I assume it was the staircase that ushered me in - somewhere in the vastness of the internet I had read that the Mechanic’s Institute in San Francisco has a beautiful spiral staircas
Read MoreLensbaby Blogcircle - Trio 28 in San Diego
According to Mr Hammond’s song' it never rains in southern California ...’
... unfortunately I can not confirm that 😊- during my visit to the ‘Cradle of California’ at the end of my time in the US in December, the forecast announced two rainy days after four wonderful days of sunshine - so there was my opportunity to leave the beach and to explore the city.
Read MoreTraveling Burnside Project - Cimitero Monumentale
... cemeteries seem to magically attract me again ... I spend a fair amount of time on one or the other at the moment.
Mostly, I am touched by the quiet and serene mood right from the beginning. It kind of suits my current mindframe quite well - not that death is sitting in the living room again ( luckily! ) - but it sometimes seems I can feel the turbulences caused by his cloak when he turns away ...
Apart from that, I always feel reminded of Marcel Reich Ranicki's statement that there are but two themes in literature: love and death. Standing amid those old and silent graves I feel that this ist true for live as such: the most important topics worth thinking and musing about are those two. And it feels to me as if they merge in all cemeteries as such - but exceptionally in the Cimiterio Monumentale in Milan where you can find extraordinary monuments by really great sculptors of the 1900s.
Those monuments are really very very impressive.
And most of them show love in some form and expression. Very many show young females with not really much on them in way of clothing, some are even quite erotic (to be honest, after a while I asked myself if I could find some equally beautiful male examples - and found them 😉) .
I found myself touched over and over again not just by the artistry which was very impressive all in itself but I was very moved by those emotions that were cast in bronze or carved out of stone, emotions which have not changed in all the years and centuries - in pain and in love I found myself there over and over again.
The Burnside 35 lent itself quite beautifully to the task of capturing the serenity and the feeling if this place, I love how the swirl gives the pictures a kind of etheral quality and timelessnes. As well as the Burniside performed at landscape photography I even liked it better at those portraits and transporting the mood of this place.
Traveling Burnside Project - Verzasca
In April, Lensbaby launched the Traveling Burnside Project, where you could try this new lens for two weeks. At the moment a lot of these burnsides travel all over the world - and for two weeks a Burnside 35 was with me.
Originally I know the Verzasca from my large format colleagues as a location for SW Fine Art Photography.
When studying and searching for routes in Google Maps (I have to admit, I sometimes do that along my morning coffee to cultivate my wanderlust a bit 😊 - formerly with atlases and road maps, today with the phone) I stumbled over this little place: Lavertezzo, a village at the Verzasca - and a little foraging revealed very quickly:
this something for me, I want to go there, too.
The Traveling Burnside Project was also a bit of a hitch to put that wish into action now - and so I found myself one morning in the small village of Lavertezzo to explore this beautiful river.
The first glance, however, was rather full of horror: everywhere I saw people with towels and picnic baskets! The river was literally besieged by bathing people, so apparently the Verzasca is not only a destination for photographers, but also for ordinary swimmers (something that always surprises me 😊)
So I went straight up the river until I could not see (or hear) the bathers any more - I did not have to go far, after a few meters I was on my own. ... and what a wonderful river landscapeI found! The textures of the stones, the many colors, the turquoise water with rapids and swirls: that was something to marvel about. And I saw quite perfectly, that one can take pictures here without end.
For the Burnside project, I did not want to work in black and white this time, so I packed the ND filter and practically did not take it off anymore.
However, I have to admit that I have only explored a tiny piece of the river, just around Lavertezzo a few hundred meters upriver and downriver - that certainly will not do justice to this landscape. Actually I think I would have to go there again for a few days, to see other corners as well (sounds like a plan for 2019?)
Lensbaby blog circle - Frankfurt
This blog circle gives me a monthly prompt to do a small project with one of my lensbabies . and this time while thinking about ideas and stories I remembered my very first lensbaby, the Lensbaby 2.0.
Read MoreLensbaby BLOG Circle - Meet Pedro
I was wildly determined to do at least one portrait project for this Lensbaby Circle during my stay in Cuba so I packed my Lensbabies especially for you 😉.
In San Diego de los Baños, a small village deep in the Cuban countryside we met Pedro who was very happy to show us how cigars are rolled. I decided that this would be THE opportunity to do a small series of portraits.
Read MoreLensbaby Blog Circle - Jellyfish and Seanettles
At the end of February I was in Berlin again for a few days. This time it was not just for fun, I had an appointment there and was just hoping to be able to find some time to take some pictures there.
My date endet early and at half past 2 I found myself with a free afternoon at minus 7 degrees on Potsdamer Platz. I got very cold very quickly - adding (or subtracting 😊) the windchill factor the temperature felt like minus 13! - so I decided to find an indoor photolocation: the aquarium.
Ganz weit raus aus der Komfortzone heisst für mich: Blümchen fotografieren!
Wer mich ein bisschen kennt, weiss, dass ich ein eher reserviertes Verhältnis zu Blumen habe. Nicht dass ich sie nicht mag.
Und mich nicht über sie freue.
Aber so zur Hege und Pflege sind sie nix für mich - das liegt ganz sicher auch daran, dass ich ziemlich grundsätzlich keinen grünen Daumen habe und meine Zeit lieber in einer dunklen Kammer verbringe, als in einem Garten zu werkeln...
Hmmm ... soll das so?
... und was soll es mir sagen?
Read MoreSpaziergänge mit der Kamera - unterwegs mit dem Lensbaby Trio28
Dieses neue Objektiv von Lensbaby bietet drei der klassischen Lensbaby-Optiken in einem Body, die Sweet, die Twist und die Velvet-Optik mit einer festen Blende von 3,5, die Brennweite ist 28mm. Fokussiert wird auf Sicht - und manuell.
Die Optiken lassen sich durch ein einfaches Verdrehen schnell und unkompliziert wechseln, so dass man das Objektiv an sich nicht abnehmen muss.