Photographing Shinjuku

Shinjuku has lots to offer compared to the other parts of Tokyo.  It's the home of the famous Yakitori Alley, Tokyo metropolitan building, and several other great spots to see and love. The area is full of bright neon lights and the fast past movements of thousands of business men and women, people taking buses to far away locations, and high-end shoppers with garage bands singing their hearts out on the streets. This place has every thing you could ask for and so much more.
       If you are like me and take the train every time you want to get around, this train station is very large and could have you looking for the right exit, real fast!  So, you are out of the train station itching to get some great photos. I am a Landscape photographer at heart and this place has so many look outs. From the walk bridges and tall buildings that surround shinjuku, you could be here for weeks and never find them all.  One of my favorite spots is the Tokyo metropolitan building. The few reasons are 1. It's tall, 48 floors in total. 2. You can see and photograph Skytree, Tokyo Tower, and all the buildings around it. 3. The best reason of all.......  IT IS FREE! In Tokyo this is so freaking rare. The only 2 downsides to this place is the fact that you can't use a Tripod and the south tower closes early. I would say that this place is a very solid place to come and see for an amazing rooftop type shots of tokyo.

If you want to Grab a bite to eat and take a few images, then Yakitori Alley is your next stop.  This place is filled with little hole in the walk type BBQ shops. Think of a 6 x 12 foot little shop with a bar and a few stools for you to sit on and a very interesting person behind the bar cooking and serving beer.  If you want to capture some real honest reactions of random people, then Yakitori Alley is the perfect place for it. The light in side of this place is dramatic and some what bright from all the bar bulbs and neon lights. This is just a fun place to see and enjoy. Must see and do! it's only a 3 min walk out of the east or west exit to the north side of the station.

I could go on about "This spot" or "That spot" but i would rather you go out and explore it yourself. I found that if you just go out and just wonder the streets, you will find new spots that no one has ever thought of shooting before, or you can just find a spot that everyone else has shot to death.

Last thing i would say is that this place is a Street Photographer's heaven. There are all kinds of people that hang around this area of Tokyo.  Am talking about an old lady with a $8,000 hand bag, and god knows how much else she has on her to the homeless guy right next to her. Then right down the street are a bunch of drunk 20 somethings coming out of Yakitori Alley. So please, get out and have fun. It's well worth the trip to this amazing spot!

My New Life Here In JAPAN!

Well I Moved to Japan. I guess the title could have told you that from the start but i just wanted to make that clear for some of you:) So i now live in one of the most populated areas in the world. Just to put it into terms of how long it takes to get around, my 2.3 mile drive home from work every day can some times take 45 minutes...... Ow so much fun right there.
        So you are in a new place, you love to explore, and you take photos. Then what do you do? YOU GO CRAZY FOR A FEW MONTHS!  I have been traveling all over the Tokyo Area seeing the sights, tasting the food, and putting alot of miles on my shoes. I have found a few well known spots to photograph and some "Hidden" spots that are a little gems of mine.  One of the very first spots i have been to in Shibuya is pictured below. In this post we are going to talk mostly about Shibuya and the sights to see around there and the Spots that i love to shot.

Shibuya is one of the most famous spots in all of Tokyo. The reason being is the crossing and the mass amounts of people that cross it every 45 seconds. When the lights turn green and the people begin to cross, there some times can be upwards of thousands of people that walk from all 4 corners to the middle and to get to the side that they want to get to. In short, It is a mad house!

This is a calm night here at the shibuya crossing. This is one of the a few views you can take of the intersection but its one of the "hidden" secrets. To get to this crossing is rather a difficult one once you find out how to get to it. Am not going to tell you how to get to it, but if you just look at the images, i bet you will be able to find out how to get to it. Just make sure that you treat it with respect so we can keep this spot open for fellow photographer to enjoy.

         If you cant find this spot there is a ton of other great spots here that are just asking to be photographed. You can post up in a corner of the intersection and shot that way, or go to the starbucks that has windows and seating for people to enjoy a cup of coffee and take in the view. Just like this video shows.

