Graduation — ? ! ! ! of the Kyoto Uni’

Photos from Japan. —– a guy said “If anything crazy happened, it’s in Japan”.

As a very decent Japanese, —– still I agree with him.  Those photos were not from

Cos-Ple or Carnival but  can you believe, it was the Graduation Ceremony in

 the Kyoto University.

 Yes, they are new Graduates, the top-brains in Japan.  So, they are not crazy at all.  

 It’s not a Halloween or Carnival but more like an act  of Manga or Anime

 = Typical Japanese culture.

Before Manga, Japan had Ukiyoe (Utamaro) tradition.  = This tradition was in the context

 of Kabuki Culture.

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This Kabuki derived from a word “Kabuku” (傾く) = inclined or twisted = Eccentric. 

Strangely you might thought, the very traditional, Shinto, Buddhists Feudal society  

under the Shogun / Samurai-Ruled society,  still having very exceptional tolerance

towards the Eccentric or even indecency. ( think, mass publication of “Utamaro” !)

So, to have a public display of very extravagant Kimono of  Lord Date etc, etc, or

show-off of Fire-fighters, even a Yakuza’s stunt was a part of the Japanese culture.

= So, why not to have a FUN at the Graduation Ceremony ! ! !

(You may mistaken that it was a display of Ego, but far from it,

If the person could kill-off the own Ego, he can become a cat = otherwise, how

the one could make oneself fool, on THE day = only once in the life.) 

—– Original Report  :  http://togech.jp/2015/03/25/2105

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PS: Since WP changed the system for us to upload / editing, I can no longer change 

      the color of the letters = so that, the text may looks funny here. 

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Lens Test on Cherry and Plum Blossom

Those photos were taken a while ago, the same day I took pictures of Daffodils.

(After this, there must be much better full bloom somewhere else though.  🙂 )

(photo above was taken by a Canon Fisheye lens)

And the following photos were taken by the Two Element Homemade Lens above.

The beauty of this lens was that there is no focus  😀   (Other than this lens,

rest of the lenses were used with the Tilting Macro Bellows for focus.)

And the following photos were taken by a lens originally came from a Canon

compact camera G9 = it was their zoom’s front element.

The lens was Epoxy glued onto a lens mount ring and a filter ring was fixed too.  

Unlike first two photos, those photos were (I think) Plum tree.

Next was a front element of a Zoom lens  (I don’t remember where it’s came from,

Canon or Sigma ?)  — The lens was fixed in a similar way to the other homemade lens.

Front element itself couldn’t eliminate the aberration. —– but this one showed

very strong Coma aberration — (if not a camera shake).  In most of the case,

good softness of the image was created by the Spherical  aberration  

= so, Coma aberration was not desirable here.

Strangely, this Coma aberration appeared somewhat in middle distance.  

And not much so on the close-up.

This one above showed no Coma aberration but the following one did  ? ? ?

I need to have more test.

Last one here came from a cheap Wide-Converter for a compact camera.

It got quite big diameter — hence the effective F-aperture is F1.6 !

 

I like the images from this lens though —– strangely, despite full open F1.6,

the back image was not necessary out of focus or dissolved into big  Bokeh.  

Anyhow, each lens got its own character = pros and cons.  🙂

Last photo above was again by the same Fisheye lens. 

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Daffodil — Lens Test

As the spring has started, I took the lenses (in fact quite few) which I “made” duling 

 the winter hibernation out to the test.  🙂

And those lenses were designed to use with 

 tilting bellows I specially made for Canon 5D.

Photo left, Those three lenses (mounted on the

 Nikon mount adapter) were saved from 

 the broken cameras or lenses.

— Left one came from Canon G9, center one from an old zoom lens and the right one

came from a Wide-adapter and as they are having focal-length about 50mm~60mm

therefore effective F-aperture is about F2 (fully open only ! )   And being used on the

Tilting bellows they are able to give a focus from infinity to more than 1:1 close-up.

