1611 - burning bum syndrome

setup: sony nex 7 with sel 50 f1.8 | 50mm | f1.8 | ISO160 | 1/80 | lightroom 4.2

since i hanged up my active football career in may, cycling has come into my focus more and more. my bum isn't accustomed to the daily rides yet, so many a time it gets me back for stressing it permanently.

nevertheless currently there is nothing better and relieving for me than riding a bike in the cold mornings or evenings and a hot shower afterwards. 

cu, trshptr

1511 - cascade

setup: sony nex 7 with sel 50 f1.8 | 50mm | f1.8 | ISO100 | 1/400 | lightroom 4.2

if you concentrate on seeing natural patterns in your daily environment, you should surely catch sight of many of them.

they might not always make a good subject for photography if you'd image them in their overall context. but if you handle detaching them from their surrounding and highlighting the peculiarity of your composition, the results will satisfy you very probably. additionally you can try to mix overall patterns with small ones - i especially like this feature in today's photograph of the green, straightly triangle-shaped hedge in association with the wonderfully coloured, patterned leave mass.

cu, trshptr

1211 - sun-rimmed glasses

setup: sony nex 7 with sel 50 f1.8 | 50mm | f2.8 | ISO100 | 1/500 | lightroom 4.2

the cold months constrain me to go by bus in the morning, especially if tina needs the car. at the moment we own only one car, an eleven years old volkswagen golf iv. i bought it in 2002 with only 5k kilometres driven. today there are 320k on the counter, and i haven't had any incidents yet. what a great car!

nevertheless riding my bike is my favourite way to go to work. unfortunately i'm still a bit sick, so I didn't want to risk to become completely ill by breathing the very cold and fresh air on the bike this morning. anyhow i'm able to use the comfortable transportation system of a certain company bus, that stops both directly in front of my home and also my company. fortunately i don't use this service every day, otherwise i could not guarantee that my physical condition would be as good as today in a few months.

cu, trshptr

1011 - fishbone pigtail

setup: sony nex 7 with sel 50 f1.8 | 50mm | f1.8 | ISO1600 | 1/40 | silver efex pro for lightroom

youtube tutorials can be very helpful, especially if you need a clear and simple explanation of a special method here and now. today in the evening after the daily body care tina wanted to braid maxi's hair with a fishbone pigtail so that she is even more attractive than she usually already is without special styling activities for her today's birthday party.

setup: sony nex 7 with sel 50 f1.8 | 50mm | f1.8 | ISO1600 | 1/60 | silver efex pro for lightroom

both of them evinced different, well developed talents - tina is able to acquire a new mechanical skill on the basis of an instruction within a short length of time. and maxi looks very good with simply every (long) hairstyle.

cu, trshptr

0911 - options

setup: sony nex 7 with sel 50 f1.8 | 50mm | f1.8 | ISO3200 | 1/13 | silver efex pro for lightroom

usually you have many options to watching tv in the evening: reading a book, surfing the web, talking to each other or playing games are only a few of them. unfortunately german television programmes are mainly of poor quality by this time. in fact most of the broadcasters have to be avoided completely, otherwise you risk your solid sense.

plainspoken with increased regularity watching tv isn't an option for me and us anymore. while my girls are resting on the couch and reading their stuffs i'm going to head off to meet my best friend here in homeland, the only thing that makes sense for me now.

as a technical note the pic above was processed without any noise reduction or additional grain again - not so bad after all.

cu, trshptr

0511 - guitar hero

setup: sony nex 7 with sel 50 f1.8 | 50mm | f1.8 | ISO1600 | 1/8 | lightroom 4.2

there are different possibilities to produce well exposed low light shots. one of them is to hold the camera steady and use the capabilities of the built-in stabiliser. if your skills are well developed, the subject isn't moving and you are fortunate you can get decent results. this method shouldn't be used when you desperately have to get a good result in a temporary and short candid scenery but it is the first choice if you need best quality, rejects are not a problem and time isn't limited. for the picture above i applied only a bit of noise reduction during post-processing. the sample is one of round about 30 attempts to shoot marv while he was playing a slow, relaxed song on his guitar.

