One of the most important points of the essay which help understand Beato's album is that the captions were printed with a lot of errors, which the writer of the captions (James W. Murray) did not realize were errors. A lot of the images are "westernized" without actually being western. The image of the "fencers" for one, is obvious to viewers now that there is a difference between fencing and iaido/kendo. But back when the image was taken, the westerners probably wouldn't know that there were other sword arts. I'm sure they would notice that the sword work carried out by the Japanese did not look like traditional fencing, but there's something in the view of Westerners/Imperialists that makes anything that looks sort of like something they created automatically theirs. I think this is important to note because this sort of thing happened in Beato's Places also. Referring to a tea house as a "B & B" or as the "Richmond, Virginia of Japan" shows that it was hard for people of this age to see and understand something they had no prior experience with.
Another important point is read between the lines in the Photographic Terms section of the essay. The techniques Beato used to create these photographs were so advanced and made up of all different chemical solutions. Ultimately, this work for Beato was work. I think with today's technology we take for granted how difficult it was back then to get the perfect shot. With today'd digital cameras (and even some current film cameras) you can be immediately assured after the shot that your photograph is exactly the right color, light/dark balance, and composition. There were quite a few different cameras circulating during this time, the most common being the wet plate camera (the Wet Collodion process describes the workings of a wet plate camera.) Beato had limited chances to get the perfect image, which makes all of his images that much more spectacular. I also think even more interesting is that at this time they were attempting to color images. The technique used was actually still used during World War I to color soldier portraits (We have one of my Great Grandfather colored this way.) And this just adds a layer to the work Beato (and probably some assistants.) The essay details how specific the process of mixing the watercolors had to be in order to work correctly with the photographs, in the same way that the chemical mixtures also had to be in the correct proportions to develop photographs. The essay really details the science behind all of these processes.
Unlike some of the photographs in Places, the photographs in this album are posed, with Beato dictating how each subject should be arranged. The photos are of very "Japanese" activities and posing. The image that strikes me the most is the image of the "Two Beauties Sleeping." Right off the bat, the women are "sleeping" with all of their hair pins in, which (I don't know much about Edo/Meiji period hairstyles but I think i can safely say:) seems wildly unlikely/uncomfortable. They also look as though they are sleeping in full kimono rather than in any bedclothes, which also seems unlikely. Furthermore, I don't believe many women would let a strange man into their rooms to watch them sleep, so this picture immediately comes off as staged. However, Beato is photographing for his audience, as he did in the last album we looked at. I think if he took a photograph of women actually ready for bed, the image would not scream "THIS IS A JAPANESE IMAGE," besides the setting. As the image is now, as well as all of the other images, it's very obvious that these images were made for people who wanted to see something that punched them in the face with Japan-ness.

This image looks as though Beato tried to pack in as many signs of Japan as possible while still making it believable that it's a bedroom. The lamp, the cup, the pattern on the blankets, and the two women all look "oriental." People of this time period would want this image because it provides a setting (especially with the caption) and it humanizes the Japanese women, in a vulnerable and domineering way. When you're sleeping you're the most vulnerable, so it makes sense that someone would subconsciously want to have "other" women in this vulnerable position. The caption describes how the women would sleep, even describing that they would most likely have a night light, like the one in the picture. However, I don't think if this were a real image of women sleeping that the night light would be so close to them, as this seems kind of fire-hazard-y.

I chose this image more to discuss the caption that accompanied it. The image itself seems generally tame, although it's weird to me to have images of doctors helping patients if it were in the West. With the caption, however, it makes sense. The caption describe the work of the doctor as "backwards" two separate times, and also makes the point that they have no "academic" medical training a few times also. This image obviously is made in the same way today we would circulate a photograph of a third world hospital, to show how primitive and underdeveloped it is. Despite the fact that "pre-modern Japan" (a term I found in the article Fertility, Mortality, and Life Expectancy in Pre-modern Japan by Susan Hanely) had very high rates of mortality, this image's only purpose is to mock the practice of Eastern medicine. And I'll be the first to admit, I have given Eastern medicine a laugh every once in a while (not while in Japan with a bladder infection though, thank you herbs and spices.) but this image, like the one above, exists to show dominance over a "lesser" not-as-developed culture.