Today is my fifth anniversary. Five years Japan, quite a long time. But time runs along so fast.
But I really cant celebrate or enjoy it as much as I wish I could … I feel much too depressed. At least one urban legend I can debunk. Foreigners don’t get sex so easy as every body says. Just another big lie.
One of my photos was posted in this blog and this was then submitted to this digg storry. The story got dugg over 2000 times and my photo has now more than 10.000 views.
I am totally impressed. Not only that one of my photos became so popular, but also because its not one of the usual young girl with tits and hot-pants photos that usually get so many views.
Good bye.
I am going to jump now.
Thanks for everything.
Some months ago Google introdcued “My Maps” for google earth where you can easily create your own path with icons, etc. Whenever I do a longer walk with camera I try to remember where I took the pictures and where I went. I still have not yet come around to buy myself a GPS reciever, nor did I yet decide which one is the best for me. So for now its more a “from the mind” generation.
But its really nice. Especially as you can add all those funky icons with HTML, and so you can actually create a path where you went and add the pictures you took there.
There is already loc.alize.us which reads the geo tags from flickr and puts them on the google maps. I always loved it, because the yahoo maps for japan really suck ass super big time. They are as a 2 year old blind deaf retard would draw a map. So, kinda useless. Google is the only foreign company that has kinda accurate maps and they are getting better. Yahoo Japan has very nice ones, so other local map providers - I always forget their names 
Anyway, back to the maps. During Golden Week I did a nice walk around the Kawasaki Port area and I finally started to upload some pictures to flickr. And I also created a map for this walk and started to put the pictures into it. Sad thing is that I have to set them all by myself, but of course google does not read out the flickr tags. I wished loc.alize.us would combine “my maps” with the flickr pictures or something like this. Setthing them all by hand is really … a bit annoying 
The next nice thing is that you can download a KML file and use it with Google EARTH, thats really neat.
It all started a long time ago. Someone invented a way to imprint light on silver plate.
Well, then a long time passed and I hold a camera in my hand. Probably the first one was my moms old Miranda Sensorex, at that time already broken and never to be repaired. Although my mom was a fond shooter, from then on she always used some compact cameras. The most time a simple Minolta Point and Shoot camera. Small, but it took really good pictures. Then, much later, she switched to an Olympus compact SLR camera. One that has all included.
So well, much about my surroundings, not much about me.
Well, I had to work until early morning time, and so one of my co worker brought up the idea to go to sushi. Well, just the fact, that you can get sushi at 3 o’clock in the morning is amazing. I really love it. And it was so good, just more than good. What a great way to start my birthday.
The Ultra Wide Heliar 12mm is the new adition to my lens collection, and the second lens for my Bessa Rangefinder camera. Cosina has two very wide lenses in their product lineup, the 15mm f3.6 and the 12mm f5.6. I decided with the latter one, because I wanted to go realy ultra wide.
The lens comes with a small hood and an external 12mm viewfinder, which is amazing bright and a joy to look through. Thought the viewfinder has absolutly no markins for helping you level the camera, nor does it help you if you do close up focus. The manual describes how the picture shifts if you focos on the closes - which is 30cm.
Build Quality is for a lack of a word stunning. Like the Nokton 40mm it is made out of solit metal, including the lens hood. The Aperture wheel has clicks stops for each half stop which are solid and do not move by themselves, even if you might brush over them. It does not have the same hubs as the Nokton, but you will less change the aperture here, because of the very low focus on infinite.
The focus wheel has a small metal knob that helps you move it and it has click stops at 0.5m and 1m. Because the lens has a very shallow infinite point you can set it to 1m and f8 and you are set for just clicking away - except you should check the shutter speed.
Which bringts me to another point. The lens is fairly slow, actually very slow compared to the avery speed of my lens collection I have. f5.6 is slow and because of the still very strong vignetting at f5.6 you will use it most at f11 or more and then you need a fast film, ISO400, to be able to shoot at proper shutter speeds.
On my first day, it was cloudy, dark cloudy and I used an Ilford Super XP2 iso 400 and when it became more dark towards the evening I found myself fighting with shutter speeds below 1/15s. I later used a Fuji Super Presto iso 1600, but still, if its too dark, you can forget it to use it handheld.
