Archive | okinawa

Last year I briefly visited Okinawa, Japan, for a friends wedding. Okinawa is one of a string of islands stretching between the southern most Japanese island of Kyushu and Taiwan.  This was my second visit to Japan, the first some time ago was prompted by my love of Japanese gardens. I admire the Japanese for their rich sophisticated culture, their cohesion, and mutual respect.

The top photograph is one of a series taken at the fantastic Churaumi Aquarium which is midway between the main city of Naha and the wedding resort at Okuma Beach. The main aquarium is huge with a number of whale sharks cruising amongst giant Manta Rays and other fish.  The second photograph was taken at night in the main street of Naha. In Taiwan and Okinawa, many young people were interacting with flipped out cell phones, I guess Wi-Fi is widely availabe to the public. I travelled simply, – a Canon 5D2 with a single Voigtlander Ultron 40mm f2.0 lens  : : peter

In the spirit of the slideshow photographs of Marti Friedlander currently showing above, I feel inclined to post one of my favourite ‘street photos’.  To capture this I had to position the camera  against the aircraft interior wall, making it impossible to see the viewfinder or screen.  It took  a number of attempts, but this composition is exactly what I envisaged and wanted to secure.  As previously mentioned, this photograph was taken during a visit to Okinawa where I travelled with one camera and one lens, the Canon 5D2 with a Voigtlander Ultron 40mm f2.0 attached  : : peter

While my primary focus is producing fine art New Zealand landscape, seascape, and urban photography (street photography) initially centred on Auckland, it has been refreshing to travel.

The above photographs of Churaumi Aquarium Okinawa Japan were taken with a Canon 5D mk2 and Voigtlander Ultron 40mm f2 prime lens (fixed focal length).  In fact I travelled for two weeks in both Taiwan and Okinawa with this ‘one camera one lens’ combination.  To my surprise I never wanted for anything else.  The combination was compact, unobtrusive, and encouraged me to visualise and compose with immediacy and simplicity.  It worked perfectly.

Most of the two weeks was spent in Taiwan, and a gallery of Taiwan photos will be added next month.  Again all the Okinawa images and Taiwan photographs were  made with the 5D mk2 and 40mm Voigtlander ‘one camera one lens’ combination, – as was the gallery The New Zealand Jewellery Show  : : peter