Life in Japan - Pictures galore !! Arcades, Temples, Rainy days, etc

About 2 weeks ago I took a road trip down to Oita with a few friends (two cars) and we stayed in a friends country home. It was an excellent trip with loads of great views. Here's a few that I took with my old Lumix camera. I just wish I had my new GF2 with me then.

Two shots of the lake behind the Oita damn.





A really old traditional Japanese sweet shop.



More old shops



We were going to climb / hike up that mountain but it was too bloody cold at 4 degrees Celsius.





The view from this bridge is breathtaking. I've been on it before so this time round I didn't bother because you have to pay to walk on it.



Yakumo

 

That lake is awesome -- think of what that reflection would be w/ a clear sky!

 

I've seen it mate. On a beautiful day the view is amazing. I really do wish the weather was better when we went. I may be going up there again in January for a skiing trip. The sky is normally quite clear in winter. Fingers crossed it will be when I next go up there.

 

This week I do plan to cycle to one of the local mountains, mount Tsukuba (one of the great mountains of Japan) is only 40km away and Lake Kasumigaura (second largest lake in Japan) is a further 20km away.

Although my aim before I leave is to travel to Lake Haruna with the many mountains around it, about 105km away.

 

I took my new camera out for the first time tonight while going shopping in Kita Kyushu.

I'm still very new to the whole DLR / DSLR camera thing and do need some pointers but here's what I did tonight using no flash or tripod at all.

Some Food Stands (How can I stop the motion blur of passes by yet keep a good image without using a flash?)



River running through Kokura. This is actually salt water!





The Chinese restaurant


The very tall and very oddly shaped, River walk (Again, nasty motion blur)



This is my son and wife. I'm very happy with this picture. you can see all the natrual colours that would be normally washed away with using a flash.



Yakumo

 

Looks good. What model did you get? I just upgraded to one of those work horses w/ killer high ISO performance. Holy fuck balls -- blown away!

I'll get some samples up later.


Nerd Glasses by gaijin_punch, on Flickr


Kikousan by gaijin_punch, on Flickr


Harajuku Intersection by gaijin_punch, on Flickr


Bone Stockings by gaijin_punch, on Flickr


Red Leaves (1) by gaijin_punch, on Flickr


Red Leaves by gaijin_punch, on Flickr


Yoyogi Bride by gaijin_punch, on Flickr


Early morning on the Odakyuu Line (2) by gaijin_punch, on Flickr


Yoyogi Scarf (5) by gaijin_punch, on Flickr


Lonely in the Park (Cinematic) by gaijin_punch, on Flickr


Sunny Morning (1) by gaijin_punch, on Flickr


Talk to the Hand (1) by gaijin_punch, on Flickr

 

As always, some smashing pictures there, gaijinPunch. Are you touching them up in Photoshop to give them that retro look?

The camera I bought is a Panasonic Lumix GF2. It came from yahoo auctions brand new for a nice 23'000 yen. not bad at all. The camera was released in February 2011 but they've already released the GF3 however it's missing quite a few options for some odd reason. What new camera did you buy?

Like I said, I'm still new to all this stuff so I need to learn more about ISO levels and shutter speeds to stop blur when not using a flash.

Yakumo

 

@ Yakumo

Do you have to ask people's permission to take random photos like that in the street?
In the US people would be really paranoid about somebody taking their pictures.

 

Some of the pictures that Gaijin punch took, does look like he is being a perverted stalker

 

You have a filter for that effect or do you them all by hand? Lovely pictures nevertheless GP. Reminds me of the fact that Japanese girls >>> Chinese girls .

 

I do quite a lot of processing. Some come out more retro than others. I just try to get something that works right.

Google + Experimentation. There are some "rules" to follow... like 1/focal length for handheld. But, that doesn't always mean a non-blurry picture. For a walking target at a not far distance, 1/60 is still too slow, etc. You figure it out. For high ISO performance I'm afraid you have to spend a lot of dough.

The camera I got is a Canon 5D Mark II. Now that I have it I'm surethe Mark III will be announced tomorrow.

Candid photography is an artform... actually not getting people to stare in the camera is. It's not too bad. Every now and again you get people doing the peace sign. Other times, just staring. Pretty sure the law is the same here as it is in the US/UK - pictures are okay, you just have to have a model release to sell them unless they're used for news.

Two of the photos (somewhat obvious) were "models" posing for someone else. That's pretty easy to do in Yoyogi Park on the weekend... but not necessarily the most kosher.

Curves layers in Photoshop are the main thing. There's of course some other stuff but that's the main magic. Some just come out that way. The 2nd to last one (Sunny Morning) hasn't had much curves work done -- just some contrast. The sun was in the viewfinder.

Whities >>> All.

 

Would be nice if dcharlie would quit fingering himself and post some of his photos. His are/were great and if I recall correctly, he does absolutely zero post-processing. Different philosophies, but who cares.

 

Great pics as usual GP. I particularly like Sunny Morning.

 

I had Jetlag, so made the best of it. I was practicing some words of wisdom from Bart Simpson. "You can always tell which direction North is by staring directly at the sun."

 

hahaha!

"I once took a pair of binoculars and stared at the sun for over an hour."

 

After looking at several pages of this thread and at the AMAZING pictures uploaded by some users (specially GP, you are a very talented dude!) i can only say 2 things:

1) The famous Don King motto "Only in America" should be rephrased as "Only in Japan": the awesomeness is too huge to convey it in words.

2) I need to go to Japan ASAP! It's a pity a trip to Japan is so expensive...

 

Well as long as you are not outside a school taking photos :lol:

 

I live right opposite a senior high school, no shit. Here's the view from my gaming room window.



Sorry for the piss poor quality photo. I had to use the phone because my camera's battery is flat.

The school is the most prestige senior high school in this city so there's no problem with dickhead kids. Just so many lovely 18 year old girls in summer. If only I was a younger man :lol:

Yakumo

 

Also not illegal, but I'm still not stupid.

 

I guess being married isn't a problem then. Haha