Family dinner, trip recap

Twelve days in Japan

What was typed

Slides for a family dinner about our 12-day trip to Japan: Tokyo, Kyoto, Hiroshima. The best food, the bullet train, the deer in Nara, what we'd do differently.

The cover of Twelve days in Japan, made by Cue.

Another slide from Twelve days in Japan.

A later slide from Twelve days in Japan.

Companies, people and numbers in the example briefs are made up, unless they’re public facts like history or science.

The look Cue chose

Night train

Near-black like a train window after dark, one glowing cyan accent, clean grotesk type that reads like a station sign

Type: Familjen Grotesk and Inter Tight
Colours: inkslatepaperfogcyanvermilion
Motion: Slow and cinematic, like looking out of a moving train. Long soft ease-out, 0.9 to 1.2 s. Headlines rise word by word from behind a mask. Photos drift with a slow Ken Burns push. Type never bounces or spins.
Transitions: Mostly fade and dissolve at 0.8 s between photo slides. A push to the left when the story moves to the next city, like the train pulling out. A cut only into a quiet statement slide.

Slide by slide

10 slides, with what the presenter says. Highlighted words are cues: saying them makes something on the slide move.

1
Cover
Opens with a fade

So, you asked about Japan. Here it is, twelve days in one go. We went to three cities, and I promise this won't take long. There's dessert after.
2
The route
Enters with a wipe

Here is the whole trip on one map. We landed in Tokyo and spent the first part there. Then the train took us west to Kyoto, and from there Nara is just a short hop. Last stop was Hiroshima, with Miyajima island just off the coast.
3
Tokyo food
Enters with a push

Tokyo was the best place to eat. You can have sushi, a big bowl of ramen, crispy tempura, or yakitori, which is chicken grilled on little sticks. And the conveyor belt places are so much fun. The plates go round and you just grab what you like.
4
Okonomiyaki layers
Enters with a slide over

Every city has its own food. In Kyoto the special meal is kaiseki. It comes as lots of small courses, one little dish after another. Hiroshima does it the other way. Their okonomiyaki is a pancake, piled with cabbage, then noodles, then sauce on top.
5
Train timeline
Enters with a wipe

The bullet train makes this route easy. Tokyo to Kyoto takes about two hours and a quarter. Hiroshima is further on, about four hours from Tokyo on the fastest trains. That is how three cities fit into twelve days.
6
Train speed
Enters with a zoom through

And it is fast. Up to 320 kilometres an hour. That is about 200 miles an hour. The trains are also famous for leaving right on time. If the ticket says ten past nine, it means ten past nine.
7
Nara deer
Enters with a dissolve

Then we went to Nara. It is a short trip from Kyoto. Wild deer walk all over the big park there, and nobody fences them in. In the local Shinto belief they are sacred messengers, so people let them be.
8
Deer bow
Enters with a push

Here is the funny part. If you bow to a deer, it often bows back. It is very polite. Then it wants one of its crackers, and it will nudge your pocket to find them. So hold them up high.
9
Tips
Enters with a slide over

If any of you ever go, here are three easy tips. Book your train seats ahead, so the family sits together. Plan at least one slow meal, like kaiseki, and give it the whole evening. And in Nara, watch your pockets, because the deer know where the crackers are.
10
Over dessert
Enters with a iris

That's our twelve days in Japan. This photo is the gate that stands in the water at Miyajima. It's a short ferry ride from Hiroshima. There's lots more to tell, so ask us anything over dessert.

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