• Focused on photography

    Unexpected portrait

    In the Czech Republic, we celebrate a name day, the date of the year when our name is presented in a Czech calendar. It’s the same date every year. A few days ago my younger son had his name day and he was thrilled to get a T-shirt with the name of one of his favourite bands as a few days before that he had got a cap with the same name. He also got chocolate fish he liked and he came up with the idea to take a selfie to preserve the memory of the presents. I offered to use my camera to get a decent shot and when…

  • black&white
    Miscellaneous

    Along the path of blogging

    UPDATE: I wrote this post on my Blogger blog before coming to this WordPress website a year later so its contents are not relevant to what I have now. Yet I decided to keep the post here as it shows the history of my blogging and where it took me. I started my first blog about fifteen years ago on the Yahoo platform for the sole purpose of learning English and keeping in touch with my online teacher. Slowly but continuously the blog was getting a new face and finally I was sharing photos I took and thoughts I was pondering over. Then Yahoo came with the announcement that it would…

  • still-life
    Focused on photography

    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…

  • Focused on photography

    White, round and minimalist

    Week 3 of Be still 52 invited us to gather various table tops and back drops to have interesting and suitable foregrounds and backgrounds for our photos. After rummaging in our house I’m perfectly sure there is not much to use, I need to buy a few things to start with. For the time being I decided to follow a challenge offered by Kim to those being already stocked with tops, textiles and backgrounds, which was to use any or all 3 of the following prompts: WHITE – ROUND – MINIMALIST You know me, I wanted all… and created the following image: It’s not a typical still life, rather an…

  • Places in Czech Republic

    Revisiting Kozel castle

    During the last several years I posted quite a few photos taken in the park surrounding the Kozel castle. I’ve known the castle since my childhood but I see it differently every time I come there. The park is charming in each and every season. I’d like to add a few more photos to that collection today. The castle which is in the upper part of the photo above is not the only interesting building in the complex. Below it you can see greenhouses where plants are kept and grown during the colder months of a year. I liked that overall as well as detailed view. In the following photo…

  • Reflections

    Black and white

    Before Christmas I was making an appointment and on that occasion I was speaking with an assistant over the phone, with a woman I had not known. Her voice was pleasant and friendly and when I was to meet her finally, I was looking forward to that meeting. But expectations are deceiving troublemakers so when I actually saw her, I could not believe it was the same person. I did not like her appearance and felt disappointed. After exchanging the words we needed to say I got back to my car and went home. While driving, it began to dawn on me that my what-I-felt-at-first-sight perception was quite silly. She…

  • Reflections

    At the top

    I took this photograph at the top of an interesting sandstone formation with narrow passages, so called “cat castle”. I lifted my head and there was this tree. I was enchanted by the scene. It seems that being “at the top” may be a wonderful experience but may also bring strong feeling of solitude and certain fragility…