now that i'm back in the land of Oz

Hello all and now I am back home! has been a fantastic trip and i hope that my photos are enough to justify the beauty and essence of Japan. The assignment was initially to go and document the cultural and traditional heritage of Japan and the continual essence of their culture and history in a modern era they live in. Having an idea which thought to be, at the time, an easy and simple idea to complete, it turns out that Japan, although a country which still cherishes and harnesses its culture and traditions, is not completely enveloped with Geishas and girls in Kimonos. 

There were lots of Kimonos, but didnt see any geishas. My assignment took a slight tangent and ended up being a documentary on the cultural differences Japan has to Australia, a documentary on the life and the way the Japanese live their lives. Broad topic but... hopefully I had enough to cover it all.

just some random image which i quiet liked. Was outside the gates of Osaka castle, which you will see photos of soon..

What i found to be quite interesting about Japan is their continual interest and belief in traditional cultures and heritages. Yes, all the silver there is money.. i'd say alot of money.. in Japan the silver coins are 1, 50, 100, and 500 yen.. so... i wonder how many coins are of which amount haha i wanted to steal some of it...

Kimonos were everywhere.. everyone wears them and its amazing how its such an accepted style of clothing in Japan. in western cultures indifference is considered strange and unwanted, in Japan it seems this is acceptable and welcomed.  I've actually lost track of these photos.. so i'm just gonna put some random ones up in no particular order..

At Osaka castle there was a lantern festival, absolutely amazing, i'd say atleast 30000 candles where lined up all over the premises of the castle grounds, every candle had a wish written on it, its believed that if you write a wish and put it over the candles the spirits will take your wish and grant it for you.. was something to behold.. just amazing..

I could go on forever with these photos.. i'll leave it at that.. but it was amazing.. great night, great place.. wish i coulda taken a few people with me and experienced it with them.. sigh..

oh before i leave on Osaka castle, they had this awesome lantern walk. awesome.. the balloons were filled with little LED lights in there, amazing. 

Bikes everywhere in Japan, even ride them in shopping strips..

Not much to day tonight.. but that's enough of the images.. enjoy.. i'll post some more soon!

Chris.

Konichiwa?

Hello all.. so i've been in Japan lately for those who were wondering.. It's been a very interesting trip and its been very, VERY hot... mid to high 30's with high humidity.. good fun.. been sweating like i'm in a sauna, just drenched with sweat. Drinking a lot of water and my sweat just tastes like water.. maybe thats not good? hah who knows.. But yes.. hot and interesting.. In Kyoto at the moment and moving to Osaka soon, hopefully I get some good images and this trip has not just been a holiday.. The snaps i'm getting are alright but nothing has been amazing yet.. probably my expectations are too high.. Wont post too many images today.. just a small sample of what's been happening.. in no particular order..

Right... So that's a quick glimpse of the stuff i've been up to in the past.. 3 days.. time certainly flies.. Need to get a move on and start heading this doco into a more refined direction. The main idea was to focus on the traditions Japan still retains in this modern age we live in, it's a broad topic but I don't know.. we'll see how it goes.. I'm feeling okay after 3 days.. I should have something.. Moving to Osaka tomorrow and hopefully I can take it to the next level. 

Hope you enjoyed the sample. The main will be out soon!

Ciao ciao.

Chris. 

On a side note.. i've realized a lot of my work is looking more... martin parr-ish... as much as i hate to admit it.. maybe Donald was right.. 

Car Wreckers

SO as part of my ongoing assignment with the industrial portraits, I went to visit a car wreckers the other day and got a few snaps there. It turned out okay I suppose.. nothing amazing and i'm starting to think that this series may just be a lost cause... but we'll see how we go.. Had a chat to the teacher about my series and he suggested I do them as like.. mini series of images and not just to focus on the portraits.. different but we'll see how it turns out.. 

So I tried it out at the car wreckers and I'm not sure what I think yet but maybe as a collaborative it'll look better..

I really wanted a nice portrait of this guy, but too bad he was camera shy and refused to have a photo taken of him standing there.. woulda looked really good.. but what can you do.. take what you can.. bit annoyed.. 

Pile of these cares stacked up which I thought was quite interesting.. was a miserable wet and muddy day as you can tell by the mud all over the place.. it's hard to capture whats there.. so much going on it's almost too much visual information to absorb through the camera, which is a bizarre thing as a photographer to experience.. not good.. 

This bad boy was pretty cool. It's amazing how powerful these things were, just picked this car up and threw it around, punched through it like nothing was there, absolutely amazing. Snapped away at this bad boy for a while watching him dispose of cars and pick out parts from the car as skillfully as a surgeon would. 

Wish i was really good at editing photos.. this photo reminds me of an almost... Crewdson-esque photo.. okay maybe not.. no where near.. i lack his talent, lighting and editing skills.. and most importantly the big budgets.. but anyways.. if I have time i'd edit this just for lols.

Probably the best lot of the series.. which isn;t saying much about the quality of my portraits.. shit.... this was a really nice guy, he offered to be my model which made me happy, save me from busting my balls and getting rejected by people, top bloke.

Not a fan of this portrait.. there was a lot in this shed which I wanted to document, but having uncooperative people does not help when you want to take portraits. They just wanna shoot and scoot, no time to fix anything up.. I wanted portraits.. I tell the people at these places.. I want portraits.. set up shots.. nice lighting like I did at the boat builders.. these guys... they all expect me to walk around and get a portrait within 20 seconds.. fkn ey.. I should probably demand more.. I need an assistant to hold lights for me so I can have nice lighting instead of always having to rely on natural lighting.. I like flash.. these people don't give me the time to do so.. shit.

I quite like this image and it's probably a pretty good image to finish the series on.. I wont use all the photos for these mini series, Jerry (teacher) reckons 4 images max for these minisodes.. 1 portrait, 1 working, 1 detail and 1 overall image.. I hope i've covered everything in my shoot on the day and I'll just have to go back and sort out the onces i want.. sigh sight.. more to come.. hopefully.

Chris.