Scription

Here Are Some Excuses

You must be waiting anxiously for the Chronodex July-December version to come out, believe that I'm working on it and to be released definitely this week.  In the mean time, here's the excuses of being late.

Excuse 1: Obsession with Tri-Eye iPhonography

Can't stop, it is heavy, it is huge and it is fun.  Usually when people I met get interested in the monster, I got chances to take their "The Dog" photos.  Here's Claudia from Staedtler, whom I met in Shanghai a few days ago.  She is going to spend the next 6 weeks in China, it is a long trip.  Since I didn't go to Paperworld this year, I got good updates from her about Staedtler's new product release schedule from 2012 up to 2013.  She speaks fluent Mandarin coz she studied in Beijing some time ago.

And yes self-portraits is fun too with Tri-Eye, here's me in my own toilet.

I forgot to bring my shaver to Shanghai so I accumulated an ugly 5 days worth of beard, kids took fisheye photo of this begger just last night.

Yes kids, they are losing their teeths, in a healthy way.  Desserts are most welcome to them.

So excuse 1 the obsession continues everyhour, business or personal, it doesn't matter.  Here's Mr. Flury the inventor of Cyberclean.  Somebody said "I'm afraid of his nose poking me if it were a 3D photo".

Excuse 2: Shanghai Frequent Visits

We are going to have a new store coming up soon in Shanghai, our second store there (already 12 stores in Hong Kong and 6 in Taiwan).  Management is sending long emails coz they haven't seen my input enough, yeah yeah yeah I'm working on it, I don't want to hand in rubbish just to shut them up but seems like I have to.  Anyway, I'm confident my current composite of the Stationery section is interesting and strong, I just have to make it easier for people around me.  So, I am travelling there a week or two every month.

The last Monday I bumped into The Amazing Race season 21 first shooting.  They arrived Shanghai the same time I did, it was their first stop of the season and it was in Shanghai.  The camera men were super sensitive soon as I raised my iPhone, a few crazy fans were in Shanghai too, I saw them running around with the crew taking pictures and posting to Reality Fan Forum in real time.  Interesting encounter.

For a stay of just 5 days, the schedule was completely full, meeting after meetings.  Just so happened there was the 106th China Stationery Fair and I went there between meetings, not enough time to see but I got a sense that the show is nice despite the fact that import products are a little rare and usually arrives 6 months to 1 year later than the rest of the world.  Damn China import regulations and customs (sorry, don't ban my blog, I'm just saying it is not efficient).

Shanghai is definitely changing a lot and very quickly, IMHO it is one of the fastest changing cities in the world, after Seoul and Tokyo.  I managed to stop by some of the smaller shops and found inspirations every time.  Well, I just borrowed the toilet in this interesting wine cellar/bar, never had the luxury to enjoy a drink, must find time in June to do that.

Excuse 3: Experiencing for the Future Categories

Things won't be exciting at all if I were to order products from catalogs only.  Yesterday's merchanise makes today's sales, many lacks the vision to create a future category thus constantly being bugged by management for lack of 'concept'.  IMHO, the only way to create a future is to explore and experience as much as possible, inspirations will come.  We have so much to learn from other creative people.

Thanks to Petit Morpho, a tiny place which the owner is obsessed with organizing art/craft exhibitions, I had a chance to learn from famous Japanese rubber stamp crafting artist Ms. Tomoko Tsukui (津久井智子).  She has a pari of super steady hands and published several books (in Japanese) about rubber stamp crafting from erasers.  Ms. Tomoko works for the original rubber stamp crafting supplier Hinodewashi and came to Hong Kong for promoting the art.

2 weeks ago, I brought my kid to the event and learned some basic skills and it was great fun for both of us.

Ms. Tomoko carries a few boxes of her stamps, inkpad (she designed interesting sets of finger inkpads for accurate coloring) and signature stamps in various versions.  Why is there no man in any of these workshops and demonstrations?  They are probably playing with their cameras, iPhones or game consoles.  Oh perhaps their bikes....

Excuse 4: Ride Along

Social cause. Well, not as grand as it sounds, but I enjoyed the Ride of Silence 2012 event with a borrowed bike.  Yes that's an event with 80% male participants contrary to rubber stamp crafting's 100% female.  People close to me don't get enough of my attention and went sour sometimes, cut back or manage better I don't know.  I like the fact that we can ride together but in silence, for the same goal, well understood simple communications.  And I'm not talking about a bike ride only, figuratively rides to somewhere with companionship, just enojy the rides, explore without sourness.