Either way you can't go wrong by heading to Shibuya. It's a youthful, energetic, and fast paced area of Tokyo that is always changing. Things to bring would be

-Any camera, Even a Iphone will do
-Tripod, Just in case you want to do some long exposures.
-A wide and standard lens. I come to this place with a 17-40 F4L and a 50 F1.4
-Your appetite, There is a ton of great places to see and eat at.

So get out and have fun!

Sigma AF 15-30mm f/3.5-4.5 EX DG Review With PHOTOS!

There is a time in every ones Photographic career that they need to get a wider wide angle lens. That simple 18-55mm kit lens that came with there camera did its job but now you have out grown it and needing to get a lens that fits your needs. I was in the same spot but if you are like me, money is a issue and spending $1,000 on a used wide angle that will fit a full frame camera or a $600 for a Crop sensor lens either is still kinda high. I was able to find a deal on Ebay for $200.00. After look around a bit more its right around $200-$300 price for a used lens.

       This was Sigma's first ultra-wide zoom with the EX (EX stands for PRO level). It is a Full frame lens that can be used on a APS-C (crop body) camera so the reviews on this can be mixed seeing how there is fall off(less sharp on the edges) on the full frame camera that you dont get on the APS-C camera. Here are some specs so we can get them out of the way.

-17 elements
-13 groups
-8 aperture blades
-2 aspherical elements.
-Large lens at 87mm(3.5 inchs) x 132mm(5.2 inchs)
-Weight of 620g(1.36lbs).... the D7000 is 780g(1.7lbs)
-Minimal focus distance is 0.30m (1 foot)

Now since we have all that out of the way, now lets get down to the meat and potatoes of this lens. There is a few things on this lens i love and i hate. First off is that its build like a tank. its large, made of durable items and gives a feeling of power. its not like the little kit lens that i came from and it has some weight to it that adds to the feeling of "well built". The lens is sharp and i mean SHARP! when you team this up with a tripod and some post editing software the results are just amazing. The Low light shooting for the stars and milky way is not that bad either but a fast lens is always better for that but there is a sample showing that it can be done as well with the F3.5. The sharpest this lens i have found is right in the F7.1-F13 range. I normally shoot at F8 so this is just fine for me. Here is a sample of it below.
          

Now for the bad stuff. The lens has a conventional micro motor which means its kinda of loud. Its speed is not that bad but not as sharp as a prime lens however since its a wide angle it does not really mater if its blazing fast. The next thing is size and the fact that its almost as big as some camera bodies. With that size comes the front lens size. At 82mm the front element will be hard press to find any kind of glass to cover it but the upside to this is that it has a built in lens hood so a extra item to loose is now built in to the lens. The last item that i think was the killer of this lens but is really something that i say is not that bad is the lens flare. you do have to watch out for it cause it will show up and say hi when you don't see it. even at night time you might get some lens flare on a image even if the light source was to the side of you or even the moon on a moonlit night. However if you have any skill at Lightroom or Photoshop you can easily remove it in post.
           The bottom line is that if you are looking for a Wide angle lens that you can use on your APS-C camera body and then use on a Full Frame camera when you make that move. this is the lens for you if you are not wanting to spend a ton of money. It delivers everything that the high priced, High end lens do but at a fraction of the price. 

How to Changing your Point of View at any event!

Earlier this month i was in Reno enjoying the weather and doing some shopping with the wife when we went down to the river front to have some dinner when we noticed that there was some sort of concert that was about to start at Wingfield Park. Needless to say it was the Pops on the River concert with Laura Jackson and Reno Philharmonic. It was a Huge event with over 500+ people. So the wife and i had our dinner and went over to watch the concert after and when we got to the front gate we where told that it was $20 to enter and it was half way over. so we decided to just sit back and enjoy the music. i still had my camera with me and a mono pod. it was the first time i have ever taken a mono pod with me so i wanted to just see what i could do with it besides the normal uses for using a mono pod.  so I went to the gate where i was able to see the concert but it was at eye level and all i was seeing was the top of heads and a very little part of the stage.

Taken on with a Mono pod and 18mm.

