Hey guys,
I`m posting this from a webcafe. I`m sorry, but my laptop is formally out of commission. Thanks to all the readers so far, I hope you guys will still be around when my laptop gets fixed, and I get to posting again. I have a post on Oosu and Nagoya castle lined up.
On the other hand, there are Apple Stores in Japan! And………… the members of the Genius Bar all speak English! Not just functional English, but those in the Nagoya Sakae Apple Store spoke perfect English!
- First night time shot with a long shutter speed
Quick sad story, I went into the Apple store not knowing this, spent 30 minutes trying to communicate my issue in Japanese and got nowhere. Pulled out my English dictionary, and the genius bar guy says in PERFECT ENGLISH… ぺらぺらの英語！！！ Would you prefer if we conducted this conversation in English? Took me about 5 more minutes to figure everything out. Verdict: Substrate contamination of Nvidia Graphics chips (hurrah for made in China?) means that all Nvidia 8 series mobility chips manufactured between May 2007 – September 2008 will fail before the two year mark. My Macbook Pro failed at the 19 month mark, at possibly the WORST possible time. On the bright side, the Apple store offered to replace it for free, and will take about a week.
Oh and what do you people think about the photo? It took me about three attempts, shutter speed 1 second and aperature f/4.5 for those of you who that means something to.
A Foreigner's Tale in Japan 
Bad luck about the chipset.
Photo’s nice, but a little shaky. You’ll get that if you hand-hold at any speed under 1/60 unless you’re real careful (you could try these tips here: http://digital-photography-school.com/how-to-avoid-camera-shake to try and reduce it, or spring for a monopod/tripod/gorillapod, or take one of those handy vertical surfaces (poles, building walls) and use those to help.)
Haha, what a coincidence. I was actually reading the very same article, when I read your comment. I actually already used the technique to hold your hands to your chest, but I was kind of in a hurry to get out of the way.
You’re right though, image is kind of shakey.
Congratulations on finding a solution to fixing your computer. BTW, picture looks great.
Thanks!
hahah, i usually try to practice my japanese, but whenever it’s something ‘important’ (i.e. checking in for my hotel ^^;) i default to english. on the other hand i also would’ve assumed japanese was my best option walking into an apple store in nagoya ^^;
along the lines of what chris said above, the colors look nice but it seems a little blurry? perhaps you could’ve upped the iso for a faster shutter speed? i was trying to take some pics of an audi building near (in?) shibuya but was failing horribly even with the highest iso setting on my camera orz wish i had brought my tripod. (then again, putting a point and shoot on a tripod seems a little embarrassing for some reason ^^;;)
I guess I really should pick up a tripod. Any good old cheap tripod will probably do. For me, putting down a camera with a tripod in any public place seems kind of embarassing. I should really get over that.
What I probably should have done was up the aperture further, and increased the shutter speed.