Photographs
Still looking for that perfect shot.
Zooomr 2.0
2006.07.17, 14:39 | Comments (9)
Let’s get back into the swing of things here (oh, listen to me) with one more photo from last weekend’s motoring, this one in honour of the imminent release of Zooomr 2.0.
Pine: clifftop desktop
2006.07.17, 14:20 | Comments (3)
At dinner a while back a friend (a photographer) made a comment about just giving up and photographing flowers. I guess that’s what I’ve done here and he’s going to hate this (especially the gaussian blur – bwahaha!) but sometimes you just have to.
Be the lonesome pine
2006.07.17, 13:14 | Comments (12)
Nor have I joined the Brotherhood of the Lonesome Pine, though who is not in need of its lessons?
Farmhouse wall
2006.05.13, 21:10 | Comments (17)
This one looks better large.
The cooper’s art
2006.05.06, 22:40 | Comments (10)
Old barrel by a window
Nikko shopping street
2006.04.30, 22:49 | Comments (4)
A woman waits for a bus at the top of Nikko’s main street.
Snowmelt
2006.04.22, 12:53 | Comments (8)
As we drove up the Tohoku Expressway a full moon illuminated snow on a distant mountain. The following afternoon we had a clearer view.
Sacred Bridge
2006.04.22, 12:38 | Comments (5)
Got away to Nikko last weekend with a couple of friends. We didn’t do the Nikko extravaganza sightseeing thing, preferring to scramble along riverbanks and aquaducts on an impromptu tour of Japan’s oldest hydroelectric system (who knew hydroelectrics can be quaint?) but here’s a shot of a Nikko landmark, the Shinkyo, or sacred bridge which dates in its present form from 1676 and in legend from 767.
Rockers
2006.03.10, 21:27 | Comments (5)
A couple of the rockabilly guys from Yoyogi-koen.
Yurakucho movie posters
2006.03.10, 21:06 | Comments (4)
Between Yurakucho and Ginza there’s a wall of an underpass beneath the tracks covered with old movie posters. I talk a walk by there the other day at lunch and photographed some of them.
Young woman in synthetic fur
2006.02.20, 22:15 | Comments (4)
I love Japan, a land of gloriously mixed signals. This beautiful young woman looks like she could be off to a ball – until you notice the punkiness of her coiffure, the distinctly SM suggestion of her outfit, and that her stole, far from mink, looks like it once covered the front seat of a 1970s muscle car.
Moon shot
2006.02.12, 01:04 | Comments (14)
When it’s just shy of full the shadows down at the edge give you a better sense of the landscape.
Cosplay girls in Harajuku
2006.02.05, 22:54 | Comments (15)
No weekend stroll around Harajuku is complete without a visit to the bridge near the station where the kids hang out in their cosplay finery.
The roof of the local shrine
2006.02.04, 23:58 | Comments (2)
This is a close-up of the roof of our local shrine.
Yellow wall, purple parka
2006.01.29, 20:57 | Comments (7)
A couple walking by flowery designs on a yellow wall, Harajuku, Tokyo.
One more snow picture
2006.01.23, 12:21 | Comments (13)
We could almost be in … Narnia!
Snow day
2006.01.21, 23:03 | Comments (24)
We had a good dusting of snow in Tokyo last night and it continued snowing throughout the day. Wonderful!
Sunset 2006.01.07
2006.01.16, 22:52 | Comments (9)
A 3-panel panorama of the sunset the night before we returned. I really will try to do a larger version of this because this width doesn’t really do justice to what looked like the the fiery maw of god’s kingdom itself.
Red boat
2006.01.16, 22:03 | Comments (0)
A very belated happy new year to everyone, although it’s still January and I never really get going until February.
Snowy branches: a door in an old house
2005.12.09, 23:28 | Comments (6)
Brush and ink painting on a sliding door dividing the upsatirs rooms of an old house in Matsuzaki, Shizuoka Prefecture.
Cloud on the 18th floor
2005.11.15, 00:32 | Comments (23)
I like the cloud that’s wandering into the picture on the 18th floor (or thereabouts).
Shoji: theme and variation
2005.10.16, 12:28 | Comments (7)
By now I’m starting to see the endless possibilities for organic-shape-on-shoji-grid theme and variation, and starting to get the hang of how shoji work. The impromptu arrangements of twigs and leaves and berries that my wife has been leaving around the place have helped.
Gross domestic secrets
2005.10.10, 17:15 | Comments (11)
I wish I could tell you what was going on, it’s highly interesting. I can’t, so let me take this in a different direction thanks to a photo I found lying around the desktop from a couple of weekends ago.
More shoji
2005.09.27, 00:44 | Comments (8)
When we are outside, we are at the mercy of things – the light, the wind, the rain. But when they come inside, they are at the mercy of us.
Light through paper
2005.09.10, 19:19 | Comments (9)
Light coming through shoji is like the sound of waves: it’s always basically the same thing but it’s never actually the same thing.
The geometry of recycling
2005.07.18, 12:37 | Comments (10)
The economic vectors of anything are often the main drivers and this must ultimately be true in the case of recycling, but occasionally the geometry can be a more spectacular thing.
