(IMAGE: Pretty Flowers) everyone likes pretty flowers...
The first thing I noticed upon arrival during our visit to the Kamo no Shirabe cafe in Shiga last month were the flowers that separated the parking spaces from the walkway. It had been sprinkling, so they were photogenicly wet, and they were so vividly colored that they seemed to glow in the overcast light.
(IMAGE: Kamo no Shirabe Cafe) Takashima, Shiga, Japan

(IMAGE: Not a Bee)
I got fooled again by a syrphid fly (AKA hoverfly), a fly beneficial to gardens (it eats pest insects) whose primary means of defense is to look like a bee or a [...]
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(IMAGE: This Is Not Art) It's photography
The caption is just a silly reference to the “art” vs. “photography” discussion in my recent post about HDR. When I first looked this picture, I wondered why it was a blurry – it seemed mosaiced or pixelated, as if it hadn't been fully loaded from disk before display – and I waited for it to finish loading and to “snap” into focus. I eventually realized that it wasn't pixelated, but rather, it just had a lot of water drops that you (or, at least, I) don't notice at first.
It's a lotus flower. [UPDATE: Peter Barnes of Barnes Botany left [...]
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(IMAGE: Atrium Wall Supports) ( ultra-industrial version highly processed in Adobe Lightroom )
I posted earlier today about Kanazawa Station (Kanazawa, Japan) and how it does a wonderful job of mixing traditional Japanese with modern lines.
As I mentioned, the entire space is visually, geometrically rich, so I definitely had fun trying to capture interesting angles. The abstract results were sometimes enhanced (I perhaps fool myself by thinking) with some creative post-processing in Adobe Lightroom, to add a bit of an edge.
(IMAGE: Gate Underbelly)
(IMAGE: 11:15AM)
(IMAGE: Atrium in B & W) ( highly processed in Adobe Lightroom )
(IMAGE: Looking Straight Up) ( highly processed in [...]
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(IMAGE: Endless) at least, seemingly so
(IMAGE: Hodgepodge)
Here are a few more pics from the early part of my visit to Kyoto's Fushimi Inari Shrine (伏見稲荷大社) with Anthony yesterday....
(IMAGE: Arrival)
(IMAGE: Carefully Checking the GPS)
(IMAGE: I Love This Kind of Roof)
I tend to take pictures of them whenever I see them (all the time), so I'm surprised that they've appeared on my blog only three times in the past, in posts about Arashiyama, Giouji Temple, and Konpukuji Temple (update: and Miyajima).
Part of yesterday's Elaborate Sub-Shrine facing the pretty lake....
(IMAGE: Scenic Overlook)
(IMAGE: Rack of Offerings)
I really liked the [...]
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the scrumptious visual delight of (IMAGE: Noh Theater)
I had an amazing photographic and cultural opportunity fall into my lap this weekend.
Unfortunately, I didn't realize it until after I got home and did a bit of after-the-fact research.
One of the mommies at Anthony's preschool has three daughters. One is four years old and in the preschool year below Anthony's, and another is a year older than Anthony, having graduated from the kindergarten in March. (Like the Japanese fiscal year, the Japanese school year ends in March.) The third is older, perhaps around 13 or so. These children are absolutely exquisite. They're cute and beautiful as [...]
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(IMAGE: Exploring With New Friends) On the rocks off Kotobikihama beach, Kyoto Prefecture, Japan
I ended my previous post about day 2 of camping with Anthony with the story that we'd returned from dinner in time for the sunset.
When we got out of the car at the campsite, Anthony was playing with a superhero toy of some sort that he got at the store. (Because camping is special, “we” decided that he can get a small $2 or $3 toy each day that we happen to go to a store while camping.)
A boy about his age was walking by with his mom, and made [...]
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(IMAGE: Wisteria at the Sandai Shrine) Kusatsu City, Shiga Prefecture, Japan
The day I got back from camping, Fumie happened to hear from a taxi driver about a small out-of-the-way shrine not too far away that had a nice bloom of wisteria (or fuji – 藤 – in Japanese), so yesterday afternoon we made the 45 minute drive to Sandai Temple in Kusatsu to check it out.