Excuse 5: Researches

When a shop/place is good, you keep hearing things from people and you keep wanting to find out more about it.  What's the essense behind the apparent pleasant things you see?  People in their beta thinking mode usually cannot see deep enough, I prefer to find all angles from word of mouth, a visit and a time to sit back and think.

Fang Sou (方所) claims to be the best lifestyle store in China, many suppliers said great things about it, so I paid a visit there on a day trip to GuangZhou.  It is a bookstore with a fashion boutique, a stationery corner, a cafe, a home objects corner and an exhibition area.  Like it, although anybody with sufficient amount of money and connection can build one as easily, it is a noble attempt to composite such a mix especially in China.  It is a beautiful place to be.  I managed to stop by a few other interesting small shops in GuangZhou, all these researches help me to orient and pick the right sets of values to convey to customers when creating the next merchandise mix.

Excuse 6: Personal Projects

The best advice to a Gemini is probably "to focus", and I'm still meditating on it.  Leather projects for personal use and to gloat about are fun, creating something useful like GTD index cards and Chronodex to share with people is satisfying, blogging about products not available just yet is ..., ok some of these projects must go somewhere soon.

Excuse 7: Beautiful Hong Kong

Extremely proud of this city, such a great melting pot for many of the world-changing things to happen. Many wrote to me asking for interesting spots to visit, and I gave them a Google map if we have some common interests.  Some day our Tourism Board should have independent agents like me all over the place, equipped by the coolest map and stationery travel kit.... 

Excuse 8, 9, 10...: Skipped

Yup, I'm just giving you excuses, getting back to work now.  I hope you can have a sense of the "mess" I'm in.

TurtleJacket Tri-Eye Customization

The first time I saw Turtleback's Turtlejacket Tri-Eye I couldn't make out what it was.  It looked like a combination of multi-lens 8mm camera and old movie reel, I immediately fell in love with the look, just that it was too expensive as an iPhone case.  I kept coming back to look at it and wondered how it works, I mean I couldn't make the purchase by looking at its online shop, I had to touch and feel if it was right for me.

Smartphone photography is unstoppable, the technology convenience and convergence only means more and more people will take the advantage of improving smartphone sensors and social network connectivity, leaving behind their digital camera.  We took a lot more (crap) photos when the digital camera age came, now we take and *share* photos like crazy.  One major movement is that, with smartphone photography, we seem to take it more slowly and enjoy the process of tweaking photos with dozens of apps before posting with nice captions.

Turtleback was probably overwhelmed by orders so they were out of stock for a while, Tri-Eye is now back in stock and I'm happy to have gotten one.  You know me, I like to customize things (one reporter said 'you are the type who wouldn't carry a thing not being customized by yourself' and I agreed).  Well it was simple, I just used masking tapes from MT and Cavallini and I was happy.

(dinner with boss)

Tri-Eye has a full aluminium body, the rotating wheel allows you to carry 3 different lenses at the same time.  I found myself playing with fisheye (x0.33) mostly, because of the dramatic effect it creates.  Wide angle (x0.7) allows you to capture more in compact spaces, Tele (x1.5) I don't use much, so I plan to get a macro lens somewhere to replace it.

(Mido Cafe, Hong Kong)

Yesterday I took a Korean friend to Mido cafe in Yau Ma Tei, we had a nice sharing there after lunch hour.  A beautiful old place to visit, nice Hong Kong dishes, but don't expect smiles from the staff over there, which is one thing they need to improve a lot.

(Staircase, Mido cafe, Hong Kong)

Switching to fisheye on my Turtlejacket, I was able to capture this narrow and steep staircase with details and patterns I couldn't see.

(Old cashier, Mido cafe, Hong Kong)

I guess staff over there are still not used to being photographed despite it being a popular tourist spot, whenever I pulled out my iPhone, they'd either look away or flocked.  A little more courtship may help, but I was there just for a short while, perhaps next time.

