Just came back to Kamloops. I stepped out into my backyard and saw the same moon I saw days previous in Tokyo, but now further along in its cycle. If it’s a full moon in Kamloops, would it also be a full moon in Tokyo?
Same Moon
Category Archives: 2007
Autumn Letter
This film presents autumn scenes filmed around Seoul in November 2007, particularly on the walking trails of Namsan Mountain in central Seoul. A lot of the footage comes from the day I spent hanging around with my friend Matt – he was shooting photos, and I was doing video. It seems like I’m less shy about shooting people if I’m with someone. This video also represents my first film with the HD camera (Canon HV-120) that I bought from my friend Billy just a day or two previous. I love being productive with new technology right after I get it.
The music is an old Korean song by Kim Min-Gi called “Kaeul Pyunji” (“Autumn Letter”) (in Korean: 김민기 – 가을 편지).
Sights and sounds of the Tsukiji Fish Market
5X5 edit: Tuna Life After Death:
Extended Raw Footage Edit:
I lived in Tokyo for about a year from ’99 to 2000, but somehow never visited the Tsukiji Fish Market, though I realize now it wasn’t far off the route I took to work every day. I even lived near Tokyo Bay.
Anyway, on my recent multi-day stopover in Tokyo, I finally did it. I got one of the first trains of the morning over to the market. I was advised to go straight to the back end as early as possible if I wanted to catch any of the auctions of giant tuna.
I thought about editing this footage into some kind of proper film, even an educational one, and I might yet, but for now I think raw footage tells the story.
Plus, the market has been extremely well-documented in recent years, so I didn’t think further explanation was needed.
If you want to read up more on the market, besides Wikipedia, here’s a few links:
- book: The Fish Market at the Center of the World
- Vanity Fair article by Nick Tosches
- I know I’ve seen a few good videos with Tsukiji scenes on Vimeo. Here is one.
Update: I saw the Cove the other day. If you’ve seen it, you might recognize the lengthy Tsukiji tuna auction time lapse scenes 2/3rds of the way through the movie. In the years, there’s obviously a lot more questions about how long this tuna trade can be sustained. It’s truly boggling to think of this amount of huge fish being caught every day.
Shinjuku Station One Minute
Shinjuku Station, in central Tokyo, is said to be the busiest train station in the world. In 2007, the station was used by an average of 3.64 million passengers per day. The station has more than 200 exits. On Wednesday November 21st, 2007, around 8 PM, I filmed one of these exits for exactly 1 minute.
A few observations about this minute: Nobody looks at me at all as I stand there filming. There’s a pause of about two seconds in the middle where no one walks through, but otherwise there’s certain seconds where six people walk through. I love how adept the people are – there’s only 1 or 2 out of about a 100 people who even slightly fumble with their tickets, while there’s a few people who almost enter and then hesitate and walk away.
Warehouse Halloween
These are some excerpts from the Halloween party at the warehouse. I just taped together a bunch of 10-15 second clips from my camera in an attempt to leave behind a document from the night. Actually, most of this footage is excerpts from Earthbound’s live show, which got the party going, before DJs kept things moving till dawn. Check Earthbound out further at:
myspace.com/earthboundkirahaug
At about 2 minutes into this clip, I show my VJ set-up. I was nicely tucked away (but a little lonely) in the back corner, but totally stoked about the two large screens stage left and right, and also the projection on the giant cardboard skull. The room was really well-decorated. Check out the awesome moon behind the stage.
This party was in a warehouse in the Mount Paul industrial park. Thanks to Vinny Franchesco for the chance to VJ, Graham (How Sound) for the sound, Kyle for the lights, and all the DJs.
By the way, my VJ footage came from a mixture of animated halloween clipart, stock content in Motion, and a bunch of jack-o-lantern images I brazenly stole from Flickr.
Education and Revolution
I made this for a school project in the M.Ed program I’m enrolled in now at Thompson Rivers University in Canada. We’d done a bunch of readings related to education and power, so I plumbed the depths of youtube and came up with this.
Shibuya Sunday Morning
In Tokyo, the last train’s around midnight. Taxi costs are extortionate. But clubs and bars stay open until 5 AM (or later), when the train service resumes. On weekend mornings, there’s a rush hour in reverse, as the revelers and the stranded spill out into the streets.
Escape from Ikea Chiba
Woman of the Sea
Footage of Jeju Island, its waterfalls, waves, and diving woman set to the music of Jet Echo’s “Nizium.” (myspace.com/jetecho)
Most of the footage was recorded in June 2001 on a rainy day with my old Digital-8 camera. I just didn’t have any idea what to do with the footage, until I somehow thought it would go nice with this song.
The Future is China
I made this video for a video contest that had “Future” as its loose theme. I contemplated the future, and saw RED. This is the result. On a technical note, the video was made using Apple’s Motion software. I used all the tricks I’ve recently learned.
At the time I had this video at the video sites Metacafe and YouTube, and it seems to have attracted slightly odd comments.
Hopefully, people, whether Chinese or American, can see the humor in this video and not take it too seriously.