NIKON Z 8 (26mm, f/2.8, 1/60 sec, ISO64)
After dinner it was time for a first dose of Yodobashi.
I think I have mentioned Yodobashi Camera on my blog a couple of times. In case you missed it just type Yodobashi in the search box in the right corner. In short: it is the biggest electronic store on the planet. No matter if you look for a new camera, audio gear or a watch you will find it here. My wife was impressed but also very tired. I guess it was a long first day, a day that actually started yesterday. Because our hotel is located in the same building complex she simply went upstairs to go to sleep. I had to stay just a little bit longer.
NIKON Z 8 (26mm, f/4, 1/100 sec, ISO900)
NIKON Z 8 (26mm, f/4, 1/100 sec, ISO1600)
NIKON Z 8 (26mm, f/4, 1/100 sec, ISO1250)
First I walked through the audio department which always takes me back to the days when Hifi stereo was big and sold in big electronic stores that also sold TVs, washing machines or fridges. Audio gear was presented differently back then. Rooms were filled with speakers and walls of amplifiers. All connected with switch boxes so that you could easily try every amplifier with every speaker in the room.
Today Hifi stereo is no longer main stream and is now sold in dedicated Hifi stores. Those look more like living rooms with only a couple of items on display. Amplifiers and speakers will be moved in and demonstrated to you. Sounds exclusive and it is. You can try gear at home which is great of course but I still miss those walls of gear.
In the old days those amplifiers and speakers were rather inexpensive. Today stereo gear has become exclusive and one item can cost thousands of dollars. Yodobashi has many walls filled with gear and many rooms filled with more exclusive items, i.e. there is a room that has a top stereo from Luxman that contains their top SACD player, the smaller SACD player, their new streamer and their new DAC plus their pre- and stereo amplifier hooked on a Focal Sopra Nr. 3. Nice!
Luxman, Esoteric, McIntosh, … The inventory in the audio sector must be worth millions of dollars. It is crazy. But there is cheap and funky stuff too like those sound burgers in the picture below. A kind of turntable walkman with Bluetooth.
NIKON Z 8 (26mm, f/4, 1/100 sec, ISO200)
NIKON Z 8 (26mm, f/4, 1/100 sec, ISO640)
NIKON Z 8 (26mm, f/4, 1/100 sec, ISO500)
I also went through the watch department to check out the new Seiko Astro series. There are all kind of watches of course not just Japanese. You can get everything here from a cheap plastic Casio to a watch from Omega or Rolex. This store is just amazing. It is better equipped than most dedicated hifi or watch stores even though that’s not really their main business.
It’s cameras! It’s in their name and that’s what they are famous for. And in the camera department it is simple: every current camera, lens, camera bag, tripod or accessory is on display. No matter if you fancy a Hasselblad or a Nikon Z 58mm 0,95 S Noct it is on stock. And you can play with everything. In their Tokyo store I tried out the Z 50mm F1.2 S, the Z 135 F 1.8 S Plena, the Z 35 F 1.4 S and the 90mm Macro, the 50-400 and the 35-150(2-2.8 from Tamron on my camera.
But on my first visit I just had a quick look at the Zfs on display. Of course all colours are available. I would still go with the black version even though the grey and the red ones look really good too.
NIKON Z 8 (26mm, f/4, 1/100 sec, ISO360)
NIKON Z 8 (26mm, f/2.8, 1/100 sec, ISO200)
NIKON Z 8 (26mm, f/2.8, 1/100 sec, ISO90)
Pepper was also there but I had the feeling that it is less popular now. I haven’t seen many Peppers where I traveled. They are not as helpful for tourists as you might think because the ones I encountered didn’t speak english at all. They are still nice to look at.
And of all a sudden I got very tired too. I slept on the plane but apparently not long enough. I went back to my hotel room and went straight to bed. What a first day!
NIKON Z 8 (26mm, f/4, 1/100 sec, ISO2200)
NIKON Z 8 (26mm, f/2.8, 1/100 sec, ISO7200)
NIKON Z 8 (26mm, f/4, 1/100 sec, ISO4500)
The hotel is excellent and so were the beds. Very comfortable but I would have managed to sleep on a rock. That’s how tired I was. But it is a beautiful new day, the weather is great and we are full of energy.
On the way to our train I took this picture of Yodobashi Umeda from the other side of the street. Our hotel sticks out right behind the Yodobashi sign. Yodobashi has 12 floors, our hotel 35. Time to explore Kyoto!
NIKON Z 8 (20mm, f/8, 1/250 sec, ISO200)