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 !)

[]

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”.   🙂

[]

Rimbaud and Zen Mind

There was yet another funny coincidence.   At my friend’s party, I met a designer/

planner who happen to know an artist friend who also run a café called

Small White Elephant, which happen to be in my area.

As she suggested, I paid a visit to the café and met a guy, Dale who run it.

Dale was a painter, we got a common talk in the art. — so, while showing my work

in Youtube and the photos in this blog, I talked about what and who influenced me.

As I mentioned my taste of the Surrealism art and the Symbolist poet Arthur

Rimbaud, Dale jumped up, went to his jacket’s pocket to fetch a small book.

It was a Rimbaud’s Poem, [A season in Hell].

[]

When I use the words “funny coincidence” it’s implying “Karmic encounter” =

no rational connection or likely happening situation still, from the hidden history

or life’s context, the pathway got to cross, of which only the heaven knows it.

And my life is having so many of them.  

If not, I’m not in here, or even this blog didn’t exist. —– looking back, have I ever

chased anybody and met ? (I mean, from a reputation, I sought to meet the person.)

NONE. I am completely passive. (of course, it exclude the case on the business =

like interview and photograph somebody = it was for the editor’s needs,

not necessary my interest)

[]

In my teens, I started to read Osamu Dazai = rather popular choice of  “ a kind of

young people then” and I read all of his work include the letters.

In the same time, I also read the books written by the opposing group of Dazai,

critiques, poets etc.   A critic, Hideo Kobayashi and the friend poets were all

influenced by a French Poet Arthur Rimbaud. —– then, I end up with this Poet.

—– I’ve talked about this story in a post. [My starting point (2) ] (I might be the first person

in the history to connect Rimbaud to the Psychological mechanism of Zen mind.   🙂 )

[]

—– (Quote of the post)

< What makes reading of Rimbaud Poems somewhat common with Buddhists Pathway

was, that his approach to be a Boyant (Seer / Watcher) in Alchemy of Life was,

to examine the own mind again and again, deeper and deeper, exposing everything

like a dissected dead body = effectively made his own mind (and the life) a completely

detached dried object.  Detachment while having cut-off the Emotion, will lose 

the tag of the SELF, hence creating a state of mind, similar to the Buddhists’ Selflessness.

(This process is very similar to the Hinayana Buddhists practice  = Process of  Self-denial )

And as Rimbaud’s subject, include his own life became a detached object without the 

emotional attachment, it was described as a metaphorical object or the Symbol =

thence his poetry was called Symbolism.  (This detachment was the self-alienation too, so that

Rimbaud called the state of mind before, as a slumber of the animal

—– he missed it with tears, but it was too late) > 

[]

The modern trend of the art then, Symbolism, Surrealism and Dadaism were all try 

to find the way to express “True reality” of the existence or the human mind.

So that, all of them created uniquely formed style, since they thought that to express

straight as perceived, couldn’t show the reality or truth. —– with the idea of Freud,

they thought, since there was something behind of our mind, there couldn’t be the

straight raw expression (so, they tried autonomous writing “Automatism” etc with

futile results.)   What common in those attempt was that they tried to replace the 

subjects with something related or not so related.  =

Symbolism used the objects somewhat related or looks like, as a metaphor.  

Surrealism tried with unexpected one and Dadaism denied any connection. 

[]

Though, there was an inherent trouble departing with raw expression = as it was

a two-step conversion, first, it needed to observe the feeling, then to find a symbol to

replace it = When the original mind, perception was “observed”, its Subject became

an OBJECT = It mean, he is no longer the innocent author. —– Even if it was the

own mind/perception, it was now the separate entity = OBJECT.

(For instance, even a hot love, when it was observed as an OBJECT and written down

like a stage act, down to the every movements of sexual act, it is no longer the love but

the words in the pages of DOCUMENT. =

That was how Rimbaud’s poem “A season in Hell” was created.  And Rimbaud

described it “Je me vois me voir” = I see myself seeing myself.)

