Saturday 28 July 2007

Bookbinding

Recently, bookbinding is becoming popular among photographers in Japan. It is because the qualities of home printers, digital cameras, scanners and papers for inkjet printers. Their costs are decreasing, and the performance increasing. By chance, I got some good printer and scanner with low prices, I tried them (scanned some images from print films and printed it by the printer), and the result was greater than I had imagined. It is should be said that the technology of them was developed much.

Then, there are many people who started to make their own photo books. When you finish printing out the images, you have only to bind them. Binding itself is easy. But, therefore, they look for their original appearances. They try many kinds of papers, or some uses clothes, or so on. You can find many home-made photo books of contest prizewinners on Epson photo contests website. (Epson's archives) Some magazines showed the ways of home bookbinding this month.

Thursday 26 July 2007

Alain Marty



Alain Marty

Wednesday 25 July 2007

the temporary title of new series is "more human, selfish self"

"more human, selfish self"..., linking to "yori hito rashiku, yori sonomama ni"... i'm now editing the new series, which will follow my main series "To You", though i'm wondering when i can update, or which really i can do or not...

day and night, shooting with thinking.

Sunday 22 July 2007

Saturday 21 July 2007

Digital cameras doesn't bring about a paradigm shift in serious photography.

Some people says that the advent of the digital camera is something like a paradigm shift in photography, however, in my opinion, that was a big foolish mistake. It is easy to understand that people who adhere to digital description are same with B&W enthusiasts. The ways of representation with internet are interesting, but its fun is just due to the internet itself and the presence of digital date, and PC. Telling the truth, the daily updates of photographs doesn't interest me so much. In addition, it doesn't matter at all which cameras photographers use, digital or analogue. It's just a change of tools, not a paradigm shift. Because we cannot find anything new on the net which we have never seen before. The old, don't exaggerate, or that will blindfold the true arrivals.

Friday 20 July 2007

Cosina produces ZK Planar T* for Pentax.



Cosina announced they will launch the sale of ZK Planar lenses for Pentax KA mount. Planar T* 1.4/50 ZK & Planar T* 1.4/85 ZK, in this summer.

via: デジカメWatch(jp)

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However, I doubt their qualities. They say the lenses fit both film cameras and those of digital, but if it suits digital, would they need certain different technology from that of old Carl Zeiss lenses? They may be brandishing with the name, or are new comers just great in other points? Nmm... indeed, I don't have a Pentax.

Wednesday 18 July 2007

test scanning2

test scanning

Tuesday 17 July 2007

Minilab systems

Today I had a chance to compare Noritsu's digital minilab system with that of old Agfa's analog. The results were noticeable, so I will show some samples. Above is digital, below analog, and the photos are all mine for next "Photo Drama's" update.





















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It is not always so important to manage color balances of prints. However, recently we cab scarcely find analog minilab systems in towns of Tokyo, though it is often said that the analog exposures make better prints with color negative films. The differences were interesting. Analog minilab showed films' performance more exactly on prints than digital's.

Simon Roberts



Simon Roberts - Photographer

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via: Conscientious

Lucky's color negative film





I could not get Lucky's color negative films in Japan. Thank you, Tang! He sent them to me from Shanghai.

Monday 16 July 2007

Random Thought

"I know you well"

"I know you so well"

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So, "I know you too well" means what?

Knowing and communicating let self-consciousness go over the bounds between "I" and "you"?

She calls herself her own name instead of "I".

Sorry, this time I'll write in Japanese... If I can, I'll try to translate. This article is about self-consciousness and name in Japanese culture.

日本人の成人女性でたまに自分のことを名前で呼ぶ人がいる。仕事場では言わないが、家族や恋人等の親しい人の前では呼ぶ人がいる。男性でそういう風に自分のことを名前で呼ぶ人は私の知っている限りではいない。ここに疑問がある。

幼稚園時代で既に自分のことを名前で呼ぶ男の子はいなかった気がする。一方で、女の子は結構いたように思う。ある女性に尋ねたら、小さい頃には自分のことを名前で呼んでいたが、成長するにしたがって親にやめるようしつけられたのだそうだ。社会的には自分のことを名前で呼ぶのは、恥ずべき行為、とされているらしいことがうかがえる。そもそも言語の機能を考えれば、自分のことを名前で呼ぶと言うのは合理的ではない。

