Category: Japan

the tulip photographers

whbeebe

While I was in the Spring Magic Garden photographing the tulips, I was also (almost literally) stumbling across more photographers there than you could shake the proverbial stick at. Typical of the photographer is this grandmotherly type you see above with a Nikon D600 mounted on a monopod. When I first saw her I thought that monopod was her cane. And it may serve that purpose as well. But here amongst the tulips it was to help her keep her camera steady as she photographed the lovely tulips with her camera plus zoom. From what I could tell she knew exactly what she was doing and was having a jolly good time doing it.

While in the tulip garden I saw an example of nearly every contemporary make and model; Nikon, Canon, Pentax, Fuji, Sony, and yes, even Olympus and Panasonic. While the majority of the cameras were DSLRs, there were an interesting showing of mirrorless as well, such as the last photo above of the photographer with a Nikon 1 V1 and a DSLR class zoom adapter mounted to the body. I’m assuming he’s using that combination to give the zoom, which appears to be zoomed out a bit, an additional 2.7x magnification. In bright daylight I would imagine he’d get good critical closeups of the tulip blooms without having to be on top of them.

What, exactly, does this go to show? That given the right set of circumstances the Japanese will show their serious cameras, that they seem to purchase all over the map as it were, and that, at least in this case, they outnumbered their smart phone slinging counterparts. For while I did see any number of smart phone cameras, here in this garden the large majority had single-purpose cameras, even so-called point and shoots.

This acts as a counter-point to my earlier gloomy post, “the hard truth about ilc cameras.”

And to show just how far wireless intrudes in our lives and even here in the middle of the park, even here you’ll find some human beings glued to their portable wireless devices while ignoring the beauty around them. I shouldn’t talk as my wife is quick to remind me, because back home I’m always checking the cell phone for something, even when out to eat, and frankly, that’s rude. Seeing it happen out here though was just a little sad. The only reason I don’t do it? I can’t because I don’t have an affordable data plan for Japan.

the stroll

whbeebe2 Comments

This very short story in four photos is an accident. I never intended to take three photos with the same subject in them. I took the first because I thought he was interesting. I didn’t realize he was in two of the others until later this evening as I was going over them. The idea of the (loose) sequence then came together as I put them into the order as you see them now. I like the fact they’re all in black and white. I didn’t convert after the fact in post, I took them all that way.

These were taken in the front, free access area of Kokuei Showa Memorial Park, in the building known as the Hanamidori Cultural Center. There is a gallery at one end, which is where I was walking to when this gentleman and I “crossed paths.” The gallery is currently (at the time of this post’s writing) full of photos and painting of flowers from the garden. The photography in particular puts everything I’ve done to shame. There is some truly keen flower photography talent in and around this area.

All of these photos were taken with the Olympus E-M10 and the Panasonic 14mm f/2.5 pancake. Camera was set to custom monotone (contrast -1, sharpness -1, everything else neutral, and gradation set to high key). I will at times overexpose by up to +1 EV. Images were taken straight out of the camera, with only some cropping in post.