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Apr 08 2013

Categories: episodic review
Tagged: photokano

12 Comments »

So. Much. Rage. If only I had an outlet for expressing how I feel… oh yeah…

I am at the age now where I don’t care that much about harem anime. They’re like Tony Hawk games to me at this point. I’ve seen enough to have seen it all. However, Photokano touched on my nerve a bit because I enjoy photography, and it felt like the show was doing a piss poor job of it. Look, either go for the semi-accurate angle like how Initial D approaches drifting or Drops of God approaches wine or go completely absurd like School Rumble and basketball or Code Geass and rebellions. But don’t half-ass it. And don’t make silly errors. I mean, I would imagine a decent portion of anime fans like photography, as evidenced by the plethora of SLR cameras I see at each con I go to. Try not to induce too much photography rage, please?

(This show got me because the protagonist slash loser male lead Kazuya gets a Canon 40D. The styling and the focus points are the same as the 40D. I used my 40D for six years before I jumped from Canon to Sony Nex. It is a camera I have fond memories of. But I rage because there’s semblance of photography in this show. It’s like The Taste and good food.)

(A 40D with kit lens is worth maybe $250 now. I cannot imagine getting one to be a life-changing event for a high school kid with average to above-average income parents in Japan. And this leads me to my real rage point…)

“How about taking a photo of me sometime?”

… THIS IS JAPAN! There are cameras everywhere! I would imagine at least half the class owning their own camera, whether it is a point-and-shoot, SLR, or cellphone camera. Judging by the various phones we see in this show, most of the look like HTC Ones or Galaxy IIIs. What kind of weird world is this that high school girls do not have cameras? If you’re going to make a harem anime about a photographer, why not set it in 1970s Japan when cameras weren’t as common? 2013? Everyone’s got a camera.

Also rage worthy? The first episode’s conflict is that Kazuya has to decide whether or not to join the photography club, which is a sausage-fest that specializes in taking creep shots, or join the photo club, which features hot haremettes taking trips to capture interesting photos. How is this a dilemma? On one hand, he could improve his photography, take some nice pictures, and maybe camp out with hot haremettes. On the other hand, he could get arrested and labeled a sex offender. It’s okay for anime to go the pervert route, but that works for comedies like Sora no Otoshimono… I’m not sure how well it works here. I mean, the guy doesn’t really need to join a club. He could just go around seducing the haremettes one-by-one a la Amagami (with the ending of each girl’s arc being that she lets him photography her, uh, brushing her teeth, if you know what I mean). Toss in some fanservice, and the show would at least be decent. The fact there’s a creep shot club muddling the plot. Well, I don’t have expectations for this show now.

(He could have said “no” to both clubs and joined the Volunteer Club instead.)

(Oh who am I kidding? I had a huge issue that the club wanted to teach Kazuya to be a “better” photographer, but I suspect they will just teach him how to do more creep shots. If this show was an Amagami-styled show mixed in with some real photography elements like aperture and ISO done in a way like Drops of God, this show would have potential. Instead, squander.)

What the hell? It’s obvious that Kazuya is using a basic kit lens, yet he manages to zoom in (at least a 300mm zoom from where he is standing with relation to Mai) and be able to instantly focus. He’s indoors! With no tripod! Come on anime. If you’re going to make a harem anime, at least get the photography to be semi-realistic. I already have to deal with the harem relationships being sci-fi material, I don’t need the photography elements to be just as absurd. How hard would it have been if he swapped his lens out for one of these beauties and kept the photo realism going?

“It’s not sneak photography!”

Wait, taking up skirt and down shirt photos aren’t sneak photography? Oh anime… you may actually be correct. I mean, paparazzi sneak photos of celebrities all the time, so what’s the harm of a horny teenaged boy snapping creep shots of nubile high school girls? Oh yeah. That.

(I imagine modern Japan awash in Dr. Pepper, as it is the hipster anime drink, much like how I see nothing but IPAs in San Francisco gastropubs. I just had a Dr. Pepper right before sitting down to write this post, but not because I particularly wanted to drink it. I had made crockpot pulled pork and had some Dr. Pepper leftover from it, so I decided to drink the remainder. Then again, maybe this is why Dr. Pepper is featured in anime: it’s a non-standard soda, the Ron Paul of sodas, and it is versatile enough to be used as part of slow cooked pulled pork.)

“It’s my camera now.”

I like how the sister’s name is “Kanon,” as Canon is very large camera company. However, I was disappointed that the rest of the haremettes weren’t Nikon-chan, Leica-tan, Fuji-nee, Panny-chan, and Sony-san.

The opening, Koisuru Lens, is terrible. The song tries to put photographic terms in the lyrics, and it doesn’t work very well. Even Soulja Boy wouldn’t touch these lyrics. Also, I get the feeling the show wants to promote the fact it has fanservice, but the opening was basically five seconds of terribly done CGI photos falling followed by a split second of a fanservice shot and repeat. Make up your mind. Give us fanservice or not, but don’t half-ass it. I guess in that respect, the opening does reflect the show. It doesn’t know what it wants to do, just tosses elements in just to have those elements. Oh look, gymnast girl! Tennis girl! Softball girl!

Madhouse’s animation is average with the animation being smooth but the character designs seem inconsistent.