At A 2006 Japanese Anime Festival In Taipei

August 13, 2006

At A 2006 Japanese Anime Festival In Taipei

Richard ex colleagues from his ex-company came to pick us up yesterday for a whole day photography activity! Both of them, a man ( Lauren )and a woman( Lin )happen to love photography as much as I do. They both have really good camera and lenses that cost way more than the camera itself. Next to them, my camera ( Nikon D70 ) with it's original lens looks like a phone's camera! Plus they both have time to take photography lesson while I just learn from trial and error. If you asked me what it is that maybe I am better than them? I am an expert in taking fast shot at a subject regardless if my exposure is right or not! I have 6 years of experience on this from taking a picture of Kai Kai who always running around so fast like a bee that high on honey! Something else that I am better than them is to coax a reluctant child to pose for me! I have a lot of tricks up my sleeve on this, hahaha!

Pic: The man with glasses on the right side with a very long camera lens is Lauren.

So when they asked me if I want to see the 2006 Japanese Anime Festival in downtown Taipei my answer is a big yes! So they came and pick us up. When we were there, both of them carry a big camera bag full of their secret weapons while I just carry my only equipment ( my camera ) in a small purse!

Mind you, Lauren told Richard that today is the last week of the event. He said last week, there are a lot more participants than today, but I still found enough of them for my camera. But boy... the weather yesterday was a mean one. Yesterday was so hot that I almost give up shooting pictures and just hide somewhere. It's amazing that those participants did not mind to wear such a thick costume!!! Amazingly enough, they didn't drip sweat like I did! Sure all of them are wearing a thick make up, even the guys, but if it was me, maybe my make up will melt really fast under the beating of yesterday fierce sun. I think the girls with sexier costume is smarter...at least their costumes are cooler than the one that looks impressive but boy...they must be boiling underneath it!

At first I did not know why even the men willing to put on such a heavy make up until I saw the result of my camera at home. Those make up really make them look better on camera! Look at this guys, they even helped out each other with their make up! I love taking candid shot like this!

All of them also helping each other out at figuring the best pose for each other. Even the people who came to photograph them also help with finding the right pose. Heck... I saw even one photography willing to carry umbrella for one participant! Some photographer even bring assistant to hold the reflector to make the shadow on the subject's face more even. Sorry, I don't know the exact name for all this photography terminology. I saw one man carry 3 cameras dangling on his neck, all of them are very very expensive.

So for the next 2 hours we split up to take pictures of the participants. To be honest I felt old when I saw them, most of them are so young, they look like their age are below 20's. Plus Richard and me did not even recognize a single anime costume, you know what it means.... It means we are way too old for this generation!

Let me just tell you first here, I am going to split my entry about what we do today into 2 entries. One is this one that you are reading. The second one is at Yohana's culinary journey because it tells you the amazing story and pictures at Taipei most favorite seafood spot!

Back to my Anime story. At first I was not sure on how to ask for the participant's permission to take his/her pictures but at the end, I just point my camera at them, smile and they always stop what ever they are doing and pose for me until I nodded my head which means I am finished and say my thanks ...

I was not the only foreigners there. So I think they are used to us already. One amazing fact about the new generations ( us included ) of Taiwanese is, 25% or 1 out of 4 babies that was born has one non-Taiwanese parent. Can you imagine that high of integration (=The bringing of people of different racial or ethnic groups into unrestricted and equal association, as in society or an organization; desegregation.)? No wonder Taiwan government is planning to change their communication language from Traditional Chinese into more like Singapore's , the first being English and the second language will be Simplified Chinese like China. That's why Richard always joke that all his traditional Chinese book soon will worth more because they are becoming rare objects. That's just his excuse of not having his books thrown away by me... When I am in a cleaning mood...which means everytime I finished watching NEAT, a HGTV film about a woman whose job is specializing in organizing people's home. I love that show!

Yes, so when I saw how many people trying their best to look the same like their Anime favorite character. I just thought that if I bring La La here today in her Tinkerbell costume, I bet tons of people will ask for her photo!