Tag: uk

photo-of-the-day, photography, spring, world

Travel Tuesday: awaiting a new day

solaner

OK, guys. It seems the polling part worked and you voted for some more UK: Northern Wales.

This tree grows near or in the lake, depending on the water level. As you can see, approximately half a meter of water was missing to make the tree an island.

We were based near the lake during our stay. Thus I got up early to be there for sunrise and left the house at about 6:00 in the morning. I was only about 1 kilometer to walk. As the weather seemed to become perfect for such a morning, I planned to go here right at the first morning. You know, weather is able to change fast and not taking an opportunity can lead to waste a chance. Thus I went out before the planned breakfast to be back at right before the time aligned for breakfast. 

Side note: I wasn’t the first one out. When leaving the house for the lake, I met another photographer. But, he was outside to smoke instead of taking photos. Even when I told him about my plan, he didn’t want to come with me. Later he regretted to not having joined me for the little walk.

The silence, calmness, and serenity of this scene gives so much of power. A perfect start in such a week.

Take care!

photo-of-the-day, photography, spring, world

Travel Tuesday: infinity

solaner

 

 

On our last night on the Isle of Skye, we were sitting together in the living room of the vacation home and chatting about many different topics i.e. reviewing the just past week when suddenly the topic Astro Photography popped up.

When I started with photography back in the 1980s, I got a magazine in my hands having an image in it showing how the earth spun under the Northern Star, Polaris. I was fascinated at the first moment. I thought carefully, about how the photographer could have created that image, because there was no further information in the magazine. 

Needed equipment:

  1. camera, able to keep the shutter open for a long time
  2. tripod to keep the camera in the exact position
  3. film – what kind and which ISO?
  4. cable shutter release with a screw to keep the shutter open (had to be bought at once)

So, that was the easier part. I opted for a slide file with ISO 400 and kept the shutter open for an hour. No problem at that time.

Surprise, surprise – the settings were guessed right and the spinning stars were on my slide as planned. Unfortunately, the lab decided to cut that slide because they assumed having an underexposed image in that place. Thus, I was still without such an image.

I took that image in a rural area, quite far away from my home. So, there was no option to retake it. Over time, I forgot it. But, on that night on the Isle of Skye, all these memories came back. I had everything with me. The only difference is the approach how to capture the starts. Back in film days, it was no problem to keep the shutter open for so long. Nowadays, you have to make sure, your sensor does not overheat. Therefore, you take many, many images of each 30 seconds or so and stack them in postprocessing. We were in a quite dark place on the Isle of Skye and had a clear sky. So, I set up my tripod, put my widest lens on my camera, and dialed in a timer to automatically do a series of 30-second long exposures for a total of about 15 minutes.

The image above is not perfectly aligned with Polaris, but I like it anyway.

 

Next week, I going to start a new series. You have the opportunity to choose:

a) Northern Wales  – 70%
b) Iceland 
c) Norway – 10%
d) Graubünden (a Kanton in Switzerland) – 20%

Simply type your wish in the comments. I don’t trust the polling tool below very much.

Update: the poll tool seem to have worked. I put the results behind the options-

Take care!

architecture, photo-of-the-day, photography, spring, travel, urban, world

Travel Tuesday: lawn mowers

solaner

This was another mystery for me while walking on seemingly abandoned cemeteries in Scotland: why is the grass seemingly cut? Many of the cemeteries were not even. There were usually no buildings other than the abandoned chapels. It didn’t look like someone had used an electric power-driven lawn mower (how can one have done this without a power supply) or tracks of a fuel-driven lawn mower. On the other hand, the uneven ground would have made it extremely hard to use such a device. But, you can definitely see, the grass is very short.

Maybe we can see the reason in the back of this image: sheep! they are running around everywhere freely and you have to drive carefully because they don’t obey human rules on how to behave correctly in the streets and they don’t interact with the car drivers.

Take care! 

 

art, nature, photo-of-the-day, photography

Monochrome Monday 9-44

solaner

recently, I stumbled upon an image of this tree online. My own images of this tree are all in color. But, that fellow photographer developed and showed a monochrome image of that tree. Seeing his image, I copied mine and played a little bit around. This is a second, more traditional, version of the image.

Do you like it? Or do you like the inverted version from last week more?

Take care!

 

art, nature, photo-of-the-day, photography

Monochrome Monday 9-43

solaner

recently, I stumbled upon an image of this tree online. My own images of this tree are all in color. But, that fellow photographer developed and showed a monochrome image of that tree. Seeing his image, I copied mine and played a little bit around. In the end, I got this: monochrome and inverted.

Do you like it?

Take care!

 

architecture, photo-of-the-day, photography, spring, travel, urban, world

Travel Tuesday: Ol’ MacDonald’s graveyard

solaner

This is another question I have. We saw a lot of nice cemeteries when we were crossing the Isle of Skye. But, all of them had only a chapel ruin, and none of them was equipped with an intact building, although the cemeteries were apparently still in use for new burials. 

Take care! 

 

architecture, photo-of-the-day, photography, spring, travel, urban, world

Travel Tuesday: Ol’ MacDonald’s graveyard

solaner

 

 

Take care! 

 

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architecture, photo-of-the-day, photography, spring, travel, urban, world

Travel Tuesday: Ol’ MacDonald’s graveyard

solaner

 

Take care! 

 

<ad>

Excire has started its Christmas Promotion. 
Anyone who purchases Excire Foto between December 16th, 2022, and January 6th, 2023 will receive the Excire Analytics extension as a gift (worth 39€).
Excire Analytics is a great added value for your customers. By using it they can gain exciting insights into their photographic work. 

Retrieving the gift is simple: instead of Excire Foto, simply add the Excire Foto + Excire Analytics bundle to their shopping cart with a reduced price of 99€ instead of 129€.

If you want to purchase both Excire Foto and Excire Search add the complete Excire Collection to your shopping cart with a reduced price of 169€ instead of 189€. The Excire Collection consists of Excire Foto, Excire Search, and Excire Analytics.

But that’s not all: With the code Excire79 you can get Excire Foto or Excire Search for only 79€ instead of 99€. Of course without Excire Analytics. This promotion also runs until January 6th, 2023. The code can be used when ordering in the shop.

The same is valid for the US shop! Simply replace the € by $ 😁

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