I keep meaning to pimp this book but I always forget

2005-07-23

I keep meaning to pimp this book but I always forget

Tokyo Nobody, by NAKANO Masataki (中野正貴). Famous and striking locations in Tokyo, photographed at moments when they are absolutely free of people. You can see an example at this page, which also explains (in Japanese) his technique: wait for the big holidays like New Year's or Golden Week, and then take the photos while everyone who lives in Tokyo is off visiting their folks in the other, more rural prefectures.

「でも、うまく撮れるのは十回のうち一回程度。撮ろうと思った時には、必ずと言っていいほど人や車が現れる」
"But only about one out of every ten photos turns out right. Every time I'm about to take a photo, a person or a car appears."

If you dig photos and you dig Tokyo, you'll definitely dig this one.

Popularity factor: 3

Anonymous:

Very cool...will definitely check that book out. Have you seen Tokyo Style?http://www.amazon.co.jp/exec/obidos/ASIN/4480038094/qid=1122149978/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_10_1/249-5085375-2217143 It reminds me of Tokyo Nobody.

Only 800 yen. Pictures inside Tokyo apartments sans hitobito. Very cool. He has a larger book that is like 10,000 yen...it has a lot of similar stuff from all over Japan.

daniel

Matt:

I got a beat-up old copy of that book from Book Off a few months ago, and you're right, it's very cool. The section about "monomaniacs" is my favorite.

Anonymous:

that's what we did throughout western europe - we wanted to pretend that we weren't toursist, and the only way to do that was not to have other tourists in our photos ... we weren't always successful. You may think from our photos that none of the monuments in Europe have a ground storey.

2005-07-23