Golden Copenhagen
A sunset in lovely Copenhagen…
Ah, Copenhagen is lovely!
I just returned from a trip to Seattle, and while there met a guy from Copenhagen. We chatted a bit about the city and just how beautiful it is, which reminded me of all the visits and photos I have of that lovely city. It really is a gorgeous place - I would say one of the more beautiful cities I have visited. So I had to dig out a photo from one of my previous trips there. I captured some lovely golden light one evening over Nyhavn, which is their main entertainment area in town. So photogenic, and then when you get light like this it really sparkles!
Sunset at The Marble Church
Sunset over the Marble Church in Copenhagen...
Ah, lovely Copenhagen - I miss you!
I dearly love the city of Copenhagen. The people are great, the scenery is fabulous and of course that means there are lots of things to photograph there, too. I've had the good fortune to visit 3 times and each trip there has been really enjoyable.
One thing I love to do when I visit foreign cities is to just wander with the camera. I always find something of interest. This is Frederik's Church, better known locally as The Marble Church, and it's fabulous. It's a stunning display of architecture and a site I try and shoot each time I visit.
I captured this one under a lovely sunset, after finishing shots at nearby Amalienborg Palace (home of the Royal Family, I think, and very beautiful too).
Blue hour at Nyhavn
The scenic beauty of Nyhavn in Copenhagen, Denmark...all aglow during blue hour.
I absolutely ADORE this part of Copenhagen!
As you may have read here before, I love Copenhagen, Denmark. It's a beautiful city full of amazing sights, wonderful people, and expensive beer. ;-)
I do love it though, and should you find yourself headed there, here's my list of the best places to take photos there: Top Photo Spots in Copenhagen
This place is known as Nyhavn, which is a historic harbor that is a bit of an entertainment district nowadays. Whatever it is, it's beautiful, and I have taken so many shots here that I lost count years ago. It's usually the first and the last place I visit when in Copenhagen, just to walk around and see it and snap a few. I captured this image on my first trip there, and on my first night in town, both of which were back in 2012 I think. I need to get back there, it's so beautiful!
A night at Nyhavn
Nightfall at Nyhavn, the historic waterfront entertainment district in Copenhagen - and my favorite place to photograph in a city that is full of great spots.
This is my favorite part of Copenhagen.
As I said in my recent post about the streets of Copenhagen, it's just a lovely city. So beautiful, so nice to wander in, and so great to photograph. While I generally have my camera out the entire time I am there, my favorite spot in town for photography is Nyhavn.
Nyhavn is their historic harborfront area/entertainment district. There are historic wooden boats docked there, several restaurants and bars, and the architecture of the surrounding buildings just gets me every time. I generally stay in a hotel nearby, and start each trip shooting there. At the end of my stay, I usually finish the trip shooting there. These shots were on my last night there on my last trip to Copenhagen. A fitting end to a great week.
One might think I would tire of shooting the same subject again and again, but I really don't. With time of day differences resulting in light changes, it feels different every time I am there. Sunrise, sunset, middle of the day - I just love to visit the place and fire away.
I have done the entire spectrum of photo'ing there - from big, dramatic HDR photos to little detailed shots of small things, and everything in between. This time, I was there at blue hour and shot all of these handheld with my Olympus camera, sporting the 15mm f/1.7 prime lens. They are all single exposures. I no longer have that camera or lens (I moved to Sony) but there are times that I miss that little combo. So small yet so awesome. It was great for little night stuff like this. It's hard to beat wandering around at night and firing off handheld shots. Good fun!
Going back again and again to re-shoot a spot is also a lesson for me - that is, you can always find something new and interesting to shoot, even when you are shooting a place you have shot multiple times before. Whether it's a change of perspective, or a change of lens, or something else, you can always get a new view on things. It just takes a little hustle and some original thinking. Here's a long post I wrote about that very thing if you would like my thoughts on it. It's called "Using Monotony to Spark Creativity" and it's all about getting original even when you are staring at the same old things.
The streets of Copenhagen
Exploring some side streets in Copenhagen, which is always a good time. As the saying goes, not all who wander are lost. Though I will admit, I get lost now and then. ;-)
I love to wander aimlessly in Copenhagen...
Copenhagen is such a beautiful city. On my trips there, I have spent many hours just wandering around the historic city center, basically without a plan. There are a lot of little nooks and crannies to investigate, and I always come across a beautiful street scene...and I photograph it (surprise!).
I'm a huge fan of European street scenes, and when they look like this I am doubly excited.
I love the look of cobblestones, since it gives the scene a historic and timeless feel. The other great thing is the architecture here. I love the look of these buildings - all tall and narrow, sort of bunched together, but each distinctly colored in some pastel shade. It's just lovely.