So this is a thing you have to consider, you get ultra wide 12mm, but at a price of lower speed and vignetting. I do not own the 15mm lens, but with f4.6 it is way faster. Thats one full stop, and thats something you meed need. If you need even more faster and you can live with medium wide, you can always look at the ultra 28mm with f1.9, but we are here at the ultra wides.
So how does the lens hold up on the pictures? Well I shot several rolls of Film, Fuji Neopan, Ilford, Fuji Natura, Fuji Supera, Fuji Reala, Fuji Pro 400 and the lens is very stunning. I have not yet uploaded many shots, so I cannot post many here, but I guide you to my flickr set of this lens where I will add all the shuts I upload.
One thing I have to say about it: Be very careful with your hands. The lens is very small and really very wide. I have several shots “destroyed” because my left fingers are visible in the lens. It seems I hold the camera in a very strange style, probably because I more used to a bigger body like the 30D, so whenever I use this lens I really take care my hands and especially fingers are flat to the body. Besides that I didn’t run into any troubles.
And a second thing: This is not a people lens, because of its very ultra wide type everything will be very strong distorted. It works very well with distance objects like buildings, or some inside shots. But beware of people on the side, they look kinda stringe
Below some example pictures. All were scanned with an Epson GT-X900 at 4800 dpi.
I got hold of a second hand Rolleiflex camera (one of the topics I need to write more about) and I shot four films on sunday and they would have been ready for pickup tonight.
But sadly I had to work late - again - and therefore couldn’t make it in time to Kawasaki. The Bic Camera there seems to close at 21:00 already, although I was sure I read 22:00 on their homepage.
Whatever, I wasted time at office, because I actually just waited for an “OK” and I wasted time going to Kawasaki. What a shitty double waste.
Yeah well, life sucks as usual. I just hope I can get there in time tomorrow, or else I have to wait until sunday
Uh yes, its a cool Bond
Movies were out, like shoes, if they are done over and over again. There is no other “Brand” than Bond that runs for such a long time. Since the 60s there are Bond movies. The Bond changes, the style changes, the storrie stays the same. Bond saves the day, gets the hot girl and well that was it. There were really good Bonds like Thunderball, Diamonds are forever and Goldfinger, but there were horrible ones, like Moonraker or Octopussy.
Since Brosnan became Bond, they movies were getting a bit better. Golden Eye was a real fun to watch and the Tank chase scene was worth of beeing a bond scene. But well, it was just the same again.
And then this. Casino Royale plays now, but plays with a bond before the Bond movies. It’s a bit confusing of course. there is no male M, it’s still Judi Dench - and awesome as usual - but Bond is a fresh 007, not like in the other movies, where he is the “old one” saving the day.
The whole movie doesn’t feel like the usual Bond movie. There are no strange Q gadgets like invisible cars, super watches or whatever. No this Bond comes along with actually nothing special. Thank you for that. The whole storry is very nice and not as lame as some previous Bond storries. Plus the intro is probably one of the best ever made.
Yes, this movie is really worth to watch and it shows that Hollywood still can make movies that are more than Tits, Ass and big explosions.
Gets 9/10 imdb stars.
That should be a wild boar (lucky I am not an artist 
Well, its 2007, I don’t give a fuck.
Anyway, I drew an aweseome art (above) and I hope you are stunned by my amazing hand-mouse-line-draw art skills. If you do not recognize it, this year is the year of the “boar” or Inoshishi (いのしし、猪) how it is called in Japan.
There is definitly nothing more to say (I am tired), and plus it would be just a rant, how things suck.
and I ask myself where all the japanese come from when it rains. Every time rain purs down in the morning the trains are dense packed. But really packed. Where do they come from? What do they do on no raning days?
It is a typical japanese mystery to me, a mystery I have to solve at some point.
If it would be on a small line with a view stations only, I would understand it, as people don’t ride their bikes in the rain. But from cities outside like Yokohama or Kawasaki down to Tokyo? Are so many people using scooters or motorcycles? Or are all japanese sallary man high trained power athletes? I doubt so …
Anyway, those super dense packed train days are a fun in itself too (if you have no issues with very packed trains). Today I got tight squeezed into the train and on the first stop I was on the outer space, I couldn’t get in - almost, but I amanged. Funny thing is, once the doors are closed, the whole inside-train mass relaxes and suddenly you have much more space. It is like the japane-people-mass makes itself bigger in the stations (with or without knowing) to have less people come in, so you can have more space during the sations.
