tokyo – Ming Thein | Photographer

Photoessay: a slight dystopia

April 13, 2018 by Ming Thein

This set of images is one that’s once again benefitted from some significant curation: at the time of capture, I didn’t quite see the common thread that must have been running through my subconscious. There is, however, a definitely dystopian undertone in all of the images: it’s almost as though the aliens are about to arrive, have arrived, and then zombified the population. Timing matters: I seems to have caught some rather unflattering decisive moments. I’d like to think unintentionally, but static woman in the stream of people was very much a deliberate curation choice. Or maybe it’s not zombification so much as choose your own adventure: you see whatever you wish to project, and isn’t that where the fun lies in interpreting an image? MT

Shot on a Panasonic GX85, 42.5/1.7 and 35-100/4-5.6 and processed with Photoshop Workflow III.

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Photoessay: Cinematic vignettes from Japan, part II

February 21, 2018 by Ming Thein

Continued from part I. Think of this as Act II…MT

This series was shot with a Nikon D850, 24-120/4 VR and post processed with the Cinematic Workflow in Making Outstanding Images Ep. 5. Visit Japan vicariously with How To See Ep. 2: Tokyo.

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Photoessay: Cinematic vignettes from Japan, part I

February 15, 2018 by Ming Thein

The first part of this series is a sort of composited rush from one city (Tokyo) to the next (Kyoto) – it’s admittedly a bit discontinuous since the curation was made of a set of discontinuous 2.4:1 widescreen frames grabbed without the premeditated intention of being put together into a story; that said, I think they flow together quite well. If there’s one thing missing it’s a critical objective or action or something of that nature – but perhaps also quite indicative of what happens when one passes through a city with non-photographic objectives in mind. Shooting 2.4:1 is quite challenging without any guidelines – there is no mask or crop mode in the D850 for this, and one simply has to guess (it’s roughly half the frame height, plus a bit; I use the limits of the AF area’s outer box as a guide). 2.4:1 compositions really only work in two instances: when you’ve got a very full (‘wimmelbilt’) frame that spreads out horizontally, or a very empty one. The latter tends to be good for tighter human images, which this set is deliberately lacking – it’s about the place, not so much the people. MT

This series was shot with a Nikon D850, 24-120/4 VR and post processed with the Cinematic Workflow in Making Outstanding Images Ep. 5. Visit Japan vicariously with How To See Ep. 2: Tokyo.

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Filed Under: On Photography Tagged With: cinematic, japan, kyoto, ming, ming thein, mingthein.com, photoessay, photography, street, thein, tokyo

Photoessay: Tokyographic

January 28, 2018 by Ming Thein

In a city with a very high visual density – any sort of design has to shout quite loudly in order do differentiate itself and stand out. There are two ways of doing this: be more retina-searing than the next object, or be so plain as to create a sort of hole in space. I’ve always been fascinated with the dichotomy of Japanese design in general, and the translation to life and various classes of objects; there are examples where a design stands out but ages poorly (cars), it doesn’t stand out but is functional and occasionally clearly designed by an engineer, not a user (consumer electronics), and other times where design is so minimalist but elevated to the level of art (any traditional objects such as lacquerware, fabrics, etc.). In the case of this photoessay – we see it in the detailing and the block forms and colors used to accentuate what might otherwise be quite plain. I suppose these examples actually tend more towards the minimalist than the ornate, simply because they can all be reduced to fairly simple elements cleverly interlinked – given the large number of these kinds of photos in the archive, it would probably be safe to say this is what resonates with me as a designer and photographer…

This series was shot with a mix of equipment including a GX85, X1D and D850 and post processed with Photoshop Workflow III. Travel vicariously to Tokyo in How To See Ep.2: Tokyo.

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Filed Under: On Photography Tagged With: graphic, japan, ming, ming thein, mingthein.com, photoessay, photography, thein, tokyo, tokyographic

Photoessay: Eastern melancholy, part II

November 9, 2017 by Ming Thein

Continued from part I

Much further east, but still considered ‘eastern’ relative to other parts of the world – I shot these in Tokyo a month ago (at the time of writing) and very much remembered how I felt: the usual excitement of being in Tokyo, the anticipation of a reset in culture and scenery, and some slight dread for my wallet thanks to the camera havens of Shinjuku. Aside from that, certainly not what I seem to have captured: a sort of ‘quiet resignation to the task at hand no matter how bad or what it is’ – rather than the same sort of slightly uncertain edginess in Istanbul. Cultural? Perhaps. Or perhaps somebody in the audience is going to tell me there are things I have deeply repressed…MT

This series was shot in Tokyo with a Panasonic GX85, various M4/3 lenses, and post processed with The Monochrome Masterclass Workflow. Get more out of your voyages with T1: Travel Photography.