Of course, it wouldn't be Copenhagen without all the bicycles. You probably noticed a few in the pics. Yes, Amsterdam is well known for all the bicyclists cruisin' around there, but having seen both cities several times, I have to say that Copenhagen may have just as many. No, I didn't take the time to count them, but trust me, there's a lot in both places. ;-)
The other thing you may notice about these pics is that they are a bit muted in style, as opposed to my more typical bold and expressive colors. I haven't turned my back on big colors - it's my first love, after all - but I continue to experiment and evolve as an artist, and I am having fun with it. Variety is the spice of life, after all. A recent example is this post about London done in black and white. I imagine I will do more like that, partly because it's fun to experiment, and partly because I just like them. Oh, and these were all single exposures, not HDR. And no, I'm definitely not giving up HDR! Again, just experimenting with new processing styles and techniques. It's all good fun.
Stacking presets in Aurora HDR Pro
Today I take a photo from Copenhagen and walk you through my workflow for creating this HDR. I use Aurora HDR Pro and create several layers in order to apply presets and selectively target them to specific parts of the photo. It may sound complicated, but it's easy! Join the fun!
As you have read here before, I am doing all my HDR work in Aurora HDR Pro now, and I absolutely love it. It's been a real breath of fresh air for my processing, saving me multiple steps in post and keeping me interested and motivated to learn and share more. So today I am back with something that is sort of a text version of a tutorial I put on YouTube the other day.
If you are interested in seeing the whole video on YouTube, just click below. Or if you want to review it here, read on.
This is a photo that I took in that loveliest of cities, Copenhagen, a couple of years ago. Like many photos, it has been sitting in my library just collecting virtual dust. I thought it would be great to run it through Aurora and see what I could come up with. It was evening time and blue hour was in full swing, and I was at Nyhavn, their historic harborfront entertainment area. It's quite beautiful, and a must-see spot in Copenhagen.
I originally took a bracket set of 7 photos but decided that I really only needed 4 of them to make the photo work. So, I started in Lightroom and exported the 4 files over to Aurora. This is the screen I first see when I do that:
I then just click on "Create HDR" and it merges the 4 photos into a single base HDR and drops it into Aurora. Here is what it looks like, prior to me adding any Presets to it:
From this point, it's all about getting creative and seeing what looks good, feels good, and makes you happy with your photo. I generally start with a Preset on the base layer anyways, just to give me some starting point from which to work.
In this image, I chose the Vivid Memories preset from the Realistic HDR category. Once I apply it to the image, it now looks like this:
Now keep in mind that the nature of a Preset is that it gets applied to the whole image. Since this is my base layer (Layer 0, I guess you would call it), the Vivid Memories preset is applied across the entire image (though as you can see, I reduced the opacity on this layer slightly). That was my desire anyways, so it's fine, and a fine starting point.
As you can see, the colors and details have both "popped" a little and the photo is showing quite a bit more vibrancy. I already like it better, and I really haven't done anything yet other than click a button.
But we are just getting started. The next thing I like to do is to make some adjustments to the sky and water. In many photos, I will apply the same edits to both sky and water, because I am often just reducing noise in those areas and smoothing them out a bit. I just like smooth skies and water, giving it sort of a calm, soothing look. The same applies for this photo, so that's what we'll do next.
My first step is to choose a Preset for the sky and water. I just click the + sign in the upper right next to the word Layers, name it "Sky and water", and then choose a Preset for it. In this case, I chose the Realistic Dreamy preset. I thought the look of the sky and water was pretty interesting in that preset, so I figured I could start there.
As I mentioned before, it applies this Preset to the entire photo, but since we are on a new layer, I just grab a brush and mask in the preset to the areas where I want it to be revealed (which is the sky and water). My mask looks like this:
So now that the mask covers the sky and water, the preset will be applied just in those areas. While I am at it, I also go in to the HDR DeNoise menu on the right hand panel, and make some adjustments there to reduce the noise in the sky and water (shown in the next photo), and I also reduced the saturation of the blue, since it was a little high for my taste.
Quick note: although you don't have to be exactly precise in your masking, I do recommend you take your time around definite edges, such as the tops of the buildings and the ships' masts in the photo above. It just gives you a little cleaner result. In this photo, I just masked it quickly so I could take a screenshot, as an example. On the video I do a little more finer work with it.
Here is a close up of the water, showing the smoothness it now has thanks to the HDR DeNoise settings that were applied (and which you can see in the right hand panel).
This made the sky and water very smooth, which I like, and reduced the noise considerably. In fact, it's reduced so much that I don't need to go use a noise reduction tool now. Thanks to Aurora and the power of Layers, I just saved myself a step in post-processing! I absolutely love that about using Aurora.
Next up is to adjust the buildings. Once again, I want to do this on a separate layer, so I click on the + sign again, add a new layer, name it Buildings, and choose a Preset for it. This time, I choose the Balanced & Realistic preset from the Realistic HDR category (that's the category I find myself in time and time again).