「私」を「私」と呼ばずに、名前で呼ぶというのは、一体どんな感覚なのだろう。それが私にとって他我である限り、永遠に明白ではない。演劇でもって演じてみる場合にのみ疑似体験は可能かもしれないが。そして何故その現象が日本人女性にのみ起こっているのだろうかということも疑問だ。試しに、普段「私」とだけ呼んでいる人に、今後そうしろと命じる場合、強い抵抗感を覚えるのではないかと想像する。またこの現象の起源はいつかと考えてみたら、時代劇で武将や将軍の妻にあたる女性は、私的な場面では自分のことを名前で呼んでいるのを見かける。「ねねは寂しゅうございます」のように。この場合も公の場では「私」に切り替えられている様に思う(詳しく調べたわけではないが)。

日本語には自己と他者とを同時に意味する言葉がいくつか存在する。「自分」「われ」「手前」等が会話限定でそういう使われ方をする。これは、英語等の欧米の言語ではありえないことである。

この現象は何なのだろうか。日本の古い文化の根底に、自我と他我とをごちゃまぜに感じさせるようなものがあり、それが西欧近代哲学の流入ののちも、深いところで残っているということなのだろうか。

以心伝心だとか、空気を読むだとか言う、「他者の気持ちを感じる」という感覚が語られることは多い。「私は私である」という個人主義的な前提とは対立する感覚であろう。言語のレベルで存在しているということは、確実に意識に影響を与えていると予想出来る。

「私とは私だけではなく、他者でもありうる」かのような感覚があるのだろうか。そのような、此岸と彼岸を自由自在に行き来するような感覚が、日本文化の根底に潜んでいるのだろうか。

人間とは何か、意識とは何か、を考える上での一つの鍵のように思う。


**加筆
イヤ待てよ、逆もありうるな。

自我を殺す、謙遜の文化が、そのような自我と他我の境界線を曖昧にするような言葉を存在させているのかもしれない。

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時代劇での使われ方はあてにならないとの指摘を頂きました。確かに、あれはドラマなので、例としては不適切でした。何か資料について詳しい方がいましたら教えて頂ければ有り難いです。

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更に、試論。

自己と他者の境界線が緩くなった先に、次元を越えるような転換、境界線が取り払われるような可能性を考えてみると、自己と他者を二元論的に扱うということには、もしかしたら途轍もない過ちがあるのかもしれないとも思う。

それは自分であり他者でもあるという「人間」という枠組みを越えた「神の領域」を考えることがたまにある。というのも、近年、インターネット技術や携帯電話の発展により、他人が今どこにいるかをGPSによって一瞬に把握し続けることが理論的には可能になっており、またメッセンジャーやskypeによって常時コミュニケーションをし続けられるようになっている中で、自我と他我とが強烈かつ継続的に触れ合い続けることがそれらの境界線を緩めていっているような感覚があるからだ。過去、それらの技術が無かった頃に比べて、人間は境界線を細めているようなことをしているのかもしれない。

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英語で「自我」は「self-consciousness」なのは知ってたのだけど、じゃあ「他我」の訳語は何なのだろう?

検索したけど出ない。「他我 consciousness」で検索したら早くもここが上位に出るほど。

subjectとobject?この二元論的な発想も疑う余地はあるかもしれないな…。

**加筆20:54 on 16
ああ、何で名前が自我形成に影響を与えるんじゃないか、ということの説明が中途半端ですね。

言語は、「ある言葉があるから、その概念、感情を持つことが容易くなる」ということがあると思っている。よく知られている例で言うと、「懐かしい」という言葉は英語で直接に意味する訳語が存在しない。そのような言葉は、日本語話者がそのような感情を皆持ってるから出来たということも言えるのだけれど、私は逆に「懐かしい」という言葉が出来たから、その感情を皆が共有しやすくなったと言えることに注目している。英語話者でもその感情を理解は出来るけれど、言葉がないことで比較すると複雑化するのだと思う。逆に、「identity」という言葉は、日本語では「自己同一性」と訳されているけれど、多くの人はこの訳ではピンと来ないのではないかと思う。それは自己同一性という言葉が根付いていないからだと思うし、一方でidentityという言葉を持ってる人達は用意に想像出来る感覚があると考えている。

すなわち、言葉として存在している、ということを含め、言語のシステムが、思考、感覚、概念理解等をする上で重要な役割を果たしていることが言えるんじゃないかと思っている。

だから、私=自分=あなた、という矛盾しているように思える言葉(実際には機能出来ているので問題はない)を持つということが、その言葉を頭に浮かばせた時に抱く感情が、やはりmyself、yourselfの時のような厳密なものではない、曖昧な感じがあるのではないか。その感情が日本語話者における自我形成と欧米言語話者におけるそれとの間に、微妙な差を生む可能性は考えられるんじゃないかと思っている、

ということ。

「私とは私である」というのではなく、「私すら他人の一人である」みたいな客観視をしているかのような用法が、言語構造に具現化されているということは、大きな意味があるんじゃないかなー。

Sunday 15 July 2007

My Girlfriend wants a twin-lens reflex camera.

