I Took Infrared Photos Of Japan To Show It In A New Light

So recently (May 2016) I travelled to Japan for 10 days. I’ve been twice before and fell in love with the place. I love everything about Japan! The food, the people, the scenery, the food, the culture, the food (did I mention the food? Because THE FOOD!).

However, during the last trip, in 2015, I only went to Kyoto for 5 days. This time, I was determined to explore this amazing and incredibly beautiful country a lot more. I had recently purchased a second hand Olympus E-M10 and had it converted to infrared (590nm). I entered the country very excited but I knew that I didn’t have many chances to get the photos I wanted. This is because it’s was hard to tell whether or not my infrared photo would come out the way I wanted and a lot of the photos I took were not useable. Why? Well, contrast is an issue for a start. In some of the photos I took, it was hard to get the contrast right and would look flat and boring. While in other cases, it was horrible and too contrasty!

I took hundreds of photos and experimented with different white balances. The trouble was that I couldn’t find out what the photos would be like until I got home 10 days later… It was very hit and miss and really made me think about my position and settings. However, the thing I love most about infrared photography is that you can edit it to looking very unnatural! Still, I’m very happy with the outcome and I definitely want to visit Japan again. This trip, I went to Kyoto, Tokyo, Osaka, Kobe (Kobe Beef = WOW), Himeji, Nara, Hiroshima and Miyajima but next time I want to go to more rural places where the infrared camera will be very useful as foliage looks stunning!

More info: Instagram