Taipei on film

join me for the last city of my three city asia tour: taipei. i have my leica and harman phoenix film on me during the day and into the night.

For the final leg of my week long trip to Asia we end up in Taipei (flying in from Seoul). We had 2 nights in Taipei flying back at five to midnight on the Friday on a direct flight to Munich.

For this last blog post I used 1 roll of Harman Phoenix 200, which I have had interesting results with on my previous usage in Tokyo. I used the final shots in blue hour and then at nighttime and was impressed by the results, although I have been told that using this film at night pushes the boundary of film, and I would tend to agree. Mind you that goes for any relatively low ISO film I guess. Still, live dangerously and all that…

I love this shot, there is something very calming about observing people go along with their day to day business. Also I noticed in Taipei and Tokyo (Seoul less so) a lot of people walk around with umbrellas in the strong sunshine, makes a lot of sense to me actually.

I love the vibe of this shot and it came out very different than I expected. This will had reddish tones in the bright sunlight, which I think can make for quite interesting shots.

Really cool design seen from my hotel room.

It is a pity part of this image is so dark, I really like the composition. This film does act strangely sometimes, although I guess that is part of the fun of film: you never know what you’re gonna get!

I like this shot, it is a pity you cannot see the lady in the bus at the back as she was staring at me and I thought it worked well with the ad on the front of the bus.

Leaving Taichung by train. This is Taiwan’s second largest city.

I really like the colouring in these vertical shots.

Blue hour in downtown Taiwan. I think this works well looking into the sunset area but not the other way (e.g. below).

I love the feeling of this shot. That is Taipei 101 in the background.

I used a railing as a tripod for these shots and really happy with how them came out, in particular the one on the right. Although this low ISO film really renders anything in the shadows into a black infinity - but it makes for a cool effect of bright lights.

Taipei 101. A 101 storey and 508m high tower that let me tell you is IMPRESSIVE. You can see it from most places in the city and the architecture is sublime. It was once the world’s tallest building until the Burj Khalifa came along. What is not sublime is my poor effort of blue hour/night time shots. But to my defense these were shot handheld and actually I am surprised they are quite sharp in focus.

Overall observations

I really enjoyed Taipei and would love to go back. It is very grungy in places with lots of street markets and bustling streets but then many places surrounded by lots of modern buildings and large boulevards around.

I enjoyed an early morning run one of the mornings and was commenting how the skyline (shot on my iPhone) reminded me of a distinct composition in Frankfurt - case in point below.