For the love of silhouettes

family affairs, originally uploaded by topfloor.

When I see a beautiful background, well lit, such as a nice sky on sunset (or sunrise) with clouds and a nice mood in it, I enjoy going low down and wait for people to walk through my pictures because they add the human element.

Here I was near the Lower Saxony town of Celle, enjoying some geocaching with a friend, and saw the blueish sky and the winter tree. The young family was friendly enough to walk through my picture ;-) .

Shot with M9 and the not so great 21 mm f/4 Voigtländer Color Skopar lens (sold after this shooting because of vignetting on the full frame M9 sensor).

Have fun,
Carsten

Black and White HDR

deep tracks, originally uploaded by topfloor.

Classic problem - classic solution: When the contrast range of a scene is too wide for the camera (here the white of the snow / clouds in the sky and the black of the forest are too far apart, I do a bracketing series of shots.
The three pics were then converted to a HDR, using the standard settings of Photomatix Pro. As I dislike the artificial colors of HDRs very much, I converted the HDR pic to black and white with my fav tool - Nik Silver Efex Pro.
This is an example, taken in the forest near Celle with a 21 mm lens on a full frame sensor.

Happy shooting,
Carsten

David Solomons shooting Up West / London

San Francisco XXIV - walk on Geary Str., originally uploaded by topfloor.

This is a nice 5 minutes YouTube Video of David, doing Streetphotography in London.

David on Flickr

The video on YouTube

Have a nice day!

Andrea bloggt über ihre Sucherkamera-Erfahrungen

Angles and Corners of the Noctilux, originally uploaded by topfloor.

Andreaffm, laut ihrem Flickr-Profil eine Journalistin aus Frankfurt, berichtet auf ihrem Blog über ihren ersten Gehversuiche mit ihrer neuen Leica M9, außer den Erfahrungen mit der Retina ihres Vaters wohl ihre erste eigene Sucherkamera.

Sie tut dies so natürlich und manchmal auch selbestironisch, das man ihre Gefühle und Erfahrungen beim Umstieg von der Pentax DSLR mit 2.8er Zooms geradezu körperlich ;-) nachempfinden kann.

Hier könnt Ihr es nachlesen (auf Deutsch):
erster Tag: http://color.antville.org/stories/1975224/
zweiter Tag am Bahnhof: http://color.antville.org/stories/1975385/
dritter Tag bei Nacht: http://color.antville.org/stories/1975726/

Viel Spaß dabei.

Auch ein Kollege, der Stefan Wintermeyer, hat seine persönlichen Erfahrungswerte unter dem Titel 'Leica M9 – eine Liebesgeschichte' auf Heise.de publiziert:
http://www.heise.de/foto/artikel/Erfahrungswerte-Leica-M9-eine-Liebesgeschichte-929337.html

Auch dies vielleicht nicht immer ganz wörtlich bierernst zu nehmen, aber sehr authentisch und vergnüglich geschrieben.

Frohes knipsen,
Carsten

P.S. Dieser Beitrag wurde nach Andreaffm's Kommentar berichtigt (nicht Canon, sondern Pentax DSLR ud Vater's Retina).

Avoid the 21 mm f/4 Voigtlaender on the M9

stirring clouds, originally uploaded by topfloor.

As Ken Rockwell wrote, I can now confirm that the Color Skopar 21 mm lens, made by Voigtländer and sold for around 350 Euros in Germany should be avoided on the Leica M9 because of heavy vignetting and some color fringing. Although this picture was taken with this camera / lens combo, the vignette was corrected in post and color fringing irrelevant because of the desaturation.

Happy shooting, Carsten

Low Down is fun

Spaceship III - gangway, originally uploaded by topfloor.

My picture Spaceship III - gangway is a typical example for the low down syndrome ;-)

Trying to capture unusual persectives to make an attractive subject more eye catching, the low down thing is a common try for me.

I can recommend a visit to the Klimahaus in Bremerhaven where the shot was taken.

Happy shooting,
Carsten

Hopper's Hands at Golden Gate

San Francisco XXVIII - Hopper's Hands at Golden Gate, originally uploaded by topfloor.

This is my fav perspectve at Fort Point near Golden Gate bridge. The two hands are at the end of a runners trail (with a little version for the dogs below).
Have a nice day!
Carsten