It gets applied to the whole image, which I don't want, so I grab a brush and just brush in the adjustment to the buildings, using a mask. I could also copy the mask from the sky and water layer and invert it, since it's basically the opposite of that mask. Here's a screenshot of the mask:
And here is what the photo looks like when I hide the masking, displaying the photo with the mask applied to the buildings:
After this, I made some minor saturation reductions again, as I felt it was a little too strong. While I do like punchy colors, I wanted to tame this one a little bit. Maybe I'm softening up as I get older? ;-)
You could technically add more layers and continue to make adjustments (and in the video, I give you a couple of other examples), assuming there were other things you wanted to do with the photo. Since it's so easy with Aurora, it does get really tempting at times to just layer and layer again and again! There's really no limit on what you can do, other than your creativity, or needing to go attend to something more important. :-)
After all these edits and layer work (which really, only takes a few minutes), I ended up with the photo below. While the video is about 15 minutes, if I wasn't recording it, I would have spent less than 10 minutes on the photo, in total, since all my blabbering slows me down a little bit. ;-)
Here is a summary of what all I did to the photo:
- Took 4 RAW files from Lightroom, exported to Aurora HDR Pro, and merged them into a base HDR photo
- Added a preset to the base layer and slightly reduced the opacity
- Created a layer for the sky and water, added a preset to that layer, brushed in a mask just for the sky and water portions of the photo to selectively apply the preset, reduced blue saturation, and performed noise reduction in the sky and water sections of the photo
- Created a layer for the buildings, added a preset to that layer, brushed in a mask just for the buildings to selectively apply the preset, and once again slightly reduced saturation
- Saved the photo back to Lightroom where I removed a few dust spots, slightly bumped up the Clarity, and once again slightly reduced the overall saturation
So after these edits, I end up with the photo below. To my eye, it correctly represents the scene and thanks to the use of HDR and the various layers, I am able to selectively control what happens in specific parts of the scene (smooth skies, smooth water, details evident in the buildings, etc). It's quite fun, quite easy and thus quite quick to perform all of this on a photo, and just gets easier and quicker the more you use it. I already find myself just cruising right through an edit pretty quickly, and I have only been using Aurora for a few weeks now.
That's it - thanks for stopping by! If you want to download a free trial of Aurora, you can do that here.
Hopefully this helps you better understand how to use Aurora HDR Pro. If you would like more information about the product, just click on the banner below. It will take you to the Aurora site, where there are a lot of details and plenty of video tutorials. Or, just ask me and I will try to help!
Getting creative in Copenhagen
Today's photos are a brief selection from my last visit to Copenhagen, which is a lovely city! I just wandered there a bit, and came home with a lot of photos that I really like. Plus I talk a little about split toning, which I am starting to experiment with more and more. Enjoy!
Oh man, do I ever love Copenhagen! It's a beautiful city! And I'm inspired by my new use of split toning in Lightroom!
this is just outside of christiansborg palace, and i love this spot. it reminds me of amsterdam quite a bit. Very beautiful!
I really do have a thing for Copenhagen, as I have written about here before. The city is gorgeous and though it's rather pricey, I think it's worth a visit at least once. While there are some seriously awesome sights that I think everyone should go see (and here's a list if you are curious), for me one of the most rewarding things is to just wander the streets, nearly aimless.
You know, just meander the side streets and back alleys, and encounter interesting things to photograph. And believe me, there is a lot of that there! I admit though that I am a bit addicted to European street scenes, so that's part of why I enjoy wandering so much. Some of my favorite photos from Copenhagen are just the little things I see down side streets or back alleys, often when en route between the bigger sites. In addition to wandering being a great way to get to know a place, I also find it's an equally rewarding way to come home with great images.
one of countless street scenes that i photographed on my wanderings there.
I have visited Copenhagen three times now, and still have a massive backlog of photos to work through. On my last visit alone I came home with over 3300 photos. So, you can imagine what the collection of pics from 3 visits looks like! I guess I need some rainy days to give me the time to get to more of them. :-)
Today's selection of photos is all from my wanderings there back in March 2015 (when I spent a week there), and occurred over the course of just a couple of days, though obviously at different spots around town. It was cold out and a bit gray while I was there, and I kept feeling like Mother Nature just wanted to rain on me, but never did. Perhaps she didn't have the energy that day, or maybe she just wanted me to get my photos. Either way, it worked out rather well. No complaints - I'll take it!
hans christian andersen statue near tivoli gardens
st alban's anglican church, given a bit of a moody feel here.
nyhavn, which i photograph a lot!!
the path to st alban's as i approached - loved the trees framing it.
