Tuesday, June 21, 2022

劉學清「臨書閒趣」:鮮有的香港書法家字帖集

不少書法愛好者喜歡收藏字帖,尤其是高質素的印刷版字帖,包括經典碑帖,如漢隸、顏楷碑帖,以及近代和現代書法家的臨摹作品。高質素的經典字帖除具藝術和觀賞價值之外,也是學習書法不可缺少的教材。

在香港要找好的字帖,很多書法愛好者會到一些文房專門店(如:中環文聯莊、佐敦友生昌), 或到幾家大型書店(如:誠品、商務、三聯、天地)。我在香港一直尋找印刷版字帖,買下了不少林林總總的印刷版碑帖、臨摹版字帖。發現大多數可觀的臨摹版字帖都是出自台灣書法家的作品,作者對字帖的背景和特色也有中肯的解釋或評論。其次是內地書法家出版的,但由於前言後語以簡體字印製,對應原文亦較易有失誤,讀起時感到吃力和不慣,故甚少購買。香港本地書法家呢?完全不見蹤影!

其實,香港絕對不乏造詣非凡的書法家,學習書法的人也為數不少。那麼,為何從不見本地書法家的著作面世?相信是環境因和生活方式所致,本地書法作品雖產量不多,但屢見於大大小小的展覽會展出(疫情前),設班授徒更不在話下了。至於著書或出版字帖,需要投放大量時間、精力和資源,產品售價也不高,乃「不化算」之舉,故鮮有本地書法家和出版商願意出版高質素的印刷版字帖。

最近,資深書法家劉學清老師,在疫情期間,教學活動幾乎停頓之際,閒在家裡享受臨書之樂,大量碑帖重新臨寫。劉老師的學生不捨這麼漂亮的作品困在書齋,遂建議結集成書,公諸同好。本年六月,劉學清老師的「臨書閒趣」,一套五冊在港出版,選錄劉老師臨摹的經典隸書、楷書、行書作品。「臨書閒趣」在三聯、天地也可找到。終於看見香港書法家的著作面世,實在可喜,衷心祝賀劉老師!

期望香港書法家能夠在從事藝術和教學之餘,投放一點時間著書存世,供後輩學習參考,同時提高香港書法界在華人社會的影響力!


2022年6月21日

Sunday, May 15, 2022

HBO GO owes all Hong Kong subscribers an explanation


HBO GO owes all Hong Kong subscribers a formal notice for speeding up the playback rate of all movies and TV series. In response to my complaint, HBO GO's local operator (PCCW) acknowledged the distorted playback of all sources currently on HBO GO Hong Kong, and blamed the different video formats played in the Asian region, but did not seem to be willing to inform its subscribers that they have been paying to see distorted contents.

In a nutshell, HBO GO plays all contents faster in Hong Kong and with slightly but noticeably higher pitch when compared to the original sources. To find out what you are actually watching, just compare any episode of any TV series with corresponding parts in a trailer available on YouTube, and you will clearly notice everything (dialog, music, ...) is more rapidly played and sound is shifted up by roughly a semi-tone on HBO GO. You can imagine when a piece of music is played faster and at a higher pitch, it is not the same music intended by its composer! Likewise, a dialog said more rapidly does not convey the same impression the director has intended. But if your only source is HBO GO, you won't even know that you are being cheated!

So, Hong Kong subscribers are not getting the correct products that the content creators have carefully designed and produced for their viewers. At least, the subscribers should be told and be allowed to decide whether they wish to pay for distorted contents.

PCCW sent a friendly customer service to help me unsubscribe the service, but neither wanted to address the issue nor intended to inform its subscribers about this serious technical deficiency.

