Places

Seven cities — Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka, Nara, Nikko, Hiroshima and Kanazawa; the island of Miyajima; four regions people travel out to — Hakone, Mt Fuji and Lake Kawaguchi, Hokkaido and Okinawa; and seven districts of Tokyo and Kyoto with pages of their own.

Tokyo and Kyoto are split because their districts are different shoots, not different backdrops for the same one. Asakusa works at 7 a.m., before Senso-ji’s Nakamise street fills; Shibuya and Shinjuku work after dark; Fushimi Inari’s gates are only empty before about 8; Gion’s private lanes are off limits to cameras since 2024, so the shoot there is planned on its public streets. One page per city would have to say all of that at once.

What each page carries is what a visiting photographer would not know: when the light comes and from where, when the cherry blossom and maples usually peak, whether the shrines and temples allow a shoot or a tripod, where a drone may fly at all, and how long the trip is — Kawaguchiko is about two hours from Shinjuku by highway bus, Miyajima a ten-minute ferry from Miyajimaguchi.

Every place is covered by a photographer who works there, and travel within the place you booked is included in the price.