Kanonyama, Takasaki, Gunma #RealJapan

Feel free to use this pic as a wallpaper (If you want to use it for anything else, contact me please.)

Custom Cup Noodle ✕ The DOOK | Random Japan

The Cat went to the Cup Noodle museum in Yokohama and made me custom meaty curry cup and festooned the front with a portrait of the legendary DOOK!

Nagoya Cat Shrine | Random Japan

A little shrine near Nagoya Station that has it's own colony of furry felines.
location

music: Mr. Punch by The Living

Subscriber Meetup - Chevy | Random Japan

Take a look at Chevy's Webcomic

I love to hang out with you guys. Thanks for the support, and if you are around, drop me a line!

Harajuku, Hyperlapse, This & That | 7 Days 7 Minutes (2015-02-23)

All Music by MANNY MARX


0:00 THIS IS HOW I ROLLing shutter
1:00 takeSHITa STREET // Harajuku
2:00 Crazy Catwalk
3:00 IN YOUR FACE
4:00 Tokyo's Holiest Street
5:00 TRAINING
6:00 DOWN ONCE MORE

Shibuya Nightwalk

I have been doing some part-time layout design in Omotesando at the same place The Cat works, and, because I'm poor, on the trip home, I've been walking to Shibuya to save an extra ¥120 on the train trip. I've also been leaving my camera at home a lot more recently because, at the Tokyo Autosalon, my main 12-35 f2.8 X lens' autofocus system died a spectacular death (I cant afford to get it fixed either... hell. I can't even afford to take the train to Akihabara to get a quote form the Panny repair centre, let alone pay their price.) and if the camera dies too, as my bad-luck, QC-skipped one has a history of doing, I'll be proper screwed financially.

But because it was snowing on Friday, i popped on the 20mm f1.7 pancake and put it in my bag, just in case. The snow was all gone by the time I was done for the day, but I did have the chance to actually take pictures for fun, which I haven't really done in a very long time.

All shots are untouched apart from the odd crop/straighten and the removal of the Aston's Number-plate. Most were shot with the camera's built in vivid colour mode in aperture priority (cars were Auto)

It felt really good. so good that I'm contemplating abusing the credit card to get a second body so that I have a backup, and a daily shooter again. I probably wont unless it actually dies again... at which point I will sell all my Panny kit and go sony because I'm really sick and tired of Panasonic's overly polite, but effectively useless after-sales service, and their woeful lack of pro support.

Anyway... Pictures:

If you want to see these at double the resolution, check my FLICKR profile.

REVIEW: Sony AX100 4K Handycam (AkihabaraNews.com)

We had the need for an extra camera to shoot the IE/KMD Venture Day 2014 event last December, so we asked Sony if they would be able to throw us a bone. We got their FDR-AX100 Handycam. While nearing a year on the market, it was still the only thing that could do what it did, with the possible exception of Panasonic’s recently released DMC-LX100.

Since then however, Sony has announced the AX100’s replacement, the FDR-AX33, which, on paper at least, has addressed all the AX100’s flaws and added or improved on a number of key features. Provided that it’s as good a video shooter as its predecessor, I can say, quite simply, that If you want a 4K camcorder, Don’t buy the AX100, get the new and improved AX33.

And that would be that, except that I did spend near on 2 weeks with the AX100, shot a bunch of stuff and had planned to say a few things about it, before the AX33 pulled the rug from under my feet… So here is the gist of it:

Read the full(ish) review on AkihabaraNews.com

I also put together a vid for it (those of you who dont care abut tech and just wanna see japan can watch it below)

My photo published in the Japan Times - A pretty good article by Baye McNeil.

Publisher, Japan Times Columnist and all together cool guy, Baye McNeil wrote a piece on the African American Youth Travel Programme. They were the NGO that organised the Silent March for Mike brown. Anyway, they used one of my shots for the article. Epic Win. The fact that I'm actually getting paid an appropriate amount of money for the shot, is even better. 

I dont want to diverge from the topic at hand, but I'm really happy that at least one media outlet in Japan doesn't expect people to work for 'exposure' / pay less than McDonald's staff get. 

Anyway. Click the screenshot or HERE to read the piece.

Click here to see the other shots I took at the march or watch the video below. Actually read the comments too, they are gold!

Japan How It Is - A Long Walk through Downtown Fukuoka

I take a walk through downtown Fukuoka on a quest for epic ramen.
music by Manny Marx and The Living.

Coming Soon...

Beatboxer RyoTracks, Ikebukuro, Nabe and more... | 7 Days, 7 Minutes (2014-12-08)

00:00 MONDAY Food Library
01:00 notTUESDAY Tokyo Taxi
02:00 WEDNESDAY Ikebukuro Street
03:00 notTHURSDAY RyoTracks
04:37 FRIDAY Oh Japan!
05:00 notSaturday Riding around Yokohama
06:00 SUNDAY Tis the season to eat nabe

CP+ 2014 Booth Babes

Just axing Lightroom collections from last year so make this year's photo work a bit easier. Found some stuff that I haven't put up yet so here it is. You can see the full album HERE.

