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Description
I am a student of a traditional Japanese martial art called iaido (ee-eye-doh). This martial art is the study of Japanese swordsmanship, and I use an alloy reproduction of the samurai's katana in my classes.

(There are two basic Japanese sword arts. Very simply, kendo deals with fencing and sparring against real opponents, and iaido deals with drawing the sword and cutting down imaginary opponents. Kendo perfects your tactics; iaido perfects your form.)

This image in its original form is about 18 megapixels. I combined 11 shots to capture the fine details from tip to butt. Even the "large" version here is only 3000 pixels wide.

The phrase "tate ita ni mizu" 立板に水 is a Japanese idiom, "like water flowing down a post." It refers to fluidity or fluency.

The background is a modern Japanese weave in black silk, produced for use in making fancy kimono belts. The black silk is spread over a white board to allow the open weave pattern to show through. I'll be making a sword bag out of this fabric.

Description
I am a student of a traditional Japanese martial art called iaido (ee-eye-doh). This martial art is the study of Japanese swordsmanship, and I use an alloy reproduction of the samurai's katana in my classes.

(There are two basic Japanese sword arts. Very simply, kendo deals with fencing and sparring against real opponents, and iaido deals with drawing the sword and cutting down imaginary opponents. Kendo perfects your tactics; iaido perfects your form.)

This image in its original form is about 18 megapixels. I combined 11 shots to capture the fine details from tip to butt. Even the "large" version here is only 3000 pixels wide.

The phrase "tate ita ni mizu" 立板に水 is a Japanese idiom, "like water flowing down a post." It refers to fluidity or fluency.

The background is a modern Japanese weave in black silk, produced for use in making fancy kimono belts. The black silk is spread over a white board to allow the open weave pattern to show through. I'll be making a sword bag out of this fabric.