On Saturday the 6th of June, I had the pleasure of attending a party to mark the opening of Tokyo based photographer, Jon Sheer’s exhibition, Eternal Japan.
Twilight In The Sprawl (on the Eternal Japan Exhibition Flyer)
Having communicated with Jon for many months via Flickr and the odd phone conversation, it was great to finally meet him. I love Jon’s work and was expecting great images, but I have to say that seeing his work in 13×19″ prints on the wall far surpassed my expectations. It was an experience that I won’t forget in a hurry. The Guinness was pretty damn good too!
Martin with Jon Sheer
Exhibition Dates & Location
If you can get to Tokyo before the 29th of June, 2009, you have to make your way to the Grail Bar, in Nishi–Azabu. It’s a small British bar, and not open during the day. They’re open from 6:00pm to 5:00am Monday to Saturday, and closed Sundays. Here’s the address etc.
Grail Bar
Azabu-Empire Mansion 2F
4-11-28 Nishi-Azabu, Minato-ku,
Tokyo 106-0031
TEL/FAX 03-3499-6366
Website: www.grailbar.com
e-mail: info@grailbar.com
The Art
All of the images in the exhibition are HDR (High Dynamic Range) images. Jon is a master of HDR. Some of them have a bit of an HDR look, but none of them are overdone and gaudy. He uses very subtle tones that even when you can tell they’re HDR only serve to add to the image.
Jon was also kind enough to send me three images to share here to give you a taste of what can be seen at Eternal Japan Exhibition. Just look at these!
Oracle Of The Subconcious
Alley Of Broken Dreams
Temple of Haunted Nightmares: Ghosts of the Storm
Truly wonderful work!
Thanks for the invite Jon! I had a great night, and it was great to see your art “in the flesh” and to finally meet you!
Jon on the Web
A wonderful selection of Jon’s work can be seen on his BLUECANVAS site.
You can also find Jon under the guise of “JRaptor” on Flickr. His Photostream really is something else, so do check it out.
Interview Podcast
Following the Exhibition, Jon agreed to record an interview with me for the Martin Bailey Photography Podcast. You can listen to Episode #194 in iTunes, or download the audio files from my Podcasts page. Do take a listen to this gem-filled conversation with an amazingly talented artist.
Show-notes
Grab a demo of Lightzone, the image processing software that Jon mentions here: http://www.lightcrafts.com/lightzone/ [no longer live]
A wonderful selection of Jon’s work can be seen on his BLUECANVAS site: [Removed invalid link]
You can also find Jon under the guise of JRaptor on Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jraptor/
This episode is sponsored by WebSpy, the Internet Monitoring, Analysis & Reporting Specialists.
Here are the details of the photography assignment prizes that WebSpy has kindly sponsored too: https://martinbaileyphotography.com/2009/06/09/competition-prizes/
The music in this episode is from the PodShow Podsafe Music Network at http://music.podshow.com/
Excellent interview … Truly amazing HDR photography..
Jon – Your work at http://www.bluecanvas.com/jraptor/ is AWESOME !!!
KUDOS to both Martin and Jon !!!
Thanks for the vote of confidence Ade, and great to see you here at the blog! Thanks for dropping by mate! 😀
Thanks guys, much appreciated! While (alas) the Eternal Japan exhibit is scheduled to wrap up this weekend (;_;), I am most pleased to announce that hot on its heels I will be having another one starting at the end of August and going until the middle of October at the massive NOS (http://www.nos-ebisu.net/top.html) in Ebisu!
While the exact theme hasn’t been decided yet, the fantastic people at Taiyo Printing have been generous enough to apply my images on 5mm-thick transparent backlit acrylic plates that will measure 1.5m x 2m in size using their proprietary “barrier dot” stochastic printing process. While unfortunately I don’t have any examples of the technology that I can share with you on the Web (yet), I can tell you that I have NEVER seen pictures with the color, clarity, and sense of depth that this process provides–it’s simply jaw-dropping. Combined with the backlighting, it honestly makes the photos look almost like 3-D holograms! I am so excited I can hardly contain myself–I hope you all will have the opportunity to come down and see them for yourselves, it really will be something else!
Cheers!
Jon
Wow! That is simply too cool Jon. Congratulations!
I will most certainly be coming along to the NOS to see this. Keep us posted on dates as they become available.
I’m totally thrilled for you! 🙂
Thank you for every other informative site. Where else may just I am getting that type of information written in such an ideal method? I’ve a project that I am simply now operating on, and I’ve been on the look out for such info.
Listening in 2013 😀