SG-image 25mm f/1.8 (manual) : Samples At Different Apertures

This is a follow-up to my previous post on the SG Image 25mm f/1.8 manual lens.

In this post, I will show some pictures I have taken with this lens at different aperture settings, from wide open at f/1.8 to the smaller apertures at f/16.

This isn't going to be a laboratory lens test with charts and scientific measurements. It is simply a practical look at the images this little, (in my case heavily discounted) RM110 manual lens can produce. Perhaps it will also help someone else who, like me, is wondering just how good the SG Image 25mm f/1.8 really is.

My Unexpected Journey With The SG-image 25mm f/1.8 Manual Lens

For almost two years, I had been looking for a manual-focus 25mm lens for my Olympus Pen E-PL9. This after I realised that there is an internal design flaw in the Olympus 14-42mm EZ kit lens. During that time, I came across plenty of information about the 25mm lenses from 7Artisans and TTArtisan. They have many reviews, sample photographs and comparisons.

Then about a year ago I came across another option: the SG-image 25mm f/1.8. Naturally, I wanted to know how it compared. So I searched for image samples and reviews of the SG-image lens. Unfortunately, I could find very little. In fact, I could hardly find any pictures that were available at full resolution that would allow me to pixel peep.

When The Camera Focuses On The Wrong Thing

Some photographs stay with us not because they are technically perfect, but because they capture a moment that is impossible to recreate. A few months ago, I spotted a Gardenia bread delivery man walking under the blazing Malaysian afternoon sun. Instead of carrying the empty plastic bread basket normally, he had lifted it over his head, using it as a makeshift sunshade. It was one of those wonderfully human moments - practical, slightly amusing, and instantly relatable to anyone who has experienced our tropical heat.

The Art Of Lying Down

I came into possession of a cheap "Made in China", mechanical alarm clock years ago. It was purchased sometime around 1976. Precision was never its strong suit; it keeps time the way a drunk uncle keeps a secret - loosely, approximately, with occasional lapses into nonsense. But hey, as long as it points me vaguely toward the hour, I'm content.

Around the turn of the millennium, though, things started to get interesting. The clock still ran, but its stamina had gone soft. A full wind used to last me a solid 24 plus hours. Now? It conks out before I even crawl into bed. The decline was gradual. Every night now, I have to reset the hands and give the winding knob a few twists.

Ten Bantams Lost In One Year

When I first inherited my bantam chickens, they seemed to have long lives compared to normal chickens. They would cruise past ten years with ease. Ruffled but resilient, hardly ever sick. When death did come, it was the usual feathered drama: a rooster's battle wound from defending his hens, or the quiet, peaceful fade of old age.

Then the last twelve months rewrote everything. In one year, I lost four hens and six roosters. Ten birds. My biggest poultry loss ever.

What I saw

I can't give you a neat timeline. The deaths didn't arrive in a tidy order. But here is what I witnessed across those months:

• One rooster found dead upon opening the coop door one morning. He had appeared perfectly healthy days earlier, even showing his dominance within the flock the day earlier. No symptoms. No warning.

• Four hens - each at different times spread across the twelve months - died the same way. They simply faded. Stopped eating. Stopped drinking. Sat queitly in one corner. Died days later. One of them had even just hatched an egg. Her chicks survived. She did not.

• Some roosters turned pale around the head and face. Their combs looked bleached. They lasted a few weeks, then died.

• Two roosters had vision problems before death. Stumbling. Missing the perch. Then gone.

From my guess, all these birds were around five to eight years old.

The detail that keeps me awake

Seeing that each chicken's illness was not contagious, I did not isolate any of them. In a contagious outbreak, that would have spread illness like wildfire. But it didn't. Healthy birds ate from the same feeder, drank the same water, dust-bathed alongside sick ones. Only certain birds got sick and subsequently died.

So what is it? What caused the illness?

To be honest, I have no idea, but I tend to lean toward rat-borne pathogens.

The older cages are not rat-proof. There are traces of rat droppings around the feeders and bedding. Exposure could happen now and then. A rat visits one month, not the next - that might explain deaths spread over time. Older birds would be more vulnerable, like us humans.

Extreme weather during the last ten years did not help either. Blazing hot temperatures during the day may drop suddenly because of freezing cold winds blowing from the north.

What I don't know

I am not a veterinarian. I didn't perform any tests. I didn't send a body to a lab. All I have are observations and grief.

But I've kept chickens long enough to know when something is wrong. This wasn't old age. This wasn't a fight. This was something else.

What I've changed

• New cages are fully rat-proofed. I have three cages so far.

• Letting my three older cats out at night seems to be doing a good job. Many rodents were caught during the last couple of months.

