. No bugs.
Flies and mosquitoes are just drawn to me, so winter gives me times to replenish my blood supply.
Seriously,
I get AT LEAST ten bug bites on the first day of spring.
Hate those annoying little guys.
6. You get to freeze your butt off as you hide under your bed covers waiting for the big wintery ice monster to pop out of your closet and munch you to death!!
...Wait, that might be a bad thing.
Oh, well.
You get the point.
8D

Winter ROX!!!!!

Okay, just so this is clear, this is NOT a post about rocks. 8D

Winter is my absolute FAVORITE season!
I luv it,
Luv it,
LUV IT!!!!
I mean, come on.
There are so many reasons why it is positively AWESOME!!!!!
1. Girls don't have to shave their legs.
8D
2. One word: SNOW.
I can't get enough of that cold little white fluffy stuff.
8D
3. Ice, ice, and more ice!!!
Come on.
How many of you out there DON'T luv sliding around on those little icy patches?
*crickets chirp*
Yeah, thought so.
8D
4. SNOW DAYS
I don't think I could live without snow days!
WE
NEED
BREAKS!!!!
(Well, and we need time to do our neglected homework. 8D )
5. No bugs.
Flies and mosquitoes are just drawn to me, so winter gives me times to replenish my blood supply.
Seriously,
I get AT LEAST ten bug bites on the first day of spring.
Hate those annoying little guys.
6. You get to freeze your butt off as you hide under your bed covers waiting for the big wintery ice monster to pop out of your closet and munch you to death!!
...Wait, that might be a bad thing.
Oh, well.
You get the point.
8D

Truth is always hidden in fiction - uncover it in the noir of Carlos Ruiz Zafon!

I read Carlos Ruiz Zafon and I knew I wanted to see Barcelona. Author of The Shadow of The Wind - the most successful novel in Spanish publishing after Don Quixote - Zafon was born in Barcelona and the city is another character in his noir novels. A gothic organism, it shifts shape and form to yield narrow alleys and desolate mansions, stifling haze and blanketing fog even casting the residence of Gaudi - the Catalan architect whose Baroque buildings define the cityscape - as a set piece. 


Zafon is hailed as a worthy successor to Bram Stoker and if you haven't read him yet, go exploring your local library/bookstore for his books - The Angel's Game, and most recently, The Prince of Mist. I reviewed the former for South China Morning Post, and as you'll read, loved it! 


As a writer, Zafon is soubly entertaining with his wise and witty take on a writer's life. Witness: "The only way you can truly get to know an author is through the trail of ink he leaves behind him. The person you think you see is only an empty character: truth is always hidden in fiction." 


A tragic romance, a gothic mystery, a rollercoaster ride through the sights, sounds and streets of Barca - what's not to love!

The Angel’s Game

by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

Weidenfeld & Nicholson

HK$ 204

****

Manreet Sodhi Someshwar

FICTION

The Angel’s Game is Carlos Ruiz Zafon’s prequel to the immensely successful Shadow of the Wind, a novel that become a worldwide bestseller and was translated into more than 35 languages. It is set in 1920’s Barcelona, a turbulent time marked by dictatorship and the end of constitutional monarchy in Spain. The backdrop is thus appropriately arrayed for a noir thriller replete with mean characters, a tragic hero, a doomed love and quicksand circumstances. Keeping with the spirit of its predecessor, this book too features Barcelona as a character in the story, a gothic organism that shifts shape and form to yield narrow alleys and desolate mansions, stifling haze and blanketing fog. With his tongue firmly in cheek, Zafon even summons Antoni Gaudi, the Spanish Catalan architect famous for his baroque buildings, and casts his residence, “the garden of columns and towers looked more like a cursed paradise”, as a set piece.

The book opens with David Martin, a 17-year-old impoverished writer working at a languishing newspaper. Despite being brought up by an illiterate war veteran, since childhood David’s “only friends were made of paper and ink”, a passion in which he was ably assisted by the bookseller Sempere. Readers familiar with Shadow will smile at the reappearance of the delightful Sempere & Sons, a bookstore that along with the Cemetery of Forgotten Books, played a stellar role in the first novel. David’s favourite book is a Christmas gift from Sempere, Great Expectations, and Dickens’ novel runs as a leitmotif through The Angel’s Game. Much like Pip, David has a rich benefactor in Pedro Vidal, star writer and scion of a wealthy Barcelona family; David’s Estella is the glacial Christina, alternately aloof and approachable; and the character of Victorian London is parlayed by Baroque Barcelona. 

When David gets commissioned to write penny dreadfuls, he proceeds to do so under a pseudonym. His tales of Barcelona’s underbelly garner him a steady readership, an abandoned mansion for residence, and the attentions of a mysterious publisher Andreas Corelli. The reclusive Corelli wants David to write a book unlike any other, a book with the power to change hearts and minds, and offers a fortune in return. As David begins the work macabre incidents start to rip through his life: the death of his ex-publishers by fire, a police patrol hotfooting on his heels, the discovery of sinister murders of yore in his labyrinthine mansion, and Christina’s descent into madness. Grappling with the bizarre happenings David realizes he might just have struck a Faustian bargain. 

The Angel’s Game pulses with Zafon’s trademark wit as, armed with the knowledge of an insider, he takes swipes at a writer’s life and the publisher’s trade. More reverentially, it unpicks the role of books in our lives, the consuming passion a writer pours into his work and the magical hold a good book can exercise on our soul. It is reputed to be the fastest-selling Spanish novel and, unless you are seriously opposed to the idea of roller coaster rides, what is there not to like?

