Recently, Chinese photographer Fan Ho has fascinated me. His photos amaze me. He was a master of light and shadow. I resolved to do my own. So I headed to Nishi-Shinjuku to see what I could do.
Well, skill levels aside, there are more differences between Ho and me. One is that the landscapes we work with are entirely different. And Fan did much of his work in the 1950s and 1960s in Hong Kong, nearly half a century ago. Nish-Shinjuku has nothing in common with that city. What would I do?
I started with some trepidation. Never before had I done anything like this. Well, I had once at Yushima Seido, but that was a simple thing. And even though I knew Nishi-Shinjuku well, it was my first time doing something creative there.
Still, once I took my first photo, I realized what I needed to do. Or, maybe I should say, I thought I understood what I needed to do. As with everything in life, the more you do it, the easier it becomes. But, there are times we still won’t be sure. Anyway, the more I walked, the more shadows I found. They were in the sky, on walls, on the ground. Mode Gakuen Cocoon Tower was covered in them. I saw them everywhere.
The one thing that I was happy about was the timing. I got some nice shadows with the sun only halfway into the sky. They nicely angled across the buildings.
In the end, I learned one important thing. It is harder to write about shadows than take pictures of them. Should I stop writing?
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