The audience settling in to watch the awarded images of the 15th Malmö International

Can you really take good pictures with that thing?

May 22, 2015 in Cell Phone, Photography, Post production, Travel

There’s been very little new photography for me in the last week or so for a few reasons, one being I’ve been busy with photo club stuff (our big international exhibition was shown last weekend and I was the whirling dervish of tech for that, which gave me very little time for photography). I pretty much only had time to snap the panorama photo shown above.

Also my best photo buddy, a.k.a. my dad, is temporarily incapacitated with a bad knee which makes it impossible for him to tag along on photo walks and expeditions. That has put a serious damper on my urges to go out shooting for a bit. Hopefully some time with a physiotherapist will help that though, so that he can come with me again on our little adventures.

I have snapped a few shots here and there though with my soon-to-be-replaced HTC One M7 and played around with them in Snapseed 2.0 when I’ve not bothered to take my big DSLR with me. (I know...there are times that I do that sort of thing...leave home with no camera except for the one in the cell phone...that’s probably a major no-no for a photography inclined person…). My cellphone camera isn't very good in low light, but given the right conditions it can take a half decent snapshot...which then can be improved with some post-processing.

The far left image is from Malmö Central Station. The middle picture is from the the island called Öland in the Baltic Sea and a local amusement park there. The far right image is taken in Staffanstorp, Sweden.

Seeing animals in the woods

April 19, 2015 in Photography, Post production

I've been seeing animals in the woods...and no, I am not talking about deer, or squirrels or even birds (although I saw those too). At least not this time. No...I'm talking about the kind of animal...or creature shapes you can see in tree trunks and fallen branches. I guess it is a bit like looking at clouds and seeing familiar shapes and animals there. It's all in the way your brain and eyes are tuned into seeing it.

There are still fans of the 80s show "V" out there...

Such crowds at Sci-Fi World!

March 01, 2015 in Photography, Post production

I went to the Sci-Fi World event in Malmö, Sweden this weekend with my 12 year old nephew, who is a “nerd-in-training” with a preference for Star Wars, the world of Tolkien and LEGO of all kinds. Of course I brought my camera with the hopes of capturing a few cosplayers there.

Cecilia from my photo club looking thrilled about the weather.

Best to focus on the images you take!

February 22, 2015 in Photography, Post production

I’ve done a a bit of street photography since my last blog post, and all of that in the city of Malmö, Sweden. It’s one of my usual “hunting grounds”, so the streets are very familiar to me. So for me it is trying to catch people that is the more important thing, and in interesting situations at that. That’s not always possible, due to them being too far away (yes I know I can get closer) or being too quick to end up on the memory card.

Sometimes you can’t get the camera up to your eye fast enough to grab a shot when someone does something interesting...at least I can’t. My reflexes aren’t at ninja levels, so sometimes those picture opportunities slip through my fingers.

That’s perfectly fine though, and I’ve learned to not commiserate over or mope around about the images or people that got away. There’s always other images to take, more people to spot! It is much better to focus on the shots you actually did take! If you focus well enough (no pun intended) on them you’re bound to find at least a few keepers there!

Göran and Karin from my photo club have both found something interesting to capture.

It looks like this little dog is ready to take its humans home and out of the wind!

Out on the streets again

February 08, 2015 in Photography, Post production

The first photowalk of the year for me was a rather windswept and chilly event, but it was also a lot of fun, and a nice way to ease myself back into photography after my hiatus.

I put up a post in a photography related Facebook group that I planned to do an impromptu photowalk in central Malmö on Saturday, and two other photographers from the group showed up and joined me as we slowly moved from the Triangeln train station through the city’s central parts to the Malmö Central station and back again.

Use the camera you have with you!

December 28, 2014 in Cell Phone, Photography, Post production, Travel

I am currently on vacation in Austin, Texas and as my beloved host and I made our way home from brunch at IHOP (gotta get some of those pancakes when I am here!) she suggested we go to the Aquarium, and I thought that was a great idea. I hadn't exactly planned for a day of photography, so my DSLR was still in my backpack. My HTC One cell phone was what I'd have to use for photography that day. I was fine with that though, this vacation is NOT a photo vacation as much as it is a time of seeing loved ones.