In this process, not only the own mind/perception became separate object, but crucially,

the Mind lost the connection to its “Emotion” therefore, the own mind is no longer

connected to the SELF.   His life became a Puppet show remotely played.

(Self couldn’t define the own place without having tethered to the own Emotion !)

(When Alzheimer sufferer lost the connection to the emotional region of the brain,

his/her identity, the recognition of the family also gone.)

[]

Unlike most of the Surrealists, Dadaists who has been a part-timer = “Pretender” for

the sake of their art,  Rimbaud was a full-time Symbolist, he lost the raw feeling of the

“Live-view”, hence the sizzling excitement of the life.  So, he try to sex-up the life, such

as with absinthe, heroin or to play homo-sexuality etc which didn’t bring any solution.

—– on the end, lured by a false excitement, he left to the Abyssinia.

———- (And the other trouble of the Rimbaud’s poems to a reader was, —– as they

were written as narrations, after a while, his words became the reader’s words and

gradually they seeped into the bottom of the subconscious, then “who I am” would be

slowly eroded. = in the end, we will be left in the middle of nowhere alone, without

identity = it would be our Abyssinia.)

[] * * * * * * *

Fundamental difference of Selflessness and the Detachment of Rimbaud against

the Buddhist was, —– to Rimbaud, it was the unexpected by-product.

But to the Buddhist, it was the requisite way to reach peace of life and ultimately

the Enlightenment.    In contrast, Rimbaud wanted to have a true reality of the life

which should enhance the excitement though, to became Voyant (seer / watcher) 

gave him the opposite effect.

—– ? ? ? to give a thought,  ISN’T IT strange, nobody did gave him an advice or after

100.000 years history of human culture, why such wisdom haven’t been established ?

—– then think more, ? ? ? ? ? —– Have we got a wisdom in the first place at all ?

What is the wisdom ?

—– Very basic morality ? Such as that, DON’T do wrong or bad otherwise the society,

and ultimately you will get a repercussion and suffer. —– And the way to see what is

wrong or bad. —– In reality, the burst majority of the practical detail on the

“life’s how to do” is open to the person to experiment on the spot, and find the answer

by themselves. = It’s mean that existing / ready-made “Wisdom” is not more than an

Opinion, since even the people, so-called “Burst majority”, among them, non of two

Karma is the same, and operating strictly individual base.   This was the reason why,

Lord Buddha ordered to his disciples “Don’t believe what others said. Think yourself”=

Simply because, the answer will be different, person to person.

—– (This was originally intended to be the 700th post —– though, it gone to banana.   😀 )

[]

 

Immersive Cult Party

It was the first anniversary of the Immersive Cult.  —– though, they are nothing 

to do with any religious act, but exclusively dedicated to a fancy Party. = They are

the Party People.  (The Party like this was what they designed and organized.)

This was the Party for themselves to celebrate successful first year as a company.  

So, they are the Planner, Stage Designer, Costume Designer, Performer and the

Party Food cataler.  If any body, corporate, want to have a specially themed fancy

Party, they are the people to be called.   (—– they are in fact my long standing

friends who worked together for a theatrical stage design etc, and appeared in 

this blog time to time such as this and that .)  

Funny things was, as people meet again here and there, sometimes years apart and

my memory of the name was so bad, still, they remember my name. (How they can ?)

In here, other than a Fish-eye lens, photos were taken by a homemade lens,

and this lens was meant to be fuzzy. (If you don’t like look away please.)

 

 Then, in the midnight, the party moved down to the basement of the building,

to the club called Basement Snack where DJ got rather soft house.  😀

So, the party went on to the (seemingly) pretty late.

(but, I took the two hours journey back on 1:00, because this party was the second

one today = I had the other gathering on the afternoon.  Better take a rest)  🙂

Anyhow, it was a very joyful party with a lots of interesting people.

