StoNur on the Road – Hong Kong

Morning view of Tsim She Tsui | 2.5 sec - f/8 - ISO80
Hotel room morning view of Tsim Sha Tsui | 2.5 sec – f/8 – ISO80

These days it is the job that pays the bills that prohibits me to pick up the camera and head into town. Especially now, that the gruesome weather of the past days has given way to calm winter weather.

But it is also the same job that comes with some benefits, like traveling to places around the globe. And while those business trips for the most part are limited to seeing airport, office and hotel, sometimes arises the opportunity to sneak away for an hour or two to catch some more touristic glimpses of those fascinating places. Especially, when you are willing to fight the jet lag and wander around a foreign city all by yourself late at night or very early in the morning. Continue reading “StoNur on the Road – Hong Kong”

Weekly Photo Challenge: Out of This World

Dusk at Storms River Mouth in Tsitsikamma National Park

Out of This World” is the theme of this week’s WPC.  A place where I always feel detached from the hectic and challenges of this world is at the seashore, taking in the ever present magic light and the roaring surf of the big ocean.

Shooting becomes something truly meditative, I set shutter speed to about 6 seconds and click, moving the camera ever so slight, creative experiments with the impossible mission to transfer the sights and sounds of an ocean evening onto the sensor of my camera…..

Dusk at Storms River Mouth in Tsitsikamma National Park

Dusk at Storms River Mouth in Tsitsikamma National Park

Dusk at Storms River Mouth in Tsitsikamma National Park

I wish all of you a great and relaxed weekend!

Marcus

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Weekly Photo Challenge: Elemental

Sunset at the end of the road

A Pacific Sunset

Street ? Beach !

End of the Holidays

Moody Waters
Moody Waters | Luzern | 2016

All around, no flowers in bloom
Nor maple leaves in glare,
A solitary fisherman’s hut alone
On the twilight shore
Of this autumn eve.

Fujiwara no Teika (1162-1241)

This morning I read this beautiful, almost nine hundred years old Japanese poem in the (most interesting) book “Wabi-Sabi for Artists, Designers, Poets & Philosophers”. And somehow it reflects the mood of this day at the very end of our two week Christmas break. Tomorrow it is back to the job that pays the bills.

I took the photo on a gloomy day at Lake Lucerne in Switzerland. I wanted to capture the motion of the dark, fast moving clouds, so I dialed in the lowest native ISO on my PEN-F, the narrowest aperture (f/22), with resulted in a shutter speed of 56 seconds. Obviously, the cam was sitting on a tripod. It resulted in a kind of Zen-ish image, a creative genre of photography that I want to explore a bit more this year besides my usual street work.

Have a great Sunday!

Marcus

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Instant Inspiration (16) – Dusk at the Ocean

Instant Inspiration (2) – Motion Blur

Sunset at the end of the road

African Sunset
African Sunset | Swakopmund | 2017

Driving on African gravel roads is tiring. The landscape around you is fantastic, bit keeping the car steady on the gravel or sandy roads takes a lot of effort, you can never drive on “autopilot”. After a 380 kilometer and 6 hour trip on unpaved roads we arrived at the coastal town of Swakopmund. After checking into our B&B we went straight to the historic jetty to experience the African sunset behind the Southern Atlantic Ocean.

Despite having a coastline of 1400 kilometers, Namibia has only two natural ports, Luderitz Bay in the south and Walvis Bay just 30 kilometers south of Swakopmund. As Luderitz was limited to the diamond mining operations and had no real access to the rest of the country due to being isolated by the Namib desert, and Walvis Bay was British, the German colonial authorities founded Swakopmund as a city that had at least some access too fresh water and decided to built a Jetty in 1905 to help the unloading of cargo from ships and support the settling activities. At the Ocean end of the Jetty is a great restaurant where we enjoyed a great fish dinner after getting the obligatory sunset pictures first.

The Ocean waves where impressive, as was the colors of the sky after the sun went down behind the great Oceans waves. I wanted to create a long exposure image of the waves, creating that dreamy effect. In order to achieve the longest possible exposure time I set the PEN-F to its smallest aperture of f/22 and the lowest native ISO of 200, resulting in a 6 second exposure time, long enough to create what I was after.

