A Box of Kitchen: Hanami: Part 1

April in Japan is time for "hanami (花見）", which literally means "flower watching". During hanami, people usually spend sometime outside under the sakura trees having picnics with friends, family, or colleagues. This April is my 8th hanami, but it was only recently I realized that I didn`t have any decent pictures of the sakura, except for this one. Thinking how ridiculous that was and that April is about to end, I was so determined to go sakura hunting while I can. As a result, although I could only got the pictures from two places, I was very happy with what I`ve got. The first place was in my campus where I work and the second one was in Ogawara, 30 km down the south from Sendai. For now, I only share some pictures from my campus and I will share the other pictures from Ogawara in the next post.

These pictures were taken on an overcast day where I was hurrying shooting with my camera before the rain started to pour. One thing I learned is this kind of weather actually give the best lighting situation, although probably it still depends on what kind of mood you want to have from the pictures. Gloominess due to the low light was what I`ve thought would come out of the pictures, but I was wrong! Especially for the close-ups (although not macros), with the soft light blotchlessly lit everything up, they look rather dreamy and soothing to me. I`ve heard about the photography tips recommending shooting on an overcast day, but when I actually experienced it I was glad that was true! Another lesson: never leave your macro lens at home if you have any.