setup: sony nex 7 with sel 50 f1.8 | 50mm | f1.8 | ISO12800 | 1/160 | silver efex pro for lightroom

contrary to the first one the black and white sample was shot with very, very high iso settings. i'd never touched such high iso ranges before, but now i've to say that it is really an option for me if the subject is suitable. the image above was post-processed in silver efex pro completely without any noise reduction and additional grain. due to the iso of 12800 i was able to shoot marv while he was rocking the guitar in the almost complete darkness. i think that it looks really great.

cu, trshptr

0111 - skate dance

setup: sony nex 7 with sel 50 f1.8 | 50mm | f1.8 | ISO100 | 1/640 | lightroom 4.2

dancing the skate seems to be easier than it really is. by all appearance you don't have to be keen on sports but at least relaxed and well balanced.

setup: sony nex 7 with walimex pro 8 f2.8 fisheye | 8mm | f4.0 | ISO320 | 1/250 | cornerfix & lightroom 4.2

no matter how high you can jump - your shadow is willing to jump higher. your shadow is your best challenger and opponent.

setup: sony nex 7 with walimex pro 8 f2.8 fisheye | 8mm | f4.0 | ISO1000 | 1/320 | cornerfix & lightroom 4.2

escaping from the depth of the space is not always successful but today it worked. after a lot of photographs with flash that do not satisfy me completely and a few shots against the light for working with the shadows we finally used the frontal light to get some images with a proper exposure, too.

cu, trshptr

3010 - end of these particular work days

setup: sony nex 7 with sel 50 f1.8 | 50mm | f1.8 | ISO640 | 1/80 | lightroom 4.2

some things will never change: coming home from work on night duty days of tina is pure heartache for me because i'm anything but a person who enjoys his own company.

so i hurl myself into rituals: coming home; cuddling nila, the cat; exercises, taking a hot shower, dinner, extensive practising. sleep. 

no matter if the year is 2005 or 2015: this was and will be the same as it ever was in our relationship.

cu, trshptr

2810 - first flakes

setup: sony nex 7 with sel 50 f1.8 | 50mm | f1.8 | ISO125 | 1/80 | lightroom 4.2

besides reading lecture notes and solving different messy problems i haven't done much more this weekend. so the sunday afternoon walk was my solely aim for today.

funnily the first proper snow fell last night and didn't thaw, so the walk was supposed to be a specific pleasure for kingston, the dog. he really likes mud and water, but he definitely loves snow.

although my today's photograph doesn't picture an animal-human-couple of strangers but my wonderful girl and kingston, the great dog of our neighbours, i want to dedicate the daily posting to a project to which this image would actually match quite good.

a special category of pablo heimplatz' blog that is called at eye level covers the topic of the special relationship between dog and owner. i'm really into his project and absolutely recommend following him.

cu, trshptr

2710 - plumed visit

setup: sony nex 7 with sel 50 f1.8 | 50mm | f1.8 | ISO200 | 1/160 | lightroom 4.2

tina and i take care of animals in the same way like we respect humans.

this fact finds expression for example in our direct environment: besides our own cat we sometimes look after the kitties and dogs that live in our yard, too. additionally to that tina donates a little sum to an animal welfare organisation.

i for one try to help all the beings in my direct surrounding. for that reason i started to feed the birds in our yard since a few days again. corresponding the first spit of snow fell today and the first soil frost is said to appear in the coming night. i'm pretty sure that the eurasian nuthatch of my today's pic is very pleased with the delicious seeds that we usually serve.

on bad weather days like today the observation of approach and departure of the beautiful european birds is more amusing than watching a movie in the home cinema and a welcome variation to my learning periods.

cu, trshptr