Can Japan do no wrong? From epic television serials, all the way down to Shampoo commercials. Watch the Japanese get it right, as Kazuto Nakazawa get's it done the right way.


(Animated ad for Kao Corporation's Asience shampoo created by Production I.G
featuring music by Ryuichi Sakamoto.)

Inspired by XVIII century Japanese paintings, he gives the public a work of art disguised as a hair care commercial. The story concept, focusing on woman's hair as metaphor of feminine life, is portrayed as a tragic love story in a samurai drama fashion, and we couldn't ask for more. Keep'em coming this way Japan, maybe America's haircare market will eventually catch on.

O.K. I never brought this up when I bought my 28-70 2.8 sigma lens from Norman, but until I actually filled out my warranty info for sigma I had no reason to...
A little more than a month ago I had an issue with my lenses: They were stolen. When something like this happens sans insurance you get a really sick feeling in your stomach knowing that you won't be able to get your daily fix of photography until you buy a new one. Normally if I was going to buy a lens I would scour Craigslist, Amazon, or KEH/BnH to find something new, being that I had to shoot my wife's cousins senior photos in the U.P. the next weekend I was under limited options. Enter Norman Camera...

I went to Norman's looking for a new lens and the first trip there resulted in a 17-50 2.8 lens which I was told was going to cost 137? It seemed to good to be true, but if the salesman wanted to sell it to me at that cost, who was I to argue. When I jumped at the deal, he decided to go in the back and see if they had the Nikon mount. He came up to the counter empty handed and told me it would take a week to order it (personally I think he just realized his mistake on pricing). I told him I was going to hold off, and I went searching around for a lens elsewhere with no such luck.

A couple days later I decided to bite the bullet and spend a little more money than I had originally wanted to spend. I decided to land on the 28-70 2.8 sigma. Now I know that in the realm of photography 379 plus tax isn't a whole lot of money for a lens, but out in the real world when I'm not making money off of my photography (yet, hopefully someday?) 379 makes my month a whole lot easier. So I think I was entitled to not be badgered by my salesman.

He spent close to ten minutes trying to talk me into the extra 3 year warranty coverage they have, he told me that it would be more important than having a filter to cover the glass, and he basically worked as hard as he could to try to make me feel like a complete ass for not getting it. I'm in no way exaggerating when I say that he would have been physically pushing me if the counter wasn't blocking his way. I left there happy to be able to take photos, yet angry that someone would treat a customer that way.

This all came to a head 2 nights ago when I got online to register my glass and found out that I receive an extra 3 years warranty protection when I register online, bringing my total coverage to 4 years (one year more than the 3 year plan he tried to sell me).

I'm normally not the kind of person that vents on the net, but besides getting out my frustration, I want people to make sure and register their lenses online, and not to pay more money for less coverage Unless in the long run you feel spending that extra $50 on coverage that won't get you any more than what your already getting.