[]

[]

Poppy Talk

The regular reader of this blog might have noticed that the talk in the previous post [Poppy Poppy] became increasingly lecturing.  Yes, I know it. The reason was the same why I made an exception to come to a public event and took picture. —– A while ago, I had a chat with a photographer who has just finished the school and learning to become Professional while doing an assistant work.  As she asked me “How to make a good Photograph” I answered ” Just press the button” she stunned and burst into laughing.  “Oh gosh, I never heard such answer”.  

“When you see a beautiful light, press the button. — It’s mean, if you couldn’t see it’s beauty, you don’t have the eyes to see.  And even if you could see it, still not able to press the button,  you don’t have a good reflex, either case, you are hopeless and any sort of advice or knuck to take picture would be useless.  Otherwise, you were lucky enough to take good picture.  Then do it.   

 Anyhow, it is pointless to speak about photography => it’s better  to see the real situation and a way of the photographic approach,  and the captured images —– good or bad. = Everything is  self explanatory.  So, those photos (with the photos of Last  Post) were the finishing part of the chat or the “lecture”.    🙂

 —– Just press the Button, mean, “Just take picture with the own intuition”, but not a theory or special thinking kind.  Still, it is better to know about the  subject, history, episode in  human term (mean, not politics or technology) which did hit  your  emotion, but the most important point is to capture the image,  sweet to your eyes. (it doesn’t mean looks nice, cute person  smiling, but in the image, context and the emotion has settled and balanced) = DON’T chase dramatic image, until you yourself  experienced a drama in your life.) 

So, this is the picture which was not a settled image but make the mind to stray away.  It’s mean, this is not a sweet picture. —– even after 70 years, Poppy field has not settled calm for some people yet.  

Peace to the dead soldier’s Soul.

___/\___

[]

Poppy Poppy

Normally I don’t  go to a public event and take picture — the same reason that I don’t watch TV.

(If million of others do the same, I can’t see a point, why do I need to do the same ? — among the millions, there must be much suited person to do the subject = leave the business to that person and I’ll do what nobody else is doing or ever tried (provided, it cost small = Most of project with large cost is not creative, since it is a rational combination of existing devices and the ideas, otherwise, it is industrial (Humanoid Robot is ingenious but not creative), if not political (Communist’s huge monument never be creative, unless we see them as an ironical symbol of man’s idiocy.) —– that is my art and who I am.)

But strangely, I made an exception to the unusual event to fill the ground of the Tower of London with Red Poppies.   (Said to be 890,000 of ceramic flowers.)

In an essence, this is an art exhibition using the Remembrance (of the War dead) Day as a pretext. (Red Poppy is the symbol of the war dead as they flowers in the old  battlefield of the western front.)

When I popped out, it was a bit of drizzle though, when the bus coming to the Tower of London, the sun blakes out and even a Rainbow appeared on front. (Top photo)

Then after a while,  the sky became like this photo.(Shadowy ground needs to have a morning sun though.)

These days, the art piece got to be massive size, it is a silly creche, the larger the work it must  impress more.  (Unless it was installed in a middle of nowhere, it’s easy to proclaim that this is a public art hence easy to get public funding and media exposure.) (it seems, it was started with that floating big duck)   😀

Red Poppy ? ? ? — they don’t look like a Poppy  though, it’s their problem.

(This photo was taken — can you believe — 20 m away ! )

 The cascading flowers was dubbed as “Weeping window” — is it ?

(A man in the cloud said “Snorting nostril” — well, it’s looks much more like.)   😀

Those photos were taken by Canon Fisheye Zoom 8~15 mm and the closer shot was made by Tamron Mirror 500mm F8 (I really love this lens.)  on the Canon EOS 5D Mk-III. 