To keep it simple, I did not attach any filters, and neither I used a tripod. I simply set the camera on on of the rocks between the road and the beach and used a 2 second self timer to avoid any camera shake after pressing the shutter.

The photograph is a jpg out of camera, no postprocessing was applied.

Have a great Friday!

Marcus

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Namibia Explored – Sossusvlei

 

Weekly Photo Challenge: Elemental

Fire Seat
Fire Seat | 2017
Elemental” is the current theme of the weekly photo challenge (WPC) from Word Press’ “The Daily Post”. So I share four long exposure photographs representing the elements “fire”, “water”, “earth” and “air”. Anyone remembering the movie “Angels & Demons” ? First comes fire, where I experimented with long exposures to create the streaks. Image was taken with the Olympus PEN-F, specs are 1,6 sec @ f/2.8 ISO 80 (which is ISO Low on the Oly) and 30mm focal length. The rest of the elements you find after the jump…. Continue reading “Weekly Photo Challenge: Elemental”

Weekly Photo Challenge: Delta

Taking Time
Taking Time | Schiphol | 2017

This week the weekly photo challenge (WPC) from Word Press’ “The Daily Post” has the theme “Delta“. We are called to share a photo that signifies transitions and change. As this is very close last week’s challenge “Transient” I take a slight angle on the theme.

A delta is also the difference between two locations, the difference in time and distance between two locations. Both interpretations are covered by the above Street Photo I took in Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport. The guy in the video screen of the gigantic clock working to determine the exact time by drawing a new minute hand. The plane behind the huge windows ready to cover the delta in distance and time to its overseas destination. Coincidentally, the big Airbus is from Delta Airlines. I took the photo  with the Olympus OM-D E-M1 and the mZuiko 40-150mm F/2.8 Pro Zoom.

Astoria-Megler-Bridge
Astoria-Megler-Bridge | Oregon | 2017 

To also cover the much more traditional interpretation of a river delta here are two photographs from the Columbia River Delta in Oregon. The image of the Astoria-Megler-Bridge spanning the mouth of the Columbia River was taken at 13sec,  f/20 and ISO 200. The photo of the ship was taken from the old docks in Astoria, image specs are  8sec f/16 and ISO 200. Both photos were taken with the Olympus PEN-F and the mZuiko 12-40mm F/2.8 Pro Zoom.

Columbia River
Columbia River Delta | Oregon | 2017

Visit my Learning Center with all my free tips and inspirations around photography

Have a great Thursday!

Marcus

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Instant Inspiration (15) – Long Exposure Waterscapes

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Instant Inspiration (16) – Dusk at the Ocean

Dusk at Storms River Mouth in Tsitsikamma National Park
Ocean Dreams | South Africa | 2015 | 1/4 sec @ f/5,6, ISO 1000 and 300mm focal length

In time for the weekend here is another edition of  “Instant Inspirations”, my series for you if you feel you suffer from “Photographer’s Block”  or simply want to shoot something that you have never tried. Or at least not recently. With Episode 15  I encourage you to keep the camera out after sunset, leveraging the low light to achieve  slow shutter speeds without the help of ND filters. But unlike in Episode 14, I leave the tripod at home because I want to combine motion blur with a bit of intentional camera movement (ICM) to create dreamy waterscapes at the wild coast of the Indian Ocean at Tsitsikamma National Park in South Africa. For the how-to, more images and links to all previous editions of “Instant Inspirations” continue reading after the jump…. Continue reading “Instant Inspiration (16) – Dusk at the Ocean”

Instant Inspiration (15) – Long Exposure Waterscapes

Columbia River
Columbia River | Oregon | 2017 | 8sec @ f/16 and ISO 200, ND3

Inspired by some photos I took during last weekend’s trips around beautiful Oregon I found it is time for another “Instant Inspirations” post. This is my series for you if you feel you suffer from “Photographer’s Block”  or simply want to shoot something that you have never tried. Or at least not recently. With Episode 15  I want to inspire you to go out and shoot long exposure waterscapes. For the how-to, more images and links to all previous editions of “Instant Inspirations” continue reading after the jump…. Continue reading “Instant Inspiration (15) – Long Exposure Waterscapes”

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