(Star Ferry, Hong Kong)

One of the reason why I love Tri-Eye is that you get to play with different lenses inexpensively and portable. Yes it is full metal and relatively heavy but it is still a great bargain for me because of all the fun it provides. Yup, fisheye photography is a thing I will explore more, my aim is not to make you bored by my twitter/Instagram fisheye images :)

(Customized on/off button, eraser, kid's complaint)

One thing I think Turtleback must improve is the accessibility of the iPhone on/off button.  The hole is so narrow and deep, you will need a flat finger tip or long nail to turn on/off the phone.  My solution is to steal my son's eraser, cut off a 10mm width x 4mm depth x 3mm height block, tape it to the iPhone on/off button before inserting it to the jacket.  It works perfectly and I can even feel the eraser's cushioning effect.  My son found out the missing corner of his eraser, I would be the only one in the house doing that, he drew a question mark on the eraser and gave me a note :)

Here's one more customization I'll do on my Tri-Eye: a two-tone leather holster with cool looking flap.  Well, you can use straps to carry Tri-Eye on your neck, but it is way too heavy for my neck.  I prefer a holster, perhaps it is a man thing I like, to pull and shoot.  A few ideas of the cutting is drawn on my notebook, just need to steal a few hours to experiment and make it happen.  I already feel happy about it, will tell you more.  In the mean time, enjoy an interview with famous Instagramer @Zirosou Mr. Sohjirou Yamagata from Hong Kong.

 

Pony Brown's Visit to Hong Kong

We had a great time with Pony Brown's president, illustrator and the translator when they visited our Korean Stationery fair and met their fans in Hong Kong.  I was particularly happy to be able to chat with as many fans as possible, they all love the postive messages and cuteness of the main character.  One of the fan was upsetted by something this very morning, but when she found out Pony Brown's presence and came, she felt way better.  That's why we love to bring positive energy and pleasure through these events.

Contrary to many's perception, the person behind this cute character is a tall handsome hard-bodied guy Mr. Oh.  You can pretty much see the similarity of him and the character, cool from the outside, bright and positive but sometimes shy within.  We were expecting him to just give out signatures on postcards but for each of the fans whom came, he drew something special and worked very hard in details to make every stroke counts.  I believe fans were not disappointed, at all!

After the event today, we've brought the Pony Brown team to a seafood restaurant in Lei Yue Mun (鯉魚門) tonight and enjoyed a great time chit chatting.  What a lovely evening, nice weather too.

Last year when I visited Seoul, I found out their project with a Korean music instrument brand called Countess.  Upon Countess' request they made these lovely Ukulele prototypes!  They are finally available in music instrument stores in Korea now.  Excited about this cross over with music, Mr. Oh brought along 2 Ukulele so that we can gift them to Pony Brown fans through a small competition.

So far, Pony Brown is the most successful Korean brand we've brought to Hong Kong, I hope in the future we will have a lot more collaborations and bring more happiness, no matter how tiny, to many.

Realizing the hard work Mr. Oh and the team went through.... you know what, for the past few weeks they've only slept for 2 hours every single day, working hard on projects, so we admire a lot of the Korean speed and dedication really..... last night I decided to make personal gift to them, leather jackets for Cricket lighters, embossed with "PONY BROWN" and "city'super stationery" on them.  Took me hours to design and made, until 4am, but I'm happy that it was a perfect gift for them.  Looking forward to more PONY BROWN stuffs!

It Was An Idea 4 Years Ago

Tomorrow our friends from Korea will come to help out on a Korean Stationery Fair in our shops.  I'm especially happy that Pony Brown's designer Mr. Oh and president Ms. Lee will come and meet our customers and press.

The significance of this fair to me is that it was foresaw 4 years ago and it became a reality finally.  At that time, I asked myself why we had no sourcing from Korea at all, nothing.  They have great products and reasonable price and why nobody ever built a network to get those great stuffs for our customers.  Since then a chain of events happened, many failed attempts and empty promises, poor communication due to language and culture differences, nothing worked for one and a half year.

I remember thinking, "it is impossible we cannot do it, it will work especially when everybody says it won't, I will get enough good stuffs and make a Korean Stationery Fair happen."  Well, thanks to those who care and those who don't care enough, they put in efforts afterall, this is happening now, not as elaborated as I imagined but it has come true and I appreciate all the small moves.  So what happened between nothing and now has a lot to do with tenacity and working out of ones boundaries, which I will share in a talk I will give to a university in Taiwan this year.