I guess wisteria is normally a climbing plant, but here they have them dangling from horizontal trellises. They were mostly purple/lavender, but there were some light pink ones as well.
There were a lot of big bumblebees among the [...]
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(IMAGE: Vistas) Furano, Hokkaido, Japan ( one year ago, today )
“Golden Week” is about to start here in Japan, a bunch of national holidays in short order that, along with a weekend or two, gives people willing to use them a long vacation. I work for myself so it doesn't matter to me on that level, but now that Anthony's in school, we have to match our travel to the national schedule. (For a laugh, see this humorous but sadly accurate description of Golden Week.)
We had been planning to bring Anthony to Tokyo Disneyland today, but that plan got scrapped with recent events, so instead [...]
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(IMAGE: Sturdy) Main door to the grounds of Nijo Castle, Kyoto Japan
Driving by Nijo Castle today, I remembered that I hadn't really posted much yet from my previous visit there (which was my first visit, which is embarrassing to admit because I've lived in or near Kyoto for 12 years).
So, here are some pictures of the main gate, a huge, heavy, thick wooden door augmented with bands of steel.
(IMAGE: View from the Inside) In the glow of the setting sun
The wide-angle lens I used to achieve the picture above camouflages the sheer size of the door. Note the small opening at left, [...]
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(IMAGE: Lighter than Air)
After a stupendous moment in the sun, the common white cherry blossom has all but evaporated from Kyoto, but there are still plenty of other varieties of cherry tree (and other tree, I suppose) in full bloom or just starting to blossom. The weeping crimson at the old imperial palace are one example, but there are plenty more, such as this tree full of fluffy pink I came across on the way home from Mass on Sunday. They were so nice, I had to return with my camera...



I like how in the photo above you can see all the [...]
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(IMAGE: Hanami at The Old Imperial Palace) Kyoto, Japan
Of course, I was somewhat exaggerating with my previous post, Just Like That, Kyoto's Cherry-Blossom Season Ends, because cherry-blossom season doesn't end the day after full bloom any more than blowing out the first candle on a cake ends a birthday party. The weather – very strong haze and occasional rain – isn't nearly as nice as the weekend was, but there's still plenty of Cherry-Blossom Joie de Vivre left in Kyoto.
(IMAGE: Gauntlet of Pink)
I realized this morning that I'd neglected to revisit the trees on the grounds of the Old Imperial Palace that were featured [...]
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My cold continues, so I didn't take any pictures today, but I did feel good enough at times to get out for a bit here and there. Like yesterday, there were a lot of people, but the atmosphere seemed to be all the better for it. It reminded me strongly of the joie de vivre one feels in the classic Chicago tune Saturday In The Park. I think the sight of cherry blossoms has a magical, medicinal effect, both on the human body and the human psyche. Like yesterday, it was perfectly wonderful.
Lacking energy for a well-presented well-linked post, here are a few random pics from [...]
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, f/10, ISO 200 — full exif & map — nearby photos (IMAGE: Main Gate of the Heian Shrine, at Dusk) With Cherry Blossoms
As I mentioned earlier today, full bloom has finally hit Kyoto.
Having recently read photographer Rick Lee's blog post When is dusk dusky enough? about how actually shooting a “night” shot at dusk can make use of a bit of remaining skylight to balance the harsh artificial lights, it reminded me of the lessons from Strobist's classic How to Photograph Christmas Lights, and made me want to try it with the cherry-blossom lightup that's going on in my area during the evenings this week.