You may notice that, though I mentioned above that it was pretty gray out, these photos don't all show that, and it's because I have been having a little fun in the digital darkroom. As I mentioned in a recent post, I have been utilizing the "split toning" feature in Lightroom and trying to get more familiar with it. So far, so good. I'm really having a lot of fun, and it's giving me a new creative outlet to explore, especially for photos that are essentially "flat" to start with.
I plan to go into a bit more detail on split toning in a future post, but wanted to share that bit now since I thought it was fitting to do so. If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask! I will do my best to answer them. I'm no expert, but so far my experimentation with split toning is giving me a good feel for it, and I am beginning to recognize what will work on an image, and what will not.
I have found it is a GREAT way to take an otherwise dull image and give it some serious life. Not all of these were completely flat and boring (well, at least to my eyes!) prior to my editing. I just generally tried to bump up the interestingness of them a bit (except for that first photo, which was VERY dull, color-wise, so I made it look like sunset instead - fun!). Man, I love to jack around with my photos, that's for sure! ;-)
Anyways, enjoy the shots and let me know if you have any questions!
after shooting from the tower atop christiansborg palace, I wandered over here because I just love architecture. This is part of the royal stables there.
this is the entry to kastellet, which is a historic, star-shaped fortress in town. Very cool place to explore!
The fire dancers of Tivoli Gardens
Well, here's something you don't see everyday. It's a blog post from me with photos of people in it. Yep, real, live humans. Of course, they were swinging fire torches around and breathing fire into the night like a dragon, so I launched into full "extreme portrait" mode and fired away! It was awesome, too!
Today I share photos of something I NEVER photograph - people!
It's true, I never take photos of people. Apart from some family gatherings where I may take a few photos, I never photograph people, and especially not in my travels. It's not my thing. As I tell people when they ask me what type of photography I do, I generally reply "I will shoot anything that cannot talk back".
It's not that I don't like people, or that I have limited social skills (ha, some may question that bit!), or I am afraid to talk to people. It's just that portrait work is not my thing. I prefer to capture scenes that are generally empty of humans. It's just how I'm wired, I guess. But if I have to admit it, I think having some photos of people I encounter in my travels could be a good thing.
Every travel photo you see isn't completely devoid of humans - many of the best ones actually do have people in them. Including people can be a great way to add to a scene, to give the viewer a sense of standing their themselves, and sometimes it's used to show the scale of whatever the person may be standing in front of. In other words, it's not a bad thing, and it is something I need to think more about - and likely do more of.
Anyways, I better get back on track here...
Back in March of this year, I was in Copenhagen on business for a week, and as I have said here on the blog MANY times, it's a beautiful town. Superbly beautiful, in my opinion. If you haven't seen it yet, here is my list of the best things to photograph in Copenhagen, should you either want to see more of the town or in case you are headed that way and need some things to aim the camera towards. If you get a chance to go there, take it. I am confident you will agree with my assessment of the city.
So one evening, I had to attend an event that was held at Tivoli Gardens, their world-famous and historic amusement park. Although it was designed to be a fun evening, it was still work-related, so I didn't want to haul all my gear there as it wasn't "free time" for me. But I did manage to bring my camera with the little prime lens, which ended up being the right thing to do. (Being early this year, the camera in hand was the Olympus OMD EM-1 and the lens I used was the super-awesome little Panasonic Leica 15mm f/1.7 prime - perfect for handheld shots in low light! I have since converted to Sony cameras and lenses, per my recent posts about that).
Upon entering the park, I saw these two performers standing off to the side, as though they were getting ready to start something. They were all decked out in these costumes with copious amounts of makeup on - it just screamed "we are about to do something". Everyone else was walking to the bar or to get food, but I hung back and chatted with these two performers for a few minutes. Sure enough, they were getting ready to start their fire dance, or whatever you call it, in just a moment. I was intrigued.
I asked if pictures were ok, and they said yes, so I just positioned myself (and a couple of times, asked them to slightly adjust their position), and said "GO". It was weird, because it was almost like they were working for me and I was hired to do this - but of course I wasn't. It just felt that way because we were collaborating, and I was the only photographer there, and there were no spectators at the beginning either. It was interesting, and fun, to be directing them. I've never done that before. I dare say I enjoyed it.
So they lit the fires and started their act. The young lady was swinging her fire torch things around, and the young man was blowing fire into the night. It was pretty amazing to watch (and I was close enough to feel the heat). I didn't have it to myself for long though. Once they really started going, more folks showed up so my ability to have it all to myself only lasted about 5-7 minutes, but I got plenty of great shots in that time, so I can't complain. It's amazing how fire draws in spectators. They arrived in droves.