If you are in Hong Kong, come meet Pony Brown people this Friday evening and Saturday afternoon where I will also be there in Festival Walk LOG-ON store.  There are these 3 rubber stamps for you to stamp on your notebook, they are made specially for this event and for these 2 days only.  Don't miss it.

BTW, last Saturday was a great and efficient day I spent with my kid.  Bought him a pair of cheapest possible shoes, painted in color he loves, I'm yet to paint a crazy chicken on it though.  It was a creative day too, we explored different media for his homework.  I even had time to clean up my fountain pens and made a few sketches on my Traveler's Notebook.

Wotancraft's Traveler's Notebook and City Explorer Camera Bag Review - Part 2

I've been using Wotancraft's Ranger bag for 25 days and it is only now suitable to give you this review from my personal experience.  My Ranger was with me all the time during my business trip to Taipei and Shanghai, as well as daily uses after I came back to Hong Kong, in rainy days, hiking and beach side BBQ, etc.

The soul behind Wotancraft is James, whom started researching about 5 years ago to create a camera bag he would use.  I had a great time visiting James and chatted about his creation for about an hour.  The name and logo of the company bears a resemblance of the Warcraft role-playing game logo, but James never knew about it when he named the company.  Wotancraft means in every sense a desire to achieve perfection in craftsmanship.  "Wotan" the old high German form of "Odin", is a major god in Norse mythology who is associated with battle, victory, wisdom and magic.  James would like his company to be a powerful one almost achieving a mythical status through highest possible quality standard.  He believes careful craftsmanship is better than mass production.  Let's see how much details are being put in this US$449 all purpose bag.

Ranger's distressed and nomadic look is not only defined by its unique navy grey canvas and dark brown leather mix, but also the carefully aging processes done to the material.  For example, to achieve the effect, the canvas was washed, wrinkled, brushed and stained before a final wax coating was put on it.  Although this aging thing sounds a bit superficial, but the minute you start to use it, you literally skip the honeymoon period trying to use the bag carefully, it feels like you've been using it for a while and it is part of you.  I mean it, not to worry a bit about scratches on leather, nor to spend time intentionally distressing it heavily in order to feel a personal ownership.

The look is just one of the many carefully planned features of a Ranger.  A lot of the satchels you see in the market have those two straps coming down from the top over the flap, they are there mostly for decorative purpose and not designed to function.  Ranger's straps are there because James wanted to solve one problem, to carry a jacket when you don't have an extra hand.  I'm sure many of you have the same problem, the places we go to take photos can have huge temperature differences, nobody wants to carry a larger volume bag just to take care of the jacket.  These straps became very handy because they are extra long yet adjustable, I could tie my scarf or slide my leather jacket beneath them with zero efforts during business trips.  On rainy days, I also carry a retractable umbrella like that for quick access.

Two additional straps fixed to the bottom of Ranger can also be used to carry your jacket or tripod.

Let's talk about external pockets.  There are two side pockets for small stuffs, I wish they were big enough to put my iPhone though.  The two front pockets are large enough for small cameras like my Natura Classica or Olympus EP-3 with pancake lens.  One problem with these front pockets is that there is no flap to secure the contents inside, I might have to stitch a leather flap with snaps by myself someday so that I can feel safer to put camera or keychains in them.  This is obviously a point for improvement.

Behind the front pockets is a zip pocket large enough to put your iPad, this became my quick access pocket to important things like my Traveler's Notebook.  Now these three pockets are behind the bag's leather flap, but you don't need to unfasten the snaps to access them, just quickly pull over the flap to reveal and retrieve, very handy and speedy!

Gear protection.  Heavily inspired by WWII aesthetics, Wotancraft highlights Ranger with aluminum buckles and brass snaps on the outside, but gets serious with gear protection on the inside.  The removable MK.I pouch, using the same material as military hovercraft's air cushion on the surface, sealed by YKK water-repellent zipper, is almost 100% waterproof.  According to James, he is planning a MK.II version which is completely seamless with even better waterproof features.  Well, waterproofing is not what I'm looking for, but you can see how dedicated he is to the details.

