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Die Luftbrücke - The German Airlift Memorial

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2012-03-13T21:49:27+00:00

Spending my last weekend in Frankfurt/Main in Germany, I had the opportunity to see the Airlift Memorial (Luftbrückendenkmal) right behind the runway of Frankfurt Airport. My friend whom I visited took me first to the Zeppelin museum in Zeppelinheim, a truly interesting place showcasing an exhibition from the grand old days of early aviation. Unlike other museums, this place is not very photogenic, however, it was well worth the visit. Not far from the museum is a little walkway leading right behind the runway of Frankfurt Airport. And - if you ever want to see photographers equipped with all sorts of cameras, from a basic superzoom up to a souped up 20 billion megapixel DSLR with lenses as large as my leg, this is the place to go. After watching the landing and take off of a few planes, we were heading towards the memorial, which is located not far from this viewing spot. Unfortunately we missed the better light while we spent time in the museum - by the time we arrived, the light was rather bland with a beautiful washed out white sky. Two old planes are at the memorial, a Douglas DC3/C47 and a Junkers JU52/3m, which did their duty in post war Germany in 1948 to provide food and supplies to cut off West Berlin. I was mainly fascinated by the Douglas DC3. But any attempt to portrait this plane in large failed due to the washed out sky (which would have rendered anything else in the picture as a black silhouette) and lack of my imagination. So I stuck with close ups of this plane. And, I must admit, I am fairly happy with them. They do show the hard times these planes went through during their time of duty - and of course a little bit of weathering effects during their extended time of parking outside without being used. I also started my little side project, I have in mind now for quite some time: A long time ago I found this little furry guy on a photo tour. Ever since I want to photograph him at the various locations, wherever my photo trips might bring me. This was indeed a good start of this project….. And my friend: he just could not help it :)

Symmetry and Simplicity

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2012-03-03T12:47:27+00:00

A simple photograph which lives of an arrangement of geometrical shapes and materials, colours and contrast. I spotter this on a playground around the corner - it is the top view of part of a sea saw. This photo happened to me, when I was on the look for simple subjects and is part of many attempts to photograph this sea saw, as you can see in the image below. My favourite of the series is however the above photo just applying simple compositional "rules" (I really dislike that word) and playing with basic shapes...

The Simplicity of Lines

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2012-02-21T22:15:37+00:00

Why exactly is it that something as mundane as air duct vents form a skyscraper strike my eye when I am wandering around cities? It is the simplicity of the subject. It's the defined lines that capture my brain. I walked passed these and it immediately made click in my head - no second thoughts required. I like simple lines. If you are browsing across my site or following my blog, you might have noticed the absence of photographs of human beings, the absence of anything moving at a fast paste, really. Anything moving as fast or faster than snails is a real challenge for me to photograph. This photo does not tell a story - if you are reading one into it, you are on your own. But than again - maybe it does tell a story. Someone, some industrial designer defined the colour, the shape the patterns on these. Most likely based on civil engineering requirements. Nevertheless, at least one person thought about how these things are going to look like and how they appear out in the streets. I am not sure, whether I like the Black and White photograph better or the coloured version. The warmth of the colour photo is quite nice, But it does take a little away from the purity of the lines. There are those lines again. Simple lines. A wonderful subject.

Street Symmetry

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2012-02-12T13:54:17+00:00

Recently I was walking aimlessly the streets of London and eventually finding myself in Kingston. Despite being a posh area, I found the desolateness of these streets mind-boggling, to say the least. There is absolutely nothing to photograph here, I thought, just plain buildings, a lot of parked cars and not a single soul out on the streets. Well, sometimes I can't see the forest for the trees. But thankfully, when walking around a street corner this scene opened itself in front of me: what could describe the mundane of this part of the city better than what I saw in this moment? Brilliant. This was definitely the shot of the day…. more city photographs

Street Encounter

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2012-02-03T21:53:48+00:00

Afer last weeks fairly strict still lives, I thought I would approach a subject with al little more life involved.... This photograph was taken in St. Neots, UK - close to Cambridge - during my lunch break. I just had to free my mind from the current projects I am working on during my day life. Hmmmm. there is just no more to say. This is just me being with my camera....

Indirect Light - Low Key Experiments

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2012-01-29T12:17:35+00:00

This foggy and overcast January morning was inspiration enough to set up my kitchen photo studio again to experiment a bit more with low key photography. The single window combined with the black marble kitchen counter worked before as an excellent basic set up for low light photography. Compared to my previous set up the only thing that changed was the use of a black cardboard backdrop to add flexibility and the shooting angle (no need to fill the frame with the counter) and to block off some unwanted light from the kitchen window. I started photographing the stainless steel Bamix kitchen mixer - with very little success. The Bamix just did not want to be photographed this morning. Inspired by last nights Mojito session I migrated towards photographing ice cubes. This is where the fun started and my slighty rusty low light skills woke up again. The photo session was closed by photographing some peppercorns and a pile of rock salt. After testprinting, I actually might frame this shot to hang it over the kitchen counter as inspiration for good cooking...

Frosty leafs

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2012-01-15T12:56:39+00:00

When stepping out this morning with my first cup of coffee unfolded a perfect frost wonderland scenery of a cold January morning. The leafs (yes, in England there are some leafs still about in the midsts of winter) had a perfect frost rim around them. And with the sun shining and a few patches of fog floating on the ground gave the scenery an almost fairy-tale like appearance. I realised that it was a bit too late in the morning to run out with the camera to capture this beauty - the sun would have soon melted all the magic away. Nevertheless, I had enough time to capture some leafs with their frosty surroundings before it was too late…. Maybe I should stop wandering the realms of Skyrim until late Saturday nights and get out in the mornings again shooting. I have kind of neglected this in the recent weeks….

NYC | Boston - Seriously not Street Photography

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2011-12-13T22:23:43+00:00

Finally - countless hours of reorganising photo libraries in the process of moving from iPhoto to Aperture 3 revealed enough photo material to finish off a little project which I had in mind for a while. The photo slideshow "NYC | Boston - seriously not street photography" shows photos taken during several weekend trips to New York City and to Boston. Although I used to live close to Boston, Massachusetts, when I was walking the streets there equipped with a camera it has always been more of a trip rather than a "hopping into the city" - for the better or the worse. The eclectic mix of photos shown in this slideshow shows a few touristy sights, like the Statue of Liberty, some photos of streets (which are despite being taken in larger cities curiously free of human beings) and quite a few simple, straight lined building photos. I think this shows my photographic style quite well - I do have a hard time photographing people and am a big fan of fairly simple lines. A few hours later the slideshow was produced and than I just had to overcome the hurdle of implementing it into my website. And - when you see this show the first time and it is displayed on my front page with some flaws (shadowbox not working properly due to a fast amount of implemented javascript) I realise, that it is time to leave the desk and get out shooting again…..

Sailing on the Hudson River

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2011-12-05T17:14:16+00:00

Finally - I managed to work through and finish all my older photographs from Boston and New York City. It has been an exciting trip looking through older photos with a bit more experienced set of eyes. And it resulted in some hidden photo treasures being rediscovered and reworked. There was enough material to put together a photo slideshow and a photo-book. The best photos of the New York City and Boston city side can be found in the Cityside photo gallery. As always, any photo displayed in the gallery has been test printed in a larger size and is good to go for online ordering.

An Autumn Trip

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2011-11-05T22:00:41+00:00

My short weekend trip to Karlsruhe, Germany started at 3.30 AM Local Time with the alarm clock going off. Out of bed, a quick coffee breakfast and off I went to London Stansted Airport to catch my 7.00 AM flight to Baden Airpark. Although tiresome, a wonderful weekend lay ahead of me. The early flight to Baden Airpark rewarded me with a terrific sunrise somewhere over Belgium followed by an approach to Baden Airport with a simply stunning view of the Black Forest submerged in a mix of sunshine and rivers of the early morning fog. Shamefully I had my camera in my hand luggage. So I decided to capture those views with my iPhone - see my Flickr Phone-Photostream for this view. Landing at Baden Airport on a foggy November Morning at 9.00 can make one feel a little lonesome, I must admit. I managed to make to the "Turmberg" in Karlsruhe-Durlach and catch another great vista of the Black-Forest. Unfortunately I was there mid day and it was rather hazy. Nevertheless, it was a great view which would be worth a visit in the early morning hours (view below is to the South). Well, maybe next time :)

The World's End

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2011-10-04T20:41:36+01:00

I spotted this billboard of Apple's iPad 2 recently walking the streets of Camden. It was mounted on top of "The World's End", a pub located right next to the Camden tube station. I guess none of Apple's Marketing Geniuses has planned or foreseen this one... despite their tough controls. Steve would be mad.

The Painted Lady

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2011-09-18T10:34:54+01:00

New York City

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2011-09-05T22:31:09+01:00

No words come down.

Nature & Landscape Photos

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2011-08-25T21:01:42+01:00

New Photo Album from Boston

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2011-04-10T17:55:15+01:00

The discovered work of Vivian Maier

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2011-02-13T18:23:19+00:00

John started scanning a few of the negatives - and what he saw astonished him so much, that he picked up photography himself. Not knowing anything about street photography, he had the negatives of Vivian Maier teach him photography, ending up purchasing the same camera she used and diving into the world of Henri Cartier-Besson, Harry Callahan and Lee Friedlander. Maloof started researching her online after finding her name on a photo lab envelope. All he found was the obituary - she passed away a few days before his research. John did over time find more boxes of negatives, enlarging his Vivian Maier collection to several tenthousand negatives as well as a few thousand rolls of undeveloped film. Confused about Vivian Maier not known as a street photographer, John Maloof posted some images on a Flickr Street Photographer Group, which started the trip of his life. He is today asked to exhibit these photographs pretty much around the globe….. The French born Vivian Maier arrived in New York as a young girl in the 1930s. After the first years she eventually found herself as a nanny Chicago. John Maloof was able to track three siblings down who Vivian looked after. She has been described as being a "Marry Poppin" type nanny. She has never been married and lived her lilfe alone - photographing. Strangely enough she hardly had any of her negatives turned into prints. So, why did show photograph? And, she must have judged all her work by the negatives, since, according to Mahloof there is quite some improvement and change of style to see in her images. Does excellence in Art always require a strange, or shall I call it an unusual mind? I guess so. Normal people tend not to produce art. They go to museums and look at it. Or to concerts and listen to it. Isn't it mostly the eccentrics, the obsessed, the thoughtful people that have enough mind capability to create powerful art? And - is every good artist damned to stay alone in life? Maybe not physically alone, but, well, on a spiritual basis alone? These are questions to think about….. But good photography certainly does not require a hell of a lot equipment.... ;) I want to thank John Mahloff to find this wonderful photography and for sharing it online….. His blog on Vivian Maier has some wonderful resources to follow up to and of course many photographs worthwile spending time over. Also, some very good news: The book "Vivian Maier: Street Photographer" will be released in Fall of 2011 by powerHouse Books. I am looking forward to it...