Sponsors’ lanterns
2005.07.10, 23:13 | Comments (10)
Prior to my town’s summer festival the names of the local businesses which have kicked in to sponsor it are displayed on lanterns hung ouside the station
Drops of water on the office floor
2005.07.10, 09:43 | Comments (4)
Given that the drops were distributed by forces of nature (gravity, surface tension, aerodynamics and the prevailing winds from the air-conditioner vents, perhaps, in the first place, a slight collision or sudden change of direction by the bearer of the cup from which they sloshed), it wasn’t hard to find a viewing angle from which a golden spiral could be glimpsed.
Yet another view of the Chrysler Building
2005.07.02, 09:23 | Comments (2)
Glimpsed from the 80th floor of the Empire State Building (whose sash windows, even at that height, appeared to open normally, allowing one to jump out should the crush of other tourists trying to get to the observation deck prove too much).
Chrysler Building at dusk
2005.07.01, 20:45 | Comments (8)
It’s nice to have a bit of pressure to start thinking about pictures again.
Forlorn Aerons
2005.06.26, 14:23 | Comments (26)
Their dot-com glory days behind them, a group of Aeron chairs gaze forlornly out of a window onto 5th Avenue.
Medieval Brancusiality
2005.06.25, 22:06 | Comments (1)
There’s something Brancusian about this medieval column I saw at the Cloisters. Or, more correctly, there’s something medieval about Brancusi.
The East Building
2005.05.30, 00:38 | Comments (6)
A view to the East Building of the [National Gallery of Art](http://www.nga.gov/home.htm), Washington D.C. The building was designed my I. M. Pei (and it shows, right down to the little mini-Louvre pyramids out the front).
Seven piano accordians
2005.05.28, 20:42 | Comments (5)
They were just sitting there … like a kind of challenge.
Target practice
2005.05.23, 20:46 | Comments (0)
I passed this store on the way to breakfast each day. Always try to start the day with a curious juxtaposition I say.
Lunchtime at the New York Public Library
2005.05.19, 00:11 | Comments (3)
A woman eating lunch above the steps of the New York Public Library.
Contrail
2005.04.05, 21:45 | Comments (7)
They don’t come much straighter than this.
Cracked skyline
2005.03.26, 11:19 | Comments (5)
The blue yonder glimpsed while photographing a work event last week.
Afterlife
2005.02.25, 16:45 | Comments (5)
Spent the morning and early afternoon photographing the foreign section of Aoyama Bochi* with the friends who are trying to sensibly preserve it.
Medicine packages
2005.02.13, 14:35 | Comments (2)
The nostalgia industry embraces all things: old-fashioned medicine on display in a chemist’s shop.
Fuji at a bath-house
2005.02.10, 22:34 | Comments (13)
Public baths traditionally have a mural on the wall above the baths, and that mural often depicts Fuji-san. This picture was taken at the bath-house that supposedly inspired the one that appeared in Hayao Miyazaki’s film “Spirited Away.” Desktop versions posted.
Sparrow door
2005.01.30, 23:35 | Comments (2)
Sparrows and irises depicted around the door to a restaurant in Roppongi
Meiji-era newspaper on a wall
2005.01.29, 18:59 | Comments (4)
A figure remains on a scrap of newspaper dating from the late Meiji era glued to the wall of an old house.
The way of the brush
2005.01.23, 17:12 | Comments (1)
The floor of a calligrapher friend’s studio
Straw trees
2005.01.16, 23:19 | Comments (2)
Very Dr. Seussical indeed.
Red ruins
2005.01.15, 23:00 | Comments (1)
…what they were hoping to do and whether they did it.
Penultimate sunset
2005.01.13, 23:28 | Comments (14)
Sunset on the second last night we were in Mandurah, Western Australia. Spectacular sunsets are orders of magnitude more common there than in Tokyo, that’s for sure.
Transom
2004.12.10, 14:49 | Comments (6)
Have I mentioned before that Japanese woodworking is unequalled? Perhaps just once or twice.
Friendly demon
2004.12.08, 19:34 | Comments (6)
One of the more friendly-looking demons you’ll see.
Daruma
2004.11.28, 21:41 | Comments (5)
You black in one eye with ink when you make the wish, and when the wish comes true, you colour in the other eye.
Canvas
2004.11.21, 18:59 | Comments (1)
The block is now surrounded by a canvas wall, and the air is no longer pierced by lemur cries.
Queued images
2004.11.19, 16:48 | Comments (11)
It’s time to clear that folder, but it seems a shame that the pictures don’t make it onto the site at least somehow. Here they are.
Waterfall, Chichibu
2004.10.24, 15:16 | Comments (4)
A waterfall and torii on the side of a hill in Chichibu.
Odaiba Story
2004.10.14, 22:14 | Comments (3)
Those of us who made it felt relief, but also that we were not home.
Panasonic Building, Odaiba
2004.10.14, 21:29 | Comments (1)
The corner at the other end of this building is all TV
Shadows on a whitewashed wall
2004.10.10, 14:48 | Comments (6)
It’s remarkable how less-than-impressive shots improve when you’re in an uninspired period.
