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Shining through
There is a low sideboard in my kitchen which separates the space where meals are prepared and cooked from the space where the meals are eaten and I like to have a pot with herbs or a vase with flowers placed on it as it looks quite charming. There is also a window near the sideboard which looks westwards. Sometimes, when the sun is quite low in the evening and it still shines, its rays get into the kitchen and shine through the leaves and flowers I have displayed on the sideboard and it’s always very beautiful. I sit at the table having my supper and watching the beauty… A…
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Spring wandering
Every year, when cherry trees open their beautiful white flowers and enchant me with their charm, I feel compelled to go and capture the beauty. Last year I missed that occasion which doesn’t last very long but this year I took advantage of a nice weekend afternoon and asked my husband to go with me to the cherry tree orchard situated near our village. I intended to take a few captures there and go home but my husband took advantage of that stroll to get much further and eventually we explored the surroundings of our village much more thoroughly. The following photo was taken just at the beginning of the…
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Nature in my garden
Another task to be accomplished in the “Be still 52” course was to take a walk and find some props provided by nature along the way. I didn’t make it to the woods but I took scissors and a bowl and headed for our garden to find some nature beauty there. My garden didn’t disappoint me and I gathered some branches, flowers, bark and pebbles for my photography. I even found an old wooden surface in the yard and an old ugly board which made a great background so this time I was shooting outside, in the shadow of our old barn. I created several versions and modifications with the…
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Detour
When returning home from Křivoklát, we stopped for a while by a group of buildings we noticed along the way and which arose our curiosity. We found out that the complex represents a regional museum and gallery Mariánská Týnice which has been placed in the premises of a former Cistercian pilgrimage destination. When I read that the museum was opened in 1952, I wasn’t much surprised as the fifties, having been under the communist rule, were quite unfavourable to religious orders and religion generally. On the other hand, the buildings were preserved in this way and that’s valuable. It is noteworthy that the church and the provost office were built…
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Easter outing
Though Easter cold and rainy weather forecast did not seem favourable for outings, we wanted to make one and decided to visit an Easter market at the castle Křivoklát. Frankly, I don’t like crowded places like such a market much but I had never been to Křivoklát, which is one of the oldest (more than 900 years since the first written reference) and most important castles of Bohemian kings, and this seemed to be a good opportunity to change that. When we arrived at Křivoklát, there were even more cars and people than I expected as we made an effort to get there soon enough but eventually it didn’t matter…
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Easter pastels
In the last week’s lesson of “Be still 52” Kim suggested that we might capture some pretty pastels inspired by spring and Easter and experiment with backlighting and focus. When I read that assignment I felt somewhat uncomfortable because neither pastels are something you can find abundant in my household nor the soft-pastel style is something I feel like creating. Also, I haven’t been experimenting yet with the backlighting, which makes it quite difficult to get the right exposure as the light often burns background part(s) of the photo while it leaves dark shadows on your subjects. Nevertheless, I accepted the challenge and gave it a try, that’s why I joined…
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Orchids
This time, I used two of my orchids for creating my images. Orchids are beautiful and elegant flowers, quite popular these days as it is so easy to grow them. 20 years ago my schoolmate’s father pursued a hobby of growing orchids in little greenhouses he had constructed at home and every grown orchid meant great success. Nowadays there are hybrids of various colours, shapes and sizes which you can buy even in supermarkets and which don’t need any special care… I’m quite happy about that! Here is the final image #1… and its processed original: And here is the final image #2… and its processed original: I took the…
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Nested balls
No long stories today, just the final image, the processed original …and a few words. I wouldn’t have believed how much different the image would look when taken from different angles. I took quite a few versions of the balls and just once tilted the camera in such a way that the perspective became slightly distorted. That is the photo you can see here as that perspective has become my favourite. I used kk_breathe preset (provided by Kim Klassen in her Be still 52 course) in processing the final image in Lightroom and tweaked it a bit to suit the photo better.
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Smiling
I learned very quickly last year – and see it even more now when participating in the Be still 52 course – that when you want to take arranged still life photos, you need quite a few things. Firstly those objects which are essential to your images – whether everyday objects or special ones and you may also need additional objects to complement the scene. But they are just a part of the whole and you may also need some suitable material or cloth to place underneath those objects, and often also behind, around or between, as appropriate. I found out this to be a problem for me so I…
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Apples in a basket
Playing with apples, side light, angles, depth of field and post-processing, I’ve created another image I’m not used to creating. I quite like it but expect more. Moving on… has become a motto of this project of mine.