Oh so British

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2011-02-12T20:58:27+00:00

The real drive thru

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2011-02-06T13:27:22+00:00

X marks always the spot

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2011-01-30T10:51:19+00:00

Urban Exploration

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2011-01-28T20:54:40+00:00

What is giving the kick of photographing these old, abandoned ruins of civilization? I think there are three aspects of it: Finding the location: The most tedious part, but in the internet age not a huge problem. Also, searching online opens usually a whole world of new impressions for the UrbEx interested photographer. There are photographs with new ideas, different aspects of how to photograph rust and decay and of course plenty of material, that reminds one of how not to take a photograph. Of course there is always the word of mouth story to find locations or the local knowledge that can be picked up at any good pub. Getting access to a location: I think, technically getting access to any of those location is trespassing. Someone ones this thing and usually the old ruin is nailed shut. A clear sign. Somehow though, there is in most cases always an entrance, but finding it and using it is quite a thrill, specially when carrying around a bit of gear… Exploring and photographing is of course the best part - the climax of it all. Walking through old, empty and dusty hallways, smelling the rot, breathing the stale air and just feeling the history of a place. Wondering what has happened there during the objects golden years. And of course, finding the killer subject to photograph. The one image that describes it all. This, combined with the constant thrill and the fear of not getting caught is what makes Urban Exploration a thrill. I have a very limited amount of Urban exploration photographs in my gallery. I called this category "urban decay". It was funny to read an article this morning about UrbEx, the "trend coming from the USA". I don't know - I never felt it being a trend or something oh so secretive. Ever since I picked up a camera, there have always been people photographing the old ruins of civilisation and I found photographs in all sorts of photo communities. And, I always liked them. Who knows, maybe the subject found me…. In the end, I just wanted to share a link of Ben Jones Exploration Projects website. This is a brilliant resource and a great lead for a deeper read. Unfortunately Ben did not update the site since 2007 - at a time when I first found it, but never really made use of it. Who knows, maybe this time around it will happen?

A hike to Sugar Loaf Mountain in Wales

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-10-18T10:37:03+01:00

Thankfully The Bryn is not that big of a place since the GPS proofed being useless and could not direct us to the B&B. So, after searching every single one of the few roads, we finally found our destination and were delighted about this charming old rectory located in the middle of nowhere. This promised to become a peaceful weekend. We rewarded ourselves with a delightful meal at the local pub, which name I forgot. But when I say, the meal was delightful, I really mean so. It was Welsh style home-cooking on a fairly sophisticated level, coming in portion sizes that even my American friends can only dream about (the east coast friends anyways..). It was brilliant. Unfortunately I was not able to enjoy the Welsh cheese platter for desert and had to save that piece for the next evening. Late the next morning, after a generous breakfast at the B&B, we made us on our way to Sugar Loaf Mountain. Driving the car up narrow and windy roads (and many many backing up events) we reached the upper parking lot, from which the summit can be easily reached in a two hour walk. The high plains of the Welsh mountains stretched out in front of us in a lush green. The flora was dominated by ferns and sturdy grasses. In the far distant the summit of Sugar Loaf Mountain greeted us as our destination of the day. The walk was just a wonderful experience (despite some protests I had initially to listen to). Although it was fairly busy, the overall silence was only interrupted by the occasional Welsh mountain sheep looking for its colleagues. And I was absolutely stunned, when I had my first ever encounter in my life with wild horses. This was rather ironic: after living in the States for about eight years, I had to travel to Wales of all places to see such beasts. They were absolutely graceful and stunning. Despite the fact of it being mid-day, I turned out being very lucky with the available light. Bright blue skies with fast moving clouds made for an interesting game between light and shadows. I was able to capture that in a few shots of the summit of the mountain. Fact is, that as a hobbyist I have to deal with the light the circumstances provide. This weekend was just not a photography weekend, but a getaway with the opportunity to take photographs. And dealing with mid-day light is a good skill to have. I would guess that most of us have to shoot under those conditions more often than not. So I am quite happy with the selection of photographs I came home with. They show mainly sheep and horses roaming freely on the mountain and I think, they describe the peaceful atmosphere of this walk quite well. and, just for the records, two Welsh expressions: The Sugar Loaf - "Mynydd Pen-y-Fal or Y Fâl" Welsh Mountain Sheep - "Defaid Mynydd Cymreig" The photo album of the hike is located in the "Albums & Projects" section.

Featured Artist at Fotomoto

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-10-12T11:49:57+01:00

Fotomoto is my service provider, when it comes to ordering prints from my website. And I must say, I love them and they deliver fantastic quality prints. Although they currently fulfil any order only in the US, to be precise, in sunny California, and ship from there worldwide, all orders to Europe so far have been delivered in less than one week. That is great. So, thank you Fotomoto! Keep up the good work. On another note: I know I have not been writing and doing much over the past few months. I have been in a creative slump. But, about two months back I started photographing again and I have been out a lot. I also re-vamped my digital darkroom. So, there is quite a few things to talk about which I want to do in the coming weeks.... So, stay tuned.

Lighthouses - III

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-07-09T23:13:04+01:00

Of course I did not work for three months straight on this photograph. But, over the course of the last three months I edited it, deleted my edit, re-edited it, deleted it again and so forth. You get the picture… I am asking myself now, why I hesitated so much? And I found there to be several reasons: First, despite this lighthouse photograph being a total cliché, I absolutely love this shot. I had a vision how it should look like in the end. Not being sure about my skillet and wether or not it would be good enough to edit this shot in the digital darkroom was one reason for the hesitation. Second, shooting this scene I ended up with probably fifty or so images taken from the same spot over the course of maybe thirty minutes. With the wind pushing the clouds and making the sun breaking through every so often, the light conditions changed quite dramatically during that time. In addition to that the waves were playing there game breaking at the rocky shore. It became clear almost initially that the final photograph would be a blend of several images to capture the mood I felt properly. Studying the photos after uploading them to my computer made a selection process not necessarily easy. Although I picked my three favourite ones fairly early on, I was not sure wether or not to proceed with them. Third, there were the technical issues: mistakes I made during the photo shoot. Can you believe that I came home from this event and realised, that my camera was set to JPG mode instead of RAW? Also, the ISO setting was way too high. What was I thinking? Nothing I suppose. Excitement simply took over when I reached the Portland Headlight in Maine. This certainly limited the options I had in the digital darkroom - again, I was not sure on how to touch the image. In the end I am very pleased with the end result. This shot will finish my lighthouse trilogy. I will have to visit more locations to get more photographs. It most likely won't be in Maine or New England - Old England will have to do….

MahnaMahna

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-07-02T14:15:12+01:00

First of all: I really love the Snowths. I Always did. Their facial expression is priceless. Maybe I should work on getting a portrait session with them? And I think that portrait should be in an oval frame. So, I was not aware, that this song actually debuted in 1969 on both, the Muppets Show and on Sesame Street. This song was written by Piero Umiliani . And it appeared the first time in the Italian movie "Svezia, inferno e paradiso" (Sweden: Heaven and Hell) - a "documentary" about the wild, sexual behaviour and other activities in Sweden (Wikipedia). This film is documented in two to five minute snippets on youtube as well, which might be worth checking out... Now, what I am wondering is, what business has a Muppets Director/Producer watching those kind of movies and producing child proofed content at the same time, eh? I really wonder what he (or she) was thinking that night when the video was flickering across his TV screen and he heard this song in this type of movie. How has your brain to look like (or, act like) to make the connection from that sound track in that movie to innocent puppets performing in a kids show? Come to think of it: is there a particular reason for the Snowths' facial expression? Could it be that even the puppet designer/maker watched the same movie? Or, even worse, Jim Henson himself watched it and came up with this? How dare they? Dirty bunch! Well, thank good for Ernie and Bert, Sponge Bob and, I guess, the two Snowths.... Enjoy the show.

The painted door in London

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-06-20T12:39:58+01:00

She parked across the street from a Lounge type bar. It looked like a really chill place indeed. A large stone arch embedded in the brick wall spanning parts of the building hosted the entrance door to the Lounge. This gave the outside of the bar a rather rough look - and made it even more interesting. The side or service entrance was next to the main door - and also here was a stone arch running across the door. On the side door I saw this wonderful portrait painting. It really suited the neighbourhood very well and was yet another factor, what made the lounge appear to be an interesting place. I tried to frame this shot including the stone arch. But no matter what I did, it did not work quite right. So I decided to go with the straight photograph of a painted… abstract portrait.

Is Film Photography dead?

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-06-06T14:33:21+01:00

The fist movie I wanted to share here tells, in a time laps photography way, the story of modern technology meeting old school craftsmanship, created by Matt Bigwood. A nice, simple piece which made me laugh. You find Matt's, the creators youtube channel here. Time lapse photography is of course one way to tell a story with photography and single images. But I was somehow looking for something else, when digging deeper into the realms of youtube. I was looking for movies, who's stories are told not by thousands of but just a few still photographs. In a way, I was looking for a more cinematic approach to still photography - an advanced slideshow, if you wish. And I found this masterpiece, the movie "Blindfolded" by Stephen Maneri. This is a very intriguing way of telling a story. The way Stephen assembled the photographs to a movie really makes them jump to live. The very artful way of using the Ken Burns effect combined with some colouring action in the still tell the story. Essentially he just took the "key shots" of a movie, and assembled those to tell the story. This movie taught me a lot about photography itself. It taught me about the meaning of a photograph itself and about the storytelling part of an image. It shows the importance of one image leading to the next and about the anticipation that can be created in a viewer looking at a single shot. What was before? What will come after? Looking at a landscape photographed at sunrise will (or can, actually) leave the viewer with an idea on how the next part of the morning is going to look like. This is something we as photographers can easily forget over time standing behind a camera and being obsessed with light, composition and exposure. Those three criteria are really just the most simple part of the image creation process. But the story is the important piece. Oh, and I could not properly embed this movie in my website - it only wants to be played on youtube. Oh well….

