It's been a couple of months since my last “What am I?” quiz, so here's one. What is the photo of?

As usual, I'll keep guesses private until I post the answer in a day or three...

Renewing one's American passport by mail isn't too arduous for most folks.... you just need:

• old passport
• filled-out application form
• photo
• fee
• self-addressed stamped envelope

For most folks the photo is probably the biggest hassle because you have to stop by one of those booths in a mall or something, but if you're a photographer, “photo” means you really need (or at least in my case I actually used):

• Camera (Nikon D4 + Nikkor 85mm f/1.4 lens)
• Tripod (Gitzo and Really Right Stuff)
• White foamcore board as backdrop
• SB-900 speedlight as on-camera commander (why can't Nikon's pro body include a commander like the D700!?)
• SB-800 speedlight as primary illumination
• Reflector umbrella
• Stand for umbrella
• speedlight mount for umbrella/stand
• SB-600 speedlight to light background
• CamRanger camera remote-control unit
• Apple iPad mini to connect to CamRanger remote-control unit
• computer / Lightroom / photo printer / photo paper
• patience

I have little experience with portraiture (though I try), but even less experience/confidence with artificial light, so it ended up being quite the ordeal to find everything and get it set up, then figure out how to work the speedlights. Nikon, bless them, seems to be able to come up with a completely different, completely horrible UI design with every new speedlight model.

Once I got things set up, actually taking the photos took only a few moments. Then another 20 minutes to put everything away, and then another 30 minutes fighting with Satan's Printer (the evil Canon MG3600, which I swear will be the last Canon printer I ever buy) to get the hardcopy. Then carefully cutting out the 2”×2” square required for the application took some time.

The application is a bit more complex living overseas because at least in Japan you can't write a check, so you have to go to the post office and get a “postal money order” to include with the application. With a postal money order, you pay in yen and get a paper redeemable (in this case by the passport office) for dollars at any post office in The States. It doesn't sound arduous, but wow, it was.

Years ago you could buy these at the post office like buying envelopes at a store.... simply say what you want, give the appropriate cash, and get the money order. Now, you need to fill out all kinds of forms in multiple languages in a very particular manner, government IDs, specify exactly what the money is for, etc. It was ridiculous, and took 45 minutes(!) to get the thing. Oh, and they added a $20 fee to cover their own time, I suppose. All this for a $100 transaction. I would have rather taken my chances throwing cash in the envelope, were it allowed.

Anyway, I just got my new passport in the mail this evening, so I'm set until I have to do this all over again in 2024.... or, at least, until it's time to renew Anthony's passport. But for a child's passport, America requires the physical presence of the child and both parents at the consulate/embassy, which is a hassle unto itself, but perhaps less so than the friggin' postal money order because when you show up in person, you can pay in greenbacks.

Then after that, the next passport hassle will be to renew Curious George's passport, but that's still five years off...

In the article “Heading Up To See The Naked Roof of Kyoto’s Chion’in Temple” the other day, about the once-every-100-years roof repair currently being done at the Chion'in Temple (知恩院), I'd ended the story having arrived at the top of the temporary protective-shell structure where one could walk at the level of the roof, which had its tiles and battens removed to reveal the rafters and other components of the roof truss for the first time since 1907.

The roof truss was constructed in two distinct layers... the inner/upper parts were a regular gridwork of beams, while the lower parts that sweep out to the edge are a jumble of raw tree trunks seemingly scattered at random.

I'd thought these things were made without nails or other metal, but there were plenty of old bolts and nails. I know that the nails, at least, predate the 1907 repair, and some perhaps date from the 1600s when the building was built.

I made a few wigglegram attempts, but all came out pretty bad. Here's the least bad:

One could walk the full breadth of the front face of the roof, and along one side for part of the way.

Off to one side they had the various onigawara (gargoyle like things) taken from the roof....

