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Botanical garden in Liberec
When I was planning trips for our holiday in the Jizera Mountains, the Botanical garden in Liberec was one of the places which caught my attention, especially for the architecture of its greenhouses and for its new „Water Lily Pavilion“. The garden greatly exceeded my expectations which is why I would like to present it to you. The Botanical garden in Liberec is the oldest botanical garden in the Czech Republic. It started its operation in 1895 and its purpose was primarily to provide green vegetation for the town. During both world wars its condition deteriorated, it served mostly as a market garden. At last in 1954, it was changed…
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Observation tower Slovanka
Slovanka, the oldest iron observation tower in Bohemia, is situated at the top of the hill Slovanka in the Jizera Mountains, at an altitude of 820 metres, not far from the town Janov nad Nisou. The tower is 11 metres high, 14 metres including the base. It is permanently accessible and the access is free of charge. We spent our family holiday in the vicinity and visited the observation tower twice. I would say that there is nothing spectacular about the tower, yet it looks good, there is a nice view from its top and also, it represents an interesting piece of history. The tower was constructed according to a…
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Expressed in Black and White
Do you like b&w photography? Do you create b&w photographs yourself? I have to admit that fulfilling the theme of b&w photography which I had assigned to July in my 12-month photo project was a real challenge to me. Black & white images can be really powerful and can both express and arouse profound feelings and thoughts but my experience in creating them has been very limited. Actually, I had never taken a photo with the aim of creating a b&w image before, I just tried and transformed a few of my photos when the b&w transformation seemed much more expressive than the coloured version. When a friend of mine asked…
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In motion
June is drawing to its end so here I am with five final photos that I’ve taken and selected to represent the theme IN MOTION assigned to June in my 12-month photo project. There are surely many ways how to capture motion in a photo. You need to freeze the action and yet make it obvious and to achieve that, you can choose from several effects. You can opt for having everything sharp. You can have the background sharp and blur the moving object or just the moving part of the object. You can have the object sharp and blur the background. You can blur everything. You can use zooming or…
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Step by step
Step by step moving slowly forwardstep by step through the barren landstep by step put your best foot forwardstep by step feeling good and bad Without cheer of crowdsfeet may seem too heavywithout sign of lightpassing through despairtouching barren landprints are left alreadywithout breath of airpain is hard to bear And yet step by step moving slowly forwardstep by step through the barren landstep by step put your best foot forwardstep by step feeling good and bad
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Bonsai exhibition
At the end of May my family and I visited an exhibition of bonsai in Merklín. Merklín is just a small town with about a thousand inhabitants but it started tradition of bonsai exhibitions in 2004 and still keeps it alive. Every year it invites fans of bonsai and Japanese culture generally to the local castle in the yard of which the exhibition takes place. This was the third time of our visiting and as I am no expert in this field, I could see just “the same” beautiful and interesting plants I had seen before yet I enjoyed the atmosphere of the event. In front of the castle, there…
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Having photographed people
People. No family, just strangers. People as a key feature of the photographs to be taken. That was the theme assigned for May in the 12-month photo project that I’ve been trying to fulfil this year and because today is the last day of May, here I am with the final selection of 5 photos that I took and liked most. No. 1: Attractive I took this photo during festivities celebrating the liberation of Pilsen at the end of WWII. I saw a military van coming full of soldiers along with this young woman who was literally shining among them. They all got out of the van right next to…
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May in our garden
Do you document regularly or at least here and there your garden, house, flat, I mean the environment you live in? I’m sure I don’t do it often enough… even though I find it interesting to compare the older photos with the current appearance, one quickly forgets. On Sunday I decided to grab my camera and capture some details in our garden and I would like to share some of the photos with you. Paeonia suffruticosa is a flower that has never disappointed me… So elegant. The rhododendron below is a small bush which we bought for just a few bucks in end of season sale in Tesco supermarket and frankly, we didn’t expect…
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Supernatural or not
I had quite a weird experience a few days ago which on the one hand one could explain easily and on the other hand one couldn’t explain that easily and I would like to share it with you. On Sunday, my hubby Milan and I went on a trip to castle festivities in Velhartice. When we were almost there, we saw an old church which Milan found familiar having said that he had read something about it but was not sure and was not much specific. We made a quick detour to have a look at it and found out that the church was situated inside a cemetery. We were…
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Time of lilacs
I saw first lilacs burst into flower about two weeks ago and it seems that the lilac that we have in our garden follows the lead at last and starts to open its buds. I still have a few still-life photos featuring the lilac that I took last May so now it would be the right time to share them. These are just branches cut from the bush. I added some haze to the first photo to get a different feel and to create something not that straightforward, what a change. Lilac are the essence of May, aren’t they. They always confirm to me that winter is soon to be definitely over, their…
