TokyoLand

Thoughts of a Tokyo, Japan-based editorial corporate portrait assignments photographer

12/12/2011
by Jeremy
1 Comment

Tear Sheets from a wet Friday.

Another day and another editorial assignment tear sheet pops through the letter box. Nicely, here in Tokyo, Japan, magazines which use your photographs send you a copy or two of the magazine. Kind. Courteous. To be encouraged worldwide. This following one was from a photo shoot on a recent wet dark-as-night Friday afternoon, and took place in the extremely clean, spacious modern reception area of the company (most unlike Japanese companies to have clean, spacious, non-beige reception areas).

Photo ©Jeremy Sutton-Hibbert 2011, Tokyo, Japan.

Photo ©Jeremy Sutton-Hibbert 2011. Tokyo, Japan.

The pic used for the cover wasn’t the one I’d perhaps hoped for or imagined they’d use, it’s a crop, but it’s clean and looks nice, so I’m happy. Here’s the rest of the photos from the business portrait shoot if you’re interested.

11/12/2011
by Jeremy
2 Comments

Lunar Eclipse


                    

A  quick cut and paste job of the lunar eclipse over Japan this evening. I shot it with no planning, kind of spur of the moment thing, and with no prior research or thought of how I should actually approach it.

Exposure as the sun cast a shadow of the earth across the moon was one dram of Springbank 15 year old malt whisky. Then the exposure during the “red moon” phase was a Kilchoman malt whisky from Islay, and for the shadow’s exit from the moon I had a cup of ‘Christmas Blend’ tea to warm my frozen bones.

Thoughts on how to attempt the images next time would be to wear more clothes, these pyjama trousers are a bit thin. And perhaps use a tripod.

Hope you like it.

 

07/12/2011
by Jeremy
1 Comment

’tis the season to…

…be merry.

… love fellow man.

… go whaling.


 ©Jeremy Sutton-Hibbert/ Greenpeace 2006.
(See my archive of photographs of Japanese whaling industry, Greenpeace anti-whaling protest, and Sea Shepherd anti-whaling protest.)

So another Japanese whaling season is upon us, it is the time of year when the Japanese Fisheries Authorities see fit to waste tax payers money, and that means my little contribution also as I’m living and paying tax here in Tokyo, and send the 5 ship whaling fleet to the Southern Ocean to hunt for minke and fin whales. The lethal hunt is conducted in the name of scientific research, but environmentalists claim it is nothing more than commercial whaling in disguise. This year it seems all the more shameful waste of money, as it has been today reported in The Guardian, the BBC and Sydney Morning Herald, that some of the funding (2.28 Billion Yen, to be exact) for this years expedition is actually coming from the fund set up to aid recovery from the March 11th earthquake and tsunami which rocked Tohoku, north eastern Japan. The Japanese Fisheries Agency claims that the whaling programme will help whaling communities in Tohoku which were hit by the March disaster- but I find this hard to believe. The whaling fleet which leaves for Southern Ocean is Shimonoseki based, not Tohoku based. The fleet is undertaking either scientific research of commercial whaling, depending on your point of view, and conducts it thousands of miles from home in the Antarctic. It has never been tradition for the whaling communities of Tohoku to send ships to the Southern Ocean, they undertake coastal whaling (which Greenpeace has never had an issue with to the best of my knowledge). I just find myself shaking my head incredulously at the comments put out by the Japan Fisheries Agency.

As a photographer in Japan, I’ve had my fair share of whaling related assignments- twice I’ve been fortunate to go on assignment for Greenpeace to the Southern Ocean to document their protests against the whaling fleet, and their attempts to stop the fleet from undertaking their whale hunting. I’ve also, again for Greenpeace, covered the Tokyo Two courtcase when two of their staff were on trial for, some say intercepting, some say stealing, a box of whale meat and following their exposure of an embezzlement scandal inside the taxpayer-funded whaling industry.

(See my archive of photographs of Japanese whaling industry, Greenpeace anti-whaling protest, and Sea Shepherd anti-whaling protest.)

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07/12/2011
by Jeremy
0 comments

A Brutal Death.

A Brutal Death. (written in 2006, whilst on assignment in the Southern Ocean).

I saw a whale get killed today. Sadly these days this is not an uncommon scene for me.

I’m one of the two photographers here on Greenpeace ship M.V. Esperanza and as such I either go out in the inflatables or up in the helicopter to document the protests of the activists, and to put these images on the website or out to the media. So in the past few weeks I’ve seen a few whales be killed. Whilst it hasn’t been pleasant to see any whale be killed this killing today was particularly unpleasant, it died a horrible death.



 ©Jeremy Sutton-Hibbert/ Greenpeace 2006.

(See my archive of photographs of Japanese whaling industry, Greenpeace anti-whaling protest, and Sea Shepherd anti-whaling protest.)

The ‘Billy G’ boat had already gone out, and was following the Yushin Maru catcher ship of the Japanese whaling fleet. The ‘Orange’ boat, we have never settled on a name for it, was going also, and Hernan, Greenpeace videographer and I, went in that. We were a little slow is setting out, but the crew did a good job in getting us beside the catcher and the ‘Billy G’ relatively quickly, and without getting wet which is always nice. Odin drove us fast, but swerved the waves, only occasionally a little spray, but on the whole we stayed dry.

We reached the scene quickly, and immediately were in the midst of it all. Alain, in the ‘Billy G’, tells us the harpoonist had been deliberately aiming the harpoon at their boat. Minutes later as we round the front of the catcher the harpoonist does indeed swivel on his green deck, pointing the ominous yellow harpoon with it’s black explosive tip in our direction. It is frightening. It is plain intimidation, but it works. I want to react, but don’t want to provoke the guy. I try to turn away, to look elsewhere, but it’s scary to not know what is happening behind you.  Where to look, what to do? We radio the Esperanza, our ship, to tell them, perhaps subconsciously hoping that somehow this will be a guarantee of safety.

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