As far as camera settings go, I was totally guessing about what to do, but I knew I had to fire things really quickly. Having absolutely zero experience shooting something like this before, all I could do was try a few things and see what worked. Essentially, I was shooting everything at f/1.7 since it was night and the park was pretty dark. But of course I knew once the guy blew fire into the air, I would get a big burst of light which would illuminate things rather well. I stuck with the f/1.7 setting the whole time and focused in on their faces whenever possible. I also bumped up the ISO generously since again, I wanted to fire really fast. And of course, I had the camera in "high-speed" or burst mode or whatever it is called on that camera (I can't remember, and no longer have the camera), where the shots fire rapidly in succession as the shutter button is held down. It seemed to all work out, which I was thankful for of course!
While I don't see myself changing the type of photography that I generally do, I will say this was both a learning experience for me and a fun time. It pays to mix things up and get out of your comfort zone at times. I learned quite a bit in that short span of time, and given the chance to do something like this again, I might just have to indulge myself!
And thank you to the two performers for letting me practice my portrait skills while they entertained everyone. It was a real blast! (no pun intended haha)
Catching a train in Copenhagen
Once again, I spent some time in a train station - this time it was Copenhagen's Central Station. It's a beautiful spot, and I learned that no matter how many times you have been somewhere, you can always find a new way to look at things. Read on!
Boy do I ever love European train stations!
I've said that here many times before, and it remains true - European train stations just really have a hold on me! There is something about them that I absolutely love. Perhaps it's what they represent: the idea of travel, of hopping at the last minute onto a train bound for a new destination, or returning to a treasured favorite. Maybe it's the cavernous interiors and the stunning architecture. Maybe it's something else entirely that I haven't put my finger on yet.
Whatever it is, it just draws me in.
Which reminds me that I wrote this long post about my whole addiction to train stations over a year ago. Check it out and let me know what you think!
I've been in Copenhagen Central Station several times now with a camera - and each time I come back with different shots than before. My preference is to arrive early on a weekend morning, when you can skip the weekday work rush of commuters. It's just better when it's not crowded.
As you know, I tend to prefer generally empty scenes. In addition to enjoying it more when I have it to myself (it's quieter and more peaceful, it's easier to think about your shots, and you don't have people in front of things you want to photograph), I also, artistically speaking, just like to show places without a horde of tourists there so you can actually see the thing I am photographing. I prefer to show you the whole scene, if possible.
While having people in an image can improve it at times (depending on what you are trying to convey, I guess), I still err on the side of wanting things empty. It's just what I like, I guess. Then again, I'm becoming more introverted as I get older, so maybe I'm just being fussy. :-)
But these shots were taken on a weekday evening back in March. I was actually heading to a customer event at Tivoli Gardens, and was early enough that I had some spare time on my hands. Since I was toting along my camera, I figured I might as well wander to the train station and get a few shots. It's always fun to explore a place like this, right?
Well, I'm glad I did!
On my previous visits, somehow I completely missed the shots of the front with the digital clock display all lit up and showing the current time, as well as the tracks coming at you and the bits of graffiti. I had always entered from a different angle, so I had never seen this. That's why it's good to return to familiar spots - you can always find something new there, or a new perspective on something that you think is "old news".
I also missed Vesterport Station on previous visits, which is literally a few hundred feet away from Central Station, and, for photographic purposes, is well worth a quick stop. I loved that sign on top shining bright, deep into blue hour with the bright red letters across the top of the station. How can you NOT love something like that?
A visit to Frederiksborg Castle
How about a virtual trip to a fairy-tale castle in Denmark today? Sound good? Ok, let's go! Here is a collection of pics I took at Frederiksborg Castle in Hillerod, Denmark earlier this year. It's a beautiful place!
A fairy tale castle just outside of Copenhagen!
Earlier this year while on a business trip to lovely Copenhagen, I found myself with an entire day free. I could do anything I wanted. Since it was my 3rd visit to Copenhagen and I had previously wandered all over the place taking photos, I thought it would be great to get out of town a bit and do some exploring. You know, try something new. I had heard there were some castles nearby, so I did a little research and settled on Frederiksborg Castle.
The castle sits on a lake in the town of Hillerod, just north of the city. I took a train up to Hillerod and then a local bus to get to the castle. All together, I believe it was about an hour of travel time, which isn't much when you consider where you are ending up! It's well worth it.
I'm a big fan of castles, so this was a perfect day for me. I spent my time wandering slowly up to the castle so that I could get all the shots of the exterior that I wanted. It was late March, so the weather was a little cool, cloudy and drizzly at times - another perfect combo in my opinion. The other thing about that time of year and that weather is that it's not a high tourist season like I suspect the summer is - in other words, not a lot of crowds to contend with when trying to get the shot. I ran into some folks here and there, but generally speaking I had it to myself!
All together, I spent a few hours here. After doing the approach, I opted to walk all the way around the lake to get shots of it from the other side (still need to work on those photos). With the skies being overcast, it worked out pretty well. Then I made my way back to the castle and took a tour through the interior. It was quite beautiful, if you like that sort of thing. I just wish I had a FitBit that day - I must have walked for miles!