Richard Avedon dies
2004.10.02, 12:47 | Comments (0)
Richard Avedon is dead at the age of 81
Another calligraphic screen
2004.09.25, 18:21 | Comments (0)
More calligraphy on a screen, albeit in a very different style to the previous example.
Chairs in the lobby at the office
2004.09.18, 15:13 | Comments (3)
I get a kick out of glimpsing various chair-scapes throughout the day.
Calligraphic screen
2004.09.12, 15:38 | Comments (3)
Calligraphy on a decorative screen, Takayama.
Takayama window
2004.09.04, 11:24 | Comments (2)
Window in an old house in Takayama.
Carl Mydans dies
2004.08.20, 15:16 | Comments (0)
Life photographer Carl Mydans dies at 97
Self-mapping
2004.08.15, 14:55 | Comments (0)
In the future, the environment will be self-mapping.
Soba-ya in Yoga
2004.08.02, 21:39 | Comments (5)
At least I think it’s a soba-ya. They may have retired and now it’s just a house; I haven’t seen it open the last few times I’ve been through Yoga.
Arch
2004.07.26, 21:46 | Comments (9)
The not-so-secret entrance to the Prada store in Tokyo. One day I may even enter.
Yasukuni Mitama Matsuri
2004.07.16, 23:29 | Comments (12)
Some pictures from the Yasukuni Mitama Festival last night
YA Dior
2004.07.14, 23:55 | Comments (3)
Yet another picture of the Dior building on Omote-sando
Rubin’s flower arrangement
2004.07.05, 16:13 | Comments (3)
A possibly obscene glimpse of flowers on the living room table.
Revenge of the ivy
2004.07.05, 10:55 | Comments (4)
A few weeks ago I noticed this tendril making for the antenna on the roof of a house around the corner.
Neither wind nor fan
2004.06.30, 22:27 | Comments (6)
If I’ve screwed up this story, dredged from memory, it only shows how far I’ve yet to go until my own personal shazzamness occurs.
Broken maneki-neko
2004.06.27, 11:12 | Comments (5)
Another picture from Gotokuji yesterday. Recent high winds may have blown this maneki-neko from its resting place, and now it rests in pieces.
Another stroll through Gotokuji’s cemetery
2004.06.26, 22:28 | Comments (8)
If I couldn’t find anywhere chilly, then chilling would have to do.
Self-portrait in blank advertisement
2004.06.23, 23:11 | Comments (4)
That’s a rucksack slung over my shoulder, by the way, not a bulging belly (although give it time)
Tree, tower, tree
2004.06.17, 21:58 | Comments (4)
Even the most trite view is an invitation to explore, as a dear friend says.
Prada store stairs
2004.06.11, 13:17 | Comments (10)
Life plods along … inside the Prada store for some, outside for the rest of us.
Shibuya River
2004.06.02, 22:01 | Comments (8)
The mighty Shibuya River
Metre Box
2004.05.30, 22:53 | Comments (10)
Sunshine too cheap to metre.
Nodai shutters
2004.05.26, 13:00 | Comments (5)
I’m trying to clean up and get organised around here. Throwing away old photographs.
Cranes from the Maru Bldg.
2004.05.22, 20:11 | Comments (7)
This picture just somehow feels like my week.
Smoke (no mirrors)
2004.05.16, 12:44 | Comments (16)
Smoke is hard to get in focus, especially at f2.8 (which is all this very overcast day was going to give).
Women in shop windows
2004.05.10, 23:46 | Comments (4)
Someone very kindly lent me a Sony DSC-F828 digital camera last week to play around with.
Fountain, Marunouchi
2004.05.09, 15:31 | Comments (6)
Another of those clichéd lone-salaryman type pictures that wander into the viewfinder from time to time.
Temple near the modern house
2004.05.04, 00:59 | Comments (1)
Stone lantern in the temple near the modern house.
Streetlight
2004.05.01, 07:40 | Comments (6)
If you walk up from the Sakurada gate of the palace to Marunouchi, your way along the edge of the forecourt and the field of pine trees is lit by these streetlights.
Marunouchi: Paris of the Orient
2004.05.01, 00:13 | Comments (6)
This picture is crying out for people — but who?
A bundle of brooms
2004.04.22, 10:15 | Comments (2)
I like that in Japan advances in bristle technology means waiting for nature to grow a better twig.
Annunciation
2004.04.12, 21:57 | Comments (5)
The archangel Gabriella appears before lowly handy-man Mario.
Dior, Omote-sando
2004.04.08, 22:10 | Comments (4)
It might not be a bad thing if the high-priced fashion brands try to outdo each other with their buildings.
Carp and sakura petals
2004.04.08, 10:33 | Comments (21)
The petals rain down in such numbers that, caught in a blizzard of them, strangers share a smile and a laugh.
Ivy decorated with a sprig of house
2004.04.06, 11:24 | Comments (8)
I’m not sure whether this is a house bedecked with ivy or an ivy plant that decided it needed a house.
Balusters
2004.04.05, 10:08 | Comments (6)
Clichés have feelings, too
Red letter
2004.04.05, 00:16 | Comments (8)
Clichés have feelings, too
Devotions in storage
2004.04.04, 20:59 | Comments (2)
Clichés have feelings, too
Door of an old shed
2004.04.04, 13:35 | Comments (6)
On an afternoon stroll I found a little shrine tucked away over on the other side of the tracks. I was mulling over a comment Kevin made about photographic clichés and their transcendance (or, as I usually find, their lack of trascendance).
Picnic in a snow dome
2004.04.02, 21:52 | Comments (7)
It’s been quite something of a show this year. A rainy start gave way to a wonderful weekend and then the rain returned — and how — during the week. Yet it seemed to come early enough not to knock the blossoms from their branches, and the tress bloom on, determined to have another weekend of glory.
Bluffing
2004.03.24, 22:54 | Comments (10)
Despite the dull, flat light and the rain in the afternoon I started photographing a new project today which is going to be really interesting but about which I can’t tell you anything at the moment. I know, I know: it’s not like me to be such a tease, but there you go.
Ring-neck redux
2004.03.18, 21:32 | Comments (7)
Been meaning to post another Indian ring-neck picture. This is one I found a week or so ago eating an orange someone had left out on a feeder.
Sunlight on the Tokyo Mosque
2004.03.17, 12:14 | Comments (10)
A while back I visited the Tokyo Mosque just before sunset.
The hessian trees
2004.03.16, 10:54 | Comments (8)
It’s spring and the hessian trees are about ready to be peeled. Soon the hessian gatherers will carefully remove the new hessian from the trees, unwinding it as one would the linen off a mummy, so it can be used to make bags and wall coverings and shirts for penitents.
The moon through pine boughs
2004.03.09, 11:06 | Comments (11)
This moon will never come again.
Restaurant, Omote-sando
2004.03.03, 12:36 | Comments (13)
…uwa-nuri or shiage…
Sanno Park Tower
2004.03.03, 00:36 | Comments (3)
Outside the Sanno Park Tower tonight
Letterbox Man
2004.02.28, 12:53 | Comments (11)
Came across this scene in Shibuya a month or so ago. No idea what was going on — nothing…
Greening the sky
2004.02.23, 14:38 | Comments (22)
Parrots visiting the neighbourhood are quite a welcome change from crows.
Roof, Minami Azabu
2004.02.21, 21:20 | Comments (4)
View of a temple roof from a friend’s apartment in Minami Azabu
Sun and wind (without Christo redux)
2004.02.17, 10:16 | Comments (16)
This is from a few days ago, but I’m quite taken with the great late-afternoon light we get here this time of year in case you can’t tell. Here it is shining off construction scaffolding in Shinjuku.
World Press Photo Contest
2004.02.15, 09:47 | Comments (5)
If you haven’t seen these already, take a look at the World Press Photo winners for 2003.
Flight
2004.02.11, 21:54 | Comments (17)
I used to think silhouettes were a bit cheesy but at last I may be beginning to see the point of them. They really do inflict a rigorous simplicity: you get two colours and a bunch of shapes. Deal with it.
Blue Doors
2004.02.08, 23:31 | Comments (27)
What kind of blue would you say those doors are?
Cloud on the summit of Mt. Fuji at sunset
2004.02.04, 22:23 | Comments (16)
I sat in front of the computer all day today and still didn’t get anything done. How can this be? At sunset, having seen my daughter off to her art class, I went for a walk so that I could say I had at least accomplished something.
Cemetery Sunset
2004.02.01, 17:58 | Comments (6)
Another picture from Aoyama Cemetery around sunset. Strolling around, I was struck by how routine it was that people died young, expiring in their forties and fifties (from things, I imagined, like ague and scarlet fever and acute ennui).
Roppongi Hills from Aoyama Cemetery
2004.02.01, 10:15 | Comments (3)
Not a sunset that caused this building to really glow, unfortunately, but you take what you’re given with sunsets. Aoyama Cemetery, by the way, is a charming place from which to observe them as you reflect on the happy thought that you have a considerably better chance of seeing the next one than most of those around you.
Leaf Shadow
2004.01.27, 23:51 | Comments (11)
I’m showing you pictures of leaves until I think of something interesting to say. Bear with me.
Crossing a street in Shibuya
2004.01.24, 23:43 | Comments (7)
Well-dressed women wearing wires are among the intriguing sights to be seen in Shibuya.
God and Messenger
2004.01.23, 22:06 | Comments (5)
I’d been given the gift of being able to walk around a little bit without having to worry about being anywhere.
Another view to Komazawa
2004.01.21, 22:31 | Comments (5)
I figured out what it is about this view that keeps me coming back.
Simulated office building
2004.01.19, 16:39 | Comments (5)
Not much to say about this one — I just liked the geometry. The light was also of a sort that made the building appear to be computer-generated, an idea of faded ’70s business glamour rendered through modern means.
A blank stare
2004.01.17, 13:43 | Comments (13)
Friends in Australia sent my daughter this doll for Christmas. It has no face….
Acolyte displaying umbrella
2004.01.16, 00:13 | Comments (7)
Without question, if I my culture had the greatest aesthetic legacy ever developed at any time anywhere, I’d be very proud of it, too.
I keep stumbling across religious processions
2004.01.12, 21:50 | Comments (10)
I’m constantly stunned by the things we do for gods. As Randy Newman sings, that’s why I love mankind.
A procession of monks in lime green robes
2004.01.07, 23:27 | Comments (8)
I’ve been to Mt. Takao several times and was a bit wary of visiting last weekend for our ‘winter holiday’ — the only day we would spend out of town. I’ve taken so many photographs up there that I wondered if I hadn’t fished the place out, but I resolved to find something that I hadn’t seen before.
I needn’t have worried: it found me.
Signs and Portents
2004.01.02, 23:15 | Comments (4)
The final sunset of last year was a bit of a wash. A perfectly fine day clouded over mid-afternoon in a way that seemed promising, but the clouds thickened up to block pretty much all light by the time the sun went down.
The Descent of Man
2003.12.31, 21:22 | Comments (4)
Shop window, Marunouchi, last night.
A Nicely Lit Tokyo Station
2003.12.23, 10:47 | Comments (9)
This is a classic view of Tokyo Station — a photograph that must exist in millions of slight variations throughout Japan and across the world.
Merry-Go-Round
2003.12.21, 18:48 | Comments (2)
There’s a pulsing vein of existential terror running through the meat of life which has as its heart … the fairground, the carnival, the sideshow attraction.
Chimney
2003.12.20, 23:56 | Comments (5)
I never noticed what a vaguely sinister shot this distant chimney can provide just after the sun goes down.
A Bale of Rice
2003.12.17, 11:14 | Comments (9)
There’s something very satisfying about rice being transported in its own straw.
A Dozen Chinese Proverbs
2003.12.12, 21:55 | Comments (4)
There are about a dozen Chinese proverbs that apply to me at the moment and I’m in flagrant violation of every one of ‘em.
Patched Shoji
2003.12.09, 20:52 | Comments (2)
Photograph of the old Okamoto farmhouse on the way to the river.
Traffic Trails
2003.12.06, 14:01 | Comments (18)
A friend, whose opinions on photography are always worth listening to and arguing with, gently suggested that she would like to see more movement in my pictures. Enough with the staid formalism already, I think she wanted to say, live a little, for chrissakes. ;-)
A Building Made of Sky
2003.12.04, 23:22 | Comments (12)
Couldn’t get back in the saddle here without posting a photograph. This is a building made of sky that I saw today.
Thom Hogan’s 2004 Predictions
2003.12.04, 19:44 | Comments (2)
Photo maven Thom Hogan’s predictions for 2004
Blue Heron, Imperial Palace
2003.12.01, 15:37 | Comments (3)
A blue heron stands by the moat of the Imperial Palace in Tokyo.
Furo
2003.11.25, 23:07 | Comments (9)
I almost never take vertical pictures, but I’ve been following Kristen’s creativity series and have been trying to see if a 90° shift in perspective doesn’t make a difference.
Kasa
2003.11.23, 12:30 | Comments (5)
Umbrellas at the Edo Tokyo Tatemono-En — the museum of Edo and Meiji period architecture.
White Kura
2003.11.23, 01:09 | Comments (2)
Kura are storehouses, usually 2-storey and made of stone. They can still be seen tucked away on the grounds of wealthier houses and estates that haven’t yet been broken up. I guess they became a fixture towards the end of the shogunate when a nouveau-riche merchant class arose and began to accrue stuff, but I might just be making that up.
A Rake and Five Brooms
2003.11.22, 01:41 | Comments (13)
It’s an enchanting but little-known fact that the number of human calories expended world-wide in raking leaves each year equals π times the number of arboreal calories required to make the leaves throughout the preceding year.
Many Maneki-neko
2003.11.20, 23:59 | Comments (6)
Lots of beckoning cats at Gotokuji
Autumn in Gotokuji
2003.11.18, 18:22 | Comments (16)
A beautiful wan sunlight fell all morning and I had a feeling that the temple would be pretty nicely lit by the time I got there. I arrived to find a good selection of trees in full autumn colour … and the sky almost completely overcast. From above I heard something that sounded like chuckling.
Omote-sando, Late Afternoon
2003.11.18, 12:10 | Comments (6)
A good example of the ‘ideal viewing distance’ — this shot looks not bad at about 500px or larger, but it loses anything it had at this smaller size. Alas, we are all prisoners of our design choices.
Birds on a Wire
2003.11.15, 00:29 | Comments (13)
Birds sitting on electric wires like notes on a stave.
Woodpile
2003.11.11, 23:54 | Comments (1)
It’s starting to get cool here. I wish we had an open fireplace, or even a wood-burning stove like I had in Australia (makes the tastiest bread, and you can cook chapatis on the hob).
Like a Big Pizza Pie
2003.11.07, 21:19 | Comments (11)
The moon as it was rising tonight.
Marunouchi Shop Window
2003.11.05, 23:48 | Comments (2)
Marunouchi is going through some pretty radical changes these days. What used to be bland, lifeless corridors of grey now resemble pleasant boulevards lined with shops and cafés.
