June, 2009
28
Jun 09
Life-size Gundam in Odaiba
Had some time yesterday to visit the 1/1 Scale Gundam (RX-78-2 model) in Shiokaze Park, Odaiba (get off Daiba station on the Yurikamome line). At 18 meters tall, it is a thing of beauty.
It smokes, it lights up! Too bad the weather was not cooperative that day.
I’m not liking the lights they put on the eyes, though. It ruined a lot of photos.
It’s interesting how, at events like these, everyone has their mobile phones taking photos and videos. I wonder how many terabytes are taken every day.
While the 18m Gundam looks awesome, the 4000 ton, 120 meter daibutsu (big buddha) at Ushiku can destroy it with just a flick of a finger.
Good thing the buddha is peace-loving.
17
Jun 09
Philippines, the Blob
A map showing the sister-city relationships of Shin-Yokohama. Notice how the Philippines is depicted.
(I’m sure nothing was meant by this.)
Taken near the Shiei Chikatetsu Shin-yokohama station exit last 2008-12.
16
Jun 09
Another Day, Revisited
Was reminded about this photo when someone faved it on my flickr stream today. This was taken in Odaiba.
When I originally posted this a year ago, I was frustrated at not being able to “bring out” the photo the way I had seen it. It was all dark because the camera exposed for the highlights in the clouds. Fortunately, I captured this in RAW format and now that I have additional tricks up my sleeves, the image is closer how to I wanted it to look. I might revisit it again sometime, as I just spent no more than one or two minutes tweaking this one (sleepy). I’m quite pleased with the results, though:
Coincidentally, I just listened to Martin Bailey’s interview with Jon Sheer. The subject matter is on HDR and how it allows him to fully convey the depth and feeling of his subject matter.
The photo above is not HDR, but it’s the same point. I kind of like to think of is as tweaking the image because the medium we are using – 8-bit JPGs and low dynamic range cameras and displays – are insufficient to convey what we really want to.
The limitation is artificial. If the film had been invented out of some material that could record a large large range (or similarly, if we had sensors that could do the same, and corresponding screens that could display them), HDR wouldn’t be a big deal.
(A quick google reveals some hits for HDR displays already.)
BTW, John Sheer has a collection of these really fantastic HDR photos. For folks in Japan, he has an ongoing exhibition (details).
15
Jun 09
Japanese Synonyms in Dictionary App
I love that the Dictionary App with Mac OS X comes with a very useful dictionary for Japanese. The 用例組み合わせ and the 使い分け sections are amazing.
Quick Tip : On almost any application, select some text and press Control-Command-D to look the selected word up in a mini-dictionary window.
2
Jun 09
Rembrandt
Just received a time capsule email from Photojojo and reminded me of some photos taken almost exactly a year ago. This was my first photowalk with the Flickr Tokyo Photo Session group. It was raining that day and the fading dusk light and clouds gave us some wonderful scenes.