(with a bit of difficulty on use.  😀 )

Most of the photos here were taken by the “Center lens” photo before, except

the right photo above, which was taken by the Canon Fisheye lens.

Well, they were just a fraction of test shot —– still, shows some results

which I appreciate a lots.  🙂       ( —– whatever you say.  😀  ) 

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Fuurin / Wind-Bell (2)

Well, this product / Wind-Bell here, was an utterly odd creation.  

—– ( Before this, there has been a long stories of “Lens making” though, I’m

not actually making glass lens = just modifying them to an usable shape.)

—– anyhow, in order to make a lens usable, I’ve been mounting it to the

Camera Lens Mount using another metal ring etc etc = in short

I’ve been playing with lots of small metal pieces. = then I accidentally found,

some of those metal pieces makes nice sound when they were hit.

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So, the photos above are the metal rings hanged as a wind-bell but this one

was made to rather quiet one.  🙂   —– here, there was a post about a nice Zen

story of a Fuurin / Wind-Bell. —– Yes, Fuurin makes nice sound —– yes, on

the beginning. = second day, it became an irritation. = Hence, I made quiet one.

= it chimes only once or twice in few minutes. (When wind was not too strong.)

Its high-pitch tone with resonating tail makes our ears to listen,

and our ears can catch even faintest sound

 = the ears become so sensitive, 

still its sound got no meaning,

neither no-point to waite next sound 

= it may come may not come.  

—– So, the mind become completely passive and open.

= this is nothing but a deep meditative state.

The mind is in the state of Void.

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In this design, each three metal pieces had different sizes and the sounds though,

strangely, when they hit each other, they makes only one sound ! (or, to my ear)

(You know, it’s a famous Zen question, when two hand crap, why only 

one sound came out, despite each hand makes each sound ?  — Try to see. 🙂 )

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So, now on, the spring breeze has nice company.

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Fun from a broken Camera (2)

It was two weeks ago when I showed this photo of Canon G9.

Among the disassembled component, I found some of them are useable.

Such as the front lens alone (photo above left)  could be used as a 50 mm F2.6 lens

and the second group of the optics (photo above center) is a very strong diverging

(concave) lens = could be used to widen the view of a pinhole camera.

In order to use a lens, it has to be mounted somewhere — to a lens mount or

to a filter ring etc. —– unless it got exact diameter or screw pitch, we need to fill

the gap and glue (epoxy) them.  

I cut a beer can’s thin metal to the needed diameter and fix it with epoxy.

To do this kind of work, I bought M39 to M42 adapter ring and M42 to Nikon F

mount adapter. (Those item’s cost were only few pounds though, it took 2 weeks to 

get them here, and as being as cheap Chinese products, noting is what we expected

= M42 screw was slightly larger and couldn’t fit to the Pentax original mount.  

And the clow of Nikon Mount bayonet was too thin hence it was too loose.  

For M39 to M42 ring, I “re-cut” the M42 screw (Photo left in the center).

 (Photo Left : Nikon to Canon Adapter though,

part of its diameter was 0.5mm too large

= needed to file-down !)

(Such laborious cutting work with file is 

nothing but a good Zen practice.  😀 )

Second group of concave lens aforesaid was

mounted on the center of M42 to Nikon 

mount adapter. (photo above center)  

And the Front lens of G9 was mounted

on to a Nikon mount adapter via M39-M42 ring. (photo right) 

So, what was those hastle for ? —– The photo (right) here was taken by the

front lens of discarded Canon G9 Camera aforesaid.

(Left photo was also taken by a single lens came from another broken zoom lens).

( I’m preparing those lenses for the coming flower season ! )

If you like to see “sharp but ubiquitous” photo, please go to phone-camera.

The photos here, the images were full of aberration and halation still where

the focus lies, it’s sharp.  (Look the enlarged photo) —– they might be

the images what we are actually seeing.

