A Touch of Spring

Sun Walled
Sun Walled | Nuremberg | 2018

Together with the Significant Other I headed into town yesterday, where we seemingly met the rest of Nuremberg’s population, as everybody was drawn out to just a touch of spring, with the sun shining from a spotless sky and temperatures hitting almost double digits. And everyone was trying to find her or his spot in the sun.

Oranges
Oranges | Nuremberg | 2018

I brought the Olympus OM-D E-M1 with the mZuiko 12-100mm F/4 for some snapshots of the sun seekers. Oh, and just for the case I haven’t mentioned it yet on this photography blog (I know I have numerous time), don’t forget to check your camera settings before you start shooting, they might be way off from your last photographic outing.

Stupid me shot the whole afternoon with ISO 3200, which was still dialed in from me shooting the inflight Polar Lights during my return flight from Portland last weekend. No I was lucky, because the OM-D handles noise quite well and there is no issue of having a grainy look on street photographs. Best is we all put a piece of paper in your camera bags with the text “check your settings”….or better make it a habit to reset them after every outing with your camera.

Flying Coffee
Flying Coffee | Nuremberg | 2018
Spring Break
Spring Break | Nuremberg | 2018

So far it was a good weekend, with the beautiful sunny Saturday. The daughter of a very good friend married yesterday, and at least they got very decent weather for their special day, after a mostly grey and cold week. Also this morning looks promising, the sun is shining, the sky is blue, although temperatures are still way below freezing. But I hope again for the afternoon, and coffee and cake in the sun. And some more photography with the correct ISO 😉

If you still seek some tips and inspirations for your photographic outing today,  check out my free Learning Center and get inspired.

Wish you all a happy and sunny Sunday!

Marcus

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Late Summer Family Street Fun

Late Summer Family Fun 05
1/160 sec @ f/5.6, ISO 1600, 120mm focal length

The day was too beautiful not to use it for some shooting in town, so I escaped for an hour into Nuremberg’s Old Town in the late afternoon of this last day of September. It was surprisingly warm, and everybody enjoyed what was potentially the last warm day of summer. Inspired by the atmosphere I was consciously looking for scenes of kids and their parents having fun together. I like giving me these small photographic assignments, it helps me to quickly focus and get into the flow (especially when I have only limited time for shooting) and to train visual awareness. I was with my Olympus PEN-F and the mZuiko 14-150mm F/4-5.6 travel zoom. For the rest of this series continue after the jump… Continue reading “Late Summer Family Street Fun”

Back on the Streets of Nuremberg

Ciao
Ciao | Nuremberg | 2016

It has been a while since I last posted from the Streets of Nuremberg, but lets just say I had my summer break 😉  Was back in town yesterday doing some shopping with my wife and brought along the Olympus PEN-F with the mZuiko 25mm F/1.8 (my m4/3 equivalent of a nifty fifty, considering the m4/3 crop factor of 2).

Passing through the old town we discovered that this weekend was an Italian Market on the bridges over the Pegnitz River. The food vendors offered plenty of Italian goodies to try and we even bought some delicious Italian truffeled salami to take home.

And right across from the food stalls I saw this guy leaning on the bridge railing, all relaxed and having a smoke. And I decided just then and there it would be a good time to put my new resolution (shooting deliberate street portraits with short primes instead of shooting unobtrusive candids with more distance to the subject)  to a first test, so I walked up to the guy and just asked him if I could take his portrait because I like his style. And sure enough he smiled and agreed. Talking a bit to him learned he’s Italian himself.

Visually, his bright red cloves contrast perfectly with his black coat, so I left the photo in color, just increased clarity in Lightroom to give the portrait more punch and worked a bit on the graduation curves. I also added a slight vignette. The image was taken at 1/160 sec  f/3.2 and ISO 200.

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Stay Interested !

Pensive
Pensive | Marseille | 2016

We are all living a different life. Coming from different backgrounds, living in different social environments, having pursued different career paths. Sometimes we are happy and content, sometimes we are deeply enervated or bored by our surroundings and about what we do. Sometimes we even feel trapped in life and by the burdens of having to make a living, feed our families and make our partners happy. And we feel we have missed opportunities in certain stages of our lives. And at times this leads to loss of energy and motivation.

But regardless of the situation, should we always try to dig ourselves out of these emotional holes? Finding new motivation and interest in what we do?

To read my thoughts on how this transfers to our Street Photography continue after the jump…

Continue reading “Stay Interested !”

Big Business

Big Business
Big Business | Cavo | 2016

Another image from my recent vacation on the Italian island of Elba, taken in the village of Cavo at the north tip. I just loved the passion of this big dude, doing is utmost to sell some jewelry to this group of elderly local beachcombers. I think they enjoyed the negotiations as much as he did, at least everybody seemed to have fun.

The beach of fine light pebbles was beautiful, the water crystal clear. Not many tourist there, mainly locals, as this group of Italian grandmas enjoying their late afternoon together with some of their grandchildren.

And I enjoyed some street photography while lying lazy on the beach. How ’bout that for a change?

Enjoy your day!

