Take care!
Tag: Norway
Monochrome Monday 9-52
Take care!
Monochrome Monday 9-51
That day was a bad one. Heavy winds pushed low-standing clouds over the sea towards the coast. Clouds, full of water and ready to pour it over the scene. So, we had to secure the doors when getting out of the cars. A mixture of rain, hail, and snow welcomed us. No hard rain, but enough to keep some of us inside the cars. To make it even worst, the ground was covered merely with ice and rain poodles on top of them. Very careful movements were an absolute necessity. These were not the conditions we came for. What a difference to 2016, when I was there for the first time.
This time we needed the shortest shutter speeds, even when using wide-angle lenses. While setting up a tripod was possible in those conditions, it was impossible to use it. The wind not only pushed the tripod and made longer exposures impossible, but the guts were also even so strong to make the tripod tumble down. So, I opted for another way to get a long exposure of the waves: I put my beanbag on top of the concrete wall securing the parking ground from the cliff, and pressed the camera in the bag. That way, everything was stable enough for a 20-second exposure at 97mm.
For a long, I was hoping for such a location and the right conditions. You see, you have to be open-minded when arriving at a location. Don’t stick to the idea of recreating the images you have seen online, in books, or have on your bucket list. Look around and discover what the scene and the conditions have to offer. Benefit from what you have in front of you. In German, we have a saying: better the sparrow in the hand than the pigeon on the roof (Besser den Spatz in der Hand also die Taube auf dem Dach.).
Take care!
Throwback Thursday: the sea
In German, we have the word See for the sea. But, it can have two different meanings, depending if one uses the male (der) or the female (die) article.
Der See is a body of water enclosed by land and translates to “lake” in English.
Die See is the same as “sea” in English, but also a poetic name for seas. In addition, we have the word “Meer”, which also translates to “sea”, but this is a more ‘technical’ and emotionless description of “sea”.
Btw. the word “ocean” also exists and is used in the same way as in English.
“Die See” is also referenced when saying “Ich fahre / er fährt zur See / Er is Seemann” (it’s used to describe, the I / he is sailing (the work) or a seaman/sailor).
I love standing or sitting near the sea and watching the waves come in. I love the distinct smell and the sound of the crashing waves. I love the feeling of having sand below my feet or at least below my shoes.
Take care!
Wordless Wednesday: Arctic Cathedral in Tromsø
Take care!
Monochrome Monday 9-50
Take care!
Throwback Thursday: the sky is burning
Here, we have a saying when having such a sky in November or early December: the angels are baking.
In this case, it looks a bit more like the trolls or elves are having a huge fire behind that mountain.
Take care!
Wordless Wednesday: Arctic Cathedral in Tromsø
Take care!
Monochrome Monday 9-49
Take care!
Throwback Thursday: huge nature vs. tiny men
This is one of my favorite images taken in Norway this year. Without being disturbed by the wind, the water in the fjord perfectly mirrors the surrounding mountains. The rising full moon gives this scene a very calm ambiance. In addition, only the peaks of the mountains are still touched by the warm light of the setting sun, while the rest of the scene is already bathed in cold blue light.
Just before we arrived at the small parking lot, two minibusses drove out, stopped and spit out a dozen people. The minibusses clogged the whole parking lot because of stopping right after the entrance and parked side by side in the road instead of giving room for other vehicles. So our own two cars filled up the remaining space and even had to park in knee-deep snow. While most of the minibus passengers didn’t seem interested in the location or the scene, others crossed the road and the guardrail to head down to the water through the still untouched snow. One of them is in the image. Try to find him 😁!
Our hope was to see white-tailed eagles here. When I was there, back in 2016, we saw a couple of them here. They were either in the air or sitting on the ground beside the water. Because of bad weather and being on a long transfer trip, it wasn’t possible to get nice images in 2016. This time, there were no eagles visible. But, we were compensated by this awesome light and mirror. For me personally, the rising full moon and its reflection is an additional eye-catcher that upgrades the image from great to awesome.
Take care!
Wordless Wednesday: Arctic Cathedral in Tromsø
Take care!
Monochrome Monday 9-48
Take care!
Wordless Wednesday: Tromsø
Take care!
Monochrome Monday 9-47
Take care!
Wordless Wednesday: Tromsø
Take care!
Monochrome Monday 9-46
Take care!
Throwback Thursday: snowy landscape
A wonderfully bright and friendly snowy landscape in Norway. When looking at the shadows of the bushes, you can see, the scene is backlit. The light source is slightly above the upper edge of the image. The color temperature is quite cool as a result of the silvery light. A real winterly image as there is no warmth in it. But, something’s wrong with the image. Look carefully and try to discover, what’s wrong before reading further. As usual, you can enlarge it by clicking on it.