On both the MK.I pouch and the external bag, there are hidden velcros.  They are there to make sure your MK.I pouch is fixed firmly inside the bag, but when they are not needed, the velcros are hidden to prevent scratching on your equipments.  The inside of MK.I pouch is made from high density foam covered with very smooth micro fiber cloth, making camera retrieval a low friction effort in addition to the heavy duty protection.  Four dividers are provided so that you can create your own suitable compartments.  I can put 3 cameras inside: Canon F1 with 85mm f1.2 lens, Voigtlander R4A with Nokton 35mm f1.2 lens, Olympus EP-3 with 12mm f2.0 lens.

So literally you have 3 layers of protections.  Waterproof anti-shock MK.I, external waxed canvas bag with zipper and the leather flap.  For my daily use, I actually don't need the MK.I pouch, I usually put a slimmer Artisan & Artist inner pouch to carry 1 camera, the Ranger immediately shrinks into a transit friendly casual bag.

Here's some more smart features of the Ranger.  For a large bag like this, it takes time to unzip all the way and resistance at the two corners is inevitable.  If you are not a zipper person like me, you can leave the canvas cover half zipped half opened, this can be achieved by folding the cover in half, it snaps in place by itself because of the built in magnets, it makes cameras accessible yet secure inside, very smart design.  If you are an insecure person and always want to zip up everything, speedy access is still possible because there is a small leather tab you can leave dangling outside, with just one quick pull of the tab, both zipper heads fly open in split seconds!  James nailed it, satisfying men's desire to access their tools with speed, imagine this design on a pair of jeans :)

A final note on features.  There is a laptop compartment inside the canvas bag, suitable for my 13" Macbook Air or 15" models.  There are small pockets for pen and accessories sitting behind the laptop compartment as well, although I don't use them that much.

I have to mention the weight, which is important to photographers.  My Saddleback briefcase medium size is a heavy 2.95 kg monster, I love the bag but I just can't use it to carry cameras, it is killing my shoulders and spine.  Wotancraft's Ranger is 1.72 kg without the MK.I pouch (which is 0.52 kg by itself).  The reason why it is slightly heavier than a typical canvas bag is that wax was not only coated but actually soaked thoroughly into the canvas, you can see I had no hesitation to leave my Ranger on a wet football field in one of the photos.  The softness of cushioned canvas also makes it more comfortable to body than hard thick leather used on the Saddleback briefcase (well I know, Saddleback's was never designed for photographers anyway).

The shoulder strap.  Beautiful piece of craftsmanship, it feels very comfortable hanging down the shoulder or diagonally crossing the body.  Even though its length is adjustable, I still found it a bit too long coz I like to carry weight close to my center of gravity (I'm 5'8" last time I checked 20 years ago).  So I did a little modification to suit my need.  There are two small built in D-rings near each end of the shoulder pad, I stitched safety hooks on them with scrap leather, giving me an option to shorten or quick releasing the strap in 5 possible lengths.  Now I can carry my Ranger comfortably as a messenger bag or as a clutch bag.

If you are new to Wontancraft's Ranger, I must remind you to use sand paper to blunt the buckle pins coz they are very sharp.  I also found that some of the leather edge finishing paint may fall off, I have no problem with that because it helps to give the distressed look I like about Ranger.  In any case, Wotancraft is serious about quality, according to Wotancraft and both distributors I know (one from Hong Kong (Annie Barton), one from Netherlands (Vintage 217)), they are fully committed to give Wotancraft users complete satisfaction, just shoot them an email if you need support, they are all decent and nice people as far as I know.  Again, Wotancraft is not a corporation but just a few artisans behind doing what they enjoy most, you can expect friendly services and dedication to details.  I would give Ranger a 9.5 out of 10 score as a cool stylish and function rich camera/casual bag.

During my discussion with James in their Taipei showroom, he told me that he is designing a future add-on to the Ranger bag, a strap to convert Ranger into a backpack!  I need that James!  Especially in a long day I need it to be a backpack, then it is perfect!

A week ago, Steve Huff reviewed Wotancraft's City Explorer Paratrooper camera bag, check out his video below.

 

Amazing MT Masking Tape Stop Motion

Forwarded from our MT Masking Tape friend in Japan, this cool little video is a cute stop motion animation created by artist Taijin Takeuchi (竹内泰人) in Shbaura House, a workshop space located in Tokyo.  It took him 11 days and 1700 photos to composite this 4 minutes video.  Great work!