Truth is always hidden in fiction - uncover it in the noir of Carlos Ruiz Zafon!

I read Carlos Ruiz Zafon and I knew I wanted to see Barcelona. Author of The Shadow of The Wind - the most successful novel in Spanish publishing after Don Quixote - Zafon was born in Barcelona and the city is another character in his noir novels. A gothic organism, it shifts shape and form to yield narrow alleys and desolate mansions, stifling haze and blanketing fog even casting the residence of Gaudi - the Catalan architect whose Baroque buildings define the cityscape - as a set piece. 


Zafon is hailed as a worthy successor to Bram Stoker and if you haven't read him yet, go exploring your local library/bookstore for his books - The Angel's Game, and most recently, The Prince of Mist. I reviewed the former for South China Morning Post, and as you'll read, loved it! 


As a writer, Zafon is soubly entertaining with his wise and witty take on a writer's life. Witness: "The only way you can truly get to know an author is through the trail of ink he leaves behind him. The person you think you see is only an empty character: truth is always hidden in fiction." 


A tragic romance, a gothic mystery, a rollercoaster ride through the sights, sounds and streets of Barca - what's not to love!

The Angel’s Game

by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

Weidenfeld & Nicholson

HK$ 204

****

Manreet Sodhi Someshwar

FICTION

The Angel’s Game is Carlos Ruiz Zafon’s prequel to the immensely successful Shadow of the Wind, a novel that become a worldwide bestseller and was translated into more than 35 languages. It is set in 1920’s Barcelona, a turbulent time marked by dictatorship and the end of constitutional monarchy in Spain. The backdrop is thus appropriately arrayed for a noir thriller replete with mean characters, a tragic hero, a doomed love and quicksand circumstances. Keeping with the spirit of its predecessor, this book too features Barcelona as a character in the story, a gothic organism that shifts shape and form to yield narrow alleys and desolate mansions, stifling haze and blanketing fog. With his tongue firmly in cheek, Zafon even summons Antoni Gaudi, the Spanish Catalan architect famous for his baroque buildings, and casts his residence, “the garden of columns and towers looked more like a cursed paradise”, as a set piece.

The book opens with David Martin, a 17-year-old impoverished writer working at a languishing newspaper. Despite being brought up by an illiterate war veteran, since childhood David’s “only friends were made of paper and ink”, a passion in which he was ably assisted by the bookseller Sempere. Readers familiar with Shadow will smile at the reappearance of the delightful Sempere & Sons, a bookstore that along with the Cemetery of Forgotten Books, played a stellar role in the first novel. David’s favourite book is a Christmas gift from Sempere, Great Expectations, and Dickens’ novel runs as a leitmotif through The Angel’s Game. Much like Pip, David has a rich benefactor in Pedro Vidal, star writer and scion of a wealthy Barcelona family; David’s Estella is the glacial Christina, alternately aloof and approachable; and the character of Victorian London is parlayed by Baroque Barcelona. 

When David gets commissioned to write penny dreadfuls, he proceeds to do so under a pseudonym. His tales of Barcelona’s underbelly garner him a steady readership, an abandoned mansion for residence, and the attentions of a mysterious publisher Andreas Corelli. The reclusive Corelli wants David to write a book unlike any other, a book with the power to change hearts and minds, and offers a fortune in return. As David begins the work macabre incidents start to rip through his life: the death of his ex-publishers by fire, a police patrol hotfooting on his heels, the discovery of sinister murders of yore in his labyrinthine mansion, and Christina’s descent into madness. Grappling with the bizarre happenings David realizes he might just have struck a Faustian bargain. 

The Angel’s Game pulses with Zafon’s trademark wit as, armed with the knowledge of an insider, he takes swipes at a writer’s life and the publisher’s trade. More reverentially, it unpicks the role of books in our lives, the consuming passion a writer pours into his work and the magical hold a good book can exercise on our soul. It is reputed to be the fastest-selling Spanish novel and, unless you are seriously opposed to the idea of roller coaster rides, what is there not to like?

Fresh InspirationTake Two

Hello Everyone!

A few weeks ago I featured a few of my favorite blogs

and most of you seemed to enjoy it so I decided to make

it a monthly series. Let's pay them a visit and get inspired.

Here they are in order of their first name like last time.

I list a huge blog roll and have many buttons displayed.

At the top of my blog I also feature a *Blog of the Week*.

Just so you all know I do this for *you*. It's nice to share.

If you don't have a blog roll listed on your blog you should add it.

It's always fun to browse other blog rolls as well.

*All photos enlarge when clicked*
Amy at *All Things Home* displays lovely and unique items.
Barb at *Grits and Glamour* is a bargain finding queen!
Check out her bathroom redo for under $150.00.
Jen at *Easy Peasy Chic* created a gorgeous photo wall.
She also sells wonderful vinyl wall words. Check her out!
Look at the stunning nursery created by
Jodie at *Love, Laughter and Decor'*.
You will adore this blog!
Kim at *Cheap Chic Home* is amazing!
Look at her gorgeous fridge top and bottle drying rack.
Lori at *A Time For Everything* created these precious hearts.
She is an incredible cook and photographer as well.
You must visit Roz at *La Bella Vita* for the most
mouth watering recipes ever. You will leave hungry.
One of the most unique and prettiest homes I've seen
around belongs to Sonya at *Beyond the Screen Door*.
Look at the darling chalkboard created by
Tammy at *Beatrice Banks*. So pretty!
~*~
Thanks to everyone who entered my spring garden
giveaway this past week. I wish I had 100's of gifts to give.
The winner is...*Imparting Grace*. Congrats to Richella!
~*~
Have a wonderful week!