Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55mm f/2.8 @ 55 mm — 1/640 sec, f/5, ISO 800 — map & image data — nearby photos
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.
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55mm f/2.8 @ 17 mm — 1/320 sec, f/5, ISO 200 — map & image data — nearby photos
Kamo no Shirabe Cafe
Takashima, Shiga, Japan
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55mm f/2.8 @ 55 mm — 1/400 sec, f/5, ISO 200 — map & image data — nearby photos
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55mm f/2.8 @ 55 mm — 1/320 sec, f/5.6, ISO 200 — map & image data — nearby photos
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 wasp. It was just about a year ago that I first learned of them, having thought one was a bee on my camera bag.
Slightly different on the plant-life scale, I tried to get all artsy with some onions hanging in a shed....
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55mm f/2.8 @ 35 mm — 1/100 sec, f/3.5, ISO 640 — map & image data — nearby photos
Onions
The couple running the cafe have a garden on one side where they grow a lot of the veggies that they use, and on the other side of the restaurant they have the wood-burning stone pizza oven, and a shed full of firewood for the thing, and some onions previously harvested from the garden.
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55mm f/2.8 @ 34 mm — 1/90 sec, f/5, ISO 200 — map & image data — nearby photos
Shed Full of Firewood and Onions
as seen from inside the cafe
I took the picture from my seat in the restaurant. The reflections in the window tell me that I should have broken out the polarization filter just a bit sooner.
The shed used to be the bus stop across the street. They rescued it from demolition when a new bus stop was put in, moving it here where it fits into the ambiance perfectly.
Anyway, the onions had potential, but I blew it. I prefer Shimada-san's onion shot.
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 85mm f/1.4 — 1/125 sec, f/5.6, ISO 320 — map & image data — nearby photos
Private Dining Room
( now, with a bright and airy view )
As I posted about the other day, a local restaurant suffered a fire two weeks ago. It appears that they tried to renovate, but driving by today we noticed that they've resorted to somewhat more drastic measures...
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55mm f/2.8 @ 30 mm — 1/640 sec, f/2.8, ISO 500 — map & image data — nearby photos
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55mm f/2.8 @ 23 mm — 1/160 sec, f/3.5, ISO 320 — map & image data — nearby photos
Visa and MasterCard Accepted
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55mm f/2.8 @ 34 mm — 1/350 sec, f/4.5, ISO 320 — map & image data — nearby photos
The sign says, in elegant prose whose lilt can't really be translated, something along the lines of...
To Our Customers
Notice of Temporary Closure
We appreciate your business. For the time being, due to the present circumstances, we must suspend business. We apologize from the bottom of our heart for the trouble.
June 30th, 2008
The sign looks like it says a lot more than that, but the extra is all the flowery honorifics sprinkled throughout.
Posted next to it was the demolition company's work permit, and a statement that the building had no asbestos. Of course, I'd never seen nor used “asbestos” in Japanese before, but that word — 石綿 — is composed from the characters for “rock” and “cotton”, which, in this context, I figured had to be asbestos, and indeed it is.
You can see some shots of the interior taken during better days, when we ate at the restaurant once.
UPDATE Oct 2008: they're apparently not rebuilding; it's now a pay-by-the-hour parking lot.
Anthony was really stoked on Friday afternoon when we all went shopping, and he ended up with new shoes. These had shiny leather... gleaming whites... cool blue... that all added up to shoes that he felt made him run faster. He was tickled pink.
He was excited to show them to Gen when we went to his place on Saturday, and to show them to Fumie's mom on Sunday, and, well, to anyone and everyone we met.
So today, he comes back from kindergarten, and here's what was left near the door...
You couldn't help but laugh (unless you cried, which was a distinct option), so I had to take a picture. The lighting in our entry way is pretty bad, photographically speaking (it's mixed incandescent and fluorescent), so I decided to give flash a try.
I set my D200's flash to “commander mode”, and set up my SB800 Speedlight as a CLS slave (“CLS” is Creative Lighting System – Nikon's automatic flash-power control), pointing the SB800 up into a flash umbrella directly over the shoes. I also set my camera's flash to contribute, with an exposure compensation of -0.7EV to soften it up a bit...
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55mm f/2.8 @ 32 mm — 1/60 sec, f/9, ISO 400 — full exif
Strobist
SB800 + D200's onboard flash @ -0.7EV
The result was very soft, natural, “unnoticed” lighting, which is what I wanted. Lighting setups don't come much easier than this, but with my lack of flash experience, any success is noteworthy.
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6 VR @ 80 mm — 1/250 sec, f/8, ISO 100 — map & image data — nearby photos
Cool Fun on a Hot Summer Day
Yesterday's post – Water Play at Gen's House – reminded me of two years ago while we were in Cupertino for the summer (before selling our house).
Anthony was three and a half years old at the time. Having a yard with hoses, there was lots of water play, especially because it was such a hot summer that year...
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6 VR @ 112 mm — 1/90 sec, f/5.3, ISO 250 — map & image data — nearby photos
Three-Year-Old Fireman-in-Training
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6 VR @ 28 mm — 1/160 sec, f/7.1, ISO 100 — map & image data — nearby photos
My favorite shots where of him playing in the lawn sprinklers that I posted at the time, but I'm so enamored with the series that I'll post a few more today...
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6 VR @ 200 mm — 1/50 sec, f/5.6, ISO 100 — map & image data — nearby photos
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6 VR @ 80 mm — 1/80 sec, f/5, ISO 100 — map & image data — nearby photos
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6 VR @ 75 mm — 1/250 sec, f/8, ISO 100 — map & image data — nearby photos
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6 VR @ 80 mm — 1/250 sec, f/8, ISO 100 — map & image data — nearby photos
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6 VR @ 105 mm — 1/180 sec, f/7.1, ISO 100 — map & image data — nearby photos
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6 VR @ 170 mm — 1/250 sec, f/8, ISO 100 — map & image data — nearby photos
(a little fill flash helped on this one)
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6 VR @ 105 mm — 1/160 sec, f/6.3, ISO 100 — map & image data — nearby photos
One shot was way overexposed such that it came out almost all white. I lowered the exposure four stops in Lightroom, which brought out a little detail, but what detail was there became quite posterized when it was unsquished from the top of the highlight area, creating an interesting effect....
Nikon D200 + Nikkor 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6 VR @ 95 mm — 1/10 sec, f/5.3, ISO 100 — map & image data — nearby photos
I felt the white “background” (the parts that were so overexposed that no detail could be recovered) was a bit harsh, so I added the vignette as well.