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cosplay in Taipei, Pen-F 3.5/100 and Auto Takumar f1.8/85
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 31, 2012 5:49 am    Post subject: cosplay in Taipei, Pen-F 3.5/100 and Auto Takumar f1.8/85 Reply with quote
this last weekend there was a cosplay event at the university in Taipei
for those less familiar with cosplay see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosplay

A very friendly local photographer I had become friendly with a few months ago when we both took some photos of "Geishas" in Kyoto took me there. Up front he told me there was a rule: One only can take photos when they "perform".

The "cosplay actors" would start to pose and quite a crowd of photographers would snap away. After 2 or 3 minutes a friend of the performer would do a countdown and after "one" everybody stops taking photos, bow down saying "xièxiè" and the performer takes her / his rest. What a joyful experience as if made for photographers, full of charm and respect.

It was a two days event and I was there late afternoon both days. The first day i was not really prepared for it but luckily carried a Pen-F f3.5/100mm lens. The second day I had brought along a Auto Takumar f1.8/85 mounted on my NEX5N ( and the FA43 ltd. mounted on my Pentax K-x, took also some with the AF SEL18-55 on the NEX )

here some of the pixs done with the manual focus lenses. note that the 'soft, dreamy' effect on some was done in PP by reducing "clarity" in LR
E.Zuiko Auto-T 100mm f3.5

#1

#2

#3

#4


those taken with the Auto Takumar f1.8/85mm in the coming reply


PostPosted: Tue Jul 31, 2012 5:55 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
taken with Auto Takumar f1.8/85mm on NEX5N


#1

( this "Pocky" performer was a visiting girl from Japan )
#2

#3

#4

#5

#6

#7

#8

#9

#10

#11

#12

#13

#14

#15

#16

( here you can see me taking this last picture Smile http://www.flickr.com/photos/catmanc/7668907328/ )

I hope you enjoy,
best greetings from Taiwan,
andreas


PostPosted: Tue Jul 31, 2012 6:37 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
kuuan wrote:


I hope you enjoy,

andreas


You bet! Beautiful pictures of beautiful girls, perfect start of the day.


PostPosted: Tue Jul 31, 2012 6:54 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
Very nice set, you really know how the shoot the "moment" well.
I think fermy said it best tho, beautiful pictures of beautiful girls in the morning, who doesn't like that?


PostPosted: Tue Jul 31, 2012 7:19 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
This is like on of the the creepiest sh*ts I've seen on the Internet. Downright obsessive behavior =X

Anyway, nice pics. Some would give fine portraits.


PostPosted: Tue Jul 31, 2012 7:28 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
fermy wrote:


Beautiful pictures of beautiful girls, perfect start of the day.


+1


PostPosted: Tue Jul 31, 2012 12:10 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Very nice and different posting indeed! Very Happy
I really liked that helmet, I need to get one of these when driving my gokart Laughing

Hot chicks in costumes makes all lenses look good Wink
Thx


PostPosted: Tue Jul 31, 2012 12:17 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Great shots, that must have been a lot of fun.

Do you have this set on Flickr? You'll get a million bazllion hits.


PostPosted: Tue Jul 31, 2012 1:03 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
thank's guys, happy you enjoy them Smile

@ ChromaticAberration: There only was joy, peace and happiness. These kids keep themselves, their nails asf. very tidy, dress up to look attractive, show much mental and physical control when posing. To be able to impersonate a certain character I guess there could be an element of the very wide spread, 'normal' and accepted obsessive buying and consuming, but what they showed and how they behaved highly impressed me.

fuzzywuzzy wrote:
Great shots, that must have been a lot of fun.
Do you have this set on Flickr? You'll get a million bazllion hits.


thank's, and yes I had lots of fun, even touching, in a sense.
oh, these are at my flickr alright and quite a few more than shown here, see: http://www.flickr.com/photos/kuuan/sets/72157630651241294/
concerning views you are mistaken, these get quite a bit less hits than the earlier 'normal' photos

best greetings,
andreas

Last edited by kuuan on Tue Jul 31, 2012 1:36 pm; edited 1 time in total


PostPosted: Tue Jul 31, 2012 1:34 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Hey lucky man , congrats! I can imagine how did you enjoy this session, excellent series.


PostPosted: Tue Jul 31, 2012 3:51 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
fermy wrote:
Beautiful pictures of beautiful girls, perfect start of the day

+1 beautiful series!


PostPosted: Tue Jul 31, 2012 5:00 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
haha, yes Attila, I felt lucky and happy, thank you Smile

thank you poilu, glad you like it


PostPosted: Tue Jul 31, 2012 8:22 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
kuuan wrote:
@ ChromaticAberration: There only was joy, peace and happiness. These kids keep themselves, their nails asf. very tidy, dress up to look attractive, show much mental and physical control when posing. To be able to impersonate a certain character I guess there could be an element of the very wide spread, 'normal' and accepted obsessive buying and consuming, but what they showed and how they behaved highly impressed me.


I truly believe there is a named psychological condition that describes this behavior. How much do you have to love something to try and become it and then go to events where you pose and really think you look magnificent against "regular" people.

I see them as lonely persons who spend too many hours in front of a screen watching cartoon series.
Don't get me wrong, I love certain cartoons and just like them I was also raised side by side with TV series but after a certain age it's got to be an obsession to still love the teenager/childish storyline behind most of these.

They basically turned Halloween (or Carnival) in an event that happens as many times as you like, not because of tradition but to satisfy a very particular group of people who seem not to enjoy how they were born and constantly try to impersonate their nonexistent role models. Very, very weird.

I do like the effort they make into looking so much like the characters but I find it distressing at the same time.

