London May 2015 Part 2: Highgate Cemetery

As I've mentioned, I just made a week long trip to London and I want to start with some photos from my visit at Highgate Cemetery.

Highgate Cemetery was established in 1839 as one of the "Magnificent Seven", cemeteries that was established at that time around London and which Highgate is probably the most well known.

At that time London expanded and its population doubled in a few years as a result of the industrialisation. And with that, the amount of dead people doubled too. The state of burial arrangements in the Victorian London was not that awesome and the smell from its burial grounds, as a result of shallow graves and corpses piled on top of each other, was not as of roses...

So they started to build cemeteries. And Highgate is a very fine example. It's divided into the East and the West cemetery of which the West one is the most interesting, though only available through guided tours which I recommend to take (though not enough time to find, compose and take photos). The East cemetery is also very nice and there are some famous people buried there such as Douglas Adams and Karl Marx for example.

Any how, end of the history lection and on to some photos. Enjoy.

Blackie. East Cemetery

Egyptian Avenue. West Cemetery.

West Cemetery.

Circle of Lebanon. West Cemetery.

Chamber of Death. West Cemetery.

Percy. East Cemetery.

For Fred. East Cemetery.

Circle of Lebanon. West Cemetery.


London May 2015 Part 1

I'm sitting at Heathrow Airport waiting for the plane to take me to Copenhagen and later on the train to Sweden. I've spent a week in this magnificent city and I wish I didn't have to go back to my regular life again. Here I've been doing street photography and some architecture/cityscapes during this past week and it's been fun. One thing I discovered is that it was definitely harder doing street photography here than I thought, since basically it's hard to find someone local actually doing something else than walking fast somewhere and/or checking their phone or tourists taking selfies. I probably didn't go to all the right places but I will go back here to give it another go, maybe in August. 

In London May Part 2 I will actually start adding some photos, but that will be in a couple of days. Meanwhile check me on Instagram, since I've added a few shots there.

And my plane is delayed an hour also. Awesome... 

 

 

A little quiet here, I guess...

So, I haven't updated that much the last few of weeks, but then again, haven't done any photography either. The April weather has sucked quite a bit actually, and I haven't felt the need of going out and do much photography, but I will soon.

On Friday the 1st of May I'm leaving for London and a week of street photography and I'm really looking forward to it, so in a couple of weeks there will be new shots here. I will also write my mentioned review of the F-stop Guru backpack since I plan on bringing that one with me for the final test (so far, I've been using it every day) and give my verdict.

Copenhagen Street Photography Part 23

So the trip to Copenhagen over easter was pretty okay. The weather was, well, like April weather. It was sunny and you could sense a bit of spring in the air, then minutes after it started snowing and then went back to sunny and a bit warmer again. I mean, wtf weather?!

When it comes to actual photography, it was a bit meh. Or I was a bit meh. But I've got a few to show, so enjoy.

NBD (New Bag Day)

I ordered and recieved a new backpack the other day, my third bag from F-stop, who makes the best photography bags on the planet.

I needed (wanted) something in between my Mountain Series Loka and my Millar Series Brooklyn Sling, so I got the Mountain Series Guru (with a Small Shallow ICU). I needed something that I can use back and forth from work everyday, where I can bring  (my Fujis) with me and that is big enough to house other things than cameras, but still not too big. The Loka is awesome, but it's too big for every day use in that way.

I will write a review when I've used the bag for a while, but since it's an F-stop bag it is obviously awesome and nothing else has to be said really, but still I want to use it for a while before writing something like a review.

I mention this since I see too many reviews of gear where people are "omg omg omg, I've bought this (insert gear) today and this is my review after using it for an hour and a half and it's so awesome (as in 'I-want-it-to-be-totally-awesome-because-I-paid-a-lot-of-money-for-it') and bestest evah!!!!11!!", and I'm not joining that club. So, I will be back with a review later.

Malmö

I went to the city of Malmö the other weekend to get to witness some black metal magic in the form of Watain. On the day of the concert and the day after, before returning home, I went for a couple of walks around "Triangeln" and "Möllevången "and did som street photography. Though this is the largest and most populated city in Skåne (and the third in Sweden), there wasn't that many people out except for the random shopper, homeless people, and of course the large amount of Romanian beggers outside every other store.

Also had an "interesting" conversation with some druggies/alcoholics at Burger King and learned that coffee there was better than the coffe served at the homeless shelter...

