Now is your turn Florence! I’m finally updating the travel photos of my previous travel to Florence, Italy. Following the introduction of this beautiful city of Tuscany last post, here is another snapshot that I took in Florence.

Some EXIF info: Photo taken with my Nikon D60 and my old Tamron SP10-24mm  Ultra Wide Angle lens. Shutter speed 1/320s and Aperture F9.0. Focus distance was set to 10mm (with both sides being cropped). ISO 100. Auto White Balance. No flash fired and no exposure being compensated with Matrix metering.

What captured in the photo was the main entrance door arch of the Duomo, the highest structure being constructed in Florence, which shows the height of the entrance. It also demonstrates the brilliant craftsmanship of ancient Roman civilisation during the Renaissance era.

For more exciting photos of Florence tourists sights, subscribe to my RSS feed or keep watching this space for more updates! – Travel Feeder, your ultimate photo travel guide to Europe

恭喜发财！ Happy Chinese New Year or Lunar New Year 0f Dragon 2012! This is my another photo report on CNY 2012 celebration and decoration at one of the most popular festive destination in Kuala Lumpur, the Tianhou Temple (天后宫, Tian Hou Gong). Lanterns and lighting features are put up around the temple each year to celebrate the festival. This year was no exception. People flocked into the temple as devotees as well as visitors to get into the festive mood.

In terms of decorations, there were nicely presented this year, as usual, eventhough it lacked of surprises.

The same scene that could be seen everyday: Devotees were filling up their drinking bottles with holy water poured from the Guan Yin Goddess.

Lanterns are hung all over the temple, especially at the courtyard in front of the main prayer hall at 1st floor, which houses the Goddess of The Heavenly Mother (Tian Hou).

Taoism and buddhism devotees are doing their prayer at the main hall, with lots of joss sticks burning around.

Tian Hou Temple is frequented mostly by the local Chinese community.

How to get into the Chinese New Year mood quickly? Watching Dragon dance performance is one of the best. Four “Dragons” were dancing to the beat of associated loud drums and cymbals rhythms.

Those “dragons” were so friendly to mix around and get together with children.

“Can you take a photo for me?”

These are a few of my favourite shots of the day…

Some EXIF info: Photos were taken with my Nikon D7000 and my Nikkor 18-105mm medium zoom lens. Daylight preset White Balance setting. No flash fired with Matrix metering.

Click HERE to view more Chinese Lunar New Year celebration photos in my Flickr album.

Tomorrow I’ll be moving further up to another popular New Year destination of Malaysia, Genting highland Resort World. More photo reports on CNY 2012 will be posted here in Travel Feeder. Until then, Ciao! – Travel Feeder, your ultimate photo travel guide of Festive seasons

HAPPY AND PROSPEROUS LUNAR NEW YEAR OF DRAGON 2012!

Chinese New Year (CNY) or Lunar New Year 2012, Year of Dragon, falls on the 23rd of January this year. I will be taking a week leave to celebrate the festival in Malaysia. Before the festival which is 2 days away, this is another set of Chinese New Year decorations in Mid Valley, one of the largest shopping mega mall in Kuala Lumpur. Decorations in Mid Valley this year are not as good as last year version, and simpler if compared to other shopping malls like Sunway Pyramid, but they still attracted huge crowd flocking in to snap photos while they were shopping for CNY clothing and foods in the mall.

Main stage of decorations was set at the Centre Court of the mall.

Kiosks selling CNY merchandise are set up at the lobby.

Stage is set up for various performance in conjunction with the Chinew New Year of Dragon.

Another set of giant lanterns is hung and displayed at the East Court of the mall.

Nothing to shout about on the deco, but it could at least stimulate our Chinese New Year mood to do some last minute shopping for the new year. Until I come back from my break next week, Travel Feeder would like to wish those who celebrate the festival:

HAPPY AND PROSPEROUS LUNAR NEW YEAR OF DRAGON 2012!

There are certainly more Chinese New Year decorations can be seen elsewhere in Malaysia than those posted here, but Sunway Pyramid in Subang area has the best that I’ve seen so far this year. Sunway Pyramid is an infamous mega shopping mall found in the Klang Valley of Malaysia which is well known for its giant Sphinx statue entrance and Pyramids roofing and architecture resembling those of the Egyptian Pyramids.

Each year during the Chinese New Year festival, they always put together some nice decorations in and around the mall to celebrate the event, and they have done it exceptionally well this year. Here are some of the photos taken with my Nikon D7000 and Nikkor 10-24mm UWA lens.

The overview of the centre court lobby decorated with a mock of the ancient Chinese fairyland.

A giant pendant lighting featuring red lanterns, a symbolic fitting for Chinese New Year.

Artificial Chinese cherry blossom are ‘planted’ around the lobby, as real Cherry Blossom can’t grow in the tropical climate of Malaysia. I love cherry blossoms so I will fly to Japan this Spring to witness its full bloom! If you wish to see a giant cherry blossom tree mock, head over to the Time Square of KL instead.

Stood at the centre stage is a giant Chinese dragon statue rising up high from the water pond (they really put up a temporary but real pond with water!)

If you look up higher, you will notice that the dragon is actually flying up towards to red lantern balls hanging down from the ceiling. Great idea!

A pagoda is even built at the fairyland.

This is one of my favourite shots of the day.

Walking out of the mall, various festive decorations are put up to attract patrons and tourists.

There is a fountain in the compound that served as a roundabout to the incoming traffics and is now decorated for some attractive lighting show at night. I didn’t stay until night so had to take a rain check for that.

That’s it for now for a brief report on Chinese New Year countdown decorations around town in Malaysia. More attractive photos will be posted in upcoming reports here in Travel Feeder. Watch this space and HAPPY NEW YEAR 2012! – Travel Feeder, your ultimate photo travel guide to Malaysia

For those of you shutterbugs who haven’t submitted your best travel photos to Airasia, Airasia is hosting a photo contest for its Travel 3Sixty onboard magazine from 3rd January to 14th February 2012. If you haven’t sold enough travel photos for your next travel, this is another chance for you to at least win a free trip to Hong Kong! The contest is open for everyone from any countries!

The photo contest will run for 3 months from January to March 2012, with one different theme for each month. 3 winners each month will win a totally free 4-Day-s3-Nights Return flight + Accommodation package to Hong Kong. For January category, travelers needs to submit photos of those awesome foods or fashion they found and captured on their travel in one of the Airasia flight destinations for the last 2 years.

The contest already started since 3rd January 2012 last week. If you haven’t submitted your best photos and wish to grab this opportunity for free travel, hurry up! The dateline for photo submission for January session is on 31st January 2012. After which, a handful of shortlisted entries will be posted for public voting to choose the winners! Even better if you captured the photos on your trip with either Airasia or Airasia X, you will get additional 20 votes!

Before submitting travel photos to win the ultimate Travel Photographer Of The Year contest later this year, why not joining this simple yet rewarding contest as a warm up? As what I said before, don’t waste your talent and creativity in travel photography! Share with th world out there, you might be one of the lucky winner to win prizes for your next photo trip! – Travel Feeder, your ultimate travel photo blog