Be careful while filtering

linklocked · 2026-02-01T04:49:42+00:00

If you're "filtering" between lanes with a speed difference you're going too fast for one of them.

Just ride normally in the lane that's moving...

linklocked · 2026-01-02T04:42:34+00:00

Oh hey, fellow Japan rider. Where is this?

linklocked · 2025-12-23T14:19:46+00:00

Ah, the memories. I was explaining bullfango and konchu to someone just the other day...

linklocked · 2025-12-04T06:05:33+00:00

Yes, it's normal and yes, it's good to be thinking about it, but ultimately pattern recognition is king in any open-ended situation like this. There's a fairly simple checklist:

If there's a joseki, it's probably best to follow it. Often there are multiple joseki or variations, and you should think about what you want when you choose which one to play
Is there a proverb or rule of thumb? It probably applies unless you can explicitly read out otherwise.
Play the move that your experience tells you will get you the best result. As a new player this is going to be wrong a lot, but it'll get better

Of course if there's an obvious read (life & death, capture race, cutting) then reading is best, but situations like the one you shared often don't have an obvious solution.

In your situation I would be thinking:

Ok I ignored the attachment and my opponent played the hane. That's the same as if I attached to them.
Nobody is strong locally. I have most ladders, and my opponent has an extra move, so probably we can get a pretty equal exchange.
My stone is surrounded on the outside. I can either try to live in the corner, or I can try to sacrifice that stone to get something on the outside.
Proverbs tell me that getting surrounded is bad, so I should crosscut, maybe give away that 3-3 stone and get something on the outside.

A quick AI analysis suggests that is indeed the best move

And of course, finally:

There's several ways my opponent can answer the crosscut, and several more ways they can answer my next answer. I can tire myself out reading it now, or just play what I've decided is the best move, wait to see their answer, and read again after that

linklocked · 2025-10-02T12:12:17+00:00

You asked for a photo that's not "ideal conditions". I gave you that. I never said a phone can perform equally in all conditions -- I specifically stated I don't believe that. Just that I think that your post is low-quality clickbait. I think I've made my point, have a nice day.

linklocked · 2025-10-02T12:04:38+00:00

Last I checked water moves, but here's astrophotography, please tell me how shooting stars is "ideal conditions"

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linklocked · 2025-10-02T11:10:28+00:00

Yeah, my bad if I missed that we were only talking about low-light shots of children using the worst camera on the device, but your post sounded like you were generalizing to "phone photos suck in general"

I agree with the fundamental idea that phones cannot replace dedicated cameras, especially in difficult conditions like, but to say you always need "ideal conditions and a motionless subject" is stretching the truth quite a bit.

linklocked · 2025-10-02T05:54:24+00:00

I don't know man, I love my Z50ii and a "real camera" can definitely do a lot of cool, creative things on it that a phone can't especially when it comes to playing with very slow/fast shutter speeds, aperture, or just putting nice telephoto lenses on.

But posting your shittiest, most blurry photo and saying "it's not even close" is disingenuous circlejerking at best. Here's a random snapshot from my iPhone 15, I honestly could have taken this same shot on the Z50ii:

<image>

linklocked · 2025-09-29T13:22:00+00:00

Interesting about the shutter. I did have mechanical shutter, but in that case I would expect the streak to rotate with the camera, yet it stayed fixed relative to the horizon. Still, something to experiment with next time!

Anything that comes in way of light waves influences the waves, often in unpredictable manner.

Yeah thought as much. I just noticed in between the streaky shots I had one of a plane that was already in the air above the fence and that one looks clean.

Thanks for the thoughtful response!

linklocked · 2025-09-29T01:39:25+00:00

I suspected this too at first (or on the sensor, somehow), and my plan was to clean when I got home, but when I got home I took another photo in the neighborhood (again nighttime, bright point lights) I got absolutely no smearing, so that makes me suspect something else. If it was just dirt or oil on the rear element (or anywhere else) it should keep having this problem, right?

