At the beginning of the year I had my old Leica M2 from 1961 CLAed in Wetzlar. Here’s the first result……
Leica M2; Elmar 2.8 50mm; Kodak Portra 400
Leica M2
Tag: 50mm
Week 41 – Indian Summer….
Week 33 – Renate…
…in Warsaw….
Fujifilm X-Pro1
Fujinon 35mm f1.4
Lightroom & NIK
Week 26 – Kim Wilde and the Siblings
The Economist was recently titled “The man who screwed an entire country” accompanied by a picture of Silvio Berlusconi. In Potsdam it isn’t a single man but more a political morass of people who were on the payroll of the regime before the fall of the wall. One of the latest victims has been the local public services company which hosts the annual music festival in Potsdam. This year’s roll call included Simple Minds, Robin Gibb and Kim Wilde.
The first shot was taken as a candid during Kim Wilde’s “Cambodia”. My covert skills obviously leave a lot to be desired as my subjects quickly spotted my intentions. The second shot was taken with their kind permission.
My thanks go to these unknown siblings on a bench.
f/4 1/25 ISO 800 @50mm
f/5 1/8 ISO 1250 @30mm
Week 22 – Schloss Lindstedt
as above ………
f8 1/50 ISO 800 @50mm
Week 21 – Back to basics…..
This was taken early in the morning whilst on my way to work on that “sit up and beg” style Dutch bike of mine that I have mentioned previously. The view is from the Havelstrasse across to the Hans Otto theatre in Potsdam.
I’ve finally gone full frame, albeit analogue. This was shot with a Pentacon 50mm f1.8 (effectively a Meyer Oreston 50mm f1.8) lens on a Praktica MTL3 camera which were last produced around 1984. The MTL3 is completely manual with the only electronics being an inbuilt TTL light meter. It is pure East German precision engineering even if the technology used is over five decades old.
I’m really enjoying shooting film at the moment so be prepared for more in the coming weeks. This shot is OOC as they say, meaning straight out of the camera with no digital development whatsoever.
If I remember rightly:
f11 1/500 Ilford HP5 (ISO 400) @50mm
Week 19 – The Schleizer Triangle
Schleiz’s claim to fame is one of the oldest “natural” race tracks in Germany.
The first ever race took place on the 10th of June 1923, with the aim being to race as far as possible and as quickly as possible on five litres of fuel. The winner of the car race was Mr. Huldreich Heußer with a total distance of 87.3 km and an average of 41.4 km/h (which quite incidentally is similar to what I get out of my Dutch “sit up and beg” style bicycle when going downhill fully laden). Mr. Horst Raebel on his motorcycle managed six laps with an average speed of 64.2 km/h (which is something to aim for on that bicycle).
I’ve really no idea who won this particular race, but today the top speeds average 160 km/h per lap……I think I’ll get my coat!
f10 1/250 ISO 200 @35mm Pol. Filter
Week 18 – The Lady by the Lake
…… on a sunny May afternoon in Neuruppin (1923).
f4 1/800 ISO 200 @19mm
Week 9 – From Bremen to ….
…… tune in again next week for the sequel, you won’t be disappointed!
Thanks to Peter for his patience trudging around Bremen city centre on a cold damp winters evening.
f1.8 1/25 ISO 800 50mm ambient light
(P.S. I really do love that cheap 50mm 1.8 piece of glass)
Week 6 – BOGOF
This weeks offer is a BOGOF (not to be mixed up with BOBFOC), where you get two for the price of one, which probably applies for both actually…..
I just couldn’t decide between the two. So why don’t you decide?
Both photographs were taken of the same bank on the floodplains of the Wisenta River in Schleiz (Thuringia). I was hoping for a little more variety of motifs, when I set out, i.e. a balance between portrait and landscape photography, however encountering someone sitting on a bank at this time of year in these weather conditions has proved more than just a little challenging.
f8 1/8 ISO 400 50mm Pol. Filter
- View across the floodplain to the Wisenta river
f8 1/6 ISO 400 35 mm Pol. Filter
- A tight corner
Week 2 Potsdam – “The-Bread-Roll-Run”
I think you may have to get used to a number of these banks being within the boundaries of the city of Potsdam, as well as being taken at the last possible moment during the week.
The more observant of you will have noticed that this was taken on a Sunday, hence it was taken on the first day of the new week. This is correct, unless you live in Germany, where the first day of the week is a Monday. Although I always mutter that this custom is incorrect and probably goes against some international (most probably European Union) law, it certainly worked to my advantage this week.
To those readers used to my rants on this subject and the mixing up of commas and full stops in the German numerical system I have this to say:
“Was interessiert mich mein Geschwätz von gestern.” Konrad Adenauer (First German Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany)
This roughly translates as:
“Who cares what twaddle I have spoken in the past” A rather novel admittance for a politician I think.
That does not go to say that I will in future condone either of the above errors.
The image was taken on my Sunday “Bread-Roll-Run” with the kids, whilst their mother idled, well deserved I might add, in her warm and cosy bed.
We’ve had mild weather with rain over the past few days, which has brought the remnants of the New Year’s celebrations to the surface as well as preserving patches of dirty snow.
A picture fitting for the time of year I think.
Week 1 Dallgow Döberitzer Heide
“It takes a lot of imagination to be a good photographer. You need less imagination to be a painter, because you can invent things. But in photography everything is so ordinary; it takes a lot of looking before you learn to see the extraordinary.” – David Bailey – In “Face,” (London), Dec 1984.
It is with this in mind that we set off on our 53 week photographic journey. There are few things more ordinary than a bank, so in the hope that not all the images presented are just ordinary, let’s get started.
It was one of the those wonderful Winter afternoons that you get when the easterly winds blow across the North German plains making the air dry, crisp and very cold. We were out with the kids to see how the wild bison, horses and reindeer fared in the conditions. As the winter sun started to set I came across this makeshift bench.
It was my first bank of the year.
Facing Reality - Faces on Film 