TEST

TEST

No internet, no blog !

I had an internet failure at home, which has now been repaired, but in the meantime I couldn't access the blog from my PC. I've been working on some snow photos, and here is one of them ...........

And one WITH snow ......

.... or rather two. I couldn't decide whether to post the B&W version or the colour version, so here they are.

(This one is done with the Orton effect.)

Back again

Hi, everyone. First of all, a very happy 2012. Even if you read this in a month's time, this will still be valid !


I've been "off-blog" for a while, for two reasons. One is that it was a holiday period, so I had a break. The other reason is that although I took some photos and worked on them, I got to thinking a lot about the photos I take. What sort of photos, what style, what with, why. Some of these thoughts came from reading pages on Ken Rockwell's site. If you have a look, you'll see what I mean. A lot of what he writes is very thought-provoking, even provocative. About the relative merits of shooting RAW and JPEG files, for example.


One result is that I have revisited photos taken over the Xmas period, before moving on to others I haven't edited yet. Here is one. Winter, no snow, dull day with some light out there somewhere.

Christmas photo

No Santa Claus in this one, sorry !

HAPPY XMAS TO ALL !

And the choo choo station

Again edited with Picturenaut 3, using a filter called Luminance from Banty's Toolkit.

This photo was taken in the autumn. The scheduled steam train trips had stopped by then. In the summer, the platform is packed with visitors. In the background, you can see that the weather was very misty, and it was already quite late in the afternoon, so I was surprised that Picturenaut brought out the subject so clearly. Good programme !

Choo choo

Another Picturenaut HDR experiment - of a Sauschwänzlebahn loco.

Autumn in the Black Forest 3

Autumn in the Black Forest 2

I thought the first one didn't bring out the atmosphere enough ....

Autumn in the Black Forest

"La Collégiale" revisited

Today I discovered Picturenaut 3, a freeware HDR tool. Here is one of the first results of a little experimenting.

Dublin Park

Dublin lights

Dublin leaf

Ptuj

Ptuj in Slovenia, before a heavy storm, in July 2007.

Barge

St. Blasien

St. (Sankt) Blasien - Saint Blaise - is in the Black Forest near the Schluchsee. This and the other photos were taken this year in early spring.

The name of the town comes from its Abbey (cf. photo above). The dome is the third largest in Europe, after St Peter's in Rome and Les Invalides in Paris.
  
The Dom hotel/restaurant/tearoom is rather nice. I was sitting behind the left-hand window, but not when I was taking the photo.

Stairway

Taken in June 2010, in Mantes-la-Jolie. Behind the camera is the river Seine, beyond the steps is the "Collégiale" church. 

Walking in the street

Met this little creature walking down the street yesterday. Samsung Galaxy S telephone, HDR.

Fixed focal compact camera

Before using a reflex camera, and more recently, my telephone, I used the fixed focal (no zoom) Ricoh GR compact. No zoom : working within the limits of a fixed 28mm wide angle lense, but getting to know the lense well, and having to be creative.


This photo was taken on the Normany coast in 2006.

Others photos from this visit are here.