Self — Phenomenology

I found a talking post in the Youtube, a TV presenter introducing and discussing the topics in the new book = what he found the interesting point in the book.   In this time, while referring to a book introducing the Phenomenology, the presenter picked up that a person expose real self when the person made a mistake, havoc or failure. (Phenomenology is a study to observe / analyse “What was happened” in such “Event” —– so, this technique has been adapted to the Sociology, Psychology etc)    This TV program has been talking about such as a popular misunderstanding, misconception, etc, = give a second thought or new idea to the many daily topics and even an introduction to the Zen kind.

So, what interesting in the matter of Self = “Self would be exposed when the person encountered a bad event” = this IS the same Phenomenon, the “Selfless” in the Zen, but viewed from the opposite direction.  We or a person IS living Selfless as the human norm.  But when the peace of norm was broken at the event, we may get into a panic, or get angry etc and “go into the emotional response”.  These responses tend to reflect the personality = “Real Self”  (Broken something may be a financial loss, inconvenience to live without, or a loss of the precious memento, even a crisis to lose the job with its responsibility = in any aspects, it was the big shock to the Ego, Greed, Sense of security, even a matter of own survival.  And as those emotion is often beyond the rational control, the person act from the deep subconscious = it’s exposes hidden “Self”.  People may interested in to know their “Real Self” though, when actually faced such own response in the moment of “The Event” it would surprise, or even annoyed the person.)

Imagine a situation, when a USB cable was broken — some might shout “F***”, other may get upset “What a bad luck, why today, Why me” or blame the self “Why I was so careless to pull the cable” otherwise, even started to laugh “What’s a day, how silly”   Or, just go to the spare parts box which has been kept for such event. —– Certainly, they were the reflection of each personality.  = When usual kind of the signal was going into the brain = because of the signal was just usual, those signals were ignored by the emotional region (in the limbic system) therefore the daily task would be carried out as a routine, almost automatically, without any emotion.  So, it was seen as the Selfless in the Zen teachings. (Nevertheless, even in the “Selfless” state, all the brain is still functioning just as normal (hence all the bodily function too) BUT only without the Emotional reaction. = its mean, without Ego, Greed, Envy, Fear etc = all the psych emanated from the Emotional region = therefore the tactical response, proper repair etc to the breakage will be carried out with cool rational thinking.)

Though, in a context of the human life, strangely or NOT strangely, those “Emotional Person” was seen as a “Lovable person” and the Selfless calm person was seen cold. (Because, the people can relate to those emotional person for helping, listening, advising, even despising and teasing.)  Life is complicated and hard.  😀    —– Which type you want to be ?

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Lens Comparison (2)

This photo — by the Zeiss 18mm F3.5 on Nikon D850 / ISO 800, 250th Sec —– (All the photos in this post were cropped only in its hight, and the width were kept as its original to show the relative angle of view of each lens —– for example, after the widest 18mm, next wide image was shown here by the Fun lens, which was originally an one-time use panorama camera and the viewing angle was the 35mm equivalent of 27mm lens.)

Seeing the same old sky, I took the picture of the same, with many different lenses —– and made more or less the same images.  😀

Still, they are only a half of my homemade lens stocks.  (It’s annoyed myself a bit) 😀

The first of this operation was, the Helicoid (B) with a setting of ISO100, 650th Sec —– since this lens has the brightness about fully open F2.2,and 2.2 only = no iris = needed to use lower ISO.

By the so-called Fun Lens / ISO 100, 15th

By the Helicoid (A) / ISO 100, 320th

By the G9 lens / ISO 100, 1250th

By the Double Density Pinhole / ISO 6400, 250th

By the G10 lens / ISO 50, 640th

By the Mag lens / ISO 50, 650th

By the Sony 30mm F3.5 / ISO 50, 500th —– I can not stop thinking, what this “sharper” image can give us, more than the other fuzzy images ?

