A little Nanning & Guilin

I was in China again last week for work, and this trip was significant for me because it was my first chance to truly use my newly acquired Nikon F6 SLR.

It's an amazing camera to say the least -- the ergonomics are simply perfect for my hands. Some comments I read online say that the settings on the camera are complex, but about an hour fiddling with it (with the help of the manual) was all I needed to get everything in order. And after figuring out how to load the film properly (it's been a while), I was all geared up to put the camera through its paces.

Perhaps because of HCB and Ansel Adams, I had always associated film with two things: street photography and landscapes. And maybe fine art photography as well. While I hope to do all three with film, street photography is where I start.

A friendly motorcycle cab shifu I met in Guilin. I wanted to chat a little more with him, but had to re-join my tour group. © Lin Zhaowei, 2009.

One thing I liked about using the F6 is that my favourite lens, the AFS 60mm f2.8, becomes a "normal" lens -- the field of view is close to that of the human eye. Normal lenses have always been popular for that reason. And it's a comfortable focal length for street, as it's wide enough to capture the surroundings and long enough to give some object-background separation.

A little boy and his grandma, outside a park in Guilin. © Lin Zhaowei, 2009.

It's quite funny when I would lower my camera after taking a shot to look at the back. But sorry, there's no image review in film, even on the most advanced bodies! I find that it wasn't really a handicap, partly because I trust the F6's metering and partly because that's part of the reason why I decided to turn to film. And the initial results are encouraging.

An old man at the jetty in Yangshuo. You can pay a few yuan to take photos with his birds. On hindsight, perhaps I should have paid to take a photo of him! © Lin Zhaowei, 2009.

One thing that surprised me was that it's not easy to find film in China nowadays, even in a relatively less developed place like Guangxi. I was lucky to have a photo store near my hotel in Nanning, which sold Kodak Max 200 and Fuji Superia 200. But by the time I arrived at Yangshuo's West Street, I had run out of film. I was immensely relieved that I finally found one photography equipment shop at the very end of the street.

A little girl in a shop along Yangshuo's tourist trap, the West Street. © Lin Zhaowei, 2009.

Actually halfway through my short trip to Guilin, I desperately wanted to buy some B&W film, mainly for the Liqiang cruise. But that proved elusive. I will be stocking up on the Tri-X's next time round! Have already found out where to buy them at a reasonable price in Singapore.

Going "full frame"

By some accident, I found myself the winner of an ebay auction for a Nikon F6 just over an hour ago.

Let me explain myself...

I bought my Nikon D40X when I was in Japan almost two years ago. Now, Japan is practically photography equipment heaven if you live in Tokyo, because there are so many branches of the two big chains, Bic Camera and Yodobashi Camera around, and they display their camera gear freely for anyone to feel and try. The bigger stores, in particular, even had most of the Nikon and Canon lenses displayed for you to try as much as you like (without walking away with it, of course).

The camera bodies, though, where displayed in all the stores for trying, if I don't recall wrongly. The D300 and D3 didn't feel that impressive then, though their price tags were astronomical to me at that point of time.

That was the time when I first handled the Nikon F6. Even before I first picked it up (not sure when exactly, but it must have been early 2008), I was shocked by the price tag -- over 260,000 yen (about S$4k)??? For a film camera??? Isn't film already obsolete as hell??? Who would buy something like this???

Yet at the same time, I also thought to myself: once I become skilled enough in photography, film is where I would want to be. I'm not sure where I got that from, but it's always been at the back of my head. Getting the Nikon F6, which many believe will be Nikon's last film camera, will be a mark of my progress in photography.

On a certain level, I think I have learnt enough about using a camera to move on to that stage.

But there was another push factor -- I am certainly no master photographer yet. I have been spending many hours on the computer processing my photos over the past three or four years, perhaps a little more. I'd been doing that even when I only had my Sony point-and-shoot, which finally died on me when I was in Japan. And when I moved on to shooting in RAW and processing them in Capture NX 2, the time I need to process photos on my 4-year-old X41 got longer.

I already spend about 10 hours a day at work staring at the computer nowadays. Should I be doing the same thing when I'm home? In a way I had become a slave to the computer.

I guess I'll end here, I get ahead of myself. I need to go make payment for my F6 first.

In the meantime, take a look at this article. It's well worth a read, even for people who started out with digital like me.

ただ、君を愛してる (Heavenly Forest)

I had been introduced to this movie by a friend quite a few months back, but finally sat down to watch it yesterday afternoon. When I first searched around for information on the film, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that the super cute Miyazaki Aoi (宮崎あおい) was the lead actress, though I don't think I actually noticed that the male lead was Tamaki Hiroshi (玉木宏) who appeared in the extremely entertaining Nodame Cantabile drama series.

Anyway, the plot has something to do with photography, which is why I'm licensed to post this here. Ha. University freshman Makoto meets an eccentric, child-like fellow freshman called Shizuru on his first day in school. Makoto begins to get fascinated by her and snaps a photo of her stubbornly trying to cross a road where cars never seem to stop for pedestrians.

The first meeting

They soon become friends after Shizuru, the more outgoing one of the two, initiates conversation with him on campus. That very day they both explore a peaceful forest close to their campus. There they found their sanctuary, where Makoto inspires Shizuru to pick up a camera too and start taking photos with him. However, Makoto likes another girl in school, and the love triangle develops...

The photo that made Shizuru's day

Besides Miyazaki Aoi (!!!) there is quite a bit I like about the film. Firstly, the characters get bonded through photography -- they spend many hours taking pictures and then developing the film in Makoto's darkroom at his place. (Photography will also play a part in the climatic ending. ) Crazy as it sounds, I have recently decided to move into film photography and am only waiting for a good deal on the Nikon F6 on ebay now to make that final step. So the film developing part somewhat resonated with me. One of the things I look forward to with film is spending more time away from the computer (post-processing), and the show just added some romance to it for me.

Another thing I like about the film is that there are actually no villains in the show. It focuses on the romance and interactions between the main characters. This may seem to make the plot simplistic but on the contrary, I think it brings out a lot more character development. The relationships built between the characters are sincere and touching. Perhaps it's a common feature of stories from the 純愛 ("pure love") genre. One of my all-time favourite drama series,　世界の中心で、愛を叫ぶ (Shouting love from the centre of the world), which drowns you in its melancholic beauty, also belongs to the genre.

Makoto's best friends from University

The pacing of the film was also perfect. Every scene advanced the plot, and there are no distracting side-stories along the way. While photography is a theme in the show, it never gets technical -- they don't even mention what camera or lenses they use. It's simply something the characters use. What matters is what they do with it, and where it takes them.

Tempted as I am to talk about the ending, I shall not spoil it for anyone who hasn't watched it. I won't say I'm completely happy with it, but I'm sure I'll come to terms with it somehow. Now to find the DVD...

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Note: All pictures were taken from http://www.cinemacafe.net/movies/cgi/17212/

I would have loved to provide a link to the film's official website, but it seems to be down. I'll check again and update if it works next time. The Japanese wikipedia page is here.

The first time I almost cried when looking at photos

http://www.flickr.com/photos/nyoroko/

初めて　ある写真を見ると　言葉にできなく　泣きほど　感動した。