Fabric Table
2003.11.05, 00:22 | Comments (5)
Such a big beautiful practical table — but a single-minded table. Built only for bolts of cloth.
Big Pumpkin
2003.10.31, 02:21 | Comments (7)
I suppose today there should also be a big pumpkin. Happy Hallowe’en, everyone. May all your nightmares come true.
Yet Another Fuji
2003.10.31, 01:14 | Comments (5)
Can you tell I love Fuji? What a classic shape, your standard volcano, a child’s idea of a mountain — yet how absolutely it transcends its simple geometry.
Mountain Food
2003.10.27, 19:04 | Comments (4)
On the table outside where we sat and drank our coffee (which could have used some snake in it) was a bowl filled with mountain food. The old guy explained what everything was, but apart from the acorns and chestnuts, I can’t remember the names of anything. We didn’t eat any of it; I think the arrangement was more decorative than tasty and anyway, I had some snake to keep me warm.
Fuji From Kintoki-yama
2003.10.27, 00:50 | Comments (4)
Absolutely exhausted! Up at 5:30 this morning for an early start out to Hakone for a walk up Kintoki-yama to eat lunch in the company of Fuji (and more than a few other people with the same idea). The weather couldn’t have been better, and Fuji was on fine display.
A Bottle of Booze
2003.10.24, 13:45 | Comments (3)
They really knew how to put together a bottle of booze in the old days. Perhaps the contents were every bit as rough-hewn as the bottle itself.
The Perfect Squall
2003.10.23, 21:46 | Comments (8)
I caught a bus home from Shibuya today and by the time it dropped me in front of the Agricultural University, a neat little localised squall was bubbling away overhead.
Shinjuku Boogie Woogie
2003.10.21, 11:35 | Comments (5)
I happened to be in Shinjuku yesterday just before sunset and saw this view as I walked back to the station. Rats in mazes must get views like this all the time.
More Sunlight and Plaster
2003.10.20, 13:44 | Comments (6)
On the spur of the moment we decided to visit the Nihon Minak-en yesterday which is a park full of old houses that have been collected from all over the country (how they were brought to the park is a mystery, but there they are). I now have more photographs of sunlight on plaster than you can shake a stick at. Here are two more.
Bounced Sunlight on a Plaster Wall
2003.10.17, 22:11 | Comments (5)
This photograph almost shows the nice lighting that was at work here. Two old plaster walls face each other across a driveway. Mid-afternoon sunlight strikes the one behind me and is reflected back onto the wall shown here making it, in effect, lit by itself, or at least its twin.
Enticing Pachinko
2003.10.16, 23:10 | Comments (8)
Isn’t this enticing? Ah yes, pachinko! Where the fun never ends.
View to Komazawa
2003.10.14, 01:17 | Comments (2)
Noticed this view towards Komazawa tonight just after sunset.
Pale View of Hills
2003.10.10, 12:02 | Comments (0)
Now that it’s cooling down, moisture is leaving the air like the last guest of a summer party that went on too long and we’re getting the first hints of the clarity that winter brings. Last night’s sunset happened (as it always does) over the Õyama and Tanzawa Ranges, only now we can actually see them rather than just infer them.
Festival Fashions
2003.10.07, 11:06 | Comments (0)
Happi are loose jackets (I guess) worn at festivals. They often bear a crest or design that identifies the wearer’s affiliation with a particular temple, shrine or organisation. Get a whole lot of them together and it’s typography on parade.
The Biggest Drum in the World
2003.10.05, 22:07 | Comments (2)
OK, I don’t really know if this is the biggest drum in the world or not, but it has to be a contender.
Minami Shinjuku
2003.10.04, 23:06 | Comments (3)
I was early — both time of time and time of year. While the light was indeed beautiful, the sun is still setting too far to the north. I hadn’t realised it was a winter effect I was after.
Ferry Returning From Kozushima
2003.10.01, 22:20 | Comments (5)
A not-so-bad example of Fuji NeoPan’s grain
The Autumn Switch
2003.09.30, 18:14 | Comments (5)
About 2 weeks ago someone somewhere in Japan found a big switch marked “Autumn” and turned it on.
Shutterbugged
2003.09.29, 10:10 | Comments (6)
On Saturday the Japan Photographers mailing list organised a field trip to Komazawa Park. For some reason the day did not come together for me at all and I did not take a single photograph I’d be prepared to show anyone. Not a single one! All absolute crap.
Shopping is Scary
2003.09.24, 19:14 | Comments (10)
This is an old shot. I post it to remind me of why shopping is scary.
Antipicture Rocks On
2003.09.23, 22:02 | Comments (1)
I posted a gallery of rock carving photographs to Antipicture.
The Word for Word
2003.09.20, 14:03 | Comments (4)
The kanji for “word” — gen — carved into rock above Jinata onsen.
The Gods Don’t Live Here Anymore
2003.09.17, 17:04 | Comments (3)
I wonder what the process is for relocating gods?
A Long Run Off A Short Pier
2003.09.16, 14:52 | Comments (7)
Four boys enjoy one of the oldest summer past-times there is: leaping from a high place into water.