A final reflection

The coop feels quieter now. Yes, I know I complained about the gender imbalance at one time, but I never wished for this.

If you've seen something similar - sudden death, vision loss, pale faces, hens dying months apart with the same symptoms, all without contagion between birds - please leave a comment. I'm not looking for a diagnosis. Just stories from people who've loved old bantams and lost them too fast.

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Age Is The Gauge

It's been almost a year since I got my egg incubator. At the time, I was pretty hopeful. It felt like the solution to my low hatch rate problem with my chickens. I figured if I couldn't rely on the hens, at least the incubator would give me better results.

But now, looking back it's kind of funny. The results I'm getting from the incubator aren't that different from what the hens were doing all along. Most of the time, nothing hatches. And on the rare occasion something does, and it's usually just one chick out of a batch of six or more eggs.

I even tried switching their feed to breeder or layer, thinking that better nutrition might help. Honestly, I can't say it made any noticeable difference.

Like Mother Like Daughter

After nearly seven weeks of waiting, I can finally say with confidence: I've got another hen!

The proof? This little one looks exactly like its mother - plumage and all.

Hooray!

The Golden Lion, a Lucky Gambler, and the Miracle Chick

A few months ago, I stumbled upon a delightful story at NHK Japan. There is a golden Lion statue at a train station in Tokyo that lets out a thunderous roar every time someone slips money into its mouth.The segment followed a gambler who was about to place a bet on a horse race. Before he did, he walked up to the Lion, donated some coins, and listened to it roar. He went off, placed his bet, and watched the race unfold. Next thing I knew, he had won.

Before he left the site, he walked back over to the statue and donated again.

I found this absolutely charming.

The Thought That Stuck

A few days later, I couldn't shake the image of that Lion. I found myself wondering: If I perform a charitable deed, does the universe take note?

I am not someone who donates expecting anything in return. I give when I have spare cash, and I try not to think too hard about where that money "goes" afterward.

My Guess - A Rooster

If I were to take a guess, I think I will be getting a rooster. After all, I think its comb is growing and it is quite prominent now at 4 weeks old. Besides that, it seems more bolder compared to my other hen (ie. its older sister) when it was a chick. My wife do notice that it is more daring and not hide when she walks near the cage to take a peek at it. Also, it always jumps and claw at my hands when I am changing the feeding dish and water cup.

First Pullet Egg And Other Flock Updates

My little hen is all grown up! Four days ago, she laid her very first egg. I was - and still am - a whirlwind of anxious excitement. Since that first surprise, however, she hasn't laid another. I'm trying to be patient.

Three Months Of Love, Gone In An Instant

It's with a heavy heart that I write this post.

Seven days ago, I lost my beloved incubator chick. She was just three days shy of her third-month birthday. Her life was cut short by a cobra bite.

The feeling of devastation is profound. For the last four months, I have poured effort, hope, and care into raising her. From the delicate incubation process to the first cheeps, and watching her grow into a healthy young hen... it feels like all that work has come to naught. The frustration and disappointment are a lot to bear.

A Tense Few Days With My Chick

The last couple of days have been tense.

My 2 month old chick, in a curious peck, snagged a thread from the rafia string securing its feeding box. A thin piece had become entangled around the base of its tongue.

My heart sank. All I could do was carefully snip the thread and hope for the best.

Success! A pair of new hens

The big question when raising chicks is always: will they be hens or roosters? While I am no expert, I'm thrilled to report that judging by their plumage, both of my young chicks are looking like hens. Their feathers are a identical to their mother's. This is exactly the outcome I was hoping for when I started this incubator journey.

Lessons from my fourth hatch

The triumphant chirp of a new chick is a sound that never gets old. This time, I was lucky enough to hear it twice.

As of today, my flock has grown by two tiny, peeping bantam chicks. One fought its way out of the incubator; the other was delivered under the expert care of a broody hen. This fourth hatch attempt was a rollercoaster of expectation, science, and a little bit of old-fashioned luck - and I learned more than ever before.

The Incubator Mystery: A Case of the Singleton Chicks

Let's address the elephant in the room: my incubator. It has a curious habit of producing one, and only one, perfect chick per hatch. My first, third, and now this fourth attempt have all followed this pattern.

This time, four other eggs showed promising signs during candling - a red glow with a dark shadow indicating development - but they never pipped. By day 24, I had to accept they weren't going to make it. It's a frustrating puzzle. The lone chick that did hatch is now a thriving 29-day-old ball of fluff and energy, which tells me the basics are right, but the fine-tuning is off. Moving the incubator away from drafts (a lesson from hatch #3) seems to have helped the overall environment, but the mystery of the singleton continues. The investigation is still very much open.