A tour on the Grand Union Canal

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-06-01T15:00:41+01:00

For this day I just wanted to show him this spot. The plan was to go for a long walk on the following Sunday. We had something like a pub hop walk in mind, since there are many cozy and rustic pubs in the villages along the canal. But my friend was so intrigued by the canal boats, that he became obsessed with the idea, to go on a boat tour. But not only did he want a tour with a rented boat, but wanted to bribe one of the canal dwellers into taking us for a ride. This happening was a rather unlikely possibility in my mind, but I let him alone with his thoughts. The Grand Union Canal in England is part of the British canal system. Its main line connects London and Birmingham, stretching for 220 km (137 miles). The (present) Grand Union Canal came into being on 1 January 1929, extended in 1932. It was formed from the amalgamation of several different canals. Read more about the Grand Union Canal on Wikipedia.org. The following Sunday we set out mid morning for our tour along the Grand Union Canal. It was a sunny but crisp morning. As soon as we reached the Iron Trunk Aqueduct, my friend started asking the boat dwellers around for boats for hire - and we were told that past the water lock, about half a mile down the Canal we would find that. As soon as the water lock came into sight, he asked the first folks he saw on a boat: "Hey, are you the guys doing the tours?" A man looked at us for a second. "No, but how long've you got?" ... We looked at each other. "Well, all afternoon I suppose. ... "Well, we will be going up the Canal for a couple of hours, to the marina to get some fuel. It will be a few hour round trip. Hop on if you like". ... That was that. We had our ride. And we could not believe our luck. And lucky we were: After a short introduction and some preparations we went on board. And it turned out that we just met some of the friendliest folks in a long time. The three guys on the boat were the owner and two of his friends. The vessel was named "Lydia". Despite the bright sunshine, it was cold cruising along the canal. The wind was blowing stiff in our faces. The sun was high and the few clouds were like cotton balls in the super blue sky. The boat was going with an unhurried three knots (I think that is something like four miles per hour) up the canal, which was meandering through the English countryside, revealing views of small villages nestled beautifully in between meadows and fields. There were still some rapeseed fields showing the last bits of their bright yellow blooms. The air was clear and all colours were simply showing themselves in their brightest way. What can I say: while standing at the bow of the vessel and enjoying the views, it was time to take out the Nikon and shoot some pictures. It was bright enough to keep the polarising filter on the entire time, and with the sun mainly in our back, it really brought those already bright colours to live. This is what I personally call "summer sunshine tourist photography". It is just a lot of fun. We really warmed up to the folks on the boat as the journey went on, and by the time we reached the marina we were happily chatting along. Our suggestion to stop on the way back at the "Navigation Inn", a pub we spotted on our way up, to treat them for a pint or two broke the last pieces of ice. There is not much more to say other than we had a fabulous, wonderful Sunday afternoon and we met some incredibly nice and interesting people. We learned a lot about the life on the canal, the boats and why they are built the way they are built. The guys brought us back to the Iron Trunk Aqueduct and after some sincere goodbyes we walked the last mile home through green meadows along the River Ouse, with the sun just starting to set. The perfect Sunday was about to come to a perfect end. After this day I am thinking that the story of the Grand Union Canal will continue in my life. I certainly hope so….

More on photographing textures

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-05-24T11:07:45+01:00

The sun was certainly shining bright this last week, All day, everyday. So, would this light be ok to shoot textures as well? Or would the harsh daylight just ruin every subtlety, as I suggested last week? So, instead of contemplating this matter, I just grabbed my camera and went on a bright morning to the Ouse Valley park. And my hopes were not that high. I was indeed very surprised. The park laid very lush and enjoyable in front of me, despite the fairly harsh mid morning sun. This made for some really nice snaps. Not bad I thought. But when I walked around a hedge, I saw this really stunning green meadow in front of me. And yes, there it was: the texture I was looking for without knowing it: juicy green grass. As I went to work and "working the scene" I soon regretted not to bring my tripod. I would have loved to experiment with ND and polarising filters. The light and the resulting shutter speeds photographing the grass did not allow that though with the f-stop I wanted to use. Even there I had to compromise. Oh well. Just one of those situations I had to deal with. You can see the outcome below: I like this image. A simple texture. No real focal point for the viewer. All colours within the same family. No highlights or black shadows. Just a texture. Photographed mid morning…

Using texture in photographs

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-05-16T13:59:40+01:00

Capturing texture in a photograph can be fairly easy. Texture is usually a by-product of side lighting. When sunlight shines across the surface of a subject, it shines light on one side and shadows on the other. A good time to capture this type of light is early morning or mid to late afternoon. It is a big help if the sky is partially overcast. Otherwise the shadows might become just a little bit too harsh and the highlights a bit too intense. This would be destroying the subtleties created by indirect side lighting. When a flat surface or a small cut out of a large object is captured at this time of the day, most textured surfaces will show their deep nature. Working at this time of the day with larger scenes is a lot harder. Working a large scene usually throws in shadows created by large objects in or around the scene. Specially there overcast is a wonderful help - most certainly though if you are not planning on implementing the sky in your composition. The textured images I captured are indeed small cutouts of the bigger picture. The first photograph shows the bottom part of a rusty door of a water tower. Captured on a sunny, partially overcast day during mid-afternoon: The second image shows a wooden door inside a wooden wall. I was just walking by when the sun was just partially hiding behind the clouds which made this wall just jump at me - or into my lens for that matter. Again, it was mid afternoon: The third image is my neighbours roof. The time of capturing the image was again mid afternoon, but the overcast was significantly thicker than with the other shots. Once the sun broke through the clouds, it was impossible to capture this scene (or not worth it for that matter) due to the glare on the roof, the reflections in the window and the harsh shadows under the roof edge. This was a good lesson to learn and certainly helped me pointing my finger on things that I worked with but for the longest time did not quite understand how all those elements come together…..

An afternoon on the train

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-05-03T12:58:00+01:00

The Histogram and the Advantage of High Bit Files

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-04-30T10:55:19+01:00

The histogram in photography explained in an easy way. I had the honor of guest-blogging at www. ThePhotoArgus.com. I was writing a brief article about the histogram from shooting to image editing in the digital darkroom and explained the advantages of using 12 bit files. I am explaining there the "tonal distribution" and the correct interpretation of a histogram, details about the data depth of a photograph (12bit RAW vs. 8 bit JPG) and how it pays for a photographer to pay attention to little details happening in that graph. If you are interested in this type of techinical level, read the article "Histogram and the Advantage of High Bit Files" here.

Lighthouses - II

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-04-29T10:38:57+01:00

The weather was, well, mediocre at best as we (Ian and myself) arrived on a mid Sunday morning in Portland: bland, cloudy skies with dull light. "Great" I was thinking, "three hours of driving for nothing - or at least nothing great". We started our morning by scouting out the area. After a while of walking around we found a good view of the Lighthouse complex with a long and wide stretch of cliffy shoreline and the rough Atlantic Ocean as foreground. Brilliant. We found a way down to the steep cliffs. I would recommend that If you ever go there, bring good shoes. The rocks are extremely slippery and a fall does not look like something you want to experience. A tripod in one hand, and the camera in the other I made my way down. Just as we reached a really nice spot, the sky broke open and immersed the Lighthouse complex in beautiful, warm, soft light. The clouds started to show shape and contrast. That was indeed a gift. To create the photo shown above, I used a grad ND filter to darken the sky. This was enhanced in Photoshop to give it a more dramatic look and feel, describing better how I actually felt when I released the shutter. I like how the rock formation forms lines pointing towards the Lighthouse tower itself, letting the eye wander from the foreground to the background with the clouds leading the viewer to the writing on the rocks. This is how most viewers told me how they experience the photo. The Portland Headlight is one of the many lighthouses guiding the way into Portland harbour. Most of them were built in the late 1700's, with this headlight built in 1790. The writing tells about the British Vessel Anny C. Macguire which stranded at that rock at Christmas eve in 1886 - despite the lighthouse doing its' duty. All passengers and sailors were rescued that night.

The BeetleCam Adventures

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-04-27T10:08:02+01:00

Since they are two DYI guys, they found a way to approach wildlife photography from a new perspective: up from the ground. Close up to animals big and small, dangerous and friendly. Although that has been done before with stationary cameras triggered by in infrared beam, they decided to push this a bit further. So they set of to and simply invented their own approach by mounting a DSLR including two split ETTL flashes onto a four wheel drive remote buggy. This sounds a lot simpler than it actually was. A first prototype proofed to be very unstable and with just a few weeks to go to their planned trip to Tanzania, they had to re-design the setup to lower the centre of gravity. They also had to convince their Canon400D to cooperate with the controller they used for the buggy. Finishing touches on the design were to completely camouflage the camera and sealing the camera gear from the dust that they would be facing in the Tanzanian National Parks. Once in Tanzania Will and Matt learned quickly that approaching the seemingly easy subject, Elephants, proofed to be a rather difficult one. With their excellent hearing and weariness to unknown subjects they acted rather suspicious towards the approaching BeetleCam vehicle. The solution was to park the buggy well ahead of their path and wait for the Elephants arrival. Apparently that worked well. These images are absolutely stunning ! The second subject, Lions, was a lot easier to get Not only that, but within a short time of deploying BeetleCam and approaching the lions, the cats got really curious and decided to check it out - in private. They carried BeetleCam away into the bush. After a recovery mission Matt and Will could only rescue a lightly damaged BeetleCam but a totally ruined Canon 400D. They did manage to rescue the the memory card however which revealed some amazing photographs. To continue with this mission, they had to mount their last camera, a Canon EOS 1d MK III on top of the fixed BeetleCam. Wow. That is really brave I would say. With this new setup they approached bachelor Buffalos - which have a reputation of being rather grumpy animals, but were actually nice models while Matt and Will were directing BeeleCam around them. They returned happily back to the UK with many fantastic images in their luggage. Great work guys! To see more of Matts and Wills African Wildlife photography, go visit their website. There you will also a more detailed report about their BeetleCam adventures. This is some very exciting photography approach. I will keep an eye on Matt and Wills Burrad-Lucas website. They are apparently planning a trip back to Tanzania later this year with an all new revamped version of their vehicle: The BeetleCam Mark II. I personally have many questions for them which will hopefully be answered in an interview in a few weeks. So stay tuned! All photos shown in this article are Copyright Burrad-lucas.com. Images are used with permission.