Marcus

StoNur on the Road – Italian Sunset

Last Man Standing
Last Man Standing | Isola d’Elba | 2016
Technically no street photography I would say even though there are persons in the image and there is a road on the far shoreline ;-).  Sunset at a small beach on Elba’s North Shore near Cape St. Andrea. Both images shot with the Olympus PEN-F and the m.Zuiko 12mm f/2.0 . Jpg’s as they came out of camera (Color Profile 3 and Dramatic Art Filter 2).How beautiful is Italy !

Dramatic Sunset
Dramatic Sunset | Isola d’Elba | 2016
Enjoy your weekend!

Marcus

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Off Topic – Studio Anywhere

Portrait of Teenager Daniel
Daniel | Porto Ferraio | 2016
With today’s post I’m venturing far away from my usual posts around Street- and Travel Photography. But vacation time is not only time for intensified photography around documenting our family trip to Italy.

Holidays means also having finally time for a lot of (photography) related reading of books, blogs and websites to get fresh doses of inspiration. And also having time to try out a few things off your usual beaten paths.

In this case I decided to do some portrait photography with my (more or less willing) family. First victim up was my son Daniel. To see more and learn how this studio-like portrait was taken without help of any flash on a 1m stretch of white wall inside our rented apartment’s bedroom continue reading after the jump.

Continue reading “Off Topic – Studio Anywhere”

Stages of Life on a Street Photography Morning

While strolling through the streets of Marseille’s magnificent Old Town some weeks ago I also took some photographs of local street life. While doing my selections / post processing a couple of images caught my eye. I realized that  unintentionally I have captured humans in activities that for me are somehow representative for their respective  stages of their lives. So I put them together in this post and wrote down a few brief thoughts coming to my mind when looking at those images.

Rough Rider
Rough Rider | Marseille | 2016

I want to start with the elder ones. The generation that has built the foundations of what we live in today through a life full of work and caring for their families. The last stage can be a tough one. Poverty, deteriorating health, the loss of a partner, increasing loneliness. Still there are many that remain active, take their lives into their hands, find time to enjoy what they didn’t have time for during their working years. Still passing on their experiences and lessons of life.   Continue reading “Stages of Life on a Street Photography Morning”

Street Photography Below Street Level

Rush Up
Rush Up | Stockholm | 2016

Sometimes I turn Street Photography into Subway Photography. There are various good reasons for that. In the underground you can escape foul weather. On their way to and from the trains people are mostly in a rush so they tend to oversee the “hunting” Street Photographers. And in the subway cars travelers are often so focused on their smart phone or their books and papers that you have a very good chance to go unnoticed while taking candid portraits. For other good reasons to take your Street Photography below ground and more subway photographs continue reading after the jump. Continue reading “Street Photography Below Street Level”

StoNur on the Road – Fotografiska

Exhibition
Exhibition II | Stockholm | 2016

While in Stockholm we visited Fotografiska, a centre for contemporary photography that was opened in May 2010 by American star photographer Annie Leibowitz. It is situated in an old customs building on Södermalm island directly at the waterfront near the Viking Lines cruise terminal. It features a bar, a great store for art and photography and it is open until 11pm most days so you can actually spend “a night in the museum”.

Fotografiska carries parallel exhibitions, when we visited last week there was the awesome “Inherit the Dust” exhibition by British photographer Nick Brandt, a collection about photos of famous Swedish Actor Greta Garbo as well as an exhibition featuring the impressive photographic work of Rock Star Bryan Adams.  Known for his exceptional fashion photography (e.g. Linda Evangelista, Cindy Crawford) and portraits of famous musicians (e.g. Amy Winehouse, Rammstein, Rolling Stones), film stars (e.g. Christoph Waltz, Christopher Lee) and politicians (e.g. Queen Elizabeth).

Besides the portraits a second part of the Bryan Adams exhibition featured “Wounded: The Legacy of War”,  his portrait work  of military servicemen and women from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and the injuries they have sustained, matter-of-factly. Their missing limbs, prosthetics and scar tissue are seen by the viewer as part of the subjects as they are now. The portraits are very graphic and carry a lot of emotions.

In this part of the exhibition I also took the photograph above were a mother tried to explain to her children the horrors of war, a scene that I found very touching.

For some more photos from Fotografiska and for the links to the website of the photographers and the museum click here. Continue reading “StoNur on the Road – Fotografiska”

Little woes of a traveling photographer

Stortorget
Stortorget | Stockholm | 2016

You have been looking forward to this weekend trip to a fancy city  that you always wanted to see. Time is limited, you only have a couple of days. You are travelling with your partner who is not all that much into photography.  You don’t want to spoil the getaway by constantly logging behind, hunting for that perfect photo opportunity, that better angle, fumbling with your gear to change to the more appropriate lens.

And besides taking the marquee shots of well-known attractions (and that everybody back home expects from you)  you are looking for those special shots that you expect from yourself, because after all your are not after the tourist snap shots, for you are a photographer.

You arrive at your destination, it is great to be there, the sights and sounds are awesome, the food tastes great, you take the “must-have” shots, but photographically you just don’t get into the right groove, into your creative flow. And somehow this frustrates you because your own expectations towards yourself are otherwise and you know you won’t have a chance to get back to this city anytime soon when the photographic circumstances might be better. Sounds familiar? Continue reading after the jump. Continue reading “Little woes of a traveling photographer”

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