On the next stop an sallary man with a huge packbag came in, two other guyes were pushing his pack in while he himself tried to stay in the train.
Today was also one of the rare times I had to get out of the train on three stations, because so many people behind me wanted to get out. Ah how much I wished i had a camera with me. Some ultra-wide angle pictures would have been awesome.
The Voigtländer Bessa R3a
The Voigtländer Bessa R3a is a Rangefinder camera from Cosina Japan. So although it carries a german sound brand name, it has nothing to do with anything from Europa. This is purly japanese designed and produced camera. Before you think negative about it, Cosina Japan is a company that produces lenses for Zeiss and other companies, so it has quite a good knowledge about this topic.
The R3a is the currently newest model in the R series from Cosina. In this series exists a fully manual and a half automatic version. The “a” stands for automatic, or aperture priorty, which this model can do. Because of this, the shutter is electronically controlled and needs two small batteries. According to internet sources those battieries should be fine for about 60 rolls of film. As with all electronically controlled cameras, if there is no battery you cannot use the shutter. If you are not interested in aperture priority, you can choose the “m” version, which is fully manual and works even without batteries.
The R3 has a sister camera the R2 which is completly identical, except the frameing in the rangefinder window. The R3 has a 40mm framing, next to a 50, 75 and 90, wehreas the R2 has a 35mm instead of the 40mm.
Which one of the two you want, purly depends if you want to with a the 40mm Nokton Classic - which I did - or more the a 35mm series. Here Voigtlaender has a f1.2 and a f2 version, plus you can choose from several Leica lenses.
Read more below.
Self cooked
Cooking Ramen in Japan is super easy. Thanks to the fact that you get all stuff here in the local supermarket.
So last friday my supermarket had a sale for Ramen, and as I haven’t eaten Ramen for quite some time, I decided to fetch one. Plus it was uncooked ramen, raw, which means it tastes even more delicous.
Additional I just bought naga negi (long onions), some ramen meat and some additional vegetables which name I do not know, but I just recognice and which have to be in Ramen
Anyway, prepareing it was really easy. Just heat up water until it boils and put in the ramen. During the boiling time, which is very short, only two minutes, heat up some extra water for the ramen soup. Once the ramen is finished boiling, mix the soup with the water you boiled extra, add the noodles, cut some onions and add the with the meat and the special ramen vegetables.
Enjoy your ramen
So, a bit more than a year ago I picked up a more higher level of photography. The SLR, single lense reflex, camera was the logical step up from my minimal Ixy Point & Shoot camera. Well, it is fun, it is amazing, it is stunning what kind of pictures I can take with such a camera, good lense attached of course.
Still, I longed for something else. Fullframe (35mm) sensor cameras are a bit out of my price range - sad but true. Until this changes, I have to stick to a smaller, APC-S, sized sensor. Sure very good, but because of the smaller sensor size, I loose a lot on a normal 50mm lense for example. I got used to it, but still, have not prober fast standard lense was not very good on the long shoot. I love my 50mm/f1.4, but the 35 that would be more like a 50, is only f2, getting a Canon f1.4L is, again, out of my price rainge. Alternative would be a more wider Canon, or a Sigma 30. But I am a bit reluctant to both of them.
All that is not a show stopper, but then, I got the feeling to shoot film again. For some reason because I saw so many film shooters on flickr and I saw no reason why not to. I first thought about getting a small current EOS film Camera, new or second hand. After thinking about that of some time and doing more and more shooting with my digital SLR I wanted more and more to be total manual. So I wa looking into older Canon Film cameras, the FD mount series that came before the current EF mount. Especially the cameras around F-1 (new), or AE-1. Those which came before autofucos. All you had was metering, and perhaps a Program mode.