(I went there only with those two lenses. = I knew what I need to photograph and had the pictures in my mind. —– I have 9 genuine Canon lens (from 8 to 200mm include Macro and TS lens kind) which got all different character  = I chose which one or two will suite the job.  — which mean, I don’t rely on the opportunistic discovery on the spot. — With a good luck and an opportunity even amateur can produce quite good picture.   But, I’m not an amateur = even in the worst condition, still need to fill the assignment = no excuse = That’s what professional meant. (—– I mean, when I was in the job.  —– Thanks goodness I’m out now.) Ha ha ha.   😀

By the way, a combination of photos here was a demonstration of minimal set, such that for 2 pages article in a small magazine.  If the Editor likes to emphasize an aspect of one photo, I’ll send the addition though, in this case, the most interesting kind of image is “Making Poppy” but, no doubt, it must have done in China and not available, (still, no doubt, organizer has them.) —– Though, as the Organizer is going to sell those “Poppy” to create huge profit, they may not like to expose the story behind “The Soul of British Dead Soldier = Red Poppy was cheaply mass produced in China”.)

[]

Become Immune or Irritated ?

When you read a post, like Key Mechanism in Zen Buddhists Mind you might have

mistaken that while doing repeated practice and keep receiving repeated same signal,

our brain automatically start ignoring it. —– Really ?      Think it yourself.

In the real situation, such as when you hear the same CM repeating the same name

on the radio or TV, in most of the case you just feel annoyance and irritation =

our brain, our perception couldn’t stand of it. —– So, which is the true.

— the brain become immune or become irritated and mad ?

[]

My explanation there was

“When a task was given by an order or from a situation in the life, first, it’s needed to

have a “Contemplation” some time interpreted as an acceptance, giving-up (to resist) or

determination to take the task (which ever it was passive or more positive, active way).

—–> And as it was accepted = no way else to go = have to face

the task head-on (this is called “Mindfulness”).

= “needed to have an acceptance” (whether, I’ll do / I have to do / I need to do).

This acceptance or determination, mind-set has to come first, preceding to the act.

And this determination = the conviction “I’ll DO” makes the same task, such as  

sweeping the garden,  from just a task to the practice to reach the Enlightenment.

Lord Buddha did know this from the beginning therefore in his earliest teachings of

“Four Noble Truth” he said

1) The Life is in sufferings.

2) There was the cause of those sufferings. (because of Karma, hence  impermanence)

3) So, it is necessary to (actively) seek the way to escape from the sufferings.

4) And the Buddhism is the way to overcome those sufferings.

Lord Buddha didn’t go any deluded idea, how this world was created by whom kind

of mumbo-jumbo but straight into the reality of the life = It IS the sufferings, and

telling the people to accept it first. 

First to accept, then seek the remedy.  And the way to seek the remedy is the way of

the repeated practice.  So that, the repeated same signal in the brain doesn’t cause

the repulsion but just accepted, then got used => ignored => so, the person become

immune to such signal while carrying out the daily life = => become immune to

the sufferings in the life general => able to live in peace without feel sufferings = is the

Enlightenment.   (What a clever magic or the clever design of the brain mechanism !)

= this is the mechanism (the Dharma) everybody was born to have

= therefore, anybody can get the Enlightenment !

= This is THE beauty of Buddhism.

___/\___

[]

Funeral Party (of Space Hijackers)

On the Halloween night, an Anarchist group Space Hijackers had their own funeral.

Is it really mean the end of their organization or it was just another ploy to attract

party goers, are waited to be seen. (They might  say, Goodness, We were resurrected.)

Anyway, what ever the excuse, it was a good busy party.  (Though, with rather slow

music, I did little dancing and spent most of the time photographing the people.

—– on the big party, DJ doesn’t go to hard-core = they do soft focus too.  😀  )

Photo was taken by my  two-element homemade lens.  (Originally a small  plastic lens

came from a toy camera and its 27 mm focal length was extended by a short-eye-sighted

specs lens from Hoya.  It’s called Retrofocus Lens design and the focal length now is

38 mm which enabled the lens to be used on the DSLR.)   I like this soft focus lens

—– but, it has no control.  And almost all blind shooting. (No use of finder)

Still, pocket sized flash-light with umbrella worked pretty well.  I like it. 

I’m not putting caption to each photo.   They are as it looks.  

And you must know your own photo. = You can Copy if you like.

Some familiar faces are the old members of Hijackers and they do

all the work and DJ as well.