By the Sony/Zeiss 55mm F1.8 / ISO 50, 2000th (It seems something wrong with this lens’ focus = even with manual setting, the lens moves away when the shutter was pressed = may be that’s why it was offered so cheap. (and lots of them in the Ebay)   😀 

100 years old Kodak lens (equivalent of 175mm F10 / ISO 400, 500th —– as a 175mm telephoto lens, the image was quite good, especially considering that the lens consists only symmetric 2 glasses, that’s all ! )

By the Koda-Fun lens / ISO 50, 4000th

By the SZ lens / ISO 50, 1250th

By the so-called Omuni (focus)lens / ISO 50, 1250th

More or less the same fuzzy images though, still got each character.  It’s not too bad to play with those lenses.  (Anyhow, they didn’t cost me much — still gave me a lots of fun)

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What on Photography

Although it was a bit cropped, still this was a quite wide-angle view (18mm) of a morning sky, and this was more or less the view what we are actually seeing = in other words, this IS a faithful representation of the view = and that was what we expect to a photo.  —– So, the Photo IS a COPY of the subject, therefore if the subject wasn’t there in the first place, the Photo couldn’t exist neither.  And may be because of that, the Photo competition prohibit the Photoshopped photo.   Photo has to stay as a faithful secondary image of the subject.

And this is the image of the same sky, taken by the other camera at about the same moment of the photo on top.

So, this is a tricky situation. This photo above may be seen to be an illegal image using a ready-made digital effect, so-called “Filter” such as in a smart phone.

But this is the natural character of the lens.  From the common sense, this images may not to be regarded a Photo still, this IS the image, straight out of the photographic device / camera.  (Downsized to 1200x*** and collaged by Picasa in my XP laptop)

They were the images out of Sony A7R with so-called Helicoid (B) lens. —– If the photography was a mean to express oneself, those photos may have my feeling which evokes much deeper into your subconscious.  And they were not by the ready-made effect but only one of the kind in the world. (Whether you like it or not.)   😀

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Helicoid Lens (B)

Helicoid Lens (B) is a sister of (A).  Both came from the same Sony Zoom lens and I’m using the same size helicoid which I got from China.

So, this 18~200 Zoom lens became the SZ lens and the Helicoid A and B.  Well done.

Lens was tested while temporally fixed on the camera using plastic pate, such as whether the lens should be used reversed or not, and with smaller Iris etc. (Photo middle) In order to adjust the infinity, lens was fixed on a M42 to M39 adaptor ring on the M42 to AI (Nikon) mount adaptor. —– after the infinity point was found, the position was fixed with super-glue. (Photo right)

It seems this lens was an aspherical as the funny shaped reflection on the surface suggests. (Photo left)  This helicoid extends from 17mm to 32mm and the Lens which got about 35mm focal length can focus from infinity to 15cm close-up.  And the calculation from the exposure reading, the brightness seemed to be F2.2.

Though, this lens is having very strong aberration. ( Astigmatism ?) —– same as the Lens (A), the center wasn’t too bad but image quality was one of the worst = which I appreciate a lots.  😀     (It’s so rare to find this kind of image in the photography because, nobody design the lens like this for sale.)

(Photo here above, Left was the (B) lens in its finished looks — looks cool isn’t it ?   😀  And the right showed the Lens’ closest view, which showed its softness for comparison.)

For impressionistic fuzzy image, the poorer the lens quality, the image looks more interesting. (I think / and that was where Pinhole Photography stands) —– strangely, the close up image was rather sharp. (I mean its center was) (Photo right)  —– Whatsoever, I’m quite happy with its outcome.   😀

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Helicoid Lens (A)

While hibernating in the winter (because, I can’t go ski kind, let alone climbing the mountain, = still have to do something — I made yet another homemade Lenses. (this time using a focusing helicoid sold in the net.)

In the political stance, I should re-use other old camera’s lens barrel kind though, they may not come when I want.  So, I bought some focusing helicoids from China such as 12~17mm, 17~35mm, 36~90mm, mostly M42 fitting.  (M42 rear mount / Pentax screw mount can be easily converted to Nikon, Canon, Sony-E with a simple (and cheap) adapter.)