A stab at spring

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-04-20T20:00:37+01:00

My first attempt of photographing blossoms. I must admit - I don't feel really confident with that subject. Nor did I have a high interest in it. Maybe that has to do with the fact that in Massachusetts where I was living before really was not any spring? And where I am living now, it is spring all the time? I don't know. All I know is that this morning at a quick break, I saw these blossoms and they made me take out my camera and give it a try. And now, I see the image, I see many things that need to be improved and I want that really nice blossom photo... This is attempt #1:

London Street Views - II

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-04-17T18:02:19+01:00

There is some style on the streets of London. Another impression from London. Black Taxis. And stylish bikers - and she knew... Worth sharing.

New York Street Photography by Guido Steenkamp

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-04-16T21:35:19+01:00

New York City Street Photography a la 1940. Just a few days ago I stumbled across this phenomenal slideshow about Street Photography in New York City by Guideo Steenkamp, a Berlin based photographer. The video takes you to NYC in 2008 and somehow Guido manages to make it in a very strange way look and feel like in the first half of the last century - if it wasn't for the cars, the cellphones and the overall more modern look of the city. The soundtrack of the video certainly helps this impression, but even without it, that old feeling is still left with the viewer. His website www.guido-steenkamp.com is worth checking our for everybody interested in street photography.

Lighthouses - I

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-04-12T21:28:15+01:00

I have seen Cape Neddick Nubble Light in countless (more or less my style) paintings at the San Francisco Gallery and Framing shop (my friend Kristin Young owns that place) as well as in some Art Galleries on Cape Cod. And ironically enough, most of them show a sailboat sailing right in front of that red cabin in front of the Lighthouse. This is funny, since no boat can sail where it is shown in most paintings - there are rocks and a walkway to reach the little "island". But hey - if it looks better that way, why not, right? The Lighthouse and the grounds are closed to the public most of the year. I think there are a few events when tourists are allowed on the grounds. This circumstance allowed me to actually capture this image without having to deal with folks walking all over the place Working the scene, I finally found a good spot to capture the Lighthouse from. Throughout the late afternoon I managed to capture some nice tourist style images of the setting. But I wanted to wait for the sunset. And the sunset came with all its might. The light turned out being beautiful. The sun was setting in the west, pretty much right over my shoulder behind me. So, I decided to try my polariser - and, what I then saw through the lens was just stunning. The faint pink hidden in the deep blue sunset sky suddenly turned into this purple pink colour that can be seen in the photograph. That was unreal and a feeling of utter excitement filled me when I kept on taking photos. This image was shot at f/22 at 1.3 second exposure using my polariser. After the drama of the sunset was over and the "blue hour" came around (the blue skies that show just after the sun has set for about 30 more minutes) I stuck around for a little longer. I got a few more nice photographs out of it, but nothing as striking as the image I am showing you here…. Sometimes (if not always) it is worth it being patient.

The wonders of indirect light - II

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-04-10T11:58:45+01:00

The art of photogarphing building blocks. In one of my previous posts I was talking about the power of indirect light in photography and where and how to find it in your house. No studio setup, no fancy lights. Just simple photography. This time I approached photographing building bloks in my pro kitchen studio.

London Street Views

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-04-02T10:32:27+01:00

Life on the streets of London. The streets of London. New opportunities. New Impressions. Worth sharing. Business lunch. Trafalgar Square.

The colour Red

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-03-20T15:36:48+00:00

So, I drove up (yes, I am able now to drive on the other side of the road - and trust me, it took me a while to learn), walked into the car dealership and actually asked (believe it or not) wether it is ok to take a few photos of this car. And the manager on duty agreed. I could not believe it. Good. Unfortunately it was a rather dull day and I did not bring my tripod. Why not? I think because deep inside I did not believe the sales folks to agree and that I would have to come back again in the early morning before the store opens. So I had to deal with that situation. And trust me, after a few approaches at higher ISO settings, I decided to keep it low. Since I was working with my 55-200 mm lens to get some nice close ups, I had to keep the shutter speed up which resulted me working at a relatively low f-stop. I do like the image I got out of this shoot. I absolutely love the lines and the colours. The shallow DOF makes the photograph more lively. Without that I think it would have just been a flat image of red and blue. The lens vignetting in the corner also add in my opinion to the dynamic of this image. I think this photo starts a new project I will keep in mind - the colour red.

The bobby hat

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-02-28T23:05:50+00:00

First, there was the ISO setting: it was set to 400. Not a good thing. Not horribly bad, but not good either. It just adds to much digital noise to an image, so I would have been limited with editing steps in the darkroom. But that would have been ok, if it would have been the only bad fact. There was more: Second, I had to shoot from a far corner, to not to be seen by the clerks. This made me have to use the 150 mm zoom setting, which is not a horrible thing per se, but due to the light conditions in the shop, the cameras' program mode (I had to use it, remember?) chose 1/50 of a second for a shutter speed. Now, that does not go well, even with every bit of image stabilisation used. As you might know, there is a rule of thumb saying, that the shutter speed for a handheld shot should not be slower than the zoom value of the lens used. This is an old rule of thumb and might or might not be true. Fact is that when I am shooting still subjects (and I mean still, like brick walls etc, not trees. Trees move even in the mildest wind!) I get along with a shutter speed a bit higher than 2/3 of my zoom value. Meaning, that in this particular situation, I should have shot at 1/100 of a second. And when I say that I 'get along', I mean that - it's far from ideal. Here is an interesting and brief discussion about recommended shutter speeds. A quick read which I would recommend. The third unlucky factor was the f-stop setting of my lens. I had to go down as low as possible at this zoom setting which is (a shameful, but I am saving for a new lens) f/5.1. With this setting, some parts of the face of the bobby mannequin was in focus, the front rim of the bobby hat was ok as well, but the silver police star was out of focus. When I opened this image to work on it, I immediately found that the police star is out of focus due to camera shake and due to the low f-stop. And there is image noise on top of it all. All of this you can see at my 100% crop on the image to the left. So, that was that - this shot will just be a nice trip memory but will never make it to my galleries….. But it was worth a try, right?

Going 520p

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-02-10T21:46:00+00:00

adjusting my fixed height site to my visitors needs. I have been listening to my critics and to Google: A significant amount of my visitors is browsing the web with a screen resolution of 1280 x 800 pixel or less. And, with the rise of netbooks with even less screen real estate is available to the average internet user. Considering that a large amount of the screen real estate is lost to (very often unecessary) browser toolbars and the likes, my old site layout fit less visitors screens properly than I hoped. And that number was shrinking. With a fixed site layout as you experience here, that is a real disadvantage and no fun for the visitor. So I went through an entire site overhaul and limited the page height to 520 pixel. This did require to downsize the thumbnai images - which is not only a bad thing: that will make browsing the photographs on this site quite a bit faster. I hope you enjoy the new gallery and site layout and spend some time browsing my photographs.

