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UltravioletPhotography

Kyoto Imperial Palace and Himeji Castle


OlDoinyo

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From our latest sojourn across the big pond, a few images. I did not have time for a lot of photography, but did manage to sneak out a couple of times.

 

All photos were taken with the Sony A900 camera at ISO 100 and f/16. Display intent is BGR.

Optics used were either the Steinheil Cassar-S with the Baader U2 filter (A), the Asahi 35mm lens with the Baader U2 filter (B,) or the Tamron 21mm lens with a UG11/S8612 stack (C.)

 

The complex of buildings known as the Kyoto Imperial Palace was built in 1855 after previous structures were destroyed in a fire. Imperial residences occupied this site from the 12th century until the Meiji Restoration of 1868; after this, the coronation ceremonies of the Taisho and Showa emperors were held in its main hall for historic reasons, although the main residence was moved to its present location in Tokyo.

 

Western porte-cochere (B:)

 

post-66-0-33694200-1508603849.jpg

 

South inner courtyard (B:)

 

post-66-0-83202500-1508603931.jpg

 

One is favorably impressed with the sharpness of the Asahi 35 in these photos, much more than can be explained by limited bandpass. This lens is easily my sharpest UV lens, even though I did not originally buy it with UV in mind!

 

Unnamed location (C:)

 

post-66-0-10244000-1508604123.jpg

 

Unnamed location (C:)

 

post-66-0-23403900-1508604186.jpg

 

Some flare and veiling is evident in these last shots. I later discovered that a film of foreign matter had accumulated on the rear filter disk (oops!) That has since been wiped off. I had other problems with gunk getting on filters on this particular trip, including some stubborn crap that got on the inside of one of my Kolari filters which was a bleep to get off.

 

Himeji Castle, completed around 1600, is one of the last historic castles where the tenshukaku (main tower) still consists largely of historic components, rather than being a mere shell replica. The tenshukaku was completely disassembled in pieces and then reassembled from 1957 to 1964, replacing rotten and worn-out components. Another, lesser restoration was performed about 15 years ago. The castle has the nickname "White Egret Castle" due to its white exterior. Several motion pictures (including one James Bond flick) were shot on these premises.

 

View from south gate (A:)

 

post-66-0-80550500-1508604986.jpg

 

Orange patches are visible on parts of the lower stonework, indicating UV-brightness at long wavelengths. I do not know what this is--the pattern is not obvious in visible images, and IRG images (not shown here) do not show the same pattern either.

 

View from west bailey (Nishi-no-maru:)

 

post-66-0-79865400-1508605404.jpg

 

View from long gallery building on west side:

 

post-66-0-45650200-1508605863.jpg

 

It is obvious that no titanium dioxide paint was used on the tower--more likely, traditional calcimine-like coatings were employed. Other than this, the UV images hold no major surprises. These pictures were taken in rainy weather, so UV levels were somewhat more limited than on other days.

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View from south gate (A:)

 

post-66-0-80550500-1508604986.jpg

 

Orange patches are visible on parts of the lower stonework, indicating UV-brightness at long wavelengths. I do not know what this is--the pattern is not obvious in visible images, and IRG images (not shown here) do not show the same pattern either.

 

 

 

I love this photograph

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Clark, I like them also. :-)

 

Added:

Clark, just curious, do you do a straight red/blue swap on your UV shots? Or is it more fancy than that?

Here is a 'reverse' red/blue channel swap to show what I am guessing it looks like when first white balanced out of camera.

I hope you don't mind me using your pic for this example.

(I also applied auto levels)

post-87-0-19986500-1508790704.jpg

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Such interesting photographs. I would love to see these fascinating buildings in person. They look quite nice in UV, don't they?

 

What Asahi 35mm lens is that? A 2.8? 3.5? 4.0? Thx.

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Clark, I like them also. :-)

 

do you do a straight red/blue swap on your UV shots? Or is it more fancy than that?

Here is a 'reverse' red/blue channel swap to show what I am guessing it looks like when first white balanced out of camera.

 

It is just a straight swap, performed in my case with the Channel Mixer.

 

What Asahi 35mm lens is that? A 2.8? 3.5? 4.0? Thx.

 

It is the 35/3.5 "Super" model.

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Yes, that is how I swapped it back, with channel mixer.

The thing I don't understand is the faint red tint in part of the sky.

I never get red in the sky with UV-only shots. The skies for me are always white, or blue, or such... never any reddish.

 

Really cool building, also..

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The thing I don't understand is the faint red tint in part of the sky.

I never get red in the sky with UV-only shots. The skies for me are always white, or blue, or such... never any reddish.

 

There have been issues concerning how my monitor displays images vis-a-vis the monitors of others. That said, I have viewed the Himeji images on several devices of different characteristics, and on none of them did the sky appear reddish to me; it tended more to cyan if anything. If it is of relevance, the pictures were shot on a rainy day when the light quality was different than on a sunny day. I tended to white balance on the building itself, figuring that was the most neutral target. Had I chosen the sky, there would have been less tint there.

 

I have seen a reddish aspect to light on images shot very late in the day. It is never as pronounced as in visible images; but you can see a bit of it in some of my Cisco, UT images. Some of the Kyoto images do show a slight pinkish tinge in the sky area, but this I believe is a consequence of what I chose as a white-balance standard.

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