 So it put on the 18-55 lens. Lowest F stop and ISO of 1600. I had the camera on the mono pod and had it at full length. I set the focus on the conductor then set the timer for 10 secs. Then i took the mono pod and head it above my head and tried to keep it very steady. It changes the "Point of View" from what every one else was getting and it was kinda fun also.

Same spot at the Photo above. zoomed in at 55mm.

As you can see that this is a look that only people that are on video towers or some crazy guy climbing in a tree can get.  After a few songs of doing this we went to a different spot. you always have to remember to never just stick in one spot. move around, change things up, try something new. it will seem weird but you might find something that you really do enjoy!

this was taken with same set up as before.

This is a shot i can say for sure that no one at this concert has. But this was a shot that was a lot of trial and error.  The concrete column was really hard to try and put in the right spot due to a 10ft tall wall that i was shooting over. the shot below is only 20 ft to the right of the shot above.

always move and try a different spots

The one thing that you will have to learn is how to pre-focus and image the shot out come. then try and try and try again. This is something that if you had a Nikon D5200 or some sort of D5XX camera it would be a lot easier cause you have the flip down screen and then you can use a remote(ML-L3 Remote) or some sort of trigger like  the Yongnuo RF-603 Wireless triggers. You can pick them up Here. So you ask your self, "What does this look like" well here is a photo of my self doing this.

Well i really hope this will help you out and change the way you look at your tool and use them for other things that will not only make you re-think how you take photos.

Why clouds makes the best Sunset in Nevada!

Thunderstorm off in the distance. The clouds bring in the Blues, Yellows, Pinks, and everything between!

Lack of clouds make a sunset very "blah". nothing to look at and makes it not an eye catching image.

So I have been living here in the middle a high desert for about 2 years and it has been a huge learning curve for trying to find things to photograph.  It's not like the mountains or the beach or any thing that you have ever seen before. It's flat, hot, cloudless skies, and has not a tree in sight for miles. So with that all being said the sunsets are hit and miss at best. With the lack of clouds in the sky and nothing really interesting in the fore ground, it's just a blue sky with a sun in it...... YA for nothing interesting! (insert sarcasm here)  So when ever a storm comes into the area I am the first one that grabs my bag of gear, run out the door, jump in the car and head to some place that would make a great sunset shot. 

More Clouds bring in more things to look at. Wispy clouds are rare here.

    
What I look for in a sunset is some sort of clouds. if the shot has some sort of object that is in the blue sky, it makes the image more eye catching. Also, it makes the colors pop out more. With cloudless sky, normally you will get a nice blue sky with a yellowish color where the sky and the ground meet(photo above for example). When you have clouds in that same sky, it brings out more color and makes the sky just more interesting compared to a blank sky(Image below). The sunset with some sort of Clouds are more pleasing to the eye than a cloudless sunset. Yes, the cloudless sunset is very different, but its boring if you have nothing in the foreground to bring life to the image. Interesting clouds like "wispy clouds" are a rare find here in Nevada. So if you ever get a chance to photograph them.... DO IT! However, when you get a chance to photograph a storm, well that is when everything comes out and just makes the sky come to life. Brings a fiery red and orange to the blue sky and just makes things look amazing! (First Image on the page for Example) It has so many colors and so much character in the image. It's like a 90 year old man. A man that has seen, done, explored, and experienced so much. 

A sunset shot that over looks a Grass field.

        What I look for in a Nevada sunset is clouds. Without clouds you will get a  boring sunset that lacks that "X" factor. Clouds will either make or break an image.  What makes the Best sunsets for me is a storm! Any type of storm in Nevada is just something to watch. It can be either a Thunder storm, wind storm, Dust storm, lighting or anything really because the weather here never comes in gently. It comes in hard and fast and provides a show that is always worth watching. Well, I hope you can go out and take this info and adapt it to your neck of the woods. A boring sky with nothing going on is rare but when it happens all the time it's just another cookie in the cookie jar. So be different and look for that "X" factor. be different, and get out there and shoot away!

A thunder storm rolling in and as you can see am shooting away from the sun but it brings out all the color of the sky