One year of experience using the NIKON D60 dSLR

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-02-04T00:13:28+00:00

It is light enough to carry around everywhere, to be strapped around my neck for a longer time or for just being carried around in my hand. And that is an important matter to me on long walks and excursions at all sorts of various locations where I would find it annoying to put the camera in and out of my bag. ... With the kit lens (18-55mm 1/3.5-5.6 VR) it only weighs around 787 g. ... The Nikon D80 I used for a few times is with 703 g for body including battery a lot heavier. I know that this weight difference does not sound much on paper, but plays a big role in the real world. ... It fits in my hand and I can handle all the buttons easily without or with (thin) gloves. ... Again, my comparison is mainly the D80 which is not a lot bigger, but enough to make a significant difference for the worse in carrying it comfortably for an extended period of time. The body of the D60 itself is nicely built and does not have a "plastic feeling" to it (although it is plastic). ... In short: I absolutely fancy the size, weight and make of this camera body. The small size of the body comes for a price though: there are not too many function buttons on the body and the camera also misses the for larger Nikons (and other dSLR's) typical status LCD display on top of the camera body. The display is certainly something I would like to have - but not for exchange of a larger camera body. ... A studio or fashion photographer would probably not want to miss this feature, but that breed is unlikely to shoot with a D60 anyways. The lack of function buttons is brilliantly made up for with the simply stunning menu on the back of the LCD screen. This menu is simple to use (yes, even the full menu in manual mode) and the display has enough contrast to be used and comfortably read in bright sunlight. That was once concern of mine when I purchased this camera but it proofed to be an unnecessary one. Every single function of this camera can be called up using this menu with only a few clicks. As a matter of fact, the overall usability of the user menu is the only single fact which sold me to NIKON over CANON - or others. ...Like with every product, there are a few not so great things to be said about it. Let me start with one of the most unnecessary features, which was very hyped by NIKON's marketing department: the active D-lighting. This feature (when switched on) is supposed to give the photographs taken a higher dynamic range: photos show more details in shadows while at the same time do not suffer from highlight clipping. I tried this feature during a few shootings in subway tunnels and quickly decided not to use it any further. ... This can lead (if the shadows are dark enough) to significant noise increase in the image in the dark areas. I can achieve a cleaner, less noisy effect of increased dynamic range by shooting RAW and blending two differently converted images from one single exposure in the digital dark room. Granted, that is a lot more work, but depending on the image well worth it. I suppose that this feature serves its purpose for the generic vacation or family event shots (e.g.), but if you want to produce stunning and clean photographs, I would leave the active D-lighting feature switched off. ... There are plenty of different opinions out there about this feature in the D60 - and this was just my two cents worth. ...Image noise is very low at ISO 100 and 200, acceptable low (depending on what you shoot) at ISO 400 and too high at ISO 800 and above. But let me clarify this: Photographs taken at ISO 800 are still acceptable for everyday use. ... But, an image captured at this (or any higher) ISO setting can not undergo any alteration in the digital darkroom. The amount of underlying image noise shows in that case immediately and will render a photograph fairly useless. I personally set the maximum ISO to be used in any of the automatic modes to 400 max. I shoot manually at 400 max and don't plan on going over that again. ... But that is only my personal opinion and in the end in the eye of the beholder - or the viewer of the photograph. ...The fall-off at the edges of the image at the very wide and very long range of this lens is greater than wanted but to be expected for a lens in this price range. ... What puts this lens for me in the "bad" section is simply the fact, that it does not have a lens hood mount and the front end rotates with focusing. The fact that a lens hood can not be mounted is just poor. ... And the fact, that the lens rotates with focusing just makes using any soft of graduated or polarizing filter a real pain in the rear end, as I mentioned in a previous post. ...At first I thought, that that is totally fine, since my previous camera had only three as well. ... This feature allowed me to move a small focusing (and metering) spot across almost the entire framed image. ... Don't forget that this was a feature of a camera with an electronic viewfinder - a dSLR could not possibly have this feature. And three focal points are just not good for any tripod shot. ... Of course I found a workflow as a workaround this limitation which does the trick - but its tedious to go through. ... Which makes using the built in meter for spot metering a bit tricky - but I quickly learned to work it. ...The mirror in the D60 can only be locked up for cleaning purposes, but not for shooting. ... That is simply a feature that belongs into a camera of this class, although the lady from NIKON told me off very rudely at the 2009 photoshop world expo in Boston when I mentioned it to her. ...Most features of this camera work the way they are supposed to work -auto focusing in low light conditions stick out which I did not mention above. Other features that don't work for me I simply don't use (like the active D-lighting). ... If I would have to make the decision of purchasing it again as of today, I would probably lean more towards the D5000, simply because of the included mirror lock up feature and the increased amount of focal points. ... I like it and rather put my money towards a new 18-55 mm lens to replace the kit lens. Other than that I am happy with the NIKON D60 and I certainly hope you like the results it produces, some of which you can find in my image gallery....

The best camera is the one you have with you...

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2010-01-25T11:57:41+00:00

On one of the first days in the early morning hours there I was on my way to the coffee shop to pick up some breakfast. It was quite enjoyable ouside and before I left I was actually thinking about taking my camera with me. But I decided not to since I just wanted to pick up something to eat and would go out later anyways. So, I was walking down the street, enjoying the sun shining on my face. Passing a small park and playground I realized the brown-yellow tint Boston has during the winter months (if it is not all white and covered with snow that is). As I was turning around a corner I had to stop and hold my breath: there it was, the view of the ugly backside of Boston downtown that I was looking for all those years I was living there. Modern skyscrapers next to old buildings, all showing there not so representative back with a wide two lane street running towards it and classic brownstones to the left and right of me leading towards the scene. All wonderfully lit by the early morning sun. A picture perfect scene - I saw the photograph I wanted to capture right in front of my inner eye: the city as a backround focal point in the upper right, the street as a line cutting trough the image leading the viewers eye towards the city blocks and the brownstones as a classic frame. And no parked cars in sight. ... But, oh no, I did not bring my camera. And there I was thinking: yes, the best camera is the one you have with you. So I made a mental note and decided to come back another morning at the same time. And so I did. But when I came around the same corner again, I had to stop and rub my eyes. What happened? It was the same time in the morning, the same perfect sunlight, the same scene. The same scene? No, something was different. Big trees must have grown over night in front of the downtown view. Naked, big trees without leaves. They were all over the place. And absolutely chaotic foreground which would render the entire scene as I envisioned it useless. The clean lines I saw the day before were gone, but instead, they were covered by those big tall trees. What exactly happened? Of course those trees did not grow over night. I realized that it is simply when I walked there the first time, I only saw what I wanted to see. A typical case of selective seeing. I ignored the distracting trees, because they distracted me from what I wanted to see - or expected to see. And this is exactly, how the human vision apparatus works: we see and perceive only what we really need or in some cases want. This prevents our brains experiencing a constant data overflow. We as photographers have to force ourselves to really see the scene as it is and not only focus on the main elements of the image but paying very close attentions to back- and foregrounds which can make or brake an image. Now you might say that this is a very trivial thing to do and we do it all the time. But that is not true. Be honest to yourself: flip through your photo library and see, how often you made a photo which is good in principle but has distracting elements in it, which take away from the overall composition. I bet, that more images than not suffer from this phenomena. Pay attention to what photographs you decided to show to your friends and family and the ones you decided not to show. Now look at the images that you did not show (but did not delete or throw away yet) and take a close look: how many of them did not make the cut because of the disturbing for or backgrounds. That would be quite a few I bet. The reason for this is that a camera does not see and work like the human eye. It is a mechanical apparatus, that simply records light, a scene that we pointed the lens at and told the camera to record it. Strictly mechanic. With every little detail playing a role in the scene that you compose in the viewfinder. Our vision on the other hand is indeed very selective and we tend to see only the desired elements. The pleasing elements that we think work in the scene that we create. A beginner or occasional photographer will suffer more often from this experience than a seasoned photographer with a well trained eye. But, from all the photographers I have been dealing with over the years, nobody is immune to this situation. This was certainly one occasion where I again learned a lesson about the tao of paying attention. And I was not upset that I did not have a camera with me in that very moment on the first morning. I would have taken an unnecessary and disappointing photograph of a scene that otherwise will stay in my mind as beautiful for a long time….

The wonders of indirect light

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2009-12-03T10:47:25+00:00

Since I decided to utilize the indirect light coming through the back kitchen window, photographing kitchen utensils seemed to be a good choice to start with.... In the image here you can see the professional studio setup. The sun is shining through the window and partially onto the black, slightly reflective countertop (what a b*tch that is to clean, I am telling you). I positioned the camera straight in fromt of the window, aiming at the countertop, using it as an almost black backdrop. This gave me the indirect light and also some direct sunrays. To avoid glare on the countertop but still use those rays I had to simply play a bit with viewing angle. The subjects to be photographed were some stainless steel spoons, forks and knives. And a whisk. So this makes for the basic setting: silver colored, stainless steel kitchen utensils on a black, somewhat reflecive surface area as backdrop. Not too shabby, I would think. In case you don't have that shiny black surface, or want to photograph something standing up, you can play games here. You could use any old uni-colored cloth as a backdrop. Brown for sephia based iamges for example. Or grey, or red, for the more aggressive (or contrastful black and white) approach. And no, there is no need to spend a huge amount of money at B&H for professional backdrops - cheap cloth from Wal-Mart will do just fine. Depending on how you want to capture the light on the subject, you'd have to pick the right time of day and your approach angle. I chose the early morning hours because that gave me a nice mixture of indirect light and those few sunrays I was talking about. But that of course depends on your window. Essentially I just placed the utensils on the countertop and started experimenting. I achieved some quite interesting shots (or so I find) by simply playing with the viewing angle and showing, how the sun fell onto the stainless steel utensils. The key was to spot meter with the built in meter of my Nikon D60 for the highlights of the stainless steel and expose them so there were no overexposed, burned out areas. After that it was a matter of moving the utensil around and waiting for the right amount of sun, so the overall appearance of the image met my image I had in mind. But I realized quickly that I really would need my tripod. When you take a close look at the displayed photographs, you will see that I have indeed a depth of field (DOF) problem: for these iamges I wuold have really liked the entire utensil to be in focus. But at f/13 that was just not possible. At this setting I was also already down at 1/60 exposure time. Which is quite challenging for a handheld shot. Unfortunately, my tripod is, as of today, still in some container with the rest of my things on a boat on the Atlantic Ocean. So I had to accept the limited depth of field. I could call it for today "soft focused photographs". Yea, that will do. The images displayed here were taken in raw and developed using Adobe Camera Raw 5.6 with the suggested settings. No corrections on exposure or black values were made. This is due to the lousy monitor I have to use now, which is my 8 year old 15" not calibrated LCD. That was the only thing that fit in my suitcase, so I could have at least a temporary setup until my stuff arrives. Go ahead and start experimenting behind those windows during the cold winter months. Let your fantasy cary you away. You will be surprised what amzing photographs you can create.

On this world, a shadow falls...