(like impressionist painter had found).  🙂

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Dale’s Studio

——– (Note: Photo above by Zeiss 18mm lens for Nikon = Virtually no Distortion ! ) 

Yesterday, I went to the studio of Dale in the east London who also run the Cafe,

Small White Elephant to help a documentation, photographing his paintings.

As always, when I go out to take picture, it was a sunny blue-skyed day. = Almost

like the first spring day of this year.

(In fact, I’ve told him “If the weather was like this rainy, it would be a sign of

that the Heaven doesn’t like you” as the day before was rainy.)

As always, the studio was in a disused big industrial building,

some walk from the Bromley by Bow station.  = Real East End ! —– the area

“was” really a derelict, disused industrial land though, in the past few years,

suddenly new development was started. = would become posh town soon ! ? 

Utterly out of my guess, Dale’s paintings were the riot of colors with tons of paint.

— paint was not painted but more likely, deposited on the canvas. (= so that,

even after few years, some paint was still not completely dried yet.)

I only say ” Wao, Amaaaaaaazing”.  and then, I realized the connection, why

he interested in Zen = those process to dripping the paint without having

much of  pattern or figure = almost endless work of Mushin (Mind of No-mind

= Do the task without needing to have the Thinking.)  —– And the result

—– it showed nothing or it is the everything !  (色即是空，空即是色 = like what

Heart Mantra said ) —– He was not trying to copy a style of Zen painting

but “Do the Zen” in action.

And, for the next step, for exhibition and for a publication, he needed

to have his paintings digitized.

When we finished the shooting, his friends came to the studio with cans of beer.  

In most of the case, the studio of the artist never be tidy —– so, looks like this

pile of mess = was not a mess = it was a collage of the doodles or a draft of plan

etc etc. in his past (= said to be.  🙂 )

Therefore, I wouldn’t make any question “What is this ?” to an artist.

(with obvious reason.  🙂 )

So, I even didn’t have an attempt to guess what they are — why the blobs of

the paint was kept and treasured ? ? ?

In some distance, over the Bow Creek, landscape of the East End.

The life is there as usual. (of usual kind.  🙂 )

(Camera used was: Nikon D810 with PC Nikkor 35mm F2.8 and

Carl Zeiss 18mm F3.5 for Nikon)

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Jazz at the Cafe

Every last Thursday evening of the month, at Small White Elephant Cafe

in Peckham, South London has a Jazz Night.

The music starts 8:00 o’clock evening till 10:00, and this night had Tris Harris,

the Drummer Trigger Finger with Les Booth the Bassist and a guest

Saxophone player, Adrian Northover. = naturally, it’s a collection of

Horne Musics — even down to Take Five ! 

——— The Drummer Tris Harris —– Bassist Les Booth —– and Adrian Northover

Taking the opportunity of the evening people having a party as well,

bringing their own party food and the drinks.

I like this kind of rather casual (not a snobby “Jazz club like” ) atmosphere.

To the owner, Dale, it’s a once in a month occasion — a bit of pressure though,  

Don’t worry you can manage.

It’s an occasion for his friends coming down too. —– and it’s turned out to be

a small world. = The lady here happen to have her studio next door of Dale.

And I met her in the Immersive Cult party when she told me about this Cafe !

—– indeed, our world is pretty small. ( still, your world may be big   🙂 )

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Ai Music — What ? ? ?

This music said to have composed entirely by a computer.  It’s mean, a computer

(its program) had its mind how to compose a music, in other words it was an

Artificial Intelligence to be a classic music composer in Bach’s style.  

—– It’s pointless to talk about the music without listen it first.  (So, ask your ears.)

Sound somewhat a part of J.S.Bach’s clavier collection —– though, what did you 

find of this composition ? — In my feeling, I found this, very irritating to listen.  

So that, it convinced me that how the man who composed the original

Well Tempered Clavier, Book one = J.S.Bach  had  human mind and a sensitivity.