Photoessay: living Tokyo vignettes

September 17, 2017 by Ming Thein

The choice of title is a deliberate, non static one: the suggestion of motion in each of these images contributes to the feeling that we are viewing something transient, temporal and busy. Despite the density and size of the population, Tokyo somehow can still manage to feel quiet and isolated and times – I put this down to having something to do with the very ordered nature of society and the existence of very formal structures/expectations that mean nobody is in Ginza before about 11am since nothing is open, or Maronouchi is rather dead after 9pm and on weekends as everybody has gone home. It’s possible to make images that make the place feel quite cold and inhuman even though most of the time, this couldn’t be further form the truth. This set looks for a little chaos and humanity. You’ll probably also notice it’s quite cinematic, despite being mostly shot with relatively slow lenses. MT

This series was shot with a Canon 100D, 24STM and 55-250STM lenses, an X1D-50c and 90mm, and a H6D-100c and 100mm. Post processing was completed using the techniques in the weekly workflow and PS Workflow III. Travel to Tokyo vicariously with How To See Ep.2: Tokyo, learn to be stealthy with S1: Street Photography and see how to capture the essence of a location with T1: Travel Photography.

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Filed Under: hasselblad, On Photography Tagged With: canon, hasselblad, japan, ming, mingthein.com, people, photoessay, photography, street, thein, tokyo

Photoessay: Beyond human scale

July 28, 2017 by Ming Thein

I’ve always thought of Tokyo as a city of extremes: the insanely vast urban sprawl vs minuscule personal spaces; the pursuit of the ultimate food-art vs the ubiquitous convenience stores and vending machines; incredibly opulent wealth and luxury beyond imagination, and more homeless people than you might think. The futuristic abuts horrible 1970s square-concrete; indecipherable quipu of power lines knot the tops of poles, yet streets are laid so precisely that there’s material used in the middle of intersections for better grip. At larger distances, this devolves into something both more homogeneous and at the same time, distinctive – as neighbourhoods are somewhat cohesive. Even somewhere like Omotesando, where architects compete for the most unusual structure, it seems that such very competition creates a different kind of uniformity: what would be exceptional somewhere else isn’t when taken in multiples. It’s this very dichotomy I’ve tried to capture here – and with as few visual cues to scale as possible. MT

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Filed Under: On Photography Tagged With: cityscape, japan, ming, ming thein, mingthein.com, photoessay, photography, thein, tokyo

Photoessay: Tokyo street monochromes IV

April 26, 2017 by Ming Thein

It’s interesting to see how my style and way of seeing has evolved since the last instalment in this series from a year ago; or three years ago (here and here). Perhaps it might be even more interesting to go back a year or two further still and pull out similar material from previous visits. Tokyo is a unique place in my photographic repertoire: I’ve visit every year since 2006 generally at least once once or more, for a short but intense period, and get quite a lot of shooting done because the environment itself is so different and somehow always inspiring. This means that whatever is captured in those trips tends to be a snapshot of the best of my current creative state at the time, being in the right environment and having the right subject matter. At the same time, it’s also somewhat self-consistent in that it’s also fundamental the same sort of environment, the same sort of subject matter, and thus all the better to reflect changes in oneself. I always shoot some ‘conventional’ street in Tokyo, even if I haven’t been doing it previously; I put it down to the place, the people, and the variety of daily life that’s so different to my normal reality. MT

This series was shot with a Canon 100D, 24STM and 55-250STM lenses, and an X1D-50c and 90mm, and post processed with The Monochrome Masterclass workflow. Travel to Tokyo vicariously with How To See Ep.2: Tokyo, learn to be stealthy with S1: Street Photography and see how to capture the essence of a location with T1: Travel Photography.

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Filed Under: hasselblad, On Photography Tagged With: hasselblad, japan, ming, ming thein, mingthein.com, monochrome, photoessay, photography, street, thein, tokyo

Photoessay: Because it is Tokyo and there must be architecture

April 14, 2017 by Ming Thein

But even though Tokyo is defender of the modern, the minimalist and the avant-garde, it wouldn’t be a fair representation with a little subversive chaotic mess to sneak into the curation somewhere – in many ways, a fair representation of the real city. Whilst most of the quick-expansion concrete boxes are being rapidly erased by more modern and more interesting structures – especially in the more expensive parts of Tokyo – there are one or two left. I can’t help but wonder if in future they’ll turn out to be historical curiosities much like what we think of as ‘traditional’ buildings are today…I can only hypothesise everything is relative. MT

Photoessay: Autumn in the Nezumuseum garden

April 8, 2017 by Ming Thein

I was perhaps a week or two late and off-peak color; thees things tend to be heavily weather-dependent and extremely difficult to time with any degree of reliability. Worse, when you’ve got to travel many thousand kilometres to get there. But I think few will complain. There’s something fundamentally unnatural about such intensely red leaves, but at the same time something hugely enthralling about watching the seasons change and mark the progression of time; more so for somebody who’s spent a large portion of their lives in the tropics, where the only seasons we have are ‘wet’ and ‘dry’ – often in the same day. If you have to find an ‘ideal’ location to view the leaves in Tokyo, I’d point you to Rikyugien and Nezu – the latter of which is much more intimate and a little less manicured/planned, which gives the place a much more natural feel. Being coupled with an exceptionally good cultural museum funded by the eponymous railway mogul Nezu-san and designed by Kengo Kuma doesn’t do any harm, either. MT

This series was shot with a Canon 100D, 24STM and an X1D-50c and 90mm. Post processing was completed using the techniques in the weekly workflow and PS Workflow III. Learn more about capturing the essence of a location with T1: Travel Photography; we also visit the Nezumuseum in How To See Ep.2: Tokyo.

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