(IMAGE: My Eyes Don't Know Where to Focus) Cherry Blossoms  ·  Kyoto, Japan
(IMAGE: Full Bloom)
This is the same area whose blossoms were featured in last week's It Has Begun and this week's Sakura from my Kitchen Window. Digging around in my blog archives a bit, from 2006 I find Long Night Exposures and Cherry Blossoms and Cherry Blossom Finale, and even a few from 2005 before I moved here: Indeed, the Blooms have Bloomed in Kyoto and Poetry for the Season and More Cherry-Blossom Pics.
It's a pretty area, but photos would look much nicer without the cinderblock wall in the background (a wall one doesn't really notice until you look through [...]
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(IMAGE: Delicate (but Thoroughly) Pink) Cherry Blossoms · Kyoto, Japan
I'm not sure what variety these blossoms are, but they're quite different from the standard white blossoms that are just getting going in Kyoto, the late-blooming fluffy pink variety, and (of course) the deeply rich plum-blossom pinks. The colors are much like the shidare zakura (“crimson willow cherry”) that fill the nearby Heian-Shrine, but the tree doesn't seem all that willowy, so I don't know.
I've been busy on Lightroom projects, and trying to get ready for a short trip to the Amami Islands that we're starting tomorrow morning, but I knew this tree was at full bloom, so [...]
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(IMAGE: First Cherry Blossom) Kyoto, Japan  ·  Spring 2008
( Desktop Background Images )

Well, at least the first that I've noticed. Returning from a trip to the store around 2pm, I noticed a few blossoms on the trees near my place. It's just in time, too, because as I noted in the last couple of posts, the plum blossoms have started to wane. So, I grabbed a few snapshots of them, and even turned a couple of ones with blue sky in the background into desktop backgrounds....

(IMAGE: Most Trees Still Like This)
Using the time-lapse sequence I made last year as a guide, [...]
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(IMAGE: Plum Blossom Desktop Background)
( Desktop Background Images )

After Easter mass, we made the 15-minute drive over to Kitano Tenmangu, a Shinto shrine in north-west Kyoto that dates from 947, famous for its pink and white plum blossoms. It was my first visit.
(IMAGE: Most Trees Were Like This)
We didn't realize just how past their prime the plum blossoms were: the trees were mostly bare. I see now that they have their plum-blossom festival in late February, so we're a month late to the party.
Still, there were a few bunches of blossoms here and there, in deep pink, bleached white, and [...]
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, f/6.3, ISO 250 — full exif & map — nearby photos (IMAGE: Lightup at the Kiyomizu Temple)
I went out again to the Kyoto Higashiyama “Hanatoro” Lightup event last night. The word “Hanatoro” is made from the characters for “flower”, “lantern”, and “road”. The event had plenty of them all.
I used a tripod for all my shots, with shutter speeds ranging from half a second up to 30 seconds.
, f/7.1, ISO 200 — full exif & map — nearby photos (IMAGE: Lightup at Maruyama Park)
The cherry tree above is perhaps the most famous in Kyoto, although here its branches are still bare. In a [...]
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Earlier I posted a few preview pics of late-blooming “bundle-of-tissues” blossoms, and of plum blossoms, so today I'm posting a few pics of Kyoto's run-of-the-mill “cherry blossom” blossoms.

These first three pictures were taken a year ago by hooking up a bunch of extension tubes between the camera and my big Nikkor 70-200 f/2.8 zoom. I didn't yet have my good tripod, so this big, heavy combination on my previous (tiny, flimsy) tripod made for a comical view.

The three pictures above are fairly so-so – nothing special – but I've included them here to delay you a bit so that the images in [...]
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(IMAGE: Lots Going On at the Kenrokuen Gardens)
As I mentioned earlier, we made a short trip to Kanazawa the other day. Among the area's attractions are the Kenrokuen Gardens one of the so-called “three famous gardens” in Japan. It dates back to the 1600s, although its present state was formed later, in the mid 1800s.
It's famous for its beauty in the snow, and according to pictures I've seen it's pretty amazing in the spring, summer, and fall as well. Early march – with no snow and no flowers – is perhaps not the best time to visit, but we enjoyed it nevertheless.

Throughout the [...]
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