 

Chronodex Daily GTD in GhostWriter Notes iPad App "Paper" Format Released

For those of you who want to enjoy the everyday creativity Chronodex brings, but already moved on to digital note taking or scheduling, I've made Chronodex available for you in digital format.

GhostWriter Notes iPad app is one of the best digital notebooks you can find on a tablet.  Since the creation of Chronodex, many of you want to apply the idea in your own preferred paper and notebook size and format, some of you adapted it into stickers, printed on tracing paper.  Now you can have the same fun on your iPad, just download the Chronodex Daily GTD for GhostWriter Notes JPG, save it in your photo library, choose the image from your GhostWriter Notes "paper" setting, that's it. (Update: seems like the same JPG file works very well on another iPad app called Noteshelf too)

GhostWriter Notes is like a scrapbooking page with dozens of nice features you can play with your Chronodex core.  I love the choice of ink pen which gives you very fine lines to color your pies.  You can simply use the Chronodex core as your mindmapping center on GhostWriter as well.  If you look into the details of the format, I'm sure you will find your very own creative use of the core.

How do you use Chronodex? Please Share

This is the week when you can start using Chronodex Weekly Planner for 2012!

Approximately 2500 people downloaded Chronodex!  Many customized it to their own system, and I'm glad it actually helped people the way I intended it to be.  Do exploit the fact that it encourages your radial thinking with the free space all around the circles.  If you don't know how to use it, please read the instruction I included in every page of the PDF files.  Once you get use to the radial thinking mode, it is like you are into another dimension being able to see things more clearly and that's an advantage over a lot of others.

I'm planning to share my own method of notation on Chronodex soon, but since this is a rather free system, you may have your very own methods and I'd love to hear about them.  So please post photos to the Chronodex flickr group, Chronodex Facebook page, comment here, or share your blog post about it.  I'm gonna gather your methods of notation and share to everybody.

Kate from Studio-Sweepings decided to print off the Chronodex circle on stickers and use them only when needed, a free diary idea very well executed on her Moleskine hack.  It becomes a way to track time spent on different projects.  Lovely colors Kate!

Boris has been using the undated version for a month and moving forward to the dated version in his Russia time zone. 

How do you use Chronodex? Can't wait to hear from you all!

 

Vintage Shop, Delayed Postage, Paper Plane

I don't know about you but I simply don't have the luxury to sleep much, life is too short I think I'm using up my time fast in this life.  Dad is getting better in hospital despite tons of worries in the past few weeks, my team at work is somehow mad at me for reasons I can't quite comprehend, Xmas biggest season for our retail chain is kind of stressful, etc etc.  But all these don't stop me at all to discover more.

I had a few hours of free time the last weekend and dropped by this very nice vintage shop called nLostnFound.  The owner Shirley opened the shop 2 years ago and has been traveling to collect interesting vintage stuffs for her shop.  We had a short conversation but I will definitely going back to interview her soon.  If you happen to drop by Hong Kong, do visit her shop and bring her anything owl related, it is her passion to collect owl vintage stuffs.  Do explore that area coz it is a new hip area full of gallery, select shops, and cafe/bar.  Some of the great shops there are Kapok, Monocle.

I got this cool corkscrew in the form of a huge key from nLostnFound.  Shirley was honest and kind enough to tell me that it is not really a genuine "1960's Germany vintage corkscrew", which I figured ahead from the replica features :)

Back two weeks earlier traveling in Shanghai, I found some nice stuffs.  Some of which was these washable kraft paper made pockets and document holders, durable and tough as your jean label/tag.

I also got a nice pair of scissors (I'm somehow collecting interesting scissors) at RMB 45.  It was labelled "Paris Church" but eventually I figured it doesn't resemble any of the Paris churches I found.  Moreover, the so called "stainless steel with titanium coating" is totally unacceptable.  Titanium or not it doesn't matter, the coating just came off pretty fast and every time I use the scissors my hand stinks.  Poor China products, sigh.

Here's something I'm proud of.  It was not about winning the Best Pilot Award AND the Best Design Paper Airplane Award for my kid.  It was a paper plane (I love paper you know) flying competition in his school and I was determined to make him proud of something.  So I Googled for supreme paper plane designs and found nothing interesting except one guide, The Paper Pilot, which costed US$8.95.  No regret for such purchase, it was a great guide and we won.  The reason I'm proud of?  My kid is proud of himself and his Dad :)

I don't know what the hack is that thing, but all of a sudden there are tiny caterpillars living on my wall, what are they?  Tell me if you know.

