Easter is around the corner, so I added some new cards to my Freebies page. They’re completely free to download; feel free to have a look and use what you like, no strings attached.
I hope you like them. I love working on greeting cards; I don’t feel any performance anxiety as I’m not an illustrator. It’s just a pleasant hobby, and it makes me happy to see people using them.
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It seems I talk a lot about my writing creative process on the blog at the moment – which is quite natural as I’m working on a book. So, today I wanted to offer you an insight into one of my recent photo projects for a change.
A few weeks ago, I dreamed about huge waves crashing thunderously on a rugged beach. The full moon, high in the pitch-black sky, illuminated an alien landscape.
No trees or shrubs, no dwellings, no boats. No people. No animals or birds (I knew this in my dream). An utterly deserted landscape, devoid of any life. Nothing but the huge rocks and the surf glittering like tiny diamonds in the moonshine. Nothing but the endless rumbling of the waves and the cold silvery moon. “A desert of waves, a wilderness of water” (Langston Hughes).
The dream made such an impression on me that it haunted me for several days. I couldn’t get that desolate landscape out of my mind. So, I did what any artist would do: set to work. I wanted to capture that landscape in my mind in a series of photos, and I knew it wouldn’t be realistic photos from the beginning. The atmosphere called for something else.
As luck would have it, we live by the sea. So every day, I would go down to the beach and experiment with ICM (Intentional Camera Movement). The light, the color of the sea, the clouds, they all factor in. I knew how I wanted the photos to look like; I tested different settings and motions; I learned patience. And got the photos I wanted.
As an artist, you’re always struggling to create the vision in your mind in whatever medium you’re working in, only to fail when you do – more often than not. But this was one of these dream projects where I didn’t fail. I love how the photos turned out.
You can see the rest of the photos in my photo gallery and buy prints in the online shop if you like them too.
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August 19th is World Photography Day, an annual celebration of art, science, and history of photography.
Why August 19th, you ask? On August 19th, 1839, the French Academy of Sciences announced the Daguerreotype process, the first to obtain a permanent image with a camera. History was made that day, and the long road to photography as we know it today began.
The best way of celebrating it is to share your best photos with the world. The one above is one of my favorites, a close-up of a pink bleeding heart in my garden.
Happy World Photography Day!
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”Seeing,” really seeing what you’re looking at, is an essential skill for a photographer. For any visual artist, in fact. Some people may have been born with it, while some may struggle. No fancy equipment can compensate for its lack, though. The good news is that you can learn to, as any art student can tell you.
And this is not something you’d turn on and off; it’ll change the way you look and see the world. For example, the black & white abstract photo above …
… was converted from this.
It’s part of a terrace roof in the Mandarin Oriental hotel in Marrakech. As soon as I stepped out on the terrace and saw this pergola, I knew it would make a perfect abstract photograph. It was just a question of trying various compositions and angles until getting that ultimate photo that all photographs dream about when they press the shutter button.
Simply put: practice, practice, practice. A few tips:
To read more on photography, click here. Artsy has a good article on how to learn to see the world as an artist here.
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When words become unclear, I shall focus with photographs. When images become inadequate, I shall be content with silence.
Ansel Adams (1902-1984), American landscape photographer and environmentalist known for his black-and-white images of the American West.
To read more quotes, click here. To read more on photography, click here.
This post is about creativity, constraints and making do with what you have.
I had forgotten how dark it gets in this country after years of living in Switzerland. Last year doesn’t really count as re-acclimatization to Scandinavian darkness as we moved in at the end of October, had plenty of things to manage because of the move, and then went to Australia mid-December.
Darkness is so oppressive now; it feels like we’re living in a perpetual twilight zone. Even at noon, there’s not enough light to take decent photos. Outside, that is.
I use to go for a walk at noon, to get some fresh air and daylight. Especially daylight. I always preach creativity thrives on constraints, and so I’m forcing myself to find something to photograph during my walks. Sometimes I bring my Canon 5D if there’s enough light to give it a try; otherwise, I always have my iPhone.
On some overcast days, this really becomes an exercise in creativity as the whole world seems to be blanketed in 50 shades of gray (pun intended).
The salvation then is in post-processing. I like to keep things simple. The photos above were taken with an iPhone and processed quickly with Snapseed. That’s it; it took me only a couple of minutes. No masterworks, I’m the first to admit. But much better looking than the original photos.
And since creativity thrives on constraints, I’m considering doing a 365 project, when you take and post one photo a day, every day, for a whole year. January 1st is around the corner, a good date to start a 365 project, don’t you think? It should be fun.