My girlfriend has been interested in the twin-lens reflex camera(TLR). Recently, the square prints are popular amang young generation, and one day she saw and said to me, "Square prints so cute! I want a TLR! Takaci, you'll buy for me, won't you?"

I've recomended once SLR minolta XD to make her a minolta lover and she got it as her first camera. So according to the trend, then should I advise about minolta autocord? I thought, but it's heavy in some points as a birthday present. (First of all, presenting a TLR is just heavy.) I searched and found, Seagull may suit, because it was sold in Shanghai about 50$, Tang said. Or, former soviet camera Lubitel? It means "Lover", so a lover gets a lover, it's nicely old-century fashioned...

No, I won't buy.

Friday 13 July 2007

Thinking what to do here

I started this blog to encourage myself to see photo websites as many as possible, and to practice thinking in English. But now wondering a bit how to continue blogging. I don't know how many photographic websites on the net now, at the same time, how many websites that I will have interests in I can see in the future. In my opinion, seeing others' photos is good for my brain like travelling the world. Despite the world never shrink even in this century, however, I may find the end when I search my favourite photo sites everyday in near future (it'll come in half a year). The authors of some good blogs are seemed so talented now, like afuckaday or Art Nudes, but in the point of my intersts, I may not continue this style, and if so, I have to think what to do here next.

Writing in English isn't always the perfect way to meet someone I will like, I know well. Only better than writing in Japanese, of course than Russian, on the internet. Just BETTER, but doing always makes posibilities, doing may be posibilities itself. I will think and do something... in order to continue to take photos with cultivating philosophy.

Wednesday 11 July 2007

Tuesday 10 July 2007

Monday 9 July 2007

Tomoyuki Sakaguchi



tsaka.jp

Sunday 8 July 2007

"Photo Drama" Updated.



Photo Drama - Takaci Hirano

Contingency - Wikipedia

"In philosophy and logic, contingency is the status of facts that are not logically necessarily true or false. Contingency is opposed to necessity: a contingent act is an act which could have not been, an act which is not necessary (could not have not been). Contingency differs from possibility, in a formal sense, as the latter includes statements which are necessarily true as well as not necessarily false, while a statement can not be said to be contingent if it is true necessarily.

In colloquial English, a contingency is something that can happen, but that generally is not anticipated. Planning for contingencies often requires a more imaginative approach, because contingencies are inherently not obvious. Large organizations, such as governments, are often criticized for not planning for contingencies because the construction of plans to deal with contingencies often involves thinking outside the box. Beforehand, contingencies are hard to predict; this failure to appreciate contingencies ahead of time has led to the formulation of Murphy's law."

quoted from: Contingency - Wikipedia

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via: 茂木健一郎 クオリア日記(jp)


In my opinion, photography can be rich with contingency logic.

Saturday 7 July 2007

Lea Crespi



Lea Crespi

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via: MIKEY the MONKEY

Friday 6 July 2007

Shinichi Yokozawa



PURR

Thursday 5 July 2007

Laura Henno



Laura Henno

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via: Conscientious

Tuesday 3 July 2007

Monday 2 July 2007

The enlargers of Lucky



Recently, the number of films at the market is decreasing. As for colour print films, Agfa Photo became bankrupt, and Konicaminolta finally gave up photo business, Fuji and Kodak cut down their production. Almost all labs for also gave up their analogue printers and now uses digital lab systems. In addition, over 90% of commercial photographers shoot with digital cameras in Japan. Some serious photographers are crying "Don't loose films' culture!".

I don't know where films are going or fading away. Before I started photography, my father already got a small digital camera and sometimes I used it. I enjoyed its digital images on father's CTR display, and that memory made me build my own website of photography, though the works are almost all made from films.

On the other, it's a big problem that the best results of the films cannot be realized on prints these days. Because, although especially negative ones results best with analogue printers or home enlargers, there are few analogue lab systems in cities at last. Only I can do is getting an enlarger to realise films' best colour perfomance on prints, though its cost is expensive.

Or, are films completely fading away in near future? Agfa restarts films business. Some amateur photographers are unyielding against digital images. Some serious photo masters keep on crying...

Fujimoto Lucky's Enlargers

Todd Deutsch



Todd Deutsch Photography