Shibuya O-mikoshi
2003.09.15, 23:38 | Comments (0)
It seems you’re never far away from a festival in Japan. Walking through Shibuya on my way back from a meeting today I had to stop to let a mikoshi — portable shrine — pass. Gods first, I thought. After you!
View of Niijima and Hanjima
2003.09.14, 11:30 | Comments (5)
I wrote previously about using new film — in this case 400ASA Fuji NeoPan — and not knowing how things were going to turn out. After seeing the results, I’m happy to report that I’m now a Fuji guy.
Written in Stone
2003.09.12, 16:39 | Comments (4)
Film from the recent trip to Shikine is starting to come back. Most of it was used photographing the carvings around Jinata onsen (hot spring), with which I seem to have become quite obsessed.
Temple Lettering
2003.09.10, 18:53 | Comments (6)
There’s a folder on my desktop called “Queued Imgs” which started off as a holding bin for photographs that were going to get posted here. It’s got shots in it dating back to May of last year, so dedicated folders don’t seem to help me much organisationally. Definitely more of a chuck-it-in-a-pile (usually on the floor) kind of guy.
Tamagawa Blimp
2003.09.09, 16:47 | Comments (4)
An advertising blimp hawks its wares beyond the Tama River on a summer afternoon many years ago.
Radioactive Mikan
2003.09.09, 11:10 | Comments (1)
A mikan tree grows outside a lab containing radioactive material at the Agricultural University.
28mm.org Needs Help
2003.09.06, 12:32 | Comments (1)
28mm.org, the wonderful online photography magazine, needs money to pay for increased bandwidth costs (one of those little ironies of success). If you can spare a few bucks, they’d be going to a good cause.
Toy Museum #6 - Packaged Schoolgirls
2003.09.04, 20:24 | Comments (3)
Rika-chan is the Japanese equivalent of Barbie and has been around almost as long, I believe (although my copy of M. G. Lord’s “Forever Barbie” is stacked too deeply under other books to retrieve for confirmation). Here are miniature versions of her in various schoolgirl outfits, packaged for your retail pleasure.
Big Drum
2003.09.04, 20:09 | Comments (0)
Every spring a huge drum is wheeled around the neighbourhood in what must be some sort of blessing procession. To this day I still don’t know what it’s all about.
Another Shimokita House
2003.09.01, 21:18 | Comments (0)
Here’s an old place on the west side of Shimokita. You pass this if you walk down to the XAX sports club by the Odakyu Line.
Big Old House
2003.09.01, 20:56 | Comments (2)
I posted a shot of an old house in Shimokitazawa a while back and Jospeh from pen & think mentioned wanting a larger version. Jospeh, this is for you (and anyone else who wants it.
Toy Museum #5 - The Wedding Party
2003.09.01, 16:22 | Comments (1)
The members of the wedding, available as convenient keyring adornments.
Unknown Film
2003.08.31, 21:57 | Comments (5)
I took two 35mm film cameras to Shikine, opting not to take the CoolPix 990 because it wigged out again recently, and things that tend to do this shouldn’t be in your rucksack on a camping trip. This means waiting for the pictures to come back from the lab — more nerve-wracking than usual because I used 3 kinds of film that I’ve never shot before.
Toy Musuem #4
2003.08.22, 08:04 | Comments (1)
Finally, some robots.
Toy Museum #3
2003.08.19, 15:54 | Comments (7)
For years I’ve been looking for an old glass bell jar (dirty and mouldy is fine) but I haven’t found the right one yet. I intend to fill it with Kewpie heads of various sizes and then display it somewhere. Like a Damien Hirst piece, only cute.
Toy Museum #2
2003.08.16, 13:22 | Comments (0)
Another photograph from the toy museum of graphic design from a bygone era.
Temple in the Rain
2003.08.15, 23:49 | Comments (3)
Back in June when the hydrangeas were out we hiked up to Aikousan Amida-dera (above Hakone) in the rain. Here’s the approach to the temple.
Toy Museum #1
2003.08.14, 20:24 | Comments (0)
I found some photographs I took back in late spring during a visit to Hakone. Some of the ones from the Toy Museum are maybe worth a look. It was really the old posters that caught my eye.
The Roof of Kappa Tengoku from the Baths
2003.08.14, 18:06 | Comments (0)
My tin fetish shows no sign of abating.
Odaiba
2003.08.12, 19:38 | Comments (11)
Whatever the intention, no expense has been spared in making the place thoroughly disconcerting. The dominant message, delivered with a quiet fascistic certainty, is that in the future everything will be like this, so you’d best get used to it. [A collection of photographs from the non-place of Odaiba.]
Photos for Friends
2003.07.30, 23:50 | Comments (12)
Two Shimokitazawa photographs for friends (Fuji print film in a Contax T2)
More Festival Pictures
2003.07.30, 21:52 | Comments (2)
Alright, so I have to cheat. By way of filling up the page because I can’t stand to look at things the way they are, here are more photographs from the Kyodo Festival.
Japan Photography Mailing List
2003.07.30, 20:34 | Comments (1)
lil and Juergen Specht have launched the Japan Photography mailing list which, given their bona fides, ought to be worth subscribing to pronto.