As you can see, in addition to the bigger shots, I did a few close-in shots to capture some of the details, of which there are many. I love architecture anyways, so this stuff is just plain fun for a guy like me. But when you consider that you are in Denmark, at a castle, with a camera - it's damn near perfect!
Up early in Copenhagen
Today I share 5 HDR photos that I captured one fine morning in Copenhagen, Denmark. It's a beauty of a town and at sunrise it's even more photogenic than normal! Enjoy these shots of Nyhavn, the historic harbor front district in Copenhagen!
Do you get up early to shoot when you travel? You should!
I know, I know - it's hard to get up in the morning. It's dark outside, and you are all comfy in your bed, and you stayed up too late last night anyways. Well, that's what caffeine is for. It gets you peppy and then you can go conquer some photo sites!
I make a habit of getting up and shooting sunrise whenever I am on the road. Not every sunrise, mind you - I do need some sleep. But I love wandering the streets of some town by myself in the wee hours, before the hustle and bustle of daily life kicks in. It's pretty amazing.
And I usually find that I have things mostly to myself, which is the main reason I get up. I'm a bit of an introvert by nature, and being able to wander high-traffic spots without the distraction (or nuisance) of a lot of tourists makes for better photos and a nice, quiet start to the day.
So back in March when I was in Copenhagen, I got up a couple of times to shoot sunrise there. It's a beautiful city any time of day, but being able to wander around today's location at sunrise is just fabulous. Believe me, this places gets really crowded later, especially at night!
And speaking of today's location, this is Nyhavn, their historic harbor and waterfront dining/entertainment district. It's wicked cool here, in my opinion, and super photogenic. I make a point to stay in a nearby hotel, just so that I can get here easily in the mornings. It's worth it!
Today's pics are all 3 exposure HDRs that were merged in Photomatix and then additional filters were applied in Color Efex Pro, with final touch-up in Lightroom.
Catching up with Copenhagen
Today's post is all about Copenhagen, that lovely Danish city. So much awesomeness there, especially around their historic harborfront area known as Nyhavn. Take a peek and if you ever get to Copenhagen, be sure and spend some time shooting at Nyhavn - you'll be glad you did!
Update: I am back from my crazy summer family adventure, and it was great! We have been home about a week now, and I am catching up on a lot of things. I have a seriously huge backlog of photos and stuff to share, and I am working to get some things together. More of that is coming real soon. In the meantime, I am also catching you all up on a trip I took to Copenhagen earlier this year. I was able to process this batch of pics recently and thought you might enjoy them!
Ah, fair Copenhagen, you are quite lovely!
I have been to Copenhagen 3 times now, and I love it. It's really a beautiful city. I hope I get the chance to return again some day. One of my favorite things to do there - and really, it's my favorite thing to do in any city - is to get up early and go shoot around sunrise while the rest of the city sleeps. I'm always rewarded with no crowds and a lot of solitude and quiet. It's pretty fabulous.
So today's photos are a collection of images I shot on a solo photo walk one morning. Mostly it's centered around their historic harbor entertainment area known as Nyhavn, with a few odds and ends thrown in - just stuff that caught my eye (though I admit, I am easily distracted LOL). I'm just drawn to that spot in Copenhagen, day or night. I think I shot it 5 or 6 different times in the week that I was there. Anyways, enjoy the pics and thanks for stopping by!
A primal morning in Copenhagen
On a recent morning in lovely Copenhagen, I headed out with just one lens (my 15mm f1.7 prime) and just one purpose - to capture some beautiful photos of this city that I just love to visit. Did I accomplish my goals that morning? Was my self-imposed limitation of just one lens "good enough"? Well, here are 23 photos that show you what I came back with. Click on in and you be the judge!
On a recent morning in Copenhagen, I went out with just the prime lens, and came home with some great shots!
One morning on my recent trip to Copenhagen, I thought it would be great to head towards the Royal Library, which is known locally at the "Black Diamond". In various cab rides, I had passed the place so many times that I lost count. But I never lost track of the idea that I needed to shoot there. It's a beautiful structure.
I also wanted this to be a "forced exercise" sort of thing, meaning that I would use the prime lens, and the prime lens only. No lens changes, and no tripod. Viewing things through a prime lens is great because the fixed focal length forces you to move back and forth, up and down, etc until you land upon the composition that you like. When I have my zoom lens on the camera, it's easy to fall into the trap of just zooming in and out and firing away. I like that the prime lens makes me think more. That's a good thing.
So I got up and headed out, and of course I stopped at Nyhavn first, since it was just a short walk from the hotel. Man, I love that place! Nyhavn is Copenhagen's historic harbor and is just beautiful - but today's post isn't about that. Sorry, I get sidetracked easily! More on Nyhavn in a future post. LOTS of pics to share from that spot!