The concert was pretty good, though Watain was better the last time I saw them in 2010. This time they didn't even have their barrels of rotten pig's blood with them (to get the right smell/atmosphere of death at the venue), so that was acually a bit of a let down...

And as a bonus, here's some Watain for you.

Project Mundane

At this time of year in this part of the world, the weather mainly sucks. It's all gray or white skies, it's rainy and windy. It would be great if we had some real winter, but no, we don't. So, that makes my surrounding area seem even more boring and dull than usual.

So, I thought I'd start a little "project" or whatever to call it, and shoot boring, dull and depressing stuff.

So here it is, Project Mundane.

Helsingør

So I took the ferry over the sound (between Sweden and Denmark) to the danish side and the small and old town of Helsingør (Elsinore) on a day when the weather didn't completely suck, just partly. This place is full of life in the summer, in February, not so much...

So I just walked around and shot some of the old buildings and stuff like that (since there were not many people around) to try out the X100T. It's a quite nice little thing and I might write a review further down the road.

Anyhow, here are some shots (with heavy use of VSCO).

Gear thoughts...

So, ever since I bought my Fujifilm gear this autumn, I've been thinking about what I should do with my full frame Canon 5D MkIII and my lenses. If I should sell it, now is the time to do it. As far as I know, Canon is about to release the EOS 5Ds and EOS 5Ds R (with and without an anti aliasing filter). I haven't really read up on all about the supposed specs (because the news doesn't make me excited and I don't really care) of these two cameras, all I'm convinced about is that Canon for sure is letting us users down, again. These are some 50 megapixel monsters. And quite frankly, the megapixel race is just stupid. As far as I know, the dynamic range is NOT changed and made any better which is something that really is needed. And they are going to be restricted to a maximum of ISO6400, probably since they're cramming the same old sensor full with megapixels, the ISO performance is gonna suck. So, these ones are not really anything to look forward to. And then, the rumours are saying that an eventual 5D MkIV is also coming soon-ish. That one will probably also be a let down. Sure, the autofocus will probably be updated (the one in the 5D MkIII is pretty good though) and the ISO performance probably also a bit better and maybe the dynamic range. But it's probably gonna be aimed a lot towards video and who gives a shit about that?

I would love to see Canon to start listen to their users and to start making cameras for photographers. Like Fujifilms does. If Canon made a camera that actually took advantage of the things that full frame DSLRs have over mirrorless cameras, then that would actually be something to really look forward to. An updated sensor with maybe as much as 36 megapixels, maybe less, but without an anti aliasing filter and with a much better dynamic range. I really like the ergonomics and the layout of the 5D MkIII, but the dials of the Fujifilm X-T1 is really nice, and to put something similar on a 5D Mksomething would be nice. Actually, I'd love to have an actual aperture ring on EF lenses too, but oh well...

Anyways back again to my own and existing gear. I've been giving this quite a bit of thought but have come to the conclusion that I will keep my full frame camera and lenses (though I'm not happy about Canon's development, I still like what I have), since I will probably still use it as my go to gear for landscape photography and when I need a faster and better autofocus. A not so hot dynamic range can be faught with the use of filters in landscape photography, which I've done for years already. I think my Fujifilm gear is awesome, with fantastic image quality (both camera sensor and lenses) together with it being small and light. But the autofocus is nowhere near and the feeling of my big full frame DSLR out in the nature is something to take into count as much as I like the lightness and smallness from the Fujifilm gear on the streets or for travelling. So I will have the best of both worlds even if it makes me lose a bit of money, and that is my decision.

At least for now...

Copenhagen Street Photography Part 20

So, I had been planning on going to Copenhagen today to try out a very much avaited new part of my photography eqipment.. But I've done something to my foot at work so I'm currently half crippled and not able to walk around without being in agony.

So, instead this day is spent planning and making up plans for future trips to for example London. I thought I should post some more shots from Copenhagen and while looking through which to post, I thought "I've been taking quite a few shots of bikes"...

Lensbaby

I like Lensbaby lenses. I've had them since the first version and they're fun and creative (at least that's how it feels). I'll share a few shots and these are not new since I have used them much lately. This is the first small batch of photos.

Copenhagen Street Photography Part 18

Yep, more photos from Copenhagen. In this part of the world, the opportunities for doing photography when you have a full time job (plus on call duties) are not that great since the weather is usually shit and the daylight is kinda sparse at this time of the year.

So, that's why I keep on posting shots from Copenhagen, since I have a few of them.