Fiz-iks was invited by Kevin Meredith to contribute two chapters to his new book. We wrote a chapter on light painting and one on star trails. The chapter on light painting covers tools and techniques providing lots of ideas for light painters of all levels. The chapter on star trails covers film and digital and location lighting. The book itself is great quality and is packed with information and most importantly ideas. It covers 52 techniques which provide new ideas every week for a year.

It is available through amazon.com and through amazon.co.uk for a reasonable price.

Here is a short film we made recently. It was filmed in about 90 minutes at a temple in the mountains of Japan. All footage was shot on Canon 5Dm2’s with a variety of lenses. Check out Phill as he embarks on a spiritual and physical journey to fulfill his quest of being the best. Can he make it through the training or does he break….??

HMB style mag chooses a “creator” to feature and collaborate with and Fiz-iks was lucky enough to be chosen as the “creator” for the May issue due out on the 17th of April. The project started with us drawing out some t-shirt design in light at the five graphics studio where HMB is produced. There is more info on that night here. The following week the tees were printed. I always wondered what light would look like when slapped on a shirt and to my surprise it looked amazing. We then wore these t-shirts for the cover shoot and following promotional photos to go with our spread in the mag. The cover shoot was done at the studio with the promotional shots done at one of our favorite locations.

Below are a few photos from the shoot at the studio. Koji Ishii was behind the cam working his usual magic.

Photo credit: Koji Ishii

After the shoot at the studio was wrapped up we moved out to one of our favorite locations. We set up shop and went to work on a exclusive shot for the mag and doing a few promotional shots. The art direction for this shot was provided by the staff at five graphics.

Photo credit: Koji Ishii

Photo credit: Koji Ishii

Koji Ishii and his assistant could not resist having their portraits done!

The mag hit the shops on the 17th of April. We want to thank HMB for featuring us. It was great that they went the extra step and invited to collaborate with them. We look forward to working with them again in the future.

HMB magazine has chosen to feature us for the April issue. For each issue they make special t-shirts which are then worn by the artists they feature for a photo shoot. These photos are then printed in the magazine. For this issue they asked us to collaborate on the t-shirt design. We wrote the letters that will appear on the shirts with light. When the shirts are printed we will wear them for a promotional shoot to accompany the article on us.

The above photo was taken by Koji Ishii of five graphics which produces the HMB. It was taken at the five graphics studio where we did the shooting for the tee designs.

More news to come as we only wrapped up the shooting for the t-shirt designs. Come back in early April for the promotional shots and more news on the HMB feature.

In the fall of 2009 Fiz-iks was visited by Matt Crawford who is currently making a documentary film about light painting. He filmed with us for an exhausting ten days. With his trip planned at the last minute, we had to scramble to get a plan together for shooting. Being it was for a movie, we wanted to do something special. Nobody is interested in seeing people take pictures but rather the story behind those pictures and the people involved. We knew we could drag him out to the usual spots for the usual pictures as that would not be good footage. From the beginning it was about providing him good footage.

There was an old abandoned school about an hour into the mountains that we knew about. It was a strange location for a school as there were no houses within walking distance. It was almost as if an old school had fallen from the sky and landed in the middle of the forest. We tracked down a contact and dialed it up. We explained that we were interested in shooting there and he agreed to meet up and talk about it.

The next day we headed up to the school for a meeting. The chairman of the volunteer group took us on a tour of the small school and shared its history. He showed us old photos of the school that included him as a young boy. He explained that immediately after World War ll there was absolutely nothing left in Okayama City. Even if you had money there was no food to buy. His family and a small group of others moved to mountains to escape the mess that was left in the city. They grew their own food and built their own houses. Lacking a school, this small group went to work and started to build this school. After years of building and 10 years of operation the government recognized it as an official school and provided funding which allowed them to finally finish construction. The school operated until 1999 with a final student population of four children with 3 of those being siblings. After the history lesson we showed a few light painting pictures he handed us the keys on the spot. This is another facet to magic this art has. The amazing thing was Luminary was there and got all of this amazing meeting and the following shoot on film.

The following shots below are a few shots we got from the school. Most of the “good” shots have been saved for the movie.

Today’s lesson

Kids in the hall

School’s out.

For more pictures and information on this shoot stay tuned for Luminary due out in 2010.

In the fall of 2009 Japanese television station, OHK, featured us on their 6 o’clock news program. Our story ran for 6 and a half minutes during their popular Super News program. The filming for the segment covered 2 days. The first shoot was a night shoot where we did a demonstration of many of the techniques and tools we use. The shoot included a light painting portrait of the news anchorman. The second shoot was during the set up for the exhibition we did in the fall at MaiMai.

Construction on the temple began before World War ll and took over 30 years to complete. It was built by Reverend Kosanji Koso out of gratitude for his deceased mother. It is a massive complex that includes several different styles of architecture and even includes a very modern and very large marble mountain of a park.

The images shown here are illuminated by hand with a 500 lumen torch and served as test images of the location lighting for the final shots with the visible light sources. Those images can be found in the gallery.

If you ever make to Hiroshima we highly recommend a visit to Kousanji Temple.

The chapter on light painting offers a basic how-to and then details some tools and ideas on how to use them. The chapter on capturing star trails covers three different methods including film, single exposures, and stacking. Both chapters also offers advice for location and foreground lighting. It is bound to have something for everyone and would make a great gift so check it out!.