All in all I'm disappointed with the quality of the photos, but as my excuse it was dark and I wash rushed for time (it was already past closing time before they even let me in, the line was so long). I'll try to do better next time, in 2110, if I can remember.

The 10 huge characters across the face of the massive building seen above say:

“National-Treasure Mieido Heisei Overhaul”

where “Mieido” is the name of the main building at Kyoto's Chion'in Temple (知恩院), and “Heisei” is the name of the current emperor-of-Japan's reign. The overhaul refers mostly to the roof, which apparently undergoes this kind of thing about once every hundred years.

This is the same temple that appeared in “Huge Main Gate of Kyoto’s Chion’in Temple” last month, which I wrote in preparation for writing about the roof.

The ugly building above is a shell built around the circa-1639 main-temple building being overhauled, and the line of people is for a special viewing were you could go up and see the guts of the old roof. After having seen a news article about the special three-day once-in-a-hundred-years event, I took a walk over, arriving just before the end of the final day. This was last November.

I ended up waiting in line for 75 minutes, but I figured it was better to do it now than to wait for the next opportunity in 2110.

I thought it was smart how they used safety helmets to throttle the flow of visitors... once all the helmets were used, new folks could go in only when others came out and surrendered their helmets. It felt better than a security guard controlling the flow like a bouncer at a club.

As far as I could tell, the helmets served no other purpose.

As you got closer, various things were posted to give you something to do while waiting. The one above shows how the shell was constructed over the temple building. First rails were placed on the ground along the north and south edges of the building, then off to one side an 18'-wide slice of the building was constructed, then rolled on the rails to position over the building. With this approach they didn't have to worry about construction accidents damaging the building. It took about a year to get all twelve sections into place.

Finally I got to the front of the line and put on my silly little hat, and could go in and up the many flights of stairs to get to the top of the building...

And finally you could see what you came for...

It was quite an amazing site to behold when first emerging from the stairwell, and the size and scale of the roof is difficult (for me) to convey in a photo. It was expansive, to say the least.

You couldn't climb on the thing, of course, but you could get right up to it and touch the 400+ year-old wood.

Continued here...

At Stéphane Barbery's suggestion that the Kitano Tenmangu Shrine's plum were ripe for the photographic picking, I popped over for a quick 45-minute visit today. This is the same place I wrote about a week or so ago, both in “Kyoto Plum-Blossom Preview: Scenes From a Year Ago Today” where I talked about how Feb 22 was too early for the plum blossoms, and in the less blossom-centric post “The Many Lanterns and Overwhelming Sumptuousness of the Kitano Tenmangu Shrine”.

It was chilly (~10C / 50F), but a pleasant, relaxed atmosphere...

The shot above doesn't really “work” because the only thing in focus is the group of people in the far background, leaving the big gate building in the foreground annoyingly and dominatingly out of focus. I'd intended it this way (the group of people are in line to pay respects, as described on this post), but nah, the result doesn't work.

From about the same vantage, toward the side I noticed a tree growing out of the stump of its ancestor (perhaps a fitting image for reincarnation) net to some kind of cow statue...

Having noticed that one of the lanterns was dated 1879 while writing a recent post, I checked out a few more lanterns for dates today. The closest of these three is dated 1866...

However, in the “hallway” I wrote about before, I found one dated 1835...

I didn't have time to check them all, so there are some left for my next visit.

I'd posted a photo titled “Lanterns” the other day. These next two shots are similar, but from a different wall of the same building...

Of course, by this time in the season there are plenty of plum blossoms.

I didn't take too many blossom photos because I've already got plenty (as a click on the “nearby photos” link under any of these photos will show), but you can't visit during plum-blossom season without taking at least a few. 🙂

The many variety of plum blossom at different times and different rates, so there's currently quite a range, from bare trees to full-on maximum.

The real draw of the place is the plum orchard, which costs about $6 to enter. I didn't have time to do so today, but from what I could see from the temple's main gate (the photo below), it was starting to fill in nicely... much better than two weeks earlier in the season when it's mostly bare....