May 15, 2022

Thursday, April 28, 2022

招牌字體給一個城市的集體印象

若問香港的街景給訪客留下什麼印象?相信最普遍的答案會是在大街小巷掛滿的各式各樣以中文正楷書寫的招牌、門牌和廣告牌。雖然隨著時代變遷,採用乏味的電腦字體越趨普遍,但傳統的書法字體仍然佔一席位。講到香港的招牌,從上世紀六十年代開始,已流行採用楷體為主的書寫字體,據說大多數招牌上的字都是出自一位在街頭擺檔的「寫字佬」李漢先生的手筆。這位李先生的字,在香港各區的街道流行了大半個世紀。由於當時製作招牌廣告的需求巨大,李先生把字典上的常用字都書寫下來,在退休前將整套書法手稿贈予一位製作招牌的好友李威。最近,李威的兒子決定將整套李漢字體數碼化,以眾籌方式製作電腦字體(ttf, otf),產品今年二月已經面世*。我剛買了一套「李漢港楷」標準版,馬上製作了幾個常用的 sticker,在WhatsApp上獨家使用!  


每個城市都有代表她的的一種視角印象,而街景就是組成這種印象的主要成分。「李漢港楷」代表的正是香港獨特的視角印象。 我對台灣、大陸城市也有同樣的印象。台灣的招牌字體也是楷書字體,據說大多出自劉元祥先生的手筆。幾年前在台北偶遇一位書店老闆,從他手中買下了一套絕版的劉元祥字彙,留作參考。李漢和劉元祥的字體,分別代表兩個地區的城市印象,兩款字體皆以顏體為藍本,端正厚重、不花不巧,對招牌背後的寶號甚有象徵意義。至於大陸城市,腦海中的印象是仿毛體寫成的政治標語,不同年代有不同口號,「为人民服务」、「和平、民主、团结」、「中华民族伟大复兴」等等,近幾年大城小鎮都掛滿電腦字體印製的「高举 XJPxxxxxxxxx 理论的伟大旗帜」的巨型橫額!


2022年4月28日

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*https://www.leehonhk.store/aboutstore

Saturday, April 23, 2022

How likely you have a friend already infected with Omicron if you live in Hong Kong?

The official infected number in the fifth wave of Covid in Hong Kong so far is around 1.2 million, out of the total population of 7.5 million. So, 16% of our population have got infected with Omicron, and 84% not yet infected. This means the probability that any particular person in Hong Kong has got infected is 0.16. Let's assume this is the case.

Suppose you have N friends. The question is how likely at least one of your friends is among the 1.2 million. A shortcut to finding the answer is to first consider the complementary question of how likely none of your friends has got infected, and that's simply 0.84N.

The complement of this probability is exactly the probability of having at least one of your friends infected, which is 1 – 0.84N.

So, if you have 10 friends, i.e., N = 10, you have 82.5% chance of having at least one of your friends infected. If you have 20 friends, it's 96.94% chance, and if you have 40 friends, 99.9%. On average, each person has around 150 contacts on her or his phone book, according to Dunbar's number. That means the chance is 1.


April 24, 2022

Wednesday, March 23, 2022

Hair Salons — Subtly Indispensable! 原來飛髮舖係咁重要!

Have you ever thought seriously about what has been truly indispensable to you?

The two-year-long pandemic has trained people to tolerate the absence of facilities that used to be considered essential or to find alternatives to the activities they used to enjoy. Most people have now got used to living without fitness centres, sports venues, cinemas, concert halls, and even restaurants (after 6pm), but not hair salons!   

Seeing the aggressive fifth wave of covid, Hong Kong Government panickedly added barbershops and hair salons in early February to the list of business venues that were ordered to close.  But in less than a month, the government decided to allow barbershops and hair salons to reopen, after realizing the subtle but desperate need for getting a haircut by most people!  Other businesses were jealous of such exclusive privilege to reopen. 

The importance of barbershops and hair salons has obviously been underestimated or totally unnoticed. Only until now when Government ordered their closure that people seriously felt their vitality! On the day before closure, we saw long queues of people outside almost all QB House branches rushing to get a haircut, and on the first day of reopening, we again saw long queues of people fearing possible sudden reclosure of barbershops. What a phenomenon! 

My 80-year-old father-in-law rushed to get his first jab of covid vaccine just for the sake of getting access to his favourite barbershop!   

March 23, 2022



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