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2009-11-20T16:33:52+00:00

His fine art photography work is to become a book trilogy, with the book titles building a complete sentence: "On this world (part 1), a shadow falls (part 2) - with the third title still unknown, since he is currently working on his third book. He is using a Pentax 67 camera (you can read about this camera on the luminous-landscape page) with three lenses: 55mm, 105mm and 200mm. His film of choice is Kodak's T-Max 100. Apparently it is fine grain film, which allows to still show animal details when the large print image shows the animal only in a small part of the photo. His background as a painter certainly influences the fine art look he gives to his images. I find it to be a very calming style. Yet those photographs have a power and such a strong... luminosity to them that it makes me shiver. Nick does not deny the partially heavy use of Photoshop for grading, although he uses a lot of grad ND and other filters for the amazing skies he shoots as backgrounds. He is however very secretive about his other in-camera techniques to achieve that amazing depth of field that some images have. Take a closer look for example at the "Elephant mother and two babies, Serengeti 2002" image in his portfolio (you find it on his page in the "On this earth" portfolio). The depth of field looks absolutely fake, yet it does not. At first I thought that this is Photoshop DOF work. But looking at it over and over again and looking at his other work made me rethink that again. And digging around on the internet, I found this fantastic thread at photo.net, where his style is being discussed. Go ahead and read it - the master himself comments down on the bottom of the thread, which makes some of the readers' comments sound quite, well, foolish. Here is (one of his) replies: Nick Brandt, Feb. 23rd 2006: "A friend told me about this thread. Reading through it, I felt compelled to address some of the questions and many inaccuracies! Firstly, 90% of my photos are taken from the safety of a vehicle. Only the chimps and one special herd of giraffes are photographed on foot. Neither I nor anyone else could ever get this close to wild animals any other way. Forget about safety - most of the animals would run away (and a few would attack). Secondly, the depth of field issue. I'll say it categorically - NONE of the depth of field thing is done in Photoshop - it is all done in camera. You could not get those focal planes shifting in focus in the same plane in the way that they do in Photoshop and expect it to look like this. Don Satalic is soooo wrong. Oh, and I don't use soft focus lenses. Don't even know what they are. The longest lens I own and use is a 200mm. Great lens. Tried the 300 once and hated it. Too conventional. So yes, I am close, but safe. All anyone really needs to know is that I work in a very very impractical way - very manually - and lose a crazy number of potentially great shots with all the faffing around I do. But I do it because occasionally something great comes out of such impractical methods. My friend Rocky Schenck taught me not to reveal my trade secrets some time ago. As for my EX-SF dealer's comments, I don't know where that came from. Grading - I nearly always use a heavy ND grad for the sky, and often a red filter, to get the sky dark. But there is significant grading done in Photoshop - the vignetting is invariably photoshop - I'm a sucker for it. Okay, so if anyone is still reading this thread, there you go. PS What is a 'bokeh'?" Another interesting, worthwhile interview with him about this work is found at www.bowhouse.com But what are you waiting for: go and take a look at his stunning images at www.nickbrandt.com. I would love to have one of his prints on my wall - but his pricing is currently out of my range. But his books might be under the Christmass tree...

Legal matters with photography in public - II

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2009-10-13T23:37:32+01:00

After some discussions and a failed attempt to walk Carlos away, the officers bashed and arrested him - with the main reason being obstructing traffic by standing in the middle of a road. Later he was found not guilty of disobeying a police officer and not guilty of disorderly conduct. However, he was found guilty of resisting arresting without violence. And the story started there. This is the time when Carlos Miller started this blog, which has today a tremendous following and is a great resource and read for issues regarding the legality in photography.

God is a DJ

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2009-10-11T06:14:39+01:00

Maybe this is because I like the "rule of thirds" (if there is such a thing as a rule). You can do amazing things with it, like split the image in squares, triangles and hexagons e.g. Which leaves plenty of opportunity to create a stage in front of your lens. And this movie is full of either shots which are set by either simply splitting the screen in thirds horizontally and vertically - or it is a bullseye approach. Both work well and are easy enough to use and for the viewer to digest. I also like them very much personally and like to use them for most of my images. Take a close look at the image with the finger at the mixer. The fingertip splits the image horizontally in 1/3 from the top. The entire finger with the knob cut it into two pretty equal triangles. Simple and effective I would say. The color in the entire film is also interesting. It has a warm, old-ish looking feel to it. It reminds me a bit of Kodachrome Film. Not quite, but close. Maybe a cheaper version of that. This "portrait at work" style image is the classic bulls eye split by two lines which also split the image in 1/3 in length. This time from the bottom. When you watch the movie, you will see, that most of the shots are staged in this way. I found this rather interesting. Was it coincidence, inexperience or excellence? You watch the movie and decide. Turn up the volume and enjoy the show.

An eventful year

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2009-10-10T22:33:04+01:00

Switching from a bridge style camera (Sony DSC H2) to a digital SLR proofed to be quite a challenge. And it was certainly not getting used to the new camera functions and capabilities as such but more about getting used to a new style and way of using a tool. So it took me a while to produce pleasing photographs with the D60 and my two lenses. But it was worth the hard work. I do have plenty of images to work on which I took between March and October of 2009. So there are exciting photographs to come for the gallery. Stay tuned in that respect. Third, I finally dug out my copy of Vincent Versace's magnificent "Welcome to Oz". This is a book I bought within my second year of photographing. This book contains an unusual approach about looking at photography and an inspiring thought process behind it perked with quite some challenging photoshop lessons. The matters inside the book were interesting, to say the least, and yet quite complex. And I just knew, that I was not quite ready to peruse the challenges which this book wanted to put upon me. Two or so years later the book found me. I know, that sounds rather cheesy. But that is how it was. And I started the lessons with my newly purchased WACOM Intuos 4 tablet. That would be change number four. I touched it the first time at the Photoshop World in Boston this past March. And I fell in love with it. All I can say is that, if you love your photography and like the digital darkroom work in Photoshop, then get one. Buy the small or the medium one - the screen size does not matter. I have the medium version on a full HD 23" screen and I can honestly say that the small one would have done the job for my type of work. The medium is fine, but if you don't have the money, the small one will do the job just right. Anything is better than a mouse for that matter. The fifth change is rather personal and shall not be discussed in a photo blog in depth. But it does involve a move across the ocean and thus probably a change in the photographs I will be going after. This move will happen by the end of the months and might mean yet another break in the workflow on this site. But I will be back before the depth of the Winter comes around.

The "San Francisco Gallery" at the Applefest in Northborough, Mass.

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2009-09-27T20:27:21+01:00

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Is the 2009 Mac mini fast enough for photo editing ?

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2009-05-22T03:55:12+01:00

Of course I was debating other alternatives, like the white Mac book or the new aluminum Mac book (which I think have identical hardware specs). But I did not think that I would neither need nor utilize the mobility factor of those. And considering the fact, that most of the time I would work in front of my large screen to edit my photos (that is just what I do with my computer...) plus realizing that my mini looks at the back like a porcupine thus never unhooking that potential laptop from its place, I decided, that the upgrade would be the new 2009 Mac mini. Yes, I did take a brief look at the 2009 iMacs. But they were out of the race since I absolutely dislike glossy displays. I think they do have their advantages in photo editing, like avoiding over saturation, but I still don't like them. I have read a lot on the internet about whether or not the new 2009 mini is fast enough to do anything. And more than one source (which I will not list here, because they are easy enough to find on the internet) state, that the mini is not the highest performing computer in the world. ... I would like to state a few thoughts about the (partially misleading) information that is out there: ...My mini here is the maxed out version from Apple: 320 GB Hard Drive (yes the slower 5400 RPM one), 4 GB of RAM (yes, the expensive Apple memory) and the larger processor. The latter was indeed a step I was thinking hard and long about, since I was not sure whether or not it would buy me anything. And there is also an external 7200 RPM 150 GB Firewire 400 drive attached to it. Usually I have iPhoto, Safari, tools and all other small windows open in Space one, Photoshop Elements 6 is running in Space two and RapidWeaver in either Space one or three (I am referring here to Apple's "Spaces" in Leopard). That allows me to create a workflow which I am comfortable with. Photoshop Elements 6 is a piece of software which requires a single screen for itself - hence the use of spaces. ... The photos I am working with are 10 Mpixel in size and are JPEGS and RAW images. ...The biggest performance booster this system has are the 4 GB or memory. I allocated roughly 60% of that to PSE 6, which is also using my external drive as a scratch disk. Usually two to three images are open in Photoshop. This is usually because I like trying to blend different exposures to one image. The results in one image with several layers, adjustment layers and layer masks. Revealing parts of an image in a layer mask works without any delay while using the brush or any other tool (with the old G4, there was always that one secondish delay between applying the brush in the layer mask and revealing the underlying image.). That is good and a "have to have" performance. All filters show absolutely no delay in the preview screen and most filters I use render within two seconds or less. ... I worked with demo versions of Adobe Lightroom as well as NIKON's Capture NX2 in parallel to the above mentioned applications - all with the same responsive result. ...The performance in Photomatix Pro to create HDR images is also quite pleasing: it takes about thirty seconds to create an HDR from six 10 Mpixel exposures. The tone mapping steps in the medium size preview take between one and two seconds per slider or button action. This is also very responsive and does not feel (!!) ... In the end I breed a lot longer over the image to decide wether or not I like the performed steps. From all the work I have done in the past six weeks of ownership of the 2009 mini I never managed the CPU fan to kick in - and if it did, I did certainly not hear it. ...I don't even know what half of the results mean for me in everyday computing. ... Do I feel often that I am waiting for my computer? ... Ok, if you really want to know: This mini on my desk gives me a Geekbench result of 3050 running at full HD resolution. A workstation at my work running COMSOL Multiphysics gives me a mere 2000 and is just fine for what I am doing there. ... Because it doesn't matter whether I wait four or five minutes for a result of a simulation - it is just long anyways. By the way: the old G4 mini scored 750 and photo editing was still ok. ... In the end it is all about your or my needs. ...I don't play games on the Mac mini. It is not what it is built for. If I play games I use my Xbox 360 sitting comfortably on my couch. If I would want to play PC games, I would not buy an Apple but built myself a nice small quite Windows system, which would beat the mini in performance and vastly exceed its price tag. As a summary I can say that the 2009 Mac mini is a fine computer which fills the computing needs for the most of us - even for the serious image editor/photographer. I can not speak for workflows within the photography business that have more demanding tasks (like automated actions and batch processing in Photoshop and the likes), but if I would have to deal with such things, I would certainly not look at the MacBook pros but at the really big big machines.... ...I paid 1000 USD for my machine that is sitting on my desk. If I would have wanted to save some money, I would have ordered the cheaper machine adding my own (faster) hard drive and generic memory. But I did not want to deal with opening that box, figuring out what I need and is compatible or gives me heat issues, ordering my own parts, putting them in, etc. etc.. ... And oh yea - I sold my old G4 for 300 US on ebay. So in the end, for about 700 USD I have an ultra quite, fast enough, slick looking computer running OS X sitting on my desk. And that is what fills my needs... ... Try to answer that question honestly for yourself before you get carried away by specs and countless tech reviews.

Legal matters with photography in public.

