Kyoto Aquarium - 京都水族館

The New Aquarium in Kyoto.

One of the main exhibits at this aquarium are the Giant Salamanders.

They really are giants too averaging between 1m and 1.5m in length.  

I think they are cute too, maybe it's the stubby fingers on their toddler sized hands.

Moray Eel, proud owner of pharygeal jaws, just like the xenomorphs from Alien.

There was also a very nice jellyfish display.

 

My favourite living fossil the Nautilus.

The other main attraction was the dolphin show.

Slivers of Time

I started off with water, which has an amazingly jewel like quality as the light reflects off it and refracts through it.

 Water was a bit too clear, and as a consequence somewhat difficult to separate from the background.  I moved on to milk.  Milk works quite well for photographing splashes and drops as it is opaque and more viscous than water.

My first milk crown!

'Potential'

'Contact'

 'Solar System'

I love the little planets just hanging there in space.

 I was using an external flash to get some very short exposure times for photographing drops and splashes.  I was using a Canon Speedlite 480ex II at 1/64th power, if it is the same duration as the 580ex II then I had an exposure of about 1/31,000th of a second.

Street Scenes

 

PL Fireworks 2012 PL 花火

 August 1st is the day that the PL church has one of the biggest fireworks displays in Japan, with about 25,000 shells being used this year.

 

 

ROR INZT

Photos from the Raugh out Roud stand-up comedy group's recent show (2012/6/22) in Sannomiya@Bar INZT

Check the group's site for details on future shows.  RoRcomedy

Good shirt for a comedian, wrong but funny.

 Stand-up comedy and poetry; a very good combination by Scott Crowe.

Foxes of Inari 稲荷の狐

While most shrines in Japan have guardian lions flanking the altar, shrines to Inari have foxes.

I was nearly locked in at this shrine, as I had entered through a side entrance while the priest was making his rounds locking the doors.  I made my way through the shrine; taking the above photographs and found the front entrance where I had planned to exit locked.  Wondering how I was going to get back to the streets I made my way back to where I had come in... Just in time to see the priest pocket the keys after bringing down a storefront type shutter/door and locking the attached pad lock.  After a furious bout of kung-fu fighting*, he graciously opened the gate to allow me out.


*may or may not have actually happened

Wisteria - 藤