Click through to the flickr album for more.

Slow Motion Tokyo | 7 Days 7 Minutes (2014-12-01)

Watch on YouTube website for 60fps

00:00 MONDAY Tokyo Reflections
01:00 notTUESDAY Rollin'
01:53 WEDNESDAY SCRAMBLE!
03:00 notTHURSDAY The Quintessential Tokyo Experience
04:00 FRIDAY 36 million people and a cat
05:00 SATURDAY 2 good causes, 1 day
06:00 SUNDAY Caption This!

Random Japan Phone Snaps #5 ランダム携帯で撮った写真

Sometimes I snap things with my phone that I only ever use once or intend to use in the future but never do. They gradually build up till I drag them all off my phone into a dump folder, where would usually spend the rest of their digital eternities...

Until now.

Enjoy these random images of random times in random Japan.

  

          

  

Tokyo Protesters March in Solidarity with the US - #TOKYO4FERGUSON

On December 6th the African American Youth Travel Program (AAYTP) organised a protest against police brutality, racism and injustice in solidarity with the protests in the US and around the world.

#MikeBrown #EricGarner #Tokyo4Fergusnon #EnoughIsEnough #ICantBreathe #HandsUpDontShoot

Mt. Fuji from Mt. Takao - Shots #138

This is the view I saw earlier today. 

CASIO Excursion Tests New EXILIM EX-FR10 Action Cam & PRO-TREK Watch (AkihabaraNews.com)

♫
Media dudes are climbing a mountain.
Why are they climbing a mountain?
Media dudes are climbing a mountain.
Why are they climbing a mountain?

On Monday the 29th of September, CASIO held their first ever media retreat to give the who’s who of Japanese-language tech publications and a jumped-up hooligan from AkihabaraNews the lowdown on their new modular EXILIM EX-FR10 action camera and PRO-TREK PRW-3000 series watches. It was a two day affair in the northern Japanese Alps where we essentially got to hang out with the dudes and dudettes in charge of developing and marketing the aforementioned products, learn about the features, and shoot the shizzle with them, all in an environment that they envision the products mainly being used in. Of the 8 or 9 websites and magazines who were representing, ours was the only one that caters to an audience beyond these islands. Why any of the others would have passed on a trip like this is beyond me, because essentially it was an all-expenses-paid mountain vacation for camera nerds.

Read the rest at AkihabaraNews.com 

Got some really good photos in there too

Fukuoka (Hakata) Ramen - Mamenya (満麺屋) - It's Not Sushi

Join me as I degust on the best Hakata style Tonkotsu Ramen I've ever had. Mamenya in Fukuoka, the home of Hakata style ramen is a must for any ramen fan. It's beyond epic.

Grind Chaos #5 2014/11/29 Upcoming event

click here to go to the event page.

【VENUE】
新宿MARZ

OPEN/START 24:00

CHARGE 予約¥3,000/当日¥3,500
※予約メール grind.chaos@gmail.com

【BAND】
流血ブリザード

O.G.D.(ORGASM GRIND DISRUPTION)

猿轡

and more...

【スペシャルパフォーマンス】

THE HOOKERS (サスペンションチーム)


【DJ】
Coakira(AKIRADEATH /CustomMummy)

千尋 (TOKYO DARK CASTLE)

YUKIO (BAR-PSY-)

ITO CH@N (Grind Chaos)

モチヅキマサル(FOXPILL CULT)

Why am I punting this event? because the organizer is a mate and he asked nicely... and I'm going.

Sony α7 Ⅱ (Alpha 7 2) Part Two: The Beautiful Lovechild of Sony's α7 and Olympus' OMD-EM1 (AkihabaraNews.com)

My take on Sony's latest mirrorless interchangeable lens camera announcement.

OH YEEEEAH!

The Sony α7 Ⅱ (Alpha 7 Mark 2) has been announced (official vid embedded below), and it’s generating a buzz like no Sony interchangeable lense camera, possibly any Sony stills camera, ever has.

In part, this is due how well they managed to keep it under the radar. With the new stacked sensor announcement and the rumor mill’s fixation on the supposed ‘Pro’ full-frame E-mount that apparently is coming early next year, we were effectively blindsided by the α7 Ⅱ. 

The other big thing, for me at least, is the significance of this camera’s spec list with regards to the inevitable release of the α7R Ⅱ and the α7S Ⅱ sometime over the course of next year, because, as with the original α7, it is the base upon which the next camera I’m likely to buy will be built.

But back to the α7 Ⅱ…

Read the Rest on AkihabaraNews.com