I think, the mind was conceived phrase by phrase such as  “I like this flower”,

“A is equal to B” or “As A was equal to B, therefore A plus B will be the amount

of twice of A” kind.  So, the music expression has more or less the same structure,

whether it has a poetical dialogue inside of the composer or the description of the

landscape etc, in any case, each phrase, description etc is a complete packet.

They never drug the argument endlessly, as they ought to settle somewhere.

Yet, this  “so called, Ai composed Music”  has no such packet structure, but just

continuing on and on for the sake of making it to the length.   How irritating !

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 —– My guess is, that the man who programmed this so called Ai,  just made an 

algorithm  “What most likely choice of a note after the note, according to the 

statistical tendency of  J.S.Bach” not the artificial emulation of  Bach’s Mind.

Music is not a permutation of the note,  but the emotional phrase induced by

a musical language.  —– Language need to have a structure and the words.

They are not an endless line of  alphabet.  

I don’t mind if this music was played to a computer, but human ear is not a machine. 

If you like to follow this Ai story, the link was :

http://www.gizmag.com/creative-artificial-intelligence-computer-algorithmic-music/35764/?utm_source=Gizmag+Subscribers&utm_campaign=6730ebc432-UA-2235360-4&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_65b67362bd-6730ebc432-90317158

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Soft Effect by Camera Shake

While experimenting the effect of the camera shake, I got the idea to use the old

images on the PC screen as a subject. (Give a shake to a screenshot.)

Shaking photography become an industrial scale —– and it’s much easier to give

a different way of shake in the room = hand-held or a tap on the camera, mounted

on a flimsy shaky tripod. —> It created pretty nice soft blurr. (Photo above )

On the screen, this was the original image taken by Zeiss 85mm F1.4 Lens.

The photo above, the soft effect was made by a free program Picasa. = It’s obvious,  

a mechanical shake gives much more interesting effects. — and a fun !

Though, the screenshot having an inherent trouble to show the grid of the screen.

(If you enlarge this and next image, the grid would be seen.)

If there wasn’t a trouble of the visible grid, this was a rather pretty image.  Pity.

(When right amount of the shake was given, the soft effect dissolve the line of grid. 

Too much shake spoil the image but too little leaves sharpness and the grid too.)

There is a possibility to use the Image Stabilizer for an opposite effect =

make an image blurred !   (Though, it needs to hack-in to the control program

otherwise the lens has to be modified !)

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Camera shake

(This image above was shot by tri-color pinhole and 10 second exposure. )

Among the photographers in the net-sphere,  Karen McRae of “Draw and Shoot” 

must be the master shaker of the camera.   Not only incredibly precise macro

photography, she covers fantastic landscape, some of them were mixed with

subtle camera shake, multiple-exposure, layard images etc.

(I strongly recommend you to visit her site and see them by yourself !)

Her effective use of camera movement for the sake of creative imaging, such

subtle blur of the image, showed not only the movement but also a

flow of the time, depth in our time and space =

even a feeling being in the spiritual infinity.

(I’ve been trying to learn and simulate her movement of the camera,

while calling them “Karenisque Photography” — I succeeded very little. )

(The trace of the light while camera has been shaken = 10 second exposure here)

( While try to copy the movement of her photo, I realised that she must have

exposed the camera even minutes long — with 10s of test shots if not hundreds.)

—– On her photo of ” lingeringlights 1.jpg ” = camera might be held and exposed

even 30 second long.

But, the use camera shake to the everyday objects, = it become clear, not only 

the choice of the subject but also the lighting (weather / cloud) overall darkness

become crucial. —– otherwise, the photo become just a mess.  🙂

Karen’s use of camera movement was very complexed = not only the overall movement,

but also a combination of a follow-shoot (such as to keep aiming to one subject while

moving in a car) the background would be totally blurred  but the aimed subject would

maintain less blurred image. = still, it’s just a technique.  

The matter is the end result. = and she’s been creating utterly puzzling images. =

I couldn’t guess what she did it —– So, I described it a “Magic”.   🙂

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