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Nikon D700 + Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 at 135mm — ¹/160 sec, f/2.8, ISO 280 — map & image data — nearby photos

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(The large version of this photo might be interesting... I'm not sure... but this small thumbnail certainly isn't.)

I went out to Fushimi Castle the other day with Paul Barr and Nicolas, a French/American guy I met briefly at Gion Matsuri at the start of the summer when he noticed my big lens and introduced himself. Busy schedules prevented us from getting together until last week when we made the short trip to south part of Kyoto to visit the Fushimi Castle.

It rained nonstop.

Nikon D700 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 at 24mm — ¹/400 sec, f/2.8, ISO 200 — map & image data — nearby photos
Fushimi Castle
Kyoto, Japan

We spent quite a while under the protection of the main gate just chatting, and snapping occasional pictures, such as the kusaridoi rain gutter above. I can never remember the name “kusaridoi” without referring to this post. With the version above I was going a bit out on a limb, but just for safety also took a pedestrian straight-up version, though it would have been better with more rain:

Nikon D700 + Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 at 135mm — ¹/160 sec, f/2.8, ISO 320 — map & image data — nearby photos

The castle was built 50 years ago as a tourist attraction, near the site of where a castle did stand in the late 1590s. The company running it apparently couldn't keep it going, so gave it to the city 10 years ago, so now it's a park.

It showed a lot of potential in the rain, and with its wealth of cherry trees I'm sure it's wonderful in the spring, but it was hard to feel inspired when you're getting soaked.

Nikon D700 + Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 at 200mm — ¹/500 sec, f/2.8, ISO 900 — map & image data — nearby photos

Nikon D700 + Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 at 200mm — ¹/500 sec, f/5, ISO 1800 — map & image data — nearby photos

As it turns out, the rain was a blessing because we were so miserable that we decided to bail on photography, and we went to a coffee shop and chatted for hours. Nicolas is a biologist dealing with DNA sequencing or the like. (My take-away from the conversation is that despite claims that the human genome has been mapped, in reality not a single strand of DNA has ever been sequenced... not one. Ever. But I digress.)

Nikon D700 + Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 at 102mm — ¹/500 sec, f/2.8, ISO 900 — map & image data — nearby photos
Chatting in the Rain
deciding whether to bail on photography

Nikon D700 + Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 at 200mm — ¹/500 sec, f/2.8, ISO 720 — map & image data — nearby photos
Paul, Nicolas, Coke

Nikon D700 + Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 at 102mm — ¹/500 sec, f/2.8, ISO 800 — map & image data — nearby photos
rain makes things
Awkward

Nicolas took a picture of me taking a picture of him, which only goes to show that not only do we both act silly, we both look silly.

We got together again yesterday (again with Paul Barr, on his last day in Kyoto this season, and Stéphane Barbery), but that's for another post.