The members who is wearing red pants can get in free = so, they exposed theirs.  😀

M m m m m m m m — some are quite pretty !

BTW, if you are not happy with those fuzzy images,  you’ve bumped to the wrong man.

You should have asked your friend’s iPhone to have your own photo taken.

The photos were taken by the lens I made myself = (and I’m qualified to do this kind. )

They were aimed to be fuzzy. ( fuzzy but omnifocus = thanks, no need to focus.)

Photo is for a fun (of myself) = if you ask me serious business, I have to charge !  😀 

—————–

PS :  Other photographer wondered the lighting technique, how they were done ? =

It was not an ordinary flash-lighting, nor white plastic cap kind or bounce flash.

It was a handheld lighting of a flash with small umbrella ( — see the photo.)

(Umbrella was an one-off special made and the support frame was my handmade.)

 

 

 

[]

Autumn Color — in Japan

When this kind of photo is the standard, it’s quite discouraging for me to attempt a

substitute.  😀     This is a photo from one of the climbing club in Japan.

And this is the notorious mountain, Tanigawa-dake, otherwise known as the

Graveyard of the Climber.   When I went there (yet, the easiest rout “Nan-ryo”)

with many  younger members, — then one of them fallen from the face.

 = it was literally free fall of 10 m, while pulling out three anchor-pins.  

I could see him flying down mid air in slow motion.

But miraculously,  the man landed on his Rucksack, and tumbled half on the 

narrow terrace, stopped on its edge with small bruise on his knee ( that’s all ) !

While he was in the air, I was thinking  “Oh dear, I become the first leader to have

a fatality on the history of our club.  So the question is, how to carry his body =

carry him down on the tricky face or carry him up and ask rescue helicopter ?

[]

—– After thoughts, I realized that, how cold-blooded man I AM !  

While seeing a man going to die,  still able to think how to deal with its body.

(But mind you, I had to take care of other member’s safety as well. — Remember,

Zen is not for shedding a tear but keep clear eyes on even the harshest moment.

—– Can any “Sweet compassionate mind” stop him fall ? — Joking. )

—– We simply gave-up the day’s climb and came down the face. 

It was a beautiful day like this photo of the Ichinokura.    🙂

(The link to the original photo —- http://www.bunanokai.jp )

[]

3D View ?

On the second previous post, (to those Tri-color Photos) Photographer Karen

(drawandshoot) put a comment wondering what would happen if those picture 

 was seen under a 3D glasses.

—– My understanding of 3D image was, that if our each eyes receives the image

of slightly different viewing angle, our brain Re-configure them into one 3D image.

(but 2 different images has to be the images seen from the position, horizontally 

shifted about 2″ ~ 3″ distance = in short,  like the images seen from our eyes  😀 )  

[]

So, I tested it —– to see what happened ?    

The crucial point of my Tri-color Pinhole images was, each Pinholes were separated

 less than 2 mm. = It’s mean, the difference of each images in Sky, Pink, Orange 

colors were very small, almost identical. —> therefore they didn’t make 3D.  

Funny thing was, the brain (my brain) seemed to have a big difficulty to comprehend 

the images which got Sky and Pink in the same time.  —> So that, a moment to moment

the dominant vision Left or Right changes = suddenly the images changes Sky to Pink

or visa versa. 

(If you are good in 3D view in aerial photo kind, try the top photo here, = to see

Pink photo by the left eye and Sky photo by the right eye.  Actually, as each eyes seeing

different photo, this color change wouldn’t happen but more likely the brain sees

mixed colored image.    But if you try to see, such as this one with 3D specs (if you have

one, or use color gel) you may seen the phenomenon = dominance of Right or Left brain

changes.  =  This must be our brain’s defensive response.  Like our left eye is connected to

the right brain = a kind of evasive action to limit the damage when our head got injured.  

There couldn’t be a possibility  of one object having two colors in the same time = it’s  

mean, eye could gotten wrong, otherwise visual cortex got wrong —> hence the brain is 

testing the system by rapidly switching and changing the channel.  Interesting isn’t it ?

 

[]