Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Green Tea

Here, Doc caught me shooting Green Tea fields. Awhile back someone did an article with photos on the tea workers in China. Then a few months later, I saw another photographer do a piece on the tea in Korea; really beautiful photography.

Well, I happen to have a sister-in-law who has a job working with the green tea, right here in Okinawa. So, I decided, that's what I'm going to do; a whole year's worth of shooting tea. Not just the plants, I want to get the whole story, from the care and feeding, cultivating, harvesting, processing, curing, packaging, advertising, drying, whatever else they do to get your tea from the fields to the cup on your kitchen table. That's my plan.

This kind of story and photography, you can't just do overnight. It's more like one of those things that could take years. Little bit at a time, shoot baby tea plants, come back a month later and check on their progress. Get the stages of growth. Shoot under different lighting conditions. Catch sunrise and sunsets over the tea fields, people cultivating the plants, harvesting the tea and finding out what they do with it afterwards. Maybe get some photos of the people actually doing the stuff, give a helping hand, eat what they eat for lunch and find out what they drink at night. That's how you get the whole story; just a little bit at a time.

Well, I had this shot of me taken in June of 2008 and I'm still working on my tea story. I've only been out to the tea fields five or six times and still haven't caught the sunrise or sunset, but I will. I'll catch them in the perfect light, catch the sun, the ocean and the blue skies. Maybe even get some shots during a typhoon. I want my story to be better than the other people's tea field stories. I want the owner of the tea fields to order a 4X6 foot wall mural from me when he sees my best shot. He already ordered one from me and I haven't even shot it yet !

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

From Sabina:

I would love to read a series that you write and photograph on green tea, Mike! I drink it all day every day. I didn't know green tea leaves grew in Japan. I wanna come!

Anonymous said...

Mike, read your blog. Your dedication is worthy of applause. Well, if you need some more beautiful tea estates do come to India and Sri Lanka !! Sumitran

RyukyuMike said...

Sabina and Sumitran, THAT WAS QUICK !
Never realised/realized how fast word got around the world, until I started using Stumble and Ping ! Thanks for lookin' and commentin'.

Cheers,
Mike

Mr. Green Tea said...

I like your gallery. Good job, Mike. I usually drink a green tea and I like a hot more than cool one.

RyukyuMike said...

Mr. Green Tea,
Thanks for the read and comments. Hafta see if I can find you on that Tweet thingy.

Cheers,
Mike

shantiwallah said...

Great idea! But then I am a complete tea addict. Can't wait to see it in print.
-Marie (Threespoons from Matador)

RyukyuMike said...

Threespoons,
Never would've guessed! It'll be awhile before this piece goes to print. How about aftyer all the shooting's done, you be the author?
Thanks for dropping in and keep coming back.

Cheers,
Mike

Tea Oakville said...

This just made my day much brighter. Thanks a lot. Something else I across was this http://www.languageoftheleaf.com .Take a look!

RyukyuMike said...

Why, I enjoyed the site you have so much, I Tweet'd/Stumbl'd and Facebook'd ya to 10 million friends !

Cheers,
Mike