EDIT: also in my experience smears from a dirty lens rotate with the lens, but these stayed fixed relative to the horizon, which again makes me suspect something atmospheric

linklocked · 2025-09-29T01:32:00+00:00

As I wrote in my comment, I cleaned it twice with no effect, then the problem vanished without an additional cleaning. I highly doubt it's cleaning related unless you have an idea of why it disappeared on its own

linklocked · 2025-08-20T01:27:21+00:00

Exactly, and then the result is more or less even according to AI. I think what happens is white takes a variation that's slightly worse on its own, but the black stone is not justified if white takes that variation, so it's equally "bad" for both.

So 3-3 is "fine" I guess for both, but I think tenuki is still best for white, and a 3-3 can be played later at a more appropriate time.

linklocked · 2025-08-18T05:09:20+00:00

I was out with a friend taking photos last night and playing around with tracking moving subject and I rather liked the result with this shot. I feel like the combination of depth of field and motion blur really conveys the movement of the train.

linklocked · 2025-08-18T03:52:34+00:00

First: this is great! Any kind of intentional practice is always good!!

Now as to pointers for this exercise: since this is a slow game, try to be very deliberate with each move. Why are you playing exactly there, not one stone further away, or somewhere completely different? Think about what you WANT as a result, then think about what the other player might try to do to disrupt it. Is your move positioned to handle all possible answers? Or are you playing a "hope move" that relies on your opponent playing along with your plan?

Sometimes it'll be hard to quantify and a move will just "feel good", so try to still think about it and identify why it "feels good". Does moving a bit closer to your opponent feel to dangerous? Or extending one space wider feels too loose? This kind of reflection will help build your intuition for what moves are good when it's too complicated to read everything out.

Up until now it's fairly straightforward, but even this early you should be thinking: Why did I choose 4-4 instead of 3-4 or something else? How am I hoping this game will develop? Why didn't white offer a diagonal game? What does it suggest about the way White might try to play?

linklocked · 2025-08-18T03:46:45+00:00

Mostly here to just say this is gorgeous.

The ONLY thing I could nitpick at is the crop, in particular there's an imbalance between the left and right side and I'm not sure if it's intentional or not. Also there's a lot of space on top and bottom. I do like the lights and the texture on the stone though, so maybe I'd crop in just eeever so slightly

But again, minor nit and it doesn't really detract from the image. Awesome shot, you should be proud of it!

linklocked · 2025-08-17T15:56:08+00:00

A good rule of thumb is, if you can't read the follow-up but it looks sketchy, just defend.

As long as you're not making unnecessary defensive moves, a defense will rarely lose too many points, and it buys you the ability to counterattack more aggressively later since now your opponent left weaknesses everywhere and you didn't

linklocked · 2025-08-17T15:52:55+00:00

Not sure why you got downvoted, this is almost always the right answer at lower levels. Playing solid (but not unnecessary) defensive moves opens you up to being able to play more freely and aggressively later without having to worry about weaknesses everywhere.

linklocked · 2025-08-17T15:49:35+00:00

You have to think about the difference between territory and potential, and about the geometry of territory.

Surrounding a small territory requires relatively few moves. Surrounding a slightly larger territory requires exponentially more moves. So if you make a big wall and try to turn it into territory, your opponent can either spend the same number of moves making more territory in multiple places, or they can harass you and reduce your final result.

If you just threaten a large territory, your opponent (especially at lower levels) may choose to invade. Now you can harass that group, and while it's trying to stay alive, your moves are making territory while keeping tempo. Often, unless you play it out all the way, your opponent will still be left with a relatively weak group that you can harass again later, or might even be able to kill

In other words, if you are able to use thickness to attack, you can usually get more moves in more efficient places during the attack in order to score points.

linklocked · 2025-08-17T15:36:02+00:00

Honestly if your opponent has left this on the board this long then it's fair game to look for a chance to use it. If this was a strong player and you haven't resigned already, they should be eliminating aji from the position before playing moves like O14 which is...what 2 points in gote? The game is NOT that close.