I hope I am not hurting anyone's sensibilities with my opinion, that is not my purpose at all.


PostPosted: Tue Jul 31, 2012 8:38 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
ChromaticAberration wrote:

people who seem not to enjoy how they were born and constantly try to impersonate their nonexistent role models.


Which is what 90% of the people I know (probably including me) does for 90% of the time they spend awake.
Cosplay looks weird to me as well, but if I try to look it from a neutral point of view, it's not much weirder than being a deadhead or a star trek fan: it's a way to join people who share your passion and push it a bit further.
Maybe not that different from buying hundreds of lenses and spending hours talking about them Wink

EDIT:
I forgot the photos: really nice pics, love the tak's rendering (I have 85/1.9 which is one of my favorite lenses in my collection, but this look even better). Maybe in #13 the reduced clarity is a bit too evident. Anyway, I really liked them.


PostPosted: Tue Jul 31, 2012 9:01 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
good shots.


PostPosted: Wed Aug 01, 2012 12:47 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
ChromaticAberration wrote:
kuuan wrote:
@ ChromaticAberration: There only was joy, peace and happiness. These kids keep themselves, their nails asf. very tidy, dress up to look attractive, show much mental and physical control when posing. To be able to impersonate a certain character I guess there could be an element of the very wide spread, 'normal' and accepted obsessive buying and consuming, but what they showed and how they behaved highly impressed me.


I truly believe there is a named psychological condition that describes this behavior. How much do you have to love something to try and become it and then go to events where you pose and really think you look magnificent against "regular" people.


I believe that there is a misunderstanding.
My impression was that the cosplay performers impersonate their characters without, in the sense of having personal pride, identifying with their characters. In the contrary, with much self control they try to "serve" their character.

ChromaticAberration wrote:

They basically turned Halloween (or Carnival) in an event that happens as many times as you like, not because of tradition but to satisfy a very particular group of people who seem not to enjoy how they were born and constantly try to impersonate their nonexistent role models. Very, very weird.

I do like the effort they make into looking so much like the characters but I find it distressing at the same time.

I hope I am not hurting anyone's sensibilities with my opinion, that is not my purpose at all.


Cosplay obviously creates controversial reactions resp. most try to ignore it possibly because they wouldn't know how to deal with it or because they don't want to deal with it as that may question their own ways. That alone imo are strong signs of a great artform.

This is a dangerous thing to say publicly and me too I don't want to hurt anyone's sensibilities. I never joined the "Dive Bar" but deem cosplay worthy to make an exception:

I make my money by selling in markets and talking about the experience with friends of mine I sometimes say that I am very grateful whenever a "real" person pulls up at my stall. The vast majority seem not "real" in the sense that they identify themselves with a certain image they try to project by the way they look, dress, behave asf. which makes them proud and feel defensive of, otherwise they appear more like empty shells without personal profile. That I find distressing.

My understanding of Cosplay culture is that the performers can't identify with that "normal" role play of "regular" people. Alternatively they choose anime / game characters to take the role play to an absurd extreme. They do that with great self control without personal limitations, with impressively refined behavior.

Anyway I learned, if I judge at all, not to judge by appearance but by "content". By "content" I mean atmosphere of harmony, happiness, understanding asf. an individual creates as opposed to an atmosphere of aggression often for having to defend a role one personally identifies with. Paradoxically cosplay to me appeared to be doing the former without the pitfall of the later.


PostPosted: Wed Aug 01, 2012 1:52 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
Aanything wrote:
ChromaticAberration wrote:

people who seem not to enjoy how they were born and constantly try to impersonate their nonexistent role models.


Which is what 90% of the people I know (probably including me) does for 90% of the time they spend awake.
Cosplay looks weird to me as well, but if I try to look it from a neutral point of view, it's not much weirder than being a deadhead or a star trek fan: it's a way to join people who share your passion and push it a bit further.
Maybe not that different from buying hundreds of lenses and spending hours talking about them Wink

EDIT:
I forgot the photos: really nice pics, love the tak's rendering (I have 85/1.9 which is one of my favorite lenses in my collection, but this look even better). Maybe in #13 the reduced clarity is a bit too evident. Anyway, I really liked them.


haha, yes, I feel the same.
But imo for that one doesn't have to be a deadhead or star treck fan, regular "fashion victim" would be enough Wink
and yes again, we buy all these lenses to merely capture images, cosplay performers are creating them!


I am very happy you mention the performance of the lenses:

The Pen-F 3.5/100 I used wide open. I found the center sharpness to be impressive, bokeh not always favorable as e.g. in #3

The Auto Takumar f1.8/85 is said to have the same optical formula as the Super Takumar f1.9/85 which I also love! The Auto Takumar has a smaller, lighter body and 8 aperture blades instead of 6 of the S.Tak. That together with the same optics made the lens highly attractive for me and I was very happy when I obtained it.

I had made some test shots of the Auto Tak comparing it to the Super Tak 1.9/85 and the S-M-C f1.8/85 and found that, at least my copy, was not as sharp at open apertures.
Nevertheless I decided to take the Auto Tak with me on my travels. That lack of sharpness had made me less enthusiastic about it, this was the first time I really used for more extensively.

To get more sharpness I stopped it down mostly to f2.8 or the second stop between f1.8 and f2.8 ( the Auto has 2 stops in between f1.8 and f2.8 ). The 8 aperture blades helped to not have very decided corners in the oof highlights and I find the bokeh generally pleasing.
Maybe I must revers my impression that it is not sharp wide open, #5 possibly was taken wide open and looks sharp enough.

best greetings,
Andreas


PostPosted: Wed Aug 01, 2012 1:53 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
belenois wrote:
good shots.


thank's Smile
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