This is a link of her hometown Web page: www.city.fujiyoshida.yamanashi.jp

Toyama finds photographic inspiration from Robert Capa’s work, a famous war photographer:

www.bibl.u-szeged.hu/

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Student exposes personality from photos

Yasko Toyama self portrait

Today many students e-mail or call friends on their cell phones to start a conversation. University of Wisconsin Eau Claire Senior Yasko Toyama, however, communicates with strangers through her camera.

“I photograph unknown people just because their faces are wonderful,” she said.

Toyama started photographing her friends in the bands The Embellishment and Jimmy’s Comet at studio and live performances. A keyboard player for both bands convinced her that she should learn the technical aspects of music so she could write captions for the photos she took. The first band put her photos on its Web site, and the other added her photos to its promotional letters.

She borrowed a Nikon FM2 from a Japanese friend and used it in her photography classes at the journalism and art departments. She said, “Artistic photography doesn’t need an explanation” whereas journalism photography carries the message of the story.

She hopes to get her start at home in Yamanashi, Japan, which is 66 miles west of Tokyo, because it is a small community and she won’t have to worry about daily deadlines. Toyama described deadlines as a strain on her concentration, preventing her from writing a good story. She prefers the weekly or biweekly structure of most community newspapers in Japan. Another disadvantage of deadlines is the fact that the writing can always be improved after publication.

“The deadline doesn’t mean the end,” she said.

For the first time in her life, Toyama may write articles about college life and her viewpoints of the United States for Fujigoko TV’s Web site. The submission plans are being discussed, but she’ll probably translate Japanese articles for the station’s English-speaking audience and submit articles.

News reporting isn’t always a paid position in Japan. Some writers have two jobs, a part-time reporting job and a full-time career. Toyama said she doesn’t expect a paycheck from her current employer but enjoys the experience of writing for a television station. However, she expects to be paid when she writes for a community newspaper.

Her roommate loves speaking Japanese, eating sushi, and photographing strange people as much as Toyama. She and Senior Becky Ouimette fight like other friends do but make up afterwards. Ouimette is one of many interesting persons Toyama has photographed because she is so immersed in Japanese culture that “it’s almost like a friend in Japan,” she said.

Toyama enjoys randomly photographing groups of people on the street that she finds interesting. She said older people have more of a story to tell because their facial features are more profound than younger generations. Toyama said photography helps her catch “‘the moment,’ one facial expression that shows the person's life, personality or feeling.”