Clip Art
2003.07.12, 17:49 | Comments (2)
Ah, the endless battle of man versus nature doled out in yearly rituals.
Antique Store, Funabashi
2003.06.22, 16:07 | Comments (6)
Junk stores are so great. Fossicking through layers of objects, going back in time, the archaeology of taste and style.
Matsumoto, 1944
2003.06.19, 10:17 | Comments (0)
[Photo] During the war, Tokyo schoolchildren were evacuated to the countryside. The students at the school my daughter now attends were sent to Matsumoto, in Nagano prefecture. This photograph was taken there in 1944.
Bamboo, Todoroki
2003.06.19, 09:31 | Comments (0)
[Photo] Bamboo above the Todoroki gorge in Setagaya-ku, Tokyo.
Harajuku Looking to Yoyogi
2003.06.18, 14:23 | Comments (4)
[Photo] Harajuku looking to Yoyogi, just before the rain on Monday.
Bag of Biscuits
2003.06.17, 11:40 | Comments (3)
[Photo: New Year’s bag of senbei] A bag of senbei (Japanese ‘biscuits’) bought at New Year. They’re long gone now, of course, but the photograph remains.
Omote-Sando Body Parts
2003.06.17, 09:46 | Comments (2)
[Photo: arm in store window, Omote-Sando] Have any definitive histories of window dressing and shop manequins been written? There must be a couple of medium-sized photographic surveys from Taschen.
More Wrappings
2003.06.11, 22:00 | Comments (4)
[Photo: Wrapped building at twilight in Omote-Sando] Sometimes you’re not sure where the wrapping of the building ends and the wrapping of the sky begins.
3 Japanese Combs -#3
2003.06.08, 21:23 | Comments (4)
The comb of someone long dead. Bamboo, boxwood, steel, unidentified wood for the endpieces….
3 Japanese Combs - #2
2003.06.08, 16:08 | Comments (2)
This one’s old — don’t know the origin of this.
3 Japanese Combs – #1
2003.06.08, 15:14 | Comments (3)
Recent manufacture but rather old design, unoiled, made from two pieces of boxwood (黄楊 – tsuge). This is the…
Omote-Sando Face
2003.06.06, 10:09 | Comments (0)
At the lights on Omote-Sando, giant well-groomed poster women stare balefully from windows.
Must Have Ocean
2003.06.01, 00:02 | Comments (5)
Too long without salt water is not good.
Rustlets
2003.05.21, 16:27 | Comments (5)
If I had a dollar for every photograph of rust that’s ever been taken, I could buy that island in the Caribbean I’ve had my eye on.
Sakura By Streetlight
2003.04.04, 11:55 | Comments (10)
[Photo] Sakura (cherry trees) overhanging the road last night.
Grainy View of Fuji
2003.03.13, 12:00 | Comments (6)
Clouds louring upon Fuji
Cat in Window
2003.02.27, 12:35 | Comments (19)
This cat seemed nervy and kind of unhappy. I got the impression it was an outdoor cat spending its life as an indoor cat - a piece of furniture, to be exact.
Late Afternoon
2003.02.10, 21:39 | Comments (10)
Still disturbingly prone to this sort of first-year art student abstract texture shot.
Francis Bacon Filter
2003.01.10, 23:57 | Comments (4)
I didn’t know that my digital camera had a built-in Francis Bacon filter. Cool.
Lid 02
2003.01.03, 14:26 | Comments (6)
Wonders of Japanese Packaging, #2: Another box lid I found during our bout of end-of-year cleaning.
Lid
2002.12.30, 21:22 | Comments (1)
Chinese characters on the lid of a wooden box.
Bullet Phone
2002.12.27, 00:50 | Comments (7)
Clever print campaign for Hitachi’s new flip phone, Shinjuku station this afternoon.
A Good Day for Clouds
2002.07.27, 13:51 | Comments (2)
Yesterday was a good day for clouds. Big columns of cumulo-nimbus cruised overhead most of the day. These formations…
Galleries Online
2002.04.24, 13:24 | Comments (4)
Some people get the picture… welcome to Antipicture. The gallery pages are pretty much done and have been uploaded….
Where Are the Blimps of Yesteryear?
2002.03.15, 10:11 | Comments (5)
Blimps used to be a reasonably common sight over Tokyo. Haven’t seen one in years….
Tim Porter Exhibition
2001.12.06, 12:50 | Comments (0)
Tim Porter, special one-day exhibition Sunday, Dec 9 in Roppongi, Tokyo
A Bridge, A Lamp, A Sky
2001.11.19, 12:47 | Comments (0)
Rummaging through old Polaroids
Nihon Minka-en
2001.11.06, 00:17 | Comments (2)
Visit to the Japanese Folk House Museum
Visit to a White Elephant
2001.11.02, 02:31 | Comments (0)
Tokyo International Forum atrium
Tokyo View #01
2001.11.01, 02:43 | Comments (1)
Tokyo View #01: Buildings from R’s balcony.
Flying Sharks
2001.11.01, 02:36 | Comments (18)
It wouldn’t be Antipixel without a picture of a flying shark. Photographer Chris Fallows has documented great whites leaping…
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