Photo

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It’s been quite some time now that I have gone back to DSLRs, but the little Panasonic GF1 is still a constant presence in my backpack. In the meantime, Panasonic has churned out countless other iterations on the same micro four/thirds concept; but to me it has somehow watered down the concept and only the latest one (GX1) seems to be the true successor of the GF1.

This week, moody skies.

All shots taken with a Nikon D7000 during last weekend’s walks in and around town with Giulia. I wanted to add “all shots were minimally processed except for that one” but the reality¹ is that I used also some dodge and burn, at least one curve adjustment and several other little tweaks. As somebody once said, no photo is truly OOC (straight out of the camera).

And about that one, well that one was the easiest one as I just applied Laroque’s snap preset for that one.

There are still pearls to be found on the internet, after all.

In these days I have found three photography blogs which are full of interesting and well written articles; stimulating, instructive, much better of the crap that Popular Photography publishes (and I’m not even mentioning the countless websites and blogs of pixel-peepers and technology feticists).

Worth bookmarking them for when you have time to sit down and read something that will help renew your passion for this art:

This week a few pictures taken during a lazy Sunday in Ziano Piacentino. Good wine there, and a first experience using an old manual focus Nikkor 85mm f/1.8 which I had modified to AI-S to use it on my D7000.

Ok, so this one was obviously not taken with the 85mm but with my Tokina 12-24 f/2.

Emphasis is mine:

Shoot from the hip and sort it out later in Photoshop; this is a slippery slope plunging inevitably towards the depths of despair and devastating loss of self-esteem that comes with shooting on program mode with a high ISO, no tripod and a reversed lens hood. The latter is the photographic equivalent of wearing socks with sandals; clearly a fate worse than death.

David Noton, “The Difference Between the Taking and the Making of a Photograph”.

Inspired by Pindelski’s blog¹ here’s my first collection of snaps, something that I’ll try to honour as a weekly appointment.

There will not be a common theme or anything like that, and I cannot promise to post new snaps every week (most of the times I have a feeling that it will be stuff from my archive).

What you will find in here is photos that I have taken and that I want to hold on to for whatever reason I may have. And the fact of publishing them online is an act that makes them prominent, and gives them the recognition which I feel they deserve in that particular moment when I sit down and write.

I’m a believer now: with an iPhone (4S) and a nice cool application such as Snapseed, you can really get good shots. I hesitate to call them ‘artistic’ even if other people may do so. That’s not art to replicate the look of a heavily pushed Kodak Tri-X, but they are cool nonetheless.

I should write something more about Snapseed, how this approach to photo editing is perfect for an iPhone. I was one of those nerds who like to endlessly play with Curves, so my philosophy has always been that you need to work hard to improve a shot, and the idea of applying an automatic adjuster-thingy was never considered.

Yesterday evening I had the idea of taking a few shots during this special edition of Critical Mass Milano (special because it was the 10th year anniversary). It’s carnival time too so I figured there would have been good photo opportunities.

But I have a huge backlog of photos to check, catalog and process, so the last thing I wanted was to have another batch of photos waiting to be checked, catalogued and processed.

Last October I’ve spent a great weekend riding and racing (and eating!) in Finale Ligure with Phil, Will and Fiona. I’ve collected all photos on flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/aadm/sets/72157629004495851/with/6751815233/

Burj Khalifa in Dubai, tallest building in the world (828m!).

And this is a little video shot between Milano, Munich and Dubai, 5x5 vimeo-style (i.e., 5 sec clips put together with no background musico or other editing; the original project was called 5x5 because at the end you get a 25 secs movie, but what I did here is something slightly longer, around the minute mark).

First experiments with the Pinwide by Wanderlust. I used it for a few shots last weekend, tried to use it as a normal lens during a bike ride from Milano to Lecco along the river Adda. I soon realized that pinhole photography needs far more care and attention to get satisfying results (for other unsatisfying results see also this flickr set).

Anyway the Pinwide makes the GF-1 even smaller and since it’s just piece of plastic only a little bigger than a lens cap it’s very easy to take it everywhere – the only problem is that you need some sort of tripod to get stable shots even in full daylight.

“Bari nel nostro cuore” (Taken with instagram)

Had a great day of riding last Saturday. Woke up at 6:30am, took the 7:39 train to Sestri Levante. Three hours or so, and then here I am in Sestri; cool breeze, warm sunshine, I started following the Superenduro signs. Here’s a few pics that sum up the day.

And PS1, 2 and 3 were gone in a second; too much fun to stop.

The Russians Used a Pencil: Idea to Market in 5 Months: Making the Glif

I wish I had an iPhone 4 just to have a glif.

On July 11th, 2010, Tom Gerhardt and I had an idea for an iPhone accessory: a tripod mount that doubled as a stand. Five months later, customers began to receive our product, the Glif, in the mail. This turnaround, from idea to market in five months by two guys with no retail or manufacturing…

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Notes taken during a work meeting (Taken with instagram).