Shopping and Cowboys. Way to go!

1st August.

Forgot to mention on the way back from the Dinosaurs and mabodofu, I dropped by Yodobashi camera and made the purchase to replace my humble camera.  Sure, I only mentioned the failings of my camera yesterday but I have been aware of these issues before, so I have been looking into new cameras and decided upon one.  So today’s adventures are full of photos with my new camera.  Huzzah!  It has a heap of different photo shooting filters, one of which I am very happy about and a slow motion video option!  Niiiice.  More on my new camera later.

Um, so today was my day to myself until the afternoon, so I headed out to check out Toys R Us as I usually do, hopefully to make me think that Toys R Us is actually a decent toy store somewhere.  I also ventured out to a family restaurant that was ALWAYS packed whenever we walked by.  A good sign of decent food surely?


So since I was primarily on the hunt for some Transformer Prime Jet Vehicons, which had just been released, I made a bee line on the bus to my local Toys R Us.  There weren’t many people in the store and since I wanted to get a bit used to my new camera before a big adventure later, I went a bit snap happy!

OOh, Look at that display, Masterpiece Rodimus and Starscream.  Hmm, not particularly cheap prices there though.  Not all that surprised.  The rest was the Transformers aisle, still full of Movie toys!  Actually it even looks like there is more space devoted to the movie toys than the new Prime toys…  Especially considering how a fair whack of the Prime shelf is taken up by the TV playing ads and a display with the TRU exclusive Optimus with a shield thing.

And finally I found an end cap of some more.  have a look a that last picture though…  Full of Bloody Bumblebees!!!!  Optimus down below and the Voyager Megatron sitting up top.  Once again, you can see how Transformers is not all that huge in Japan.  Only half an aisle, with the other half being taken up by Power Rangers.  Actually less than half, as the other side is taken up with random figures and the like.  Admittedly premium figures that command a large price, but hmm, poor little Transformers in Japan.

Compare that for example with the Gundam aisle.


A full aisle..  Actually a bit disappointing…  I thought TRU would have a little bit more to it to be honest…  I mean they are a toy store, in Japan of all places and it just felt like an Australian TRU.  Disappointing.

So with my Skywarp and two Jet Vehicons in bag, I felt unsastified.  My search for Airachnid had still been for naught.  I headed off to Yokohama and Yodobashi Camera to be my toy saviour.  And perhaps a trip to Yokohama TRU in the hope that the first one I went to was just a little one. 

A bit pressed for time though, I hit Yodobashi Camera first and to be honest their toy section was much more exciting than TRU!  Check out Yodobashi’s Gundam section!!



Hoooooolllllyyyyyyy!



Mmm, sexy.  Anyway, once again my search for Airachnid was no good.  I decided that my feet were aching a little bit too much…  And so thought about getting some sweet sweet coffee.

I left Yodobashii and thoughts of TRU Yokohama behind (time was running short) and sourced a place for coffee and cake.  Mmm, cake.

So being all excited with my new camera, here is a shot of…

Coffee and cake, with the very cool ‘miniature mode’ where it blurs the image so that it looks like a toy photo, although it doesn’t quite work so well on cake and coffee.

Have a look at the large version of the pictures for best effect.

After consuming the yummy yummy cake and coffee I headed back home, as we were going out to lunch.  Ha ha ha! And I wonder why I put on 2 kilos while I was over there…

A short walk to the restaurant yielded photo opportunities!


Testing out the close up options of the camera, it’s a shell of a Japanese Semi (cicada).  These things are HUGE and this was the first close up look I had to one.  Even though it’s just a shell…





Some random street shots in the miniature model mode.  Oooo it’s sexy!!

That last one is pretty good in producing the effect!

Hmm, once again, I think that last one is the best!!

It seems to work best when you have a bit in the foreground, one subject in the middle and a little in the background.

And so we made it to our place of lunch.

Cowboy Kazoku!  (Kazoku means family)


Mmm, mm.  Cheesy menu adventures ahoy!

Don’t think it isn't cheesy?  Checkout this sign…

Ha ha ha! Gold.

Inside the food was a selection of steaks and Japanese style hamburgers and a salad bar.  It was actually pretty darn cheap (the figures escape me right now) but I was very surprised.  Desert was included in the salad bar as well.

Melon flavoured drink (tasted a bit like lime to me), salad selection, my sizzling steak and JELLY!  OH YEAH!  The steak was pretty nice, with mushrooms and sauce, but it was very salty.

After filling up we made our way home.  More photo ops, but less, as it was kind of hot now and I had been pretty busy all day.

Oooh Look!  It’s a live semi!  It even piped up and made a lot of noise!  Large and kind of ugly to be honest, but there you go.

So we made it home and plonked on the couch.  Until night as there were fireworks planned for Landmark tower are later in the night.  we headed up to a hill to see if we could see, which gave me the opportunity to test out the dark capabilities of my camera!


Which aren’t too bad considering how I didn’t have a tripod and that was a no-flash photo!  Huzzah!.

Next up, night shots, no flash and the 35x zoom lens it has.

The northern hemisphere moon.  Using the lens zoom up to 35x and the digital as well I think.  I can’t remember how much the digital zoom cranks it to, but it was pretty impressive.  Once again, no tripod, set on the low light photo option,  or possibly landscape option with the focus set on infinite.  Pretty damn good.  Click on the image for the full size version and zoom in to see some surprising detail on that moon!  I was shocked when I actually had a good look on the computer!!

Yep, I like my new camera all right!!