And the lens I used was came from broken Sony zoom lens. (In the center of the photo above, two of the small lenses)

So, the game starts = how to fix a small irregular shaped lens to the helicoid.   In here, cut a card-board paper to the shape (Photo left) and mount into an empty filter ring (Photo middle) — and 52mm filter ring was mounted to the helicoid. (Photo right) = to test and check if the infinity focus can be made. —– (this approach failed)

And in here, another lens was temporally mounted on a helicoid with soft plastic patty (Photo left) —– Photo middle showed the lens on the previous photo was screw mounted to an aluminium ring which was epoxy fixed on to the 52mm filter ring, and to the helicoid, then to the camera body. (Photo middle and right) —– (For clarity sake, those photos were taken before the mat-black paint was applied

This lens, with about 65mm focal length has an Iris ! —– though, the image made by this lens was too bad (except pretty good center) and the effect of the Iris was not much help.  😀

So, they are the images. (Looks hopeless coma aberration)

My attempt to make homemade lens has been having funny paradox, while making the lens DIY, the image quality was just fuzzy and poor, —– yet still, I’ve been trying to make it somewhat usable. —– ? ? ?    Then the “Enlightenment” came which was “Why not”  It IS the nature of the lens = bad lens makes bad image.  What’s wrong ?  The top photo here was made by this, Helicoid Lens (A) —– I think, this bad image was not too bad.  I like this painterly effect.  Don’t you agree ?  (It seems, the Japanese Zennists are visiting here.   So, those “Play with lenses” are also the demonstration of the “Mind game in Zen”=  “liberate yourself from a stucked mind” “Why not”    Ha ha ha.   😀 )

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Dance Dance Dance !

May be because I’ve clicked the Spanish Flamenco or Japanese Awa-odori dance kind before, time to time, Youtube send me the dance viz —– so, I’ve encountered those amazing dance viz.

In this viz above, the first group was Doushisha-Kouri Hi’ and the second group was Osaka Tomioka-Hi’ —— Yes, they are all Hi-school girls.  First group was performing the dance,  titled “Black Rose” in black costume.  Then the second group was dancing in the 80s Disco style.  Those two were the top of the many hundreds of the entries of Japanese Hi-school Dance Club Annual Competition.  Lots of the club members may never dance before = It’s mean, to train the members in Three years to this level must be nothing but a phenomenon. — (A story behind told, that they practiced up to Nine hours a day ! —– Some comments to the viz described “like a Ninja” = Yes, Ninja was created in the same way = They were all under the same Japanese Zen Culture !)

Despite Tomioka got only second in last (2017)  year’s National Competition, once their viz, “Babbly Dance” was uploaded on to Youtube, it spread through SNS, they received 30 million hit and created a hype in Japan. ( So, they were invited to dance at “New year’s Eve National Song Fest/ 紅白歌合戦 on NHK” = for the hi-school girls to appear such National fest was the exceptional honour)

I admire the intensity and the speed of their body movement, though I wouldn’t dance in that way.   They dance very physical though, their movement was a staged, visually choreographed style for show = not follow a natural body dynamics.   It’s mean, if they were pushed while dancing, they will be easily toppled.  I took the basic body movement from the ski = if we lose the balance on ski, we will fly in the air and land 10 Ms away.    So, I’ll keep the center of the movement always in the symmetry to the center of gravity (so that I can hit or give a kick in any moment without losing the body balance as the body itself having the counter balance.)

One girl was saying, “Don’t think. Just keep doing until the body start to move automatically” = this words were the same as what I’ve been writing here, “Don’t think = Mushin” is the key in the Zen practice.  When their body start to move automatically, the ill-balanced artificially choreographed movement would be smoothed out.  I think, while doing such intense training, those girls would gain much more important “Natural dynamism of the body” which will be the key for their happy, healthy life for whole life.  Well done girls.

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Omuni-focus Lens

About a month ago, I talked about Halina camera and its lens. —– A story how I made its lens to use on the Sony A7R camera and showed its sample photos.

While checking those homemade lenses, I found that the said Halina lens could, (with an additional diverging lens on front, as its focal length become longer) be used with a thicker Nikon body.  So, I further modified to add a diverging lens and mounted them on a 42M (Pentax screw) to Ai (Nikon) mount adapter. = Here I got Omuni-focus lens for Nikon DSLR. (And this work was somewhat related to the other lens)

I know, this situation is having a silly contradiction.  Why 47.5 MP Hi-Res camera need such low-Res images ? —– Omuni-focus mean, nowhere having a “Distinctive OUT of FOCUS (Bokhe) image” in the same time, no “Clearly Focused image” either.  = Just rotten images spread from top to bottom. ( More like a pinhole photo ! )   

Yet still, those photos above, both far and close subjects, it is a rather remarkable phenomenon, such a cheap plastic lens can make (a kind of) usable image in any distance, without focusing, without using smaller F-aperture.    (BYW, the last dried rose was taken with an additional close-up ring) = Omuni-focus is not necessary an almighty.)