UNI from Japan just released new versions of their StyleFit pen barrels, absolutely lovely designs on the barrels.  I feel the sweetness already when I see them in person.  There are chocolate and ice-cream versions and I'm trying to put them in our stores soon.

Now here comes a very delayed package by post.  A dear old friend (by old I mean Scription's oldest reader Colin from Margate UK, 83 I assumed?) sent me this package months ago and it never arrived until a few days ago.  It was battered but I just love how it looks, handwritten, properly stamped and … battered.  Thanks to him, I got to read with my kid the letter he sent to him.  Lovely mail and I learned a lot more about his life adventures and Margate.  I hope I can meet him someday soon before he meet our dear Father (Sorry Colin, no offense), too bad my 2012 trip plan doesn't include UK.  Do check out Colin's new blog adventure.

Lastly, I promoted my Chronodex weekly planner for 2012 on Fountain Pen Network and seems like I've found new acquaintances.  An update of my bookmark idea, instead of having the bookmark in rectangular format in previous post, I trimmed off excessive part and it helps to reveal the content beneath.  If you wonder about the pens, they are made by Kaweco, the black on here is a new Kaweco AL Sport Touch, ball point at one end, stylus at the other.  I'm happy there are people out there perfecting their own life by sharing.

Scription Chronodex Weekly Planner 2012 - free download with the cost of a prayer

This article below is the jump start of the Chronodex movement.  You can read all the details here, but I strongly suggest you to take a peek at what's going on in these communities:

1. Chronodex Facebook Page
2. Chronodex Flickr Group
3. The Fountain Pen Network thread about Chronodex
4. Lifehacker's cover of Chronodex

Finally made up my mind to create my own diary for 2012 a week ago, here I go sharing with you all!  But first please give me a little support, my Dad recovered from prostate cancer but at the same time developed Parkinson's disease a few years ago.  In the past week he has deteriorated a lot, bed bound finally, no more speech, I'm the last person he can recognize.  It is so tough for Mom as a care taker.  All I ask for is your sincere prayers, as you download this creation, for my Dad and Mom, so that he can go peacefully proud of his sons, and she can start to explore this new world with us.  What a courageous woman she is.

Thanks to my Dad's dedication to Chinese painting and art, I had my implicit training early in life and became a visual person yet unafraid to look deep into the subject matters.  For years, I bought diaries but none of them satisfied my visual and creative needs.

Since the beginning of the diary making business, every single diary is made by representing time in fixed grids.  To challenge this rigid representation, after exploring in deep thoughts the essence of my own perfect diary, I present to you my Chronodex idea.

Come to think of it, the paper which makes up a diary originated from trees, when the sheets of paper are bound together in the middle, it is almost like foliages stemming from a tree's trunk.  Each page is like a branch, each opened page is a week, each day is like a beautiful flower grew from that page, consist of petals of your day's time slices.

You may argue that this format is still slicing time into blocks and far from the fractal nature, but soon as you start using it, you will find that time is no longer rigid, instead you will find fluidity through free notations.

The more important time slices can be drawn larger, activities can be dots or pies (petals if you will) depending on duration or importance, space on a page is no longer limited to grids.  Basically you can roam freely and be amazed how beautiful your week can be.

What's more is that your mind gradually deviate from the rigid format a typical diary imposes on you, creactivity soon flourishes.  Imagine the effect happening in weeks!  And I'm not kidding.

Scription Chronodex Weekly Planner 2012 (Jan - Jun) Download

(just remember to pray for my Dad and Mom, sincerely)

It is done with the Midori Traveler's Notebook size in mind, even if you don't own a Traveler's Notebook, you can still use it without the leather cover.

(UPDATE on 1st March 2012: Did I tell you Computer Active from UK reported Chronodex a while ago?)

(UPDATE on 10th Jan 2012: Coronado made an easier version for people using ARC/Circa notebooks and have double side printing capable printers, thanks Coronado!)

(UPDATE on 9th Jan 2012: Just released 2 blank Chronodex cores on a blank A4 paper, so that you customize it to anything you want!)

