Afternoon Blues

Can you have a nice blues dance session in daylight? While also having at least one, sometimes two cameras pointed at you?










Why yes, yes, we can.

All photos are taken with 5d+Sigma 50mm.

The photos are taken from the “Blues Photo Shoot”-album which can be found here.

For a much more selective album done by E, see this.

First world problem

I fail to see how I can control the posting order of my posts! I made two drafts last night, and I wanted to publish them in the reverse order of their creation time, but nope, they are re-arranged chronologically based on first-save creation time.
Anyhow. To end with an actual spring photo, I therefore give you another snow drop version.

Fumes

The blog is not entirely dead. It has just been resting...!

So, before starting the spring-related posts I thought I'd just share this photo where I think I managed to catch the fumes of the newly put out candle.


Taken with my old 400d+Sigma 50mm.

Spring is on its way!

Taken at Mygård, a friends countryside house outside Uppsala




Practising close-ups with my 16-35 lens.

The Streets Of Barcelona

As I recently visited Barcelona I had a little time to do what I normally do in cities - walk around. So I made some street photos. This is back to the basics - all photos are taken with my old 400d+50mm lens.

Barcelona, a lively city with contrasts. With no further ado, I will let the photos speak for themselves.




Elderly Man


Street Life


Man with flowers


Sleeping


Sleeping


Night Life


A couple in the streets



My only comment is about the balance between respecting privacy and getting good photos. Somehow it’s easier, at least for me, to have less doubts when being outside of my own city/country. In one way it’s understandable as it means taking pictures of people it’s very very unlikely I will ever meet again; also they will never see the photos. In another way it’s worse, as it can be seen as outsiders exploiting whatever there is to exploit. In that sense I see a value of not treating places differently. But the way forward for me is to photograph more people in the streets of Stockholm (as I already do) rather than abstaining everywhere.

Comments on whether you think I’m crossing any lines I shouldn’t be crossing are very welcome!

All photos taken from my “Best of Barcelona”-album which can be found here.

Nu blommar syrenen / The lilac is flowering!

In Sweden we say “mellan hägg och syren” - “between bird cherry and lilac” - to refer to this time, which by many is seen as the most beautiful time of the year. Not much more to say.

Taken just outside where I live - in late evening light, mixed with street lamp light.







First one is taken with my 16-35 lens, the other two are taken with 50 mm+a 12 mm extension tube I bought some month ago (a cheap 12+20+36 mm set), but haven’t found the time to use that much (yet).

Go out and enjoy them, and other spring flowers, everyone who can. Soon enough it will be June / the lilac blooming period will be over.

Liveness!

Obviously I don’t have the time nor discipline to post long posts telling a “full” story on a regular basis. Instead, not to let the blog become completely stale, I will try to give some samples from recently uploaded photos.



Pre-morning light over Norrviken


Above is part the reason why I really like Stockholm, including its surroundings. The shot is taken at 3:15 am, last Sunday morning (8th of May) while biking home from Upplands Väsby. Handheld, 1/13 sec, 24mm, so I’m happy it turned out as sharp as it did.

The view is towards north-east, where the sun would rise in another hour. This means that the gradient towards the corners is not only full-frame vignetting, but the sky actually was much darker in all other directions.

An obvious drawback with the 5d+the 24-70mm lens compared with my other favourite setup, my old 400d+the 50mm lens, is the size & weight. The result is that it most often stays properly sealed in the camera bag in the baskets on the back of my bike. This view though, partly seen between the trees from the bike path along the lake, caused me to stop and take some pictures. I’m glad I did.

Speaking of my other favourite setup; the below photos that I like are taken using it.



Midnight Blues Dancing

"Fallin in Blues", the weekend blues workshop in Grenoble in the beginning of April was very nice. It would deserve a post of its own, but, at least for now, head over to the album instead.









The two first portraits are from the last day of Herräng, week 2 last summer. It was evening, but still very bright. Even after adjusting the light levels I guess some would call them over-exposed, but I like the effect.

The last is from the SICS Open House, after the session of presentations and demos, when people were socializing, and I finally had the time to take pictures (as I had been demo-ing and talking all day before that).

That's it for now, hope to get back in less than two month :)