The famous Cherry Blossoming is in full swing, in Japan an amazing sight. I’ve never experienced this in real life, though we do have lots of Cherry Blossom trees (Sakura in Japanese)  overhere, it is not uncommon to have a few nasty storms the moment the blossoming has started, thus making it a mere 3 days of enjoyable sight at the most.
Did you know Japan even has a special website, with the forecast and map on where you can go for best viewings? I didn’t, but now I know!

I’ve seen lots of Sakura, Cherry Blossoms, in Second Life the past years, and last night I visited Tatakai Tochi – a Japanese themed sim owned by Regina Mills (Heatherfury) and designed by Shen, hoping for some pink and white goodness.

Beautifully landscaped and decorated this place is a joy to explore and visitors are encouraged to take pictures and share those in the Tatakai Tochi Flickr Group. Best part for me was: the Cherry Blossoms. Not the usual static trees, no…..on Tatakai Tochi you experience the real Sakura with moving trees and petals and flowers whirling in the wind. Mesmerizing. Fantastic!

And impossible to catch on a photo!

So I decided to make a video and capture it. Now, I have been doing some machinima lately and I like making them – yet I am still a beginner and I love to look at what others do, so I learn and improve. One of the videos I admire and love are the ‘moving postcards’ by Huckleberry Hax, and I got totally inspired by his way of capturing locations.
Instead of keep moving my mouse all over the place, which I usually do, I just positioned my camera and recorded the trees and petals. I had to sit on my hands and let the trees do the work!

I am pretty happy with this end result, and thank you Huckleberry for being my inspiration and teacher (even if you may not have known you were)!