Paul Barr arrived in Kyoto last night for the fall-foliage season, and so today for our first outing we made a return trip to the aptly-named Ochiba Jinja (落葉神社), meaning "fallen-leaf shrine". This is my (our) second trip, the first having been documented two years ago in "Carpet of Yellow Deep in the Mountains of North-West Kyoto".

The first trip had been on a Dec 2, two weeks later in the season than our trip today, so most of the leaves that time had already fallen; this time most were still on the trees, and the color hadn't even fully [...]

One of the main points of interest at the Kongorinji Temple (金剛輪寺) are the many jizou (地 蔵) statues. I give a more-detailed introduction in "Deep Sorrow at the Kongourinji Temple’s Path of Jizou" from two years ago when I wrote about this path after my first visit, but in short: these statues were placed by parents who lost a child, as a form of prayer that the child will find an easy path to heaven.

Each statue is unique, and has a hand-sewn bib, a colorful pinwheel, and the engraved name of a child.

Before you get to the [...]

A few more shots from the other day's visit to the Kongorinji Temple (金剛輪寺) in Shiga, an hour's drive from Kyoto.

I had brought my computer to do some processing on the road, and while I was trying some "artsy" processing of the photo above (or, at least, the original of what eventually became the photo above) because the original was dull and boring and just not working, I was about to give up and delete it when someone glanced over my shoulder and proclaimed how much she liked it, and why she liked it (the three colors and three [...]

Today was another fun but exhausting day of photography with Belgian Damien Douxchamps on his last day visiting from near Tokyo. The other day I posed some desktop backgrounds from Temples in north-east Kyoto, from our outing two days ago. Yesterday we spent quite a bit of inspiring time at the Honnen-in Temple, but the cursory glance I gave to my photos last night gave me a strong "one of those days when it just doesn't work" feelings, so no post yesterday.

Today we went to the Kongourinji Temple an hour's drive from Kyoto, in Shiga Prefecture. I've posted much [...]

I'm exhausted after a long day of photography in north-east Kyoto, temple hopping with Damien Douxchamps visiting from Tsukuba (near Tokyo). Today's post is just a few quick pictures I picked out from two of the places.

I used the polarizer filter today quite a bit (with moss and the leaves), and tried the shot above with a polarizer, without a polarizer, and at half power, and found that it looked best without. Without the white sheen of the reflections in the lower half of the photo (something the polarizer was quite effective at removing), the tray with the tea [...]