And those comparison photos were for academic interest.  Left was by this Omuni-focus lens, and the right was in deed, a pinhole photo image !

Now, my point must be clear, not necessary only decent sharp image could be a good photo.  (Though, I’m not implying my fuzzy image here IS a good photo.  😀

—– May be not a good photo still, I found that those fuzzy images appeal to our deeper psychology. —– I had distant memories in my subconscious, I might have seen this long long time ago —– may be even on my previous life ? ? ? ) 

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Stacked Lock Pin

When I took those photos, I’ve used additional close-up rings on the SZ lens.

Close-up rings I mentioned were those kind. (Though, this photo left was when I blogged about the lens from an Instamatic camera)  The Nikon mount SZ lens was attached by “Ai to EOS” adapter.   But the adapter stacked on the EOS Close-up ring.  So, I needed to hammer down the Lock pin to release the Ai adapter from the Close-up ring. (Photo right)  In fact I was lucky as I could access the pin —– if an EOS lens was stacked, (so, the pin was hidden inside) I needed to use a hacksaw to cut open the ring ( = the saw-dust might got inside of EOS lens and creates even further trouble etc etc.) 

What I found was, the lock pin was too long ! = It protruded from the ring, hence, even the release-lever was pressed down, pin was still blocking the Ai adapter to rotate.(Photo left)    The pin needed to cut and make it short.  And to do this, both side and other side of the ring was covered by the masking tape first, to prevent an accidental touch of a file to make scratch. (Photo middle)  Then file-down the pin (Photo right), till the pin never protrude from the ring surface when it was pressed down. (check it like photo left again and again).

Close-up ring like this (not necessary red color = blue, gold etc all very colorful) was sold in Ebay a lots, mostly about £25 for set of 3 though, I found this for £15 = may be it was “the rejected seconds” rejected from other bender = somebody throw it away = then, others picked up for opportunity (= any business is the busyness in China = remember, they made a cooking oil from the sewer remain !)  Still I’m buying a lots of staffs (adapter ring kind) from  China/Ebay —– while keeping eyes on its work (I’m not asking them to be a perfect, but at least it wouldn’t harm others ! —– since, I’m a very generous Zen Buddhist.   Ha ha ha   😀  ) 

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It was a full moon !

In the evening of the New year’s day, I noticed a moon behind the trees.  I thought, Oh, it might be a full moon, though, before it came to the center of the window, the sky got cloudy.

Yet still, you can see the unusual “Norwegian Moon rise Photos” in the Bentehaarstad Blog. —– not only that, you will find many many very interesting topics and the photos in her blog (click the links in the bottom)  I’m sure you will enjoy them.   🙂  

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SZ Lens (for Nikon)

Since I failed to make the NZ lens for Nikon use, I tried it again with similar Sony lens (18~200 F3.5~6.3, A-mount lens which has been dropped and internally broken—– I think I got it for £5.)

Having had previous experience, this time I planed the lens (front compound lens element) should be mounted recessed inside of the barrel. = mounted inside still not block the movement of the zooming barrel —– and all those massive work was what I’ve been doing past 2 weeks or so. = hence no party, no dancing  😀

Whether those 2 lenses were using same design idea or not, they were having some similarities.  Front lens seemed to be about the same size and the shape, though their character seemed to be very different.  Unlike the worst lens of NZ, this SZ (for Sony Zoom) showed rather decent quality as you can see on those test shots image. (mind you, there is no iris = 100 mm lens / fully open as about F2,  but not necessary giving beautiful softness.)

Something what I found remarkable was that this SZ lens got quite good macro capability !   (Those shots above (original size) were with additional extension ring.)  (Further test shot image may come soon or later.)  😀

It’s a funny irony, Nikon lens was used for Sony and Sony lens was made for Nikon. —— (I didn’t play such game on purpose —– It was just an unintended consequence.)

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