mind the content

Today I decided to dust off my trusty camera and join a jolly company of photographers visiting Teatr Polski. The event was organised by mmpoznan.pl and we were allowed to visit the deepest recesses of the theatre. Which we did.

As usual I tried to do something out of ordinary rather than run around and take dozens of pictures. Yet another picture of the scene is boring, plus I don’t have either an adequate lens or a proper tripod to take one. I’ve focused on some details I’ve dug up and did one good close up by the entrance. The gallery is here.

Some time ago I went mountain hiking with my friends. We left Friday afternoon and left on Sunday so it was short, but intense. Snow had just fallen making the nature pure and beautiful - heaven for a man with his camera. Once again - thanks mates for taking me away from my computer and running me ragged over the hills.

See what I’ve seen here.

It still takes me a while to get a good HDR picture. Not only because of a large space of parameters I have to search to make sure I produced the best result, but mostly because I cannot tell for sure if the picture I am taking at the moment will be a good source for the algorythm when I sit in front of my monitor. Maybe it will come with time…

Look at what I’ve done.

Ok, after some experiments and with my friend Albert I think I nailed the whole HDR thing down. I take under exposed (exposure: -2.0) picture, store it in RAW format and then create 9 exposures (from -2.0 to 2.0) out of it. Merging those into one is the hardest part because I have to play with rather nonintuitive parameters of the algorithm, but the result is worth it. It might not be the best HDR images I’ve seen, and they might look a little bit artificial, but still the result is better than I expected. Check it out!

That’s the first time I took photos of dancing people. I didn’t before because it always was too dark for my old camera. Even now with a Nikon D80 and a f/2 fast lens I had problems and the pictures are not TAC sharp nor the white balance is perfect (hence many b&w images). Still I am happy with those, especially that I made them with fixed 35mm lens. Have a look

ceremony

reception

open air

I hired a photographer. Not that I can’t take pictures myself, but it would be stupid to spend my own wedding with my shiny new camera instead of my (shiny new) wife. So we’ve chosen the guy with the best website and reasonable prices. Today I got the results of his work and I must say I am not only delighted but - as a photographer - impressed. The guy managed to be invisible during the ceremony and reception, didn’t ask us to do miracles on the open air and still he managed to take so many awesome pictures. Whoa!

Thank you once again Arek for your hard work and inspiration.

Cheers,
Jan

barcelona (1)

barcelona (2)

girona

We’ve just got back from our honey moon. We went to see a beautiful city of Barcelona. Choosing cheap flight it possible for us to see a much smaller Girona as well. Generally we enjoyed our one-week trip but my feelings about Barcelona are a little contradictory.

The city is beautiful, with lots of architectural marvels and beautiful details looking at you from like every corner, every lamp post. And I don’t mean here only the famous Gaudi or Miró, but also a lot of secession (might be more than in Prague) that was untouched by wars. Unfortunately while being so breath-taking the city is also dirty, stinking and frightening. Dirt and stink are most likely the result of rubbish being thrown away right on the sidewalks (on the majority of the old town’s too-narrow streets there are no dust bins). Also the water stinks so much that we abandoned tea - it was unbearable without a glass of rum.

Also, the least pleasant was the amount of “imported Spaniards” that were up to no good during the day, not to mention the night… Don’t get me wrong. I am truly against racism but I just couldn’t help the impression (and they were not helping as well).

Girona on the other hand was only slightly less charming than Barcelona, but I felt much more confident there. Maybe it was because there were at least some people that speak English there (in BarÇa even in the hostel there was problem with it), maybe because it’s a smaller city, maybe because it was clean and water didn’t have a taste. Anyway I recommend spending some time in this city. It was enjoyable despite the rain (which Gosia was really not happy about - see picutres)…

Enjoy the galleries,
Jan

łabski szczyt people

łabski szczyt places

łabski szczyt recovered

We’ve spent the New Year’s eve in the mountains with friends. Finally I had some time to take some pictures and I am proud of the results (esp. portraits). Unfortunately some of them were lost due to the broken PQI SD card (not the first one btw). Aaagghh! Remember never to buy one!

Have a look,
Jan

Żubrówka is grass used to produce vodka with the same name. I have one of those in a pot growing on my window – looks funny and smells nice. I took some water spray, attached my new macro lens to Canon Powershot S3 and just look what I got: