Incoming: Golden Week Kyusha Festival

When I heard about the Golden Week Kyusha Festival, the concept — a California Bay Area show featuring only old school Japanese cars — rang a bell. I hit up my friend Kiavash Shariloo from TD Garage in Berkeley and, sure enough, he was hosting the show with help from a handful of friends.

The idea to hold this show in the Bay Area was something Kia had talked to me about two or three years back, but each time he tried to get it off the ground the logistics of finding a space to host it didn’t quite pan out, so the plans were postponed.

A show of this type isn’t exactly new, but in the Bay Area a large-scale event dedicated to classic Japanese cars hasn’t had any traction in recent years. And as I’m sure anyone who’s planned a show will know, there’s a colossal number of moving pieces that all need to come together to make it happen.

But last weekend it happened.

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Attendees from as far as Utah and Southern California made the trek out to the show, bringing all manner of interesting builds and restorations. Sara will be back soon with our main coverage, and I’ll have a number of spotlights from the Golden Week Kyusha Festival in the coming days and weeks.

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I also shot a couple rolls of film at the show: Kodak Ektachrome 100 — a gift from my good friend John Jack Cirone — and a roll of Cinestill 800 Tungsten. I also finished off a bit of Portra 400 here as well, so I’ll have a couple 35mm galleries on the way.

After quickly scrolling through the digital shots from the weekend, I absolutely cannot wait to get my scans back from Bay Photo Lab in Soquel, California.

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Kia selected the Craneway Pavilion in Richmond as the venue for the event, and it has to be one of the best places — if not the best — that I’ve ever photographed a car show. The light was fantastic, and the atmosphere was simply awesome with the San Francisco skyline fading into the fog across the Bay.

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While I’m excited to see the results of my analog efforts at this show, I have to admit I’m a little bit anxious about how they will turn out. As I was shooting I felt like I was making a lot of mistakes, not focusing quite hard enough on the extremely dynamic conditions on the show floor.

The experience has given me a new level of respect for old school film shooters whose livelihoods depended on the somewhat mysterious outcome of a weekend’s work. At the same time, shooting the event has further renewed my enthusiasm for car shows and Japanese classics alike. As for the latter, I didn’t think I could become more enthused, but here we are.

Check back soon.

Trevor Yale Ryan
trevor@speedhunters.com
Instagram: tyrphoto
TYRphoto.com

Additional Photos by Sara Ryan
Instagram: pockowokosara

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1

These photos are useless

2
thathellastockusdm3rdgenyaris@instagram

the uh venue might of been crowded, lots of times i shoot and have to edit people out of the shot and at crowded places like car shows its next to impossible to take photos.

3

I went early to avoid this, I just haven't had time to properly go through all the photos since I had to drive 12 hours home. For those looking forward to coverage from the event I wanted to let them know what was in store since I'll have a series of short stories coming. If Jerry can't tell what kind of show it was based on this that's okay with me haha

4

Trevor if you need any back story info on the Supra with the 2jzgte swap let me know. That's mine ;)

5
thathellastockusdm3rdgenyaris

eh, stuff happens ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

6

As is your comment.

7

Yeah I agree Jerry. I appreciate the fancy photographer photos guys on here can take but just once it'd be nice to have a feature with some simple point and shoot photography showing whole car and engine etc in each frame.

8
Paddy McGrath

It's a preview, chill.

9

Passive aggressive much?

Stop putting the artsy-fartsy before everything else. There's literally no need for most of these pics if that weren't the case. Does there need to be a blurry, over dark pic of 3/4s of a rear window or some dude taking a picture? I love most of the articles but man this place is the dude version of hey-look-i-took-a-closeup-pic-of-a-leaf-in-sepia-and-now-im-an-artist pinterest bs

10
Paddy McGrath

There's so much more to a show than just shooting front three-quarters of all the cars present. We've always taken great pride in our photography where we try to capture the mood and atmosphere of any particular event. We attend so many, that it's important to present the differences between them all. Otherwise, they all just blur into one.

I'm sure there are Facebook or Instagram pages which might cater for what you need, but I wouldn't expect to see a gallery along the lines of what you're looking for any time soon around here.

11

You do you.

12

Even if it was a full feature it'd be littered with shots of rear guards or some dude's hat. I am 'chill', simply stated my opinion. As I said; appreciate your guy's skill behind the lens just be nice to see the whole of each car in more shots or an overall engine bay that's not at some artsy angle that misses half of it. Wasn't aimed at this 'preview' either. Was talking of the features in general.

13

is there any way to ever find out when these sort of events are popping up, such as through a facebook group or something? i'm always kinda pissed I never really get to attend these cool events because I never hear about them until they're posted on some place like here or super street.

14

Terry IG is pretty much your friend. It was highly advertised but it was among the JNC crowd and a few other outlets. What I found amazing about this show was all of the followers of each others accounts /builds etc all come together in one spot. It was probably one of the best shows next to JCCS i have been too even with it being small. "Quality over Quantity"

15

I initially found out when I saw a bunch of friends posting the flyer. Beyond that not really, there are some sites that try to aggregate this sort of thing but they usually aren't that accurate.

Next year, now you know! I linked the website in the first line.

16

I can see a lot of Corollas at this show
This is about to be lit!

17

There was a lot of nicely built AE86's! There was also a couple of gems in the parking lot

18

I'm always amazed how people are able to keep these classics in such good shape. I'm not sure if they hide them away in storage in between car shows, or actually drive them regularly, but it can't be easy.

19

I'm a simple man. I see

35mm galleries on the way.

*heavy breathing*

20

Haha yesss! Soon!

21
Graeme DailyDose

Looking forward to the rest of the pics Ryan. BTW what car is on the right the yellow one in the 2nd picture?

22

It's a Starlet, nice little car. But who is Ryan?

23
Graeme DailyDose

I think Ryan i this Trevor dude that posted this haha my bad and shweet is there a full shot of the car coming soon?

24

Haha yeah I think Sara got one I really wish we took more tho it's an awesome build

25

I've seen a few of Trevor's car show "coverages," and they leave something to be desired.

I have a hard time figuring out if it's a report/coverage of a show, a feature/flowery story, or a commentary.

Hopefully that's enough of a constructive criticism, coming from a former newspaper editor.

26

This isn't "coverage" which should be pretty obvious seeing as how it's 400 words which explain what's coming paired with 5 photos (which is a lot for a newspaper, sure, but thankfully we aren't one).

Being boxed in content-wise is what led to the failing of plenty of newpapers, websites, magazines etc. and I try to approach things differently as often as I can. The main story just went up, a 35mm gallery has been posted, and three additional pieces are coming.

It's good to hear feedback and the fact people care so much about the content here is encouraging.

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