Anyways, so I cut through some unknown-to-me streets, just to mix things up and get a little different view of the city. That's something I like to do and I think it's important. It's easy to fall into the habit of trodding along the same streets each time, especially if they are a major thoroughfare for pedestrians (and especially when you are in a foreign city). That makes it easy to get places, and keeps you from getting lost. And admittedly, we all fall into the habit of going along known routes. It's predictable and it's safe.
But actually diverging from that habit on purpose is a good thing (of course, your safety is most important so always be diligent). When you step out of your comfort zone, you have the opportunity to see things that you would otherwise never get to see. You may find some surprises (good and bad), but either way, you will certainly add to your familiarity and experience with a place, and that is always good.
Plus, you may pick up some photos that you love.
All this rambling reminds me of one of my favorite quotes, which you can find on my Inspirational Quotes page here on the blog:
find life experiences and swallow them whole. travel. meet many people. go down some dead ends and explore dark alleys. try everything. exhaust yourself in the glorious pursuit of life. - lawrence k. fish
So I wandered through some streets and eventually landed next to the main canal sort of thing that runs alongside the city. I knew the Royal Library was on it, and that I was heading the right direction, so it was just a matter of continuing to walk. See? Photography is also great exercise! Haha
I also made a point of trying to shoot different things than I often shoot, as I mentioned here in a previous post. In addition to it being a great creative exercise, it's just good to get a little variety. I am constantly trying to think of new ways of looking at something, or ways that I can change my accumulated habits, so that I can create a compelling image. It's all about the image, and the experience of capturing it.
Today's post is a somewhat random assortment of images taken on that walk. They don't really correlate together, except for having the common threads of all being taken on a single morning and all being taken with the prime lens.
And if you haven't heard me sing the praises of the Panasonic/Leica Summilux 15mm f1.7 prime lens yet, then let me just tell you that it is an amazing little piece of glass! It's tiny on the camera, but big and powerful in terms of its capabilities. I am super thankful that I have it, and in some ways it's now my favorite lens.
You can read more about it here, in the review that I published of it. When it's attached to my Olympus OMD EM-1 mirrorless camera, I feel like I can shoot comfortably at anything. It's fast, light, and highly capable - a great combo for travel!
Morning at Nyhavn
On my recent trip to Copenhagen, I got up early one morning to head over to Nyhavn, their historic harbor front entertainment area. It's quite beautiful, and I fired a lot of photos. I made a concerted effort to shoot it differently than I have in previous trips, and I think I succeeded. Take a look at these 12 photos and let me know what you think!
Some sunrise goodness from my favorite spot in Copenhagen
I am strategic in terms of my hotel choices. I always pick lodging near the things I want to spend time shooting. That way, when I get up early for sunrise, it's just a short walk until I can start firing away. I can also stay in bed a little longer, which is nice. Or if I end the day shooting there, it's a short walk home at night.
I have (accidentally) done the opposite at times, and have seen the fabulous sunrise light disappear while I try to get into position. Don't ever do that - you will be doubly frustrated. First that you missed the light, and second that you even got up in the first place! Ha, or maybe the other way around.
So when in Copenhagen, my hotel of choice is right down the street from Nyhavn, their historic harborfront entertainment area. It's such a beautiful spot and I find it endlessly interesting. The colorful buildings, the historic ships at port - it just feels like you stepped back in time a little bit. And in some ways, you have.
On my recent weeklong stay there, I made sure at least once to get up and shoot sunrise, and as is often the case, it was well worth it. I frequently advocate shooting at sunrise. The light is generally great, but at least as importantly (and perhaps more so), all the tourists are still in bed. That gives me the opportunity to enjoy a normally busy place in near silence. It's awesome. Believe me, I also shot here after hours (during sunset and blue hour) and it is very busy. Still beautiful, but very busy. It is an entertainment area after all, so that's expected. It's also one of the most popular spots in Copenhagen (and for good reason, I might add).
So on one morning, I made the short stroll over here and fired all the shots you see here today (plus a bunch of others too that I still need to process). It was quiet and there were just a few people out, which is why I got up early to shoot it. In fact, I went back another morning to shoot it again. Yeah, I guess I have a thing for Nyhavn - a bit of an addiction, if you will.
In fact, I shot at Nyhavn 4 or 5 times while I was there. I was back there for sunset and blue hour another evening, and even spent my last night in Copenhagen wandering here and shooting through sunset and blue hour, even though it had been raining. I don't mind the rain, since it provides a bit of interest and really accentuates reflected light. So this is a long way of saying that I have quite a few more photos from Nyhavn to share with you.
