Bamboo

竹 │ NEX-7 & Voightländer Nokton Classic 35mm F1.4 │ 35mm, 1/60, ISO 1600, f/1.4, Lightroom 4.2

Bamboo, or "ta-ke", is native to Japan, and can be found everywhere from gardens and temples, to bowls of ramen (it's quite delicious!). It grows both in the wild and is part of landscape gardens and inner-city planning, to the extent that I don't know if any bamboo in and around Tokyo is actually wild. The same goes for all the trees here, really. Tokyo is breathtakingly huge, and its designation as the largest metropolitan area in the world (source) means that human influence oozes out from every nook and cranny. Having said that, every now and then, we do find areas which, quite obviously, have been left as they are (such as a building with a tree going through it - yes, I need a photo).

Rikugien at Night

I've been to Rikugien Gardens before, but never at night. Sunset is before 6pm now, so we won't be leaving the work in sunlight for another 6 months, most likely. Sunrise in Tokyo is still relatively early, compared to winter in the UK, however.

In the weeks running up to Christmas/New Year, the park has been lit up rather beautifully, and was full of couples taking a romantic walk... and photographers with tripods and backpacks full of gear. As I'd just come from work, I was trying to be both of the above, but the low-light realm is one of the holy grails of photography. No-one is a master, and no lens is ever "fast" enough (lets in enough light to allow a fast shutter speed and reduce motion blur). That's where the optical image stabilisation of the SEL18200LE came into play, allowing me to take this handheld shot at 1/4". Though one quarter of a second sounds like a very short time, it's effectively eons in photography. Without image stabilisation, I could not have taken the above image, simple as that. Though I have faster lenses, shutter speeds were still hampered, and so this was one of the better photos from the group that evening, though more may follow.

Kosagi

Kosagi│ NEX-7 & Canon FD 50mm  F1.4 │ 50mm, ISO 400, f/2, 1/30, 0EV Kosagi, or the Little Egret, is a bird related to the heron, with snow-white plumage, a long, pointed black bill and black legs with bright yellow feet. Its body is 50-60 cm long. This specimen was spotted in a tiny rock pool within the Rikugien Gardens in Tokyo. He was hunting for crabs... and managed to find a few! The late-afternoon sun was cascading through the trees and falling onto the mossy rocks beneath with such a vibrant green, that this pure-white bird really stood out like nothing I've seen before.

The Egret had very long feathers on his chest, which drooped down into the clear water of the pool below. I hadn't been stood there 5 seconds snapping away, when what seemed to be a flock of paparazzi turned up to take their shots. The bird, completely unfazed by the clatter of shutter clicks, plucked out yet another crab. From where I was standing, there were no crabs in that rock pool, but the Egret proved me otherwise on more than one occasion After a few minutes, I decided I'd leave him be, and hope that the paparazzi would soon move on. A very majestic bird in a very majestic garden.