On the right, you can recognize lights: there’s a restroom on the parking ground and a car with switched-on lights is driving on the street. Far in the back, there are a few more lights from houses and a town.
Although in Scandinavia you have to drive with lights on during the day, the lights were not visible in an image taken at daytime. Same with the lights issued by houses. During the daytime, you would not be able to see them even when being closer to them.
This image instead is taken at night: 22:32h at full moon. We were out there to photograph the Aurora, but she didn’t appear. So, I was using the time to do also other things.
I hope, you like this image and the idea. Try it on your own and be surprised by the results.
Take care!
Wordless Wednesday: resting while it snows
Take care!
Monochrome Monday 9-45
Today, I have a more abstract image for you. Before reading any further, guess what you see in the image.
It’s a little dune of snow created by the wind. This was one of the pro sides of the regular strong snow storms we were suffering in Norway. The structure is approximately 20 cm long and 7-8 cm high. The low-standing afternoon sun trow that long shadow. It was located right next to the path we were walking from a panoramic viewpoint back to the parking ground.
Take care!
Lens-Artists Photo Challenge #240: The Road (most often) Taken
Ok, guys. It’s Saturday and so my contribution to LAPC is due. This week, John is our host. He asks for “the road most often taken”. But, instead of following the idea literally, he explains, he understands it more metaphorically and projects it to photography. So, he wants us to show images, more or less typical for us.
There are so many kinds of photography like landscape, architecture, people, street, fashion, macro, or food, to name only a few of them. Since I started photography back in the early 1980s, my focus is primarily on nature and monochrome. Thus you can find me more likely in rural environments than in urban ones. I love observing natural landscapes and wild animals (wildlife), especially birds.
In my early years, I took over photography jobs for an advertising agency on a regular basis and photographed the given subjects with monochrome films which were developed and printed in my own lab. I still have my love for monochrome images, as you can easily see when browsing my blog.
Thus, I decided to pick a few examples for today, where nature and monochrome are combined. All of the images are taken during my latest trip to Norway, from which I returned on Wednesday night.
As usual, click on the images to enlarge them.
Maybe, I was able to inspire you to dig in your archive and find some images, you can publish your images on your blog and set a link to John’s inspiration post. Don’t forget to tag it with LENS-ARTIST, so we can find it.
Take care!
Throwback Thursday: I’m back …
… from northern Norway again. During the last 12 days we tried to meet the Green Lady again, but the overall outcome is quite disappointing considering the current peak of solar activity which is the cause of the Aurora.
At first, we had 2 days in and around Tromsø with snowy and rainy weather, but no Aurora. Next 4 days on Senja: snowstorms, thick clouds, and partly rain 😲 to melt the snow, and such even prevented nice winter images.
Thus, after checking the weather forecast for the greater region, we left 1 day early, canceled the next location, and postponed another one. Instead, we escaped to Sweden, which was proposing the best conditions for the next few days.
It was a horrible 320km drive to Sweden crossing a mountain pass: towards darkness during a snowstorm on such a steep and small road is quite a challenge, even with spikes. At first, we lost an hour because the pass was closed for rescuing a truck stuck in the snow. Snow chains were an absolute necessity for trucks. The bad sight demanded further delays because of the quite slow speed for driving. Driving convoy was also necessary to make sure to not lose sight of the car in front of us.
After dinner on the arriving day, we noticed a greenish glow above the town. So, two of us (me included 😁 of course) decided to give it a try. Despite being quite late (in comparison to their usual schedule), she popped out and danced for us. We were back at the hotel at about 2 a.m., tired, but with happy smiles on our faces. My companion even wanted to stay way longer. The first meeting with the Aurora for this trip. The others were too tired from the drive.
Unfortunately, the next two days she was shy again and didn’t show us more than a weak glow between the clouds, that already arrived there, too, although the weather forecast said differently.
After 3 nights in Sweden, we headed back to Norway for the remaining 3 nights.
When we arrived at our last location, we struggled again with bad weather. One day and night got lost to another snowstorm, but we also got two crisp clear nights, but she didn’t pop up. While we got at least a short and weak Aurora in one of these two nights, the other one was completely Aurora-free. At least we got some wonderful sunny winter days.
Overall, this year’s trip for seeing the Aurora was quite disappointing although the conditions are extremely good this year. Solar activity is at or near its maximum. Surprisingly, a green Aurora was visible even in the middle of Germany but not in northern Norway. I guess, because of the high level of solar activity, the center moved south so that we couldn’t see Auroras north of the polar circle in Norway as expected.
The green lights are at about 40km high, while the reds are up to 100km high. Thus, middle Europe usually sees the red lights of an aurora, when a strong Aurora happens. But green lights are extremely rare at these latitudes.
On the other hand, this was again a nice winter trip with nice company and quite well-prepared (although it seemed a bit chaotic sometimes).