However, on this trip (as I mentioned in my last post), I tried very hard to do things differently. I spent several years roaming different cities across the globe and firing away with my wide-angle lens. Now that I have converted to mirrorless, I find that I am shooting much differently. I'm rarely even using the wide-angle lens I have for my Olympus OMD EM-1 camera. I shot so many wide-angle photos at Nyhavn on previous trips (and admittedly, need to process a bunch still from those trips!) that I just didn't want to do that again. I wanted to come home with photos that were more than just repeats of shots I had taken last time.
So I tried hard to capture the scenes in a different way on this trip. I tried to capture some of the little details that I encountered, and tried to focus in on some small things too. I did none of this in years past, so even taking a few is a small victory. But on this trip I found that I was doing this more and more. While I will still shoot somewhat wide these days, I also spend more time shooting much closer in and focusing on the little things.
It's a refreshing change, actually. I'm having a great time doing it, and having a great time processing and sharing the pics too. I hope you enjoy viewing all these photos. Thanks for stopping by today!
An awesome sunset in Copenhagen
On my recent trip to Copenhagen, I had hopes for good shooting, but the weather forecast did not look promising. Couple that with a missed connection in London, and I was sure that my first day there was going to be a bust. But sometimes Mother Nature (and travel complications) work out for the best! I ended up shooting a fabulous sunset - and here are 22 photos (count 'em!) to illustrate just how great it was. Have a look!
You know it will be a good week when it starts like this!
On my recent trip over to Copenhagen, I was a little concerned about the weather. It was going to be a bit cold, and there was a possibility of rain in the forecast too. And while I generally like it colder and cloudy, I would hate to fly thousands of miles to a foreign city, only to miss out on shooting due to rain. That would suck.
My initial plans had me passing through London Heathrow in about an hour and a half (a challenge even with everything going my way), and thus arriving into Copenhagen before lunchtime. That all sounded great to me, but it didn't happen. My arrival into London was delayed, causing me to miss the connection. I was rebooked onto the next flight and arrived mid-afternoon instead. That's all fine really - I've had much worse.
So I made my way to the hotel and got settled, and immediately met up with my friend Mark and headed out to shoot. No point wasting any time, right? Even without sleeping on the overnight flight (I just can't sleep on planes), my excitement levels are too high to even consider sitting down to rest. I always go out and shoot, then eat, then sleep (for 12 hours!). It works for me.
We immediately headed over to Nyhavn, Copenhagen's historic harborfront, which is both fantastically awesome and a short 2 minute stroll from the Phoenix Hotel (which is why I stay there when I go to Copenhagen). I always want to see and shoot Nyhavn first - it's just that special to me. I love the place. (And I have about a million pics of it which I will share here across a few different future blog posts).
One of the good things about shooting in the winter season (this was late March, still somewhat wintry-feeling in a place so far north) is that the sunset comes reasonably early. I actually like that, because I can go shoot sunset and blue hour, and then get dinner and call it a day. Works pretty well for me. The opposite is shooting sunset in London in the summer, which happens at like 9:30 pm or something crazy. Makes for a long day!
Anyways, it was obvious that the weather was going to hold off, and that we may actually get a decent sunset out of the deal. So after Nyhavn, we made the short walk over to Amalienborg Palace and spent the rest of the evening there, firing away happily. How can you not be happy when you get a beautiful sunset, in a beautiful foreign city, looking at a beautiful palace?
So we wandered and shot the area, ending up back at the river/harbor area that runs along the edge of the city and firing away at the massive tall ship you see in today's pics. Having been here to Copenhagen 3 times now (the first two with my old full frame Nikon and wide-angle lens), my intent was to shoot it entirely different than I would have done in the past. On the previous trips I was all wide-angle, all the time - so the shots are all pretty similar. I like them, but they are have a common thread, that is, they are all wide angle shots.
This time I was using my Olympus OMD EM-1 mirrorless camera and the 12-40mm f/2.8 Pro lens, which gave me an entirely different perspective on things. Although I shot plenty of stuff at 12mm, I tried to mix it up too and get different and original compositions of the scene, zooming in and out and just experimenting. I generally think I succeeded in that effort, and I was really thankful for the great light that evening too! You just can't complain when you get great light.
It's also great to be able to shoot a city that you have previously shot. In addition to picking up shots that you may have overlooked the first time, I also just love the feeling that I don't have to be in such a hurry to "get it all done". It's almost relaxing. While I have an addiction to "the new", I also like the feeling of familiarity a return visit brings. It actually causes me to try and get creative and to find new things to shoot, as well as to shoot old things in new ways. In other words, it causes me to spend time thinking about creativity, which is exactly what I need to be doing!
After all that photo'ing, we headed back, I had dinner and a beer, and slept like a hibernating bear. Felt great! Day one was a huge success, photographically speaking. And admittedly, the rest of the week was pretty awesome too. You'll have to come back soon to see more - I am frantically working through my 3200 photos from Copenhagen, which I highlighted in this recent post. So far it appears there were a lot of keepers from this trip!
Thanks for stopping by! More soon!