Hey, this is Scott of Photography Banzai.
Today we're going on a photo walk in the beautiful Anderson Gardens,
Japanese garden in Rockford Illinois.
Love going there.
This footage was from way back in July 2021.
They were having a bonsai event. I guess there is a local group that grow these trees.
And actually my name for the channel and everything else is "Photography Banzai",
which is a different word than "bonsai".
Sometimes people get confused with those two words, but they are different.
I did get a chance to talk to one of the people there...
Is that like a mixture of American plus...?
"This is something one of our club members found this growing in his backyard."
"Okay"
"So he dug it up and put it in a pot"
"Nice"
"Literally any tree can be turned into a bonsai tree"
"Makes sense"
"We just keep them small but uh when you select a tree
you want to pick one where the leaf size is going to be appropriate to the final tree size."
"Okay"
"And this one, you know, the leaves are a little big for such a small tree."
"Looks nice though."
"Maybe he'll decide to let it grow
as big as some of these and then the leaves will be a little bit more appropriate"
"it makes sense."
"but ah..."
"Interesting!"
It's always interesting to learn about new things.
For this video I was using the peak design leash with a connection point
to the actually DJI Osmo Action, so basically a necklace with a camera on it.
Really convenient, gives you an interesting point of view.
In the future I think I need to be more careful with how I place the camera relative
to the action camera, so that the camera is in frame when I'm taking a photo.
Interesting view, it's easier to do. I get to walk around and not have to deal with anything else.
In Anderson Garden you can't use a tripod, so with a situation like this I wanted to
make a video out of it. I had to think of a novel solution for the video side of things.
I think it worked out pretty nicely. The DJI Osmo Action's field of view isn't huge,
so I didn't have a lot to work with. I think in general it was good enough.
Actually the GoPro with the Max Lens Mod is a better solution for this
type of filming and I have used it since then.
For the camera I was using the Nikon 1 AW1 with the 10mm f 2.8 lens.
With that setup you have the 1" sensor plus the 10 millimeter,
you get around a 28 millimeter equivalent field of view for that setup.
I think with the editing it definitely improves the situation.
Nice thing about this camera is that you can shoot RAW so I have a lot of
options in post to improve the photos.
Actually Acdsee which is the main software that you use for photos.
It does have a profile for the camera and this lens. It definitely improves how they look.
This is a beautiful garden to walk around. Enjoy the scenery.
In my case take some photos of pretty much anything and everything.
I think this combination does work well close up.
With situations like this I'm more so going there to enjoy the scenery.
Take a walk... and then the photography is a added plus, added addition to what I'm doing.
I've been to this garden many many times in the past. I know it well,
but still every time I go there I find something interesting to take photos of.
Of course, when you go at different times of the year you get different looks,
different views, that's an added benefit!
With this recording style it's interesting to see the position I stand. With the prime lens
that's very important to where you stand and how you angle the camera.
In this case I could see that and get an idea of
how I do things and maybe improve on the situation in the future. If I see a
way that I'm doing something that might not work out too well with the resulting photo.
The AW1 is a nice camera for snapshots. You use the directional pad plus the center button to
adjust your focus point. Other than that I was using aperture priority, so simple as possible.
Trying to focus on composition.. subjects.. even then I don't think I did an amazing job this time.
But again, in post, I think I was able to improve the photos quite a bit.
Enjoyable fun casual photo walk. These are the kind of things that I love doing.
With photography as a hobby... Such a great motivator! It's a great
facilitator to doing things. In this case going to Anderson Garden. Enjoying the beautiful scenery.
Anyways, hope you enjoyed the video.
Scott of Photography Banzai, thanks!
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