For some reason, I stopped watching this one halfway through, and only picked it up again last week. The first two episodes were spent introducing the characters, and my impression of the anime was more "slice of life" than anything else, so I may have been misled. I'd say that the last six episodes were more slightly interesting than the first six, although the anime was very consistent overall.

Beyond the first couple episodes, I sometimes forgot that this anime was supposed to be about photography. I'd estimate that the characters take photographs at a fairly normal rate on their travels, and although photography might be an excuse to visit somewhere, it's never the main focus of the episode. I think this works well because more than anything, mono is a travel show, and taking videos or photos serves as motivation for the characters do fun things like skateboard down mountains or search for perfectly spherical monuments. As the viewer who's seeing everything in the same animation and pretty art style anyway, you're going to care more about the activity or journey to get to a place itself than the photo of it.

None of the characters stuck out to me too much. No offence to them but I didn't much care for Satsuki and An. Sakurako appears spacey, but I found her endearing and full of surprises. Haruno is also endearing in her own way, even though she's lazy to the point of most of her "work" being fun sightseeing research trips.

I'd probably watch Kako's YouWeTube videos, even if they're uploaded two years after filming. mono is great at making everything the characters, particularly Kako, do seem fun, even if I really could not care less about motorcycling, ski jumping, or even photographing.

Of course, basically all of the episodes have the travel theme in common. The standard setup is to explore a prefecture, eat some nice food, possibly take a picture, and maybe bump into Kako or Kurokuma-sensei along the way. You could tell me the places they visited had bought sponsorships and I wouldn't be surprised, but everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves so much, even though the trips were "ordinary", that I wouldn't care anyway. I did get a bit of fatigue from everyone being in a different place all the time after the three-part Nagano trip, but episodes 11 and 12 brought An, Satsuki, and Sakurako closer to home. Having to use public transport instead of Haruno was a nice "twist".

About half of the episodes (4, 5, 6, 7, 10, 11) of mono involve some people going on a food tour, or at least a detour. Some of these were more successful than others (no curry!). The food all looks delightful, even if it's just a regular curry. I want to eat shaved ice now.

Paranormal activities is also recurring theme, but they don't appear to be any more serious than a random /x/ post. There was that one time when Kurokuma-sensei just spawned in and disappeared without a trace, but that seems natural for her. The final episode had an excellent setup, but in the end it was revealed than nothing strange had really happened at all, thanks Sakurako!

I read a comment along the lines of "I wish real life was like mono", and I'd have to agree. mono does a very good job of showing you a fun time which doesn't seem unrealistic or out of reach, like most anime. mono did skip over the boring side of life, featuring hardly any school or work (I can't believe Kako had a job to begin with), but to be fair, they skipped it for a good reason.