Surprisingly, I have more the half of my images already developed and even started creating an ebook with some of my monochrome images taken during this trip. So, even the days with bad weather delivered. During the last third of the trip, I definitely had the best weather. So, be prepared to see some of the images in the future.
For today I have one Aurora image for you (how could it be otherwise). You might have already seen it on Instagram.
Second, an image taken while coping with the bad conditions on the pass. Coincidentally at that time, the shuffle function of my audio collection decided to play „May it be“ by Enya from the first Lord of the Rings movie where it is underscoring how the fellows hiked upwards the Caradhras pass.
The third image is one of the last images, taken near sunset on our last day.
One of the other highlights of the trip was our visit to the Ice Hotel in Kiruna. You can rent a room for a night made of ice. Sleep in a sleeping bag on a bed made of ice covered with reindeer furs set up in a room made completely of ice. They offer three different kinds of such rooms. First, they have the standard rooms, where you feel like standing in a room of the gigantic crystalline fortress made by the green crystal thrown by Clark Kent (the later Men of Steel) in the Canadian Arctic. Other rooms were more individually decorated, like the one in the image below. All of these are supposed to melt as soon as spring starts and return their water to the lake beside the hotel. In a separate huge hall, there are individually designed rooms by some ice artists. I suppose those rooms are not for rent. According to the website, “the room holds a temperature of -5 to -8 degrees Celsius. The bed is covered with reindeer hides and you sleep in a thermal sleeping bag. Instead of doors, the hotel rooms have curtains that you draw to give you and your company privacy.“ So, I wish you a good night and sleep well 😁
The entrance fee for seeing these rooms is quite high but definitely worth the money. While I was expecting only a bar made of ice set up in a room made of ice and equipped with chairs and tables made of ice, I was visiting an art gallery where not only the rooms were made of ice, but also the pieces of art itself. Btw. they also have the bar 😁.
The final image for today is one of the monochrome images taken at a beach in the greater Tromsø area.
Here, the different layers work best in monochrome. The foreground is made of gray rocks, the middle ground is made of dark rocks and the background is formed by the mountains. All of them are well parted by the moving water of the fjord and the white splashes stand out well from the dark rocks while the shoreline leads the eye from the lower left right to the splashes and thus makes them the main subject. The color version is on Instagram for comparison.
So, my advice for photographing on a trip. Don’t stick to the ideas you have on your bucket list. Instead, try always to get the best from the situation you’re in. There is always something for you to take. Use your time well and the location will pay back. When sticking to the ideas from your bucket list, remember that you will never be in the same situation, in the same conditions, and probably in the same place as the photographer whose picture you saw. But, it will limit your ability to see the scene with your own eyes and capture the beauty laying in front of you. Be a creator and not a copycat.
Take care!
Throwback Thursday: My first encounter with the dancing Green Lady
Monochrome Monday 9-34
Happy New Year!
The calendar says it’s January now. January means we’re in the middle of winter in the northern hemisphere and winter is related to snow.
Freshly fallen snow lays on the ground like untouched and clean linen. The same is true for the first day(s) of a new year. Everything is still unclear and uncertain. Although some topics might already have been planned, everything still has to happen.
Take care!
Monochrome Monday 6-52
Take care!
Monochrome Monday 6-51 – Wanna talk?
I saw these nice English telephone boxes last year in Wales. As we are currently hindered going out and are locked in our homes to save us from getting infected by the SARS-CoV-2 virus for several weeks now life becomes kind of boring.
As so many of us are currently locked at their homes similar to sitting in jail and certainly have talked to nearly every relative and friend. Every housekeeping is done, reading, listening to the radio and watching TV or binge-watching whole seasons becomes boring. So, maybe it’s interesting to talk to a complete stranger, whom you only know slightly from reading her blog posts.
Although I’m not alone, but I’m curious about talking to people and get to know a bot about how they feel these days. Therefore I’m offering a skype call. Simply talk half an hour or so. No specific topic. A bit like you could do when meeting someone in a metro or a bus station.
Therefore I make an offer: do you want to talk to me? I’m offering a skype call. If you’re interested, drop me a line in the comments. I won’t publish that comment and only use the email address you’re leaving me, to contact you for negotiating a suitable time slot. You know, I’m in western Europe and located in CEST, that’s UTC+2 (because of the daylight savings time).
You can find your timezone i.e. when looking on the world map published at Wikipedia and then use Google by saying for example “13 PST CEST” and get back “22:00h”. So, you can see, it’s 10 p.m. (= 22:00h) for me when the people in i.e. San Fransico or LA have 1 p.m. (= 13:00h; PST = Pacific Standard time).
So, anybody interested? I’m curious for you 🙂
Take care!
MyBlog - solaner 