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2009-03-08T03:37:32+00:00

So let us begin thinking about situations where we ask ourselves whether or not it is questionable to shoot: ...Often some of us find ourselves cruising along and seeing this old, interesting house along the road, or this really eclectic something in front of that house. But we are reluctant to just stop the car and take an image. ... You can freely photograph anything that you see as long you are on public property, like the roadside or the walkway. That is the case at least as long as you are not disturbing someone's deserved and expected privacy. So, sticking your lens through the hedges and taking images of the BBQ is a no no as well as zooming into somebody's living room. If the owner is happening sitting on the front stairs, you are free to go. In this case, it really comes down to how you quick - or polite - you are.... ...Have you ever been kneeling on the street, taking your shot down the road and suddenly somebody, out of the blue, starts yelling at you and complaining that he or she is in your photograph? Well, you have all right to take that image, with or without that person. ... As a side note: Has anyone of those complainers ever asked themselves how many secretly security cameras caught their likeness? On the street and in public, you are allowed, against common believe, to take images from (and not exclusively) the following objects: celebrities, crime and fire scenes (careful though), children, police officers, airports, train stations, public utilities and really any sort of infrastructure, like bridges and the means. There is one little exception: they probably chase us away once we start taking images of military facilities... ...A proper public place is any place that can be entered by the public because the public is invited or is made for use by the public. So,of course there are streets and side walks, parks and the means. But also lobbies of office buildings, the subway and even the mall are considered being public places, since the public is invited to enter. The general rule is, that you are allowed to take photographs there. ... And when you look around, almost every office building lobby will post a big "no photo" sign. ...A lot of malls surprisingly don't have photography guidelines in place. From what I have seen, there are no rules posted alongside the normal mall rules, neither did I find anything on the malls home pages. If worst comes to worst, the mall security personal can ask you to stop photographing and leave the mall. They can not however take your camera or film or even ask you to delete your images. If you run into this situation, you should insist on having a proper law enforcement officer on the site (which by the way is not allowed to do this either). It is your decision to argue to the bitter end or simply to be polite. ...I consider this an also heavily discussed subject, Inspired by the photography of Bruce Davidson and a little side project of mine, I researched this matter a bit. And once I started asking google with some broad search terms, I quickly found many discussions about whether or not to allow photography in the NYC subway system due to national security (...). ... Today places like the NYC subway and the Boston T have rules and regulation in place, which essentially grant photographers rights to take images there. ...I essentially learned that it is a good thing to know and to be confident about those rules. While shooting on the Boston T, I have been a few times asked by officials what I am doing after spending quite some time at a single location. Explaining them in a brief manner always cleared the situation: I mean no harm, I know my rights, I know yours, so do you, leave me alone. ... But again, it comes down to being respectful and polite. ...You can find here the regulations of the MBTA about photography in the Boston T system. I always have a copy on me when shooting down there, which I did not need so far. ...A lot of us like abandoned buildings and places. ... This old brick building, sitting quietly in the fog of the early morning hours has a eery fascination: it is waiting to be explored. ... Fact is, that all those buildings or locations are usually owned by somebody and fenced off somehow. Which means, once you enter, you are trespassing. ... As a little side not here: once you start cracking open fences and doors and breaking windows in order to get in, you are not trespassing anymore. ... So, essentially, when you are not caught while trespassing the old building is only part of the whole picture Once you publish that image with details about the location where it has been taken, it can be used as proof against you that you actually entered that building - this is of course only the case if the right person with the right mindset finds that image, starts the process and uses it against you. Granted, an unlikely scenario, but in the ages of the internet and online publishing this possibility is most certainly not out of reach ("man hat schon Pferde kotzen sehen") ...This enables us to provide society with views and expressions of an ordinary world in a way that is foreign to them. Leaving the beaten paths however can bring us quickly in questionable situations, as discussed above. ... And, although in the U.S. we live in a society which is driven by laws and regulations (I am still dreaming about the "it's the law" towel for everybody) it comes down to your very own wit and most of all, politeness. Do you really want to promote the image of the guy sitting at the front stairs of his or her house that ended up yelling at you and calling the police, no matter how expressive the image actually is? Do you really want to publish that shot of that street scene where one of the "contenders" ended up swearing at you? ... Be thoughtful about what you are doing, be polite and respectful and listen to your common sense. That's anyhow how I tend to address any sticky situation... ...document gives an overview about our rights in some not so uncommon situations. ...I am no legal advice, nor should or can you refer to this article in case you are in confrontation with the law. In fact, this article is a collection of resources found on the internet and my very own thoughts about those in regards to the matters discussed above.

The old baptist church

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2009-02-22T16:16:47+00:00

The reservoir laid still and frozen in the afternoon sun. But of course I did not bring my camera with me. So I ventured out one morning later in the past week to get some shots in from this stunning scene. I arrived just after sunrise, with the sun not quite above the horizon line. The light was coming from the back, shining directly on the church. But sure enough, by the time I was setup, that moment with the orange glowing sky over the church was missed and the sky turned into a pale blue. Well, this turned into an opportunity to try out my new 0.6x grad ND filter. And with the sun in my back, the polarizer should work quite fine to bring some life back to those sunrise colors. Thought and done, the two filters were stacked on top of each other. Rotating he polarizer brought the sunrise indeed back to life. I was well aware that I had to pay attention not to rotate the grad ND while adjusting the polarizer. However, it still happened. And I ended up with a 45 degree darkened horizon across the church as I found out at home... The first course of action was to mark the grad ND with red tape, so I can see now the horizon line. Stupid beginners mistakes. I wondered how to adjust the exposure, so that I could capture the rough texture of the ice. Taking a few shots at different stops to combine them seemed like a good solution. The final images shown here are partially HDR and a manual blend of different exposures in the forest background to emphasize some of the trees more then others.

Days of my aging father

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2009-02-06T03:07:10+00:00

You should go, have a look and see for yourself: In http://www.dayswithmyfather.com Philip shares the story, in writing and images, about his aging father. I am not sure at this point about how to judge his documentary (or wether I even should) - but it is not the obvious "old man on his death bed captured in brilliant photographs" one would, or could, expect. This is simply touching. And it makes me think. This link made me go out and look for Philips home/project page and I discovered, not surprisingly, a treasure chest worth of photographs. I found the same concept of his images I have seen in the "days with my father" essay in every single image on his page. This input made me realize just one more time of how humble of a seer I am. Which is not bad, really. It is more of an... inspiration, And - simple enjoyment of excellent photography. As my friend, was telling me, the Necessary Stage in Singapore brought the prints of Philip Toledano for an exhibition to the Esplanade Tunnel for 2009's Fringe Festival. Too bad Singapore is not around the corner, so I simply missed it. I wish I would not have....

Good bye to an old friend...

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2009-01-17T02:11:56+00:00

The H2 is one of those called "superzoom" cameras - built in lens, 12x zoom (some 300 mm equivalent), designed and built to have a SLR feeling to it. This is exactly what sold me to this type of camera back in the day. I knew I had a certain interest in photography, but was not sure about how far it would cary. Back then, there were a few competitors competing in the same market: Fuji, Olympus, Panasonic and the Sony. I learned a lot about digital camera technology back then by studying the reviews extensively. After a lot of reading and re-reading, I decided for a trip to the local camera store (one day we will regret driving them out of business by ordering everything online for less!). I picked the Sony simply because of its feeling and its usability: it was lying great in my hands and did not feel like a cheap soap box and I was immediately friends with the menu and all the user interface handling - the competition could not match that, I found. I don't want to write a review about an outdated product here but just a few sentences about my experience with this camera: The digital viewfinder proofed to be blessing and curse at the same time. It was a good learning tool to have "live preview". Image composition was reduced to placing shapes and forms in the frame, since the size and resolution of this viewfinder was too small. Not the worst thing, since images consist of such elements and composition is thus reduced to the most important factors. It is not the best thing, since disturbing elements within the composition can be easily overlooked. The viewfinder was horrible to use in bright conditions and impossible to use for long exposure shots in the dark. The lens is quite unusual. It has a big zoom for its size. Image quality suffers a bit, but is fine, depending on what your are planning on shooting. The huge amount of barrel distortion can be actually quite charming, depending on the shot. Specially skyscrapers bend nicely towards the center of the image which provides interesting framing opportunities. It was extremely hard to get a shallow depth of field with this lens, despite the fairly large f/2.5-3.5 aperture settings. The combination of this lens with the small sensor results in this camera being a light hungry monster. I found myself running out of light inside and surprisingly often outside. Higher ISO settings can not make up for this, since every image taken with ISO greater than 200 is extremely noisy. ISO settings 400 and more are absolutely useless. The white balance works fine outdoors, but the indoor white balance performance was quite disappointing. The dynamic range of the DSC H2 is quite small, which results in many of my photographs being multiple exposures combined using Photoshop Elements 3 or Photomatix Pro. This camera performed best on bright, sunny days with colorful images to shoot. That is what is is built for, i think. Although what I just wrote may sound quite negative, I really enjoyed working with this camera over the past two and a half years. Again, it was a great learning tool and it is quite powerful. I think all the cameras limitations taught me, what I need and want in a new camera, taught me about the challenges of photography and certainly taught me about the use of Photoshop... So here I am posting the official last image taken with this camera, which is ironically and unintentionally one of the first subjects I ever published in the fotocommunity. What a nice way to say farewell... I am looking forward working with my D60. Once I have some experience with it I will post a small user review on here....

A cold morning

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2008-12-01T00:03:16+00:00

The sunshine and the crisp air this morning (and the turkey) made me finally going there... I did not spend too much time at this venue, since I had pretty much in mind what I wanted to shoot - is this now advantage or disadvantage? Anyways, for now I have captured close to what I wanted to capture. I like the perspective. I do have to work on the light though. The only thing that really bothers me at this shot is the crap in the lake. Can anyone clean that up, please? I decided, to migrate to Framingham downtown to the old cars sitting next to the train tracks, a location Ian has told me about. I was not quite able to capture the overall really well, but managed to get some nice detail shots in. After a while I really started to freeze, so it was time to return home for a nice bacon & eggs breakfast. I spotted a bunch of geese close to Marlboro on my way home. It was quite nice to look at, but it was nothing which I was capable of capturing properly - just nice little treat before coming home and having a nice cup of hot coffee...

