Photography

Exploring Kyoto

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Since being back in Japan I have spent most of my days out walking the streets of Kyoto. Sometimes with friends, sometimes on my own, but always accompanied with my camera. Even though I grew up in Kyoto there are always new hidden gems to find in this beautiful city. It's been great to just wander the city with no direction. Here are just a few photos from the other day I was out in Kyoto.

I will be getting a roll of film back tomorrow. Not sure how they'll turn out but I'm hoping my thumb doesn't make an appearance in any of the photos. I will try to post some of the photos, that is if they turn out all right. Still unsure whether the camera was working 100% so we'll see how the photos look tomorrow. Anyway thanks for reading, and I've got some new and exciting things happening in the future. So keep checking back for more things soon!

 

-Daniel Levy

Today, I Shoot Film

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I remember as a kid my parents would let me shoot the final few photos on a roll occasionally. I remember taking hours planning out what I wanted to shoot. I also remember the days of disposable cameras. Oh how I went through those.  So what has sparked this sudden emergence into the 35mm format again, you ask? I will tell you, good sir and ma'am. My parents have had extra rolls of film laying around the house for years, so I thought I might help clean up the place a little. 

I'm pretty excited about shooting film again. I love the slower pace of shooting and being a lot more methodical about composing shots. Also I love not being able to chimp! For those of you who haven't heard the term chimping, here's the definition. 

"Chimping is a colloquial term used in digital photography to describe the habit of checking every photo on the camera display immediately after capture." -The always reliable wikipedia...

Not being able to check my photos as I take them just adds another layer of suspense to photography.  Who doesn't love getting film developed and being shocked to see how many times your thumb is in the frame. In all honesty though I love the patience that comes with 35mm film.

Some of the film set up next to the Nikon EM. One of the two 35mm SLR's I'll be shooting.

I'm planning on going down to Kyoto and doing some street photography with all of these old new toys. So what are my new old toys, you ask again?  I'll be shooting on a Nikon EM with a Nikon E Series 50mm 1.8 lens and a Nikon F60 with a Koburn 28mm 2.8 Lens. I have some 400 B&W film in the EM, and some Super HGV 400 Fuji Color film. All the film is expired though so who knows how they will develop, it could lead to some cool photos. I'll also bring my Canon 7D along just in case. I'll try not to be tempted by the ways of chimping.

 In celebration of shooting film again I've taken a few photos with my iPhone using VSCOcam. If you haven't heard VSCO, they recreate old film for the digital age with presets for different photo editing software. They also have a pretty sweet iPhone app. So if you want to get some cool film effects on your phone, go get yourself VSCOcam! It's free and comes with a few filters, but you can always buy more if need be. VSCO is an awesome company though, and I am taken their design style. They also have a fairly new photo portfolio called Grid which is really rad. I got my code recently so you can check out my iPhone photography up there. Just go to daniellevy.vsco.co  to see all my VSCO goodness!

From left to right ; Nikon F60 with a 28mm 2.8 lens, Canon 7D with a 35mm 1.4 lens, Nikon EM with a 50mm 1.8 lens.

Lets get ARTSY!  I got this washed out effect by using the flash on the iPhone and putting a tissue over the flash to diffuse it a tad. Also gave it this blown out effect.

Love this ilford box.

The backside of the box

Thanks for reading and I'll try to post some of the film shots whenever they get developed. 

 

-Daniel Levy

Meeting with an Old Friend and PIZZA!

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I'm back in my home country at the moment, Japan. Since being back I've been meeting up with old friends who I haven't seen for aeons. It's been great reminiscing about years past with 'em again. Just recently I met up with an old school mate of mine. It was great catching up and hearing what's been going on in his life. Not much has changed though. We're both still the same kids that went to school together. Just with a taller perspective of the world, and a little more stubble on our faces. One thing has changed though, his hair! He had recently just got his hair dyed so I hadn't seen his new do. It was RAD! Loved the look, and instantly wanted to take some portraits of him and his mane. We walked by this little pizza place and decided to check it out. It was a pretty neat little hole in the wall place. Ended up eating there and taking some photos of the joint. So here they are!

The sticker on the hot sauce says "やべー" which roughly translates to danger!

Everything on the menu was super cheap. Most expensive pizza was ¥530 which is around $5.00. Granted they aren't giant but they tasted good and only cost a fist full of change. 

Tiny place as you can see, but I liked how claustrophobic it was. The next two photos of my friend I got a little carried away and pretty much transformed into my paparazzi form. Don't think he approved of my stalking ways, but the photos turned out good.

So there you are, more photos! Hope you enjoyed and I'll be posting more in the future. Check back soon!

-Daniel Levy

Blues and Orange, Portrait of a Street Performer

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I had a few minutes to spare before I headed home so I thought I might as well walk down to the river and see if there were any interesting characters to photograph, and found this guy. Perfect place to play with fire as you have a whole river to put yourself out if needed. Unfortunately I wasn't able to stick around to watch this pyromaniac eat fire but I love how this photo turned out. The contrast between the blue and orange really makes this image for me. Not to mention the glow from the fire that illuminates the ground looks very cool.

Just wanted to share this photo with you all. I should probably mention that this wasn't edited. The colors are natural and aren't boosted with instagram filters or anything like that. There really is nothing more satisfying than exposing a shot perfectly in camera.


-Daniel Levy

Street performer on the bank of Kamogawa River in Kyoto.