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To read more posts on photography, click here.
You don’t need an expensive camera or a fantastic subject to take awesome phone photos.
These are the only things you need:
1) A camera with you at all times. This is very likely your phone. As the saying goes, the best camera is the one that you have with you. And…
2) An open mind. If you expect to take photos only when you found a “nice” subject, you’ll end up with banal photos.
Be open and learn to see, really see, what’s right in front of you, without any preconceptions. As Thoreau said, The question is not what you look at, but what you see.
I’ve taken all these images with an iPhone while in the car wash. No fancy camera, no “beautiful” subject. Just the beauty of the everyday. Look for it.
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To read more posts on photography, click here.
Continuing the theme from my previous post on mobile phone photography, I wanted to show more photos taken with an iPhone and share a few tips to help you take better photos with your phone.
These are some of our vacation shots from Fregate Island (Seychelles) in the summer of 2018; they are all taken with an iPhone. Considering how the world looks like today, Covid-19 et al., I’m grateful for all experiences we’ve had; it’s something to hold on to these days. I’m sure we’ll be able to travel the world and only worry about photo quality at some time in the future. Maybe not in 2021. But in 2022? We need to keep dreaming about better days.
All photos in this post are taken with an iPhone X and the only processing is using the phone’s auto-enhance function i.e. what most people would do with their images. No filters, no post-processing. No expensive, heavy camera, tripods, or filters.
In full light, there’s hardly any need for further processing unless you’ve taken a fancy to one filter or another. Just point and shoot.
Using the Portrait mode: good background blur, perfectly fine photo.
Choosing the Portrait mode in your camera app gives your photos a nice background blur. It was meant for shooting portraits, but you can do so much more with it. Try it!
Using the Panorama mode – not bad! The horizon is slightly uneven (maybe the photographer wasn’t fully awake, maybe it’s the camera, who knows?), but the photo is acceptable, considering the alternative. I.e., carry a heavy camera to the beach, and do a lot of post-processing on your computer, stitching together the panorama. Did you try creating a panorama on your phone?
One of the rare shots with me in it. You know, the shoemaker’s children …luckily, not a bad hair day! Tips: taking photos of other people taking photos is always fun.
Some animal photos. The last one, the skink, would have been better with a blurred background (using the portrait mode), but animals usually don’t wait until you set up your camera. Shoot it, or you lose it. Overall, not bad considering animals rarely pose and are always on the move.
And lastly, two photos in low light – taken at 6am and 6pm. All phone cameras struggle on these conditions of course. But in this size for a photo album, Facebook or Instagram they are perfectly fine.
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To read more posts on photography, click here.
A recent contest for mobile phone photos made me think about the old discussion about photo gear. ”What camera do you use?” is a question I get pretty often; it seems that many people still think that great equipment equals good photographs. While it is true that a DSLR camera does have more ”horsepower” than a mobile phone, a good camera does not a photographer make. As Thoreau reminds us, what’s important is not what you look at but what you see.
I have chosen three photographs here, all taken with an iPhone, where the difference is made by ”seeing” the potential of what’s right in front of you, not by having a good camera.
1) The image above was taken with an iPhone 6 Plus in a Nespresso shop while my husband and I were waiting for our turn to be served. It’s a lamp in the shop that nobody paid any attention to. My husband was mystified as to what exactly I was shooting; he couldn’t ”see” what that lamp could become. The only processing done on the iPhone image was converting it to black and white using the Snapseed app and then doing some slight editing such as highlights and contrast. And voilà, you now have a great black and white abstract photograph instead of an ordinary lamp in a shop.
2) This one was taken with an iPhone 7 Plus and depicts the roof of the Menara airport in Marrakesh. Again, minimal editing, the same as above, converting to B&W in Snapseed.
This is how the actual roof looked like.
For more context, a quick shot of the airport (mobile phone photo).
3) And this a photo of a skyscraper in Tokyo, taken with an iPhone 6 Plus, and converted to black and white in Snapseed. The composition would have been helped if taken in portrait mode, but you get the point.
As you can see in these examples, there’s more to good photography than the photo gear. You need to train your eye to really “see” beyond the ordinary. As always, practice makes perfect.
I’ll post some more phone photos in a future post, and you’ll see that you don’t need an expensive camera to take good photographs. Use the camera you have and learn to see, really see; that’ll get you far.
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Photos taken with Canon EOS 5D Mark III with a Canon EF 24-105mm f/4L IS lens in Noordwijk, The Netherlands.