Fall Impressions in New England

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2008-11-10T01:59:36+00:00

That does however not mean, that it is not worth it to go out at the early time of the day. The trips brought me to Paxton, to Boston, my home ground the suburbs and to the Blue Hills state reservation in Massachusetts. That was actually one quite nice day in mid October and I can recommend this seven or so mile hike to everybody. The few steep climbs reward one with a really nice view over Boston and the surrounding communities. This is a great photo opportunity early in the morning I would think. I will try and get out once there is some snow to capture Boston with a winter wonder land backdrop. Until then enjoy the colors of fall...

An all new homepage

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2008-10-23T01:18:50+01:00

After a while of thinking and pondering, I came finally up with a home(front) page design that I really like. For those of of you that did not see the old front page - well, you did not miss much. I will try and keep the slideshow there somewhat up to date and will exchange the pictures over time. I hope you like it. Let me know if you don't.

It's fall outside

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2008-10-11T10:44:00+01:00

This morning, well, the late morning I stepped outside my house and saw this. I simply wanted to share this absolutely stunning view - I guess I can enjoy this for a couple of more weeks before this grim winter is moving in.... The farmers almanac says it is going to be one - and if you can not believe those guys, who can you trust?

The Folia-O-Meter

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2008-10-10T10:45:36+01:00

The foliage is, or actually can be, quite a feast for the eyes. Hence the annual foliage in New England is followed and well documented on the net. I hope I will make it to some cool spots this fall - depending on how this evening goes, I actually might head out down Rt. 2 towards southern Vermont, where the foliage is about to peak. Waiting for it to happen is Massachusetts can go both ways: it either gets really gorgeous, or it simply never really makes here leaving the trees in an average brown. Not very desirable.... So, off to Vermont I guess...

An overdue portfolio facelift

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2008-10-06T10:50:36+01:00

Since this site opened in July 2008, there has not much been going on in the portfolios. Despite the fact that I have quite a few portfolio worthy images uploaded in the fotocommunity, they never made it to my site here. There are also plenty of photos to be worked on from last years trip to Southeast Asia. I just hope that one day in the near future, I will be able to get an album together, similar to the Hong Kong Experience. Changes have been made to the Citiyside and Flea Market portfolios. I am very happy about finally adding some street photography pictures to the Cityside since this does loosen up the collection of mainly architectural photos that have been in there so far. I am also very fond of the photograph of the stage practice of the Necessary Stage in Singapore while visiting a dear friend of mine. I had a chance of observing the preparations of a rather interesting play called "Good People". The play was set in a hospice and dealt with the relationship of three people, the medical director, a nurse and the ill patient consuming marijuana for pain relieve. I think the setting was in a country were marijuana is as illegal as in Singapore itself. I never had a chance to watch the actual play, but observing the preparations was a lot of fun....

The Fitchburg Shootout

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2008-10-06T04:11:29+01:00

We ran into this half abandoned business area right on Rt. 31, a few miles past downtown just past Waites Corner. We spent the next couple of hours wandering the grounds and looking interesting and obscure things. It was a pretty cool location and offered a lot, I think. Train tracks, Silos, old buildings, loads of rust and plenty of weed. A heaven. It would have been good to be there maybe half hour earlier, but how early can a human being get possibly up? But after a few hours exploring the grounds, even tracks and rust can become boring. So we drove towards home again, passing through Princeton and Sterling. Somewhere there on the way we both saw the Old Mill. The sun shining through the trees onto a pond inhabited by an entire duck clan. Foilage, a pond, ducks and a mill. Of course we stopped. Most of the ducks were doing what ducks are doing. But one of them had a blast at the waterfall: standing in front of it, jumping towards and into it and back and just quacking as much as a duck possibly can. And yes, that feisty duck.... thing was pretty cool. He went after us and was hissing wildly. And he (he looked like a male anyways) was pretty tough to catch on chip because he just jerked his head around. Or I am just too slow. A little typical "New England romantic" to close the session... See the venue and some shots here.

The Hong Kong experience

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2008-09-27T09:57:17+01:00

On arrival I took the highly modern Airport Express train from Hong Kong International Airport on Chek Lap Kok (a man made island north of Lantau) to Hong Kong Central. Well, after being on the road for almost twenty four hours, all the plans about being brave and finding my way to the Hotel using public transportation went down the drain and I chose a taxi. Done deal, check in and off I was exploring the neighborhood in urgent need for a beer. My first encounter with the locals revealed, that there must be as many brits living in this city as chinese.... The day waiting until arrival of my friend gave me the opportunity to get used to the heat and the incredible humidity - at least so I thought. ...Two million people on the Island of which, it seems, everyone is out at the same time. ... Everything in Hong Kong makes noise - even the traffic lights. ... I think it is a habit to overcome the constant noise out in the city streets. ...Armani next to Rolex next to D&G next the HSBC and other banks and high profile shops here, but turning the corner catapults one back into one of the countless (more or less) traditional, chinese markets and hand craft business streets. ...There are a few historic buildings left nestled in between the skyscrapers. ... Well, we did not bother, since those few leftovers from long gone times do really not play a big role in the city appearance and its pace. We spent most of the time exploring the markets and the street life in Wan Chai, Central, Sheung Wan and Soho. Luckily we stayed in the Wan Chai district with our hotel fairly centrally located. So everything was pretty much around the corner - although I heard other opinions on that. ... A crowded area with a really nice, local market, plenty of bars and clubs and all that comes with it. ... But strolling through Central rewarded us with ending up Sheung Wan. This area has a certain past time feeling to it with its steep stair streets and street vendors. It is a matter until they will disappear, but for now they are still in place and holding up the fort of a time long gone. There was also the local, well, lets call it a junkyard, where folks brought collected old goods like paper, cans, old AC's, copper pipes and the likes and sold them by weight for some dollars. That explained all the, mostly older, folks in the city with their pull carts roaming the city streets. A steady, never ending stream of people kept us interested in observing for quite some time. There is not much to say about Soho, other than that there is a really cool, super long escalator, some nice bars where we should have spent way more time in, some artsi feel about it, but also bars with blinking devil horns and people wearing those. ...Kowloon across Victoria Harbor is easy enough to reach from Central or Wan Chai using the Star Ferry which crosses every 15 minutes. The Tsim Sha Tsui district is the southernmost district of Kowloon and is the tourist ghetto, home of the finest hotels and cheapest guesthouses, many stores from all levels and of course the tourist markets. ... And if you are early enough you will still get a seat in one of the many food stall restaurants before the police removes their illegally setup tables. We spend only a short time on the Jade Market - but does not mean that this one does not deserve more time. Sitting by the pier of Tsim Sha Tsui reveals the view onto one of the most breathtaking skylines I have ever seen. This view makes one realize how modern Hong Kong really is and how strangely misplaced all the local markets nestled in the streets seem to be. seeing the city from the outside, they don't appear fit, but from the inside they are a vital part of the city life. The Symphony of Light shows a magnificent side of Hong Kong by letting the lights of about twenty skyscrapers dance in the rhythm of music. ...The trip to the peak with the cable car opens the view to the typical Hong Kong Island landscape. ... Well, there are a few more houses in between the hills than in Lummerland. Annoyingly it was very foggy when we stood on top of the peak, despite the early morning hour. ... Looking down the south side gives a view of Hong Kong from top and the Victoria harbor, separating Hong Kong Island from Kowloon on the main land. ... A steady stream of ferries, craneships, djunks, fishing boats and everything else that can swim populate the waterway. ... Again its a steady stream of ships, just like everything else in the city. We never made it to the peak at night. ...Some really nice day trips brought us to the 10.000 Buddhas Monastery in Sha Tin in the New Territories. ... Another destination was the Big Buddha statue next to the Po Lin Monastery in Ngong Ping on Lantau Island. This Monastery was reached with a long cable car ride over an amazing landscape. The Big Buddha itself is a gigantic statue which hosts the "bone relic", one of the three relics in Buddhism. Buddhist pilgrimage here and pray on every stair step on the way up to the relic. Because this could take forever, they tend to take two steps at a time. On two occasions I was brave enough to not bring my camera - for the trip to sleepy Lamma Island and to the visit of the opening race of the Hong Kong Jockey Club. ... But most for the visit of the race course. ...A longer getaway lead to Macau, the Las Vegas of the east, as it wants to be called. This peninsula about 80 km west of Hong Kong has a long way to go to be even close to Las Vegas, but it is well on its way. This former Portuguese colony is a bizarre mixture of residential, rundown skyscrapers, casinos and of course plenty of historic portuguese buildings. This appearance caused some uncertainty of where I currently was - the mediterranean or China. ...Back in Hong Kong, there was only some time left to do some nick nack shopping and have a last beer overlooking this unbelievable skyline one last time. This was indeed a wonderful trip with my friend that I will not forget...

Boston Caribbean Carnival.

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2008-08-25T11:35:34+01:00

This was indeed an event I am always looking forward to. The carnival happens always on the last weekend in August, which is the weekend before Labour Day weekend. That made it complicated this year since Labour Day weekend was the last one in August. So what do do? The website was not very informative - they archive but don't announce there. Thank good I got a phone call just in time as a reminder - thanks Chicken. :D. It was a fantastic, sunny sunny afternoon (they say it was the nicest weekend in Mass all summer - well they must know it...), rushing out of bed at 2 pm. and being on Martin Luther King Blvd. Just in time at 3.30 pm or so. Yea, I was really in the groove. But unlike in previous years, I paid more attention to the photography than I did to the music. Well, sometimes priorities just change. The parade went on and I was making my way up Blue Hill Ave. towards Franklin Park, where the parade finishes. I arrived there early so I thought I would get a few good shots in of the incoming groups and dancers. I was wrong. That bit was totally unspectacular. Thankfully I got the job done on the street before. Well, I decided to leave the parade behind and check out the festival in the park. And I immediately was attracted by the "Fish and Bake" stand - unfortunately like many others as well. So, it took me 45 minutes to get my share. And boy, was that good. Some good things take a bit longer sometimes... Check out the pictures of the Boston Caribbean Carnival 2008.

The final overhaul?

Markus@photonopticum.com — 2008-08-23T01:27:10+01:00

I most certainly doubt it. But since its launch in early July 2008 this site finally grew out of its infanty. The overall appearance, as well as the photo viewer and the picture organization have changed. So that would be pretty much everything, correct? Well, welcome and enjoy the show...