Lessons from my third hatch

I'm now into my third month of incubating bantam chicken eggs, and I just started my fourth attempt. I've already written about my first hatch. My second and third attempts didn't go as planned. Here's what happened and the hard-earned lessons I've picked up along the way.

The Second Attempt: All Eggs Infertile

Out of four eggs, none were fertile - which shocked me, given that my roosters outnumber hens two to one. Was it poor mating, improper egg storage, or just bad luck? I'm still not sure, but it was a frustrating setback. These eggs were place under a table in the hall at Malaysian room temperature, by the way. Ceiling fan was running for 8+ hours everyday.

The Third Attempt: A Brief Victory

This time, I set seven eggs. Only one hatched - a tiny triumph - but the chick died after a week due to my mistakes. Three other eggs showed early development but stalled around day 14.

Here's what I learned:

My First Egg Incubator Attempt - Lessons Learned

This is an update on my first try with a new egg incubator - and honestly, it didn't go as well as I'd hoped.

Out of the three eggs I placed in the incubator:

Why I Bought An Egg Incubator

I keep bantam chickens in my backyard. I have been keeping them for something like 24 years now.

Recently, I just bought myself an incubator (Note: a Lazada Malaysia affiliate link ). It wasn't an easy decision - I've always preferred letting my hens hatch eggs the natural way. There's something deeply satisfying about watching a broody hen patiently tend to her clutch, the way nature intended. But after losing three hens in the past six months and seeing a steady decline in hatching success, I finally hit panic mode. The uneven rooster-to-hen ratio (around 2:1) didn't help either.

Gone are the days when a single hatch would give me four or five healthy chicks per hen. That was 15 or 20 years ago. These days, I'm lucky if I get two chicks out of five or six eggs. At first, I wondered if something was wrong with my flock - were my hens getting older? Was there a hidden disease? But the more I thought about it, the more I kept coming back to one glaring change: the heat.

Extreme high temperatures have become much more frequent here, and I can't help but blame that for my hatching woes. Eggs are sensitive; too much heat can kill developing embryos or prevent fertilization altogether. My hens still go broody, but the results just aren't the same.

So, I caved and bought an incubator. It feels like admitting defeat in a way - like I'm stepping in where nature should handle things. But if climate extremes are the new normal, maybe a little backup isn't such a bad idea.

Ah Ngiew's Daughter?

It's very uncommon to find stray cats with long fur in my neighbourhood. In fact, I've never seen one before. Not just here, but in my entire life. So you can imagine my surprise when, on the morning of 28th March 2025, a tiny, long-furred kitten appeared on my front porch as if by magic. My first thought? Could this be Ah Ngiew's offspring?

Grub Dual-boot Installation - Windows 7/Linux Mint 22.1

I have been putting this off for way too long. But last month, I finally gathered enough courage to take the plunge: I installed Linux Mint 21.2 on my trusty (and slightly ancient) refurbished Lenovo M70e desktop.

Rebooting after the installation felt like waiting for the results of a high-stakes exam. Would it work? Would my computer explode into a cloud of smoke? Thankfully, none of the above happened. Everything went smoothly - no hiccups, no drama. I stuck to the default settings suggested by the installer for a dual-boot setup, and Linux Mint played nice with my existing Windows 7 installation.

Fast forward to two weeks ago. With Linux Mint 22.1 released earlier this year, I thought, "Why not? Let's upgrade!" Spoiler alert: things didn't go as smoothly as they did with version 21.2.

My 22" Phillips LCD Monitor Settings

My Dell 19" monitor has served me well. Unfortunately after 14 years, delamination is happening and I can see 'bubbles' around the sides of the monitor.

So out I went in search for a new monitor and I finally decided on the budget friendly Phillips 22" LCD monitor. Thanks to Lazada Malaysia (Note: a Lazada Malaysia affiliate link) for the discounts (with Laz coins), I paid Rm225.90 for it. This is the best price that I could find online at that time.

I have been using this 22" Phillips monitor for about a month and a half now, and overall, I am not disappointed. Let's be real. One of the most economical monitors I could find on the market, it delivers solid performance. I can get Full HD at 1920x1080 resolution on Linux Mint (version 21.2) and on Windows XP, all on my 14 year old PC via VGA connection. However, everything looks a little too small in Full HD on Windows XP. So I settled for 1440x900 resolution instead.

My Settings

Out of the box though, this monitor was *not* kind to my eyes. In fact, the initial experience was so uncomfortable that it took a whopping 12 hours for the eye strain and irritation to finally subside. Twelve hours!! I was starting to wonder if I needed to invest in a pair of blue-light-blocking goggles just to survive!

Thankfully, after some strategic tweaking and adjustments, I managed to find settings that transformed this eye-straining beast into a much more comfortable viewing companion.