(UPDATE on 8th Jan 2012: Just released a Chronodex Daily GTD in GhostWriter Notes iPad app "paper" format) 

(UPDATE on 7th Jan 2012: Just released a Chronodex version with GTD integrated.  It is A5 sized per page, printed double page on an A4 paper.  Loving it, best printed on cream paper IMHO, check out the download link below)

(UPDATE on 5th Jan 2012: Paul David Krishnan from Malaysia made a version free of dates, portrait mode, dotted grid.  Thanks for sharing)

(UPDATE on 31st Dec 2011: Thanks to Lifehacker's report of Chronodex, more people are enjoying this creation!  I'm so happy the hard work paid off touching thousands.  As of today, 14,400 people downloaded Chronodex!  I got a lot of your prayers and believe it or not, my Dad does feel a lot better despite the rapid decline.  I'm not religious but I always believe in the power of minds, collective consciousness, Gaia and perhaps in your own religious language it is God's mercy.  Mom had a body check and she seems fine despite being tired, I hope I can take the courageous her to travel in 2012.  Thank you everybody!  From the bottom of my heart)

(UPDATE on 15th Dec 2011: Coronado from Fountain Pen Network made an amazing modification of Chronodex into a portrait mode, half letter size, dotted grid, check the download link below)

(UPDATE on 28th Nov 2011: All PDF files should now be perfect for download and print)

(UPDATE on 23rd Nov 2011: Thanks to fellow Scription reader "nat" who told me that her downloaded PDF has no dates on it, I figured some of you may experience the same, simply because I carelessly didn't include/outline a font called "Eurostile" in the PDF.  I am in Shanghai for work until Friday and will be rectifying it whenever time allows.  Hopefully I will be able to replace the files in the coming Sunday.  In the mean time, no harm to try downloading it to see if it works on your computer.)

• Hong Kong Holiday version
• Japanese Holiday version
• Free of Holidays version
• Dated, free of Holidays version, modification by Coronado from Fountain Pen Network, portrait mode, dotted grid: PDF
• Dated, free of Holidays version, same modification by Coronado, particularly made for ARC/Circa notebook users, print double sided on Letter size paper, cut the pages in half and bind to your ARC/Circa notebook: PDF
• Undated version, modification by Paul David Krishnan from Malaysia, portrait mode, dotted grid, 4 Chronodex cores on A4 sized paper to be printed and folded in half: PDF
• Blank Chronodex Daily GTD, two A5 pages on one A4 paper: PDF, JPG
• Blank Chronodex Daily GTD in "GhostWriter Notes" iPad app's "paper" format, works for Noteshelf too: JPG
• Blank Chronodex core, two cores on blank A4 paper for any of your customization: PDF, JPG

To grow your own diary, after downloading the PDF version of your choice, print it out double sided (duplex) in landscape mode on A4 papers.  Be sure to print it out 100% without scale, left/right binding (try the first few pages on your printer and settings and you'll see what I mean).  Check the sequence after the print out.

Next, cut away the left and right portion of the A4 paper according to the cut line.

Now here's the interesting part of the binding.  Use a chisel to punch holes on both ends of the spine and stitch the pages up.  You can staple them together just the same.  This method will get you a bound notebook but ready for a cool bookmark which I will mention in a moment.

To create a bookmark, simple take a piece of hard paper, cut it the way I showed above. Slide it between the papers of the current week, the slide 90 degree up following the spine to have the tab exposed on top of the diary (I hope I'm describing it right).  There you go!  a bookmark with a tab extruding from the top of your diary.

This cool bookmark invention based on the way you bind your diary is so useful and flexible, you will find it amazing when you reach the 12th week of the year!  Tell me about that in a few months.

The last part of my Chronodex journey was to make a cool diary cover.  Thanks for my family's tolerance, I had a little free time in broad daylight having fun doing it, 2 cups of coffee, listening to audiobook through my iPhone/Jambox combo.

Small features are infused into the diary, I hope you will enjoy the little tibits, do explore the "Boarding pass to success" idea.  If you are interested, I will be sharing the July - December version, which is still in stage zero.  Fellow Scription reader Boris from Russia already had a taste of the Chronodex, so go ahead and try yours.  Your feedback and comment is what keeps me going, please do pray.