Then I stumbled over page, showing the Cosina Voigtländer Bessa. A rangefinder, like the famouse - horrible overpriced - Leica M series. I always wanted to have a Leica, but the camera plus lens is purly way out of my price range. Body range from 350.000 to 500.000 Yen and lenses starting from 150.000 Yen up to 350.000 Yen or more are just not something I can or I am willing to pay, even for Leica. The Bessa is like the Leica M a range finder camera. Looks very similar, does the same like the M7 and has the standard bajonet leica mount. The R3a body cost me only 55.000 Yen and the Nokton Classic 40mm/f1.4 was just 47.000 Yen. Cheap and good.
I could not resist, I just got it.
Next to the body and the lens, I got a lens shade and the Voigtländer VC meter II.
A review is following shortly.
Today, 14:00, I am now four years living in Japan. How time flies by. So fast, too fast.
I have not much to say actually, my general view is very positive (except a negative girlfirend experience).
So, in the last four years, beside working, I picked up photography, so far that I now do film photography too. But besides that, I mostly work, do not much else, because of my current not very positive view of the whole world in general.
So anyway, I enjoy it here, as food is great and I can shop almost whenever I want Go for the next 4 years …
Whenever I go to Shinjuku I get lost. And so it happend last Saturday whne I made a trip there. Although I could find the shop I was searching very fast - even thought I wrote down the wrong exit - coming back to the stations was not.
I thought it will be the most easiest thing, but no. Again I was somewhere on the wrong side, on the far end of the station. Running back through shops and stores and going into wrong entrances.
It’s a pain, this station. It’s huge and confusing. The fact that I am there only a view times a year doesn’t really help.
Next time I will take a map with me.
Evening sky in Japan, 50mm @f/2.8, 1/800s, ISO 100 [EF 50]
Who knows if its true, but perhaps the sky over here is a little bit more interesting than anywhere else. But as a fact, I have never seen so impressive sky and clouds motives than anywhere else.
It might be the fact that there are taifus going by, that I am close to the sea, or that there is so much fish eaten here, but at the end, looking up and seeing something really impressive is quite easy here.
Below a small collection of some of my favourite sky shots. You can see the full set of my Sky shots at my flickr photo stream.
Yes, it is autumn! 50mm @f2, 1/125s, ISO 200 [EF 50/f1.4]
Autumn has come to Japan. It is getting colder, not cold, but fresh. It has only around 21C right now in the night and with that all the beautiful autumn flowers arise. On the 24th September 2005 I bought my first digital SLR camera and on one of the first walks I shot my first Dragon Lily:
Shot on the same day one year ago. 85mm @f5.6, 1/250s, ISO 200 [EF-s 17-85]
Since then my photography skill has literaly exploded. I changed my body from the 350D to the 30D to have something more fitting to my needs. I expanded my lens set by a lot of wonderful lenses (35, 50, 85, 100 Macro, etc) and I can say I am just so happy that I know can shoot photos and really get impressive results.
Hidden behind bushes. 100mm @f2.8, 1/125s, ISO 400 [EF 100mm Macro]
Drop by at my flickr photo stream to see all the nice shots I take every week.
Uh, flickr is still down. Since ~7:45 JST and now it s 10:50 JST. They say some storage broke and they have to move 20 TB (yes TERAbyte) of data from one datacenter to another.
That can take some serious time. So if you see some pictures missing, its not my fault. Once all flickr problems are solved the pictures will be back up.
They also have a campaign up to win a pro account. But well, I am so not talented, that I wouldn’t enter it anyway.
There is are, and there is art. It’s rare that I get catched saying “wow” when I go through some art books in some bookstores I usually go. But this was a double wow.
I never thought I would see such an amazing art style from a japanese artist. Not this style.
The name Tetsuya Ishida did not ring a bell in my mind, so I just flipped through the book and I was just stunned what kind of art I saw. Evil, sarcast art reflecting the japanese life and society. Perhaps it will say nothing to someone who hasen’t lived in Japan for some time.
But if you have, and I am really lifed, not only fucked yourself through Roppongi girls, but actually went out and worked in a japanese enviroment, then you will be amazed what this artist created.
I can only highly recommend the book.
「石田徹也遺作集」
ISBN4-7630-0629-0
You can order it through amazon.jp or perhaps through your local book store via ISBN number.
Below three more pictures I took out of the book. Sorry for the not “stunning” quality. I just took some quick snaps not taking care of distance, f stop, etc.
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