A mixture of long-exposures and people shots on this late-night walk in Tokyo
I first planned to do this walk on the evening of March 11th. No need to remind people what happened in Japan that day. As it was, the last train that Friday was at around 3pm and everybody in Tokyo ended up walking home.
I was keen to get together with some people to do the walk as soon as possible, to take advantage of the fact that now – since power-saving measures have been implemented across the city – Tokyo is much darker than usual. We didn’t have a clear night so my hope to get some stair-trail shots – in the city that now has more stars visible overhead than ever – will have to wait for another night.
We started our walk in Ikebukuro and basically followed the Yamanote Line towards Shibuya, ending up in Shinjuku for sun-up and some great people shots in the back-streets on the West Side of the station.
This one was taken just between Ikebukuro and Mejiro stations and shows the light-trails of the last train on the Yamanote Line for Friday night: [click for a larger version]
Nikon D700, 100ISO, f/8, 10secs, Tamron 14mm f/2.8
Much quieter than usual for a Friday night/Saturday morning. And to be honest it must have been ten years since I have been out at that time of the week without seeing more than three or four other foreigners.
So, this is just a preliminary post as I wanted to get some of my shots up asap.. and now I am heading to bed!
Some great shots below from the folk who came along….
Justin has a few nice ones on Flickr; here’s one I really like and click here to visit Flickr and see his shots.
Here are Rishi Mohanty’s shots from the night… cheers Rishi, some nice work, sir!
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Charles Lacz came out with his Olympus OM4-Ti and some rolls of film. His shots are in a gallery below. Nice work, Charles. Not easy doing this stuff on film.
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Mike Ross’ shots are here in a slideshow on his own site. Thanks Mike, great to see you again.
Here are a few of mine, all straight out of the camera: [Nikon D700, 50mm f/1.2, 20mm f/3.5, 14mm f/2.8 and 80-200mm f/2.8]
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Tommy
April 16, 2011
Wish i had the time to join you guys, seriously, some great street shots, i love the series of those 2 guys laughing. really great. Did you use the 80-200 for this?
Swen
April 16, 2011
the 3rd page is my fav
.. 1, 7, 10, 15 !
& lots of interesting articles on the japanorama website =)
I’ve recently bought a 50mm f/1.2 AI-S lens,.. used one,.. but it got and impact on the fucus ring, and the ring is hardly moving between 0.7 to 0.5m
it’s not a big problem, cz it still works fine between 0.7 and infinity ..
Do you think there is anything i could do to get a smooth focus again?
Tim A.
April 18, 2011
I always thought that the back streets of Shinjuku or most definitely the back streets of Shibuya were made to be seen only at night…sort of like a dive bar. You never want to go to a dive bar during the day…some things are better left with deep shadows. But, who knew there was so much personality? Well…you did obviously. And the B&W works great to retain the “gritty” feel of those back streets. Love the photographs! Gives me ideas when I’m in Japan next and I have jet lag with hours to go before I need to get into my suit.
Charles
April 21, 2011
Really enjoyed the walk. First time I really tried long exposures with film and it worked out better than I expected. Most of the credit should go to the OM4 rather than any skill figuring out exposures on my part.