Still I couldn't help myself snapping away a few as we walked through the displays and tanks with various fish, octopuses, sea urchins and a few creepies and crawlies. It actually felt good not to have that big camera with me...guess I am slowly turning into a "normal" person? Pity the thought!

My point to this post though, is that it is okay to use whatever camera you can have with you; it doesn't have to be a big full-frame DSLR, it can sometimes be a cell phone...or a point and shoot. It's even possible to do without photography entirely and experience it "live", as my beloved host so eloquently puts it. That could be my New Year's resolution for 2015, to experience things more and not necessarily shoot photos of everything.

More than halfway to Christmas

December 13, 2014 in Photography, Post production

As I write this it is December 13th, a day that in Sweden is Lucia Day where we for some strange reason celebrate an Italian saint from Syracuse, with women wearing candles in their hair, men in pointy, star-strewn hats and other costumes (look it up people, it is quite a sight).

Last night we had a pretty severe storm go past us, so I spent the night editing photos I took a few days ago on a recent, but far too rare nightly photowalk in Malmö. I was in town for a meeting of the board with my photo club, as well as picking up my telephoto lens that had had some refurbishments done at the workshop, so I headed in a bit earlier and did a walk around the city, where most of the stores are now more or less fully decorated for the holiday shopping season. Lots of lights, lots of red and quite a bit of green in other words.

Most of these photos are taken around the Gustav Adolf Square in central Malmö, which has become the epicenter of Christmas decorations in the last few years with lots of torches lit daily, decorated trees, christmas trinkets on sale and a merry-go-round for the kids.

I also tried a few really long exposure shots of the canal, but I am not sure I’m happy with those. It’s an area of photography I need a lot more practice at. Also...clean your lens and filter dude! Those dust specks are large enough to be landmarks on a map!

It's gray in November...

November 26, 2014 in Photography, Post production

During the month of November it generally is very gray and dark in Sweden, so it's perfectly timed to participate in NaNoWriMo, since it is not exactly photography weather most of the time. However, if you sit in front of your computer day in, day out you're eventually going to go bonkers (at least I think I would), so I've still been outside, if only to get a bit of grayish daylight into my eyes.

Of course I bring my camera too (I wouldn't be me otherwise), but there still hasn't been much photography this month. Here are a few of the fall-related pictures I've taken this month though, just within a mile or so from where I live.

They're all taken with my Canon 600d and a 50 mm 1.8 lens (since my zoom lens has been in the repair shop for a large part of the month), and I find it intriguing to try to take the shots with a fixed focus lens sometimes. It makes you zoom with your feet, so you get a workout on top of getting your images (albeit a very small workout!). They've been processed in Adobe Lightroom 3, where I've increased contrasts and color to make them "pop" better on screen.

No photography? Sure there has been!

September 28, 2014 in Photography, Cell Phone, Post production

It's been a few weeks with no posting on this blog. I've not exactly been off the planet, but haven't had anything interesting to post either. It's been a very non-photographic few weeks for me. That actually felt nice after the onslaught that was August with all the exhibition and photo club events.

I've only taken the DSLR out a few times in the last three weeks and to be perfectly honest I've not really taken any pictures I'm happy with during those outings. That's perfectly fine though, I didn't feel my heart was in it, so the pictures weren't that exciting. It felt more like "I should bring my camera now that I'm stepping outside", rather than, "Oh I want to take photos! I should go outside!".

Still, a few cell phone snaps were taken here and there, so that's what I'm sharing here. This is an image I took a few days ago near my home on an old defunct railroad.

I have also "abused" the photo in Snapseed to make it look like an old photo that's been through the ravages of time (sort of anyway). I tend to do at least some treatment to all my images (whether it's in Lightroom for my DSLR photos or Snapseed for cell phone snapshots, although this one has been put through more steps than I usually take!