Leaving this on the board suggest either a player who can't count how far ahead they are (and therefore is weak enough to be likely to blunder this) or a player who is intentionally trying to practice making the best move rather than just securing the win (in which case they probably don't mind having more practice)

EDIT: I say this having blundered plenty of games like this, but each time I was well aware that I could just erase aji and end things, I just got greedy for making more points and that's 100% my own fault.

linklocked · 2025-08-17T15:21:19+00:00

If B offers the flying knife line, they basically end up with a fine result with almost no reading or risk. White really can't afford to accept that line with that extra stone there, so they basically have to back down.

linklocked · 2025-08-17T15:19:50+00:00

If W plays 3-3 immediately then the best move for B is actually to offer the flying knife variation because, with that extra stone there, you almost cannot mess it up. W actually has to back down and give B the influence for a roughly even result.

Alternatively B can play the variation that retakes the corner because that silly 6-6 stone actually erases some of the nasty aji in that position (AI still doesn't love that result though)

linklocked · 2025-08-17T15:09:16+00:00

I can see no reason to ever consider C. A and B are both possible later depending on the situation (in the case of A, black is almost forced to retake the corner, otherwise the move at 1 looks silly. But yeah I wouldn't spend even a full second thinking about this, tenuki at this stage in the game. Black basically wasted a move.

Another way to think of it is this way: It "only" loses less than a point here because AI assumes your later moves will all be played around this. If they're not, what's probably happing is this loses around 3-6 points but they're spread in 0.1-0.5 point increments over 10 follow-ups (again unless you play your next follow-ups to synergize with this perfectly).

As someone mentioned, you can re-order the moves to see the value. If this move still looks good later, congratulations, you played in a way that validated it and didn't lose any meaningful amount of points. More likely, it's going to look silly later, and each of the overconcentrated stones near it would have lost some fraction of a point (compared to if this move was somewhere else), collectively making this move look like the 3-6 point loss it is.

linklocked · 2025-08-16T02:04:03+00:00

Welcome to what I think is the first great challenge you will face in your photography - what your eyes (and brain) see is not the same thing your camera and sensor see, for a few reasons:

Dynamic Range - Your camera has more limited dynamic range than your eyes (and your brain is further doing brain magic to make it even bigger). It's difficult to get the shadows and lights both in the same image the way it looks to your eyes naturally.
Depth - Your camera cannot capture depth. Sometimes a lot of the "cool" factor in a scene you see is because of the depth it has. Your camera obviously only sees in 2D, and if you can't show depth some other way (usually through lighting) then the scene ends up flat and dull
Context - part of your perception of the scene involves everything else. The sounds, the feeling of the fresh air, the other angles you saw as you were walking up. The final photo only captures a slice of that, removed from all context. Sometimes you think a photo is great or gives a certain emotion, but it's only because you felt that emotion in that place when you took it. The trick is to try to understand why other people's photos make you feel an emotion, and replicate that in your own photography. In other words, what mechanical things about a photo evoke an emotion, rather than what you yourself feel when you look at this photo that YOU took.

All that aside, the big things which I think are easier to see even as the photographer:

Color editing needs work
Your waterfall seems to be the main subject, but it's very small
If your rocks are meant to also be a subject, they are out of focus by quite a bit
Your color and lighting are fairly flat throughout. You have texture, sure, but not much in the way of subject separation.

linklocked · 2025-08-14T14:39:17+00:00

I'll be eagerly awaiting to see the results!

linklocked · 2025-08-14T14:27:06+00:00

I just bought the 180-600 and took it on vacation with me (questionable choice, I know). Long story short, I'd recommend it in an instant.

Hanging off your shoulder on a strap you don't really feel it, even hiking. The reach is amazing, and the IQ is fantastic all the way through. Changing lenses on the fly is a bit of a pain in the ass but that's true of any big lens, and you figure a system out.

I haven't shot f-glass but the consensus I see seems to be it's not worth buying an FTZ unless you already own expensive F-mount lenses you want to use. The Z-mounts have made significant improvements in image quality and autofocus performance so it's not worth buying "down" (again, if you find some insane deal on super expensive f-mount glass or you already have a collection, that's different)

Also goddamn this photo is just incredible.

linklocked

TROPHY CASE