1807 - orange patchwork

setup: sony nex 7 with sigma 30 f2.8 ex dn | 30mm | f2.8 | ISO640 | 1/50 | lightroom 4.1

today i hadn't had the time to catch a breath before half past nine. after work i had to wash all the bicycles, three in number, and do some maintenance work on tina's mountain bike. after all i have lingered after an after work coffee latte at a branch of a well-known big junk chain for the whole evening. at half past nine tina and i had finally accomplished our object, a tall latte for me and a vanilla frappe for her.

while we were stretching our legs subsequent to the drink, i spotted the illuminated, orange wall, that seems to be composed of dozens of rectangular patches. nothing spectacular, but beautiful to look at, especially because its recurring forms and the nicely produced shadows.

cu, trshptr

1607 - plump vs. lean

setup: sony nex 7 with sel 50 f1.8 | 50mm | f8.0 | ISO100 | 1/640 | lightroom 4.1

during the last few weeks i've begun to be satisfied with the technical implementation of my pics. slowly but steady i have a handle on my nex 7, i do not have to think about its operation anymore. conversely i'm really impatient of a few of my daily pic ideas or/and the composition of these images. precisely because there is a lack of interesting photography opportunities in the area around lake constance - besides the often shown and captured idyllic scenes - the collocation of a well composed image has to be reconsidered again and again. as from now i want to take into account all factors: concentrate on the full details, compose a statement and affect the viewers, if possible.

let me begin in a small way: some parts of our societies discriminate against people, that are plump or lean. the most people do not have the balls to voice this, what makes them appear even more ridiculous. fortunately there is a lid for every pot, as you can see in the image above. everybody has to have the right to exist regardless whether he, she or it is thin or fat, black or white, tall or small.

my story may seem quite a stretch, sorry, but this is what i've thought when i spotted the scene today in the afternoon in markdorf. cultivated coexistence, nothing else matters! no fence between the individuals, no podium for anybody, because there is no right or wrong. so as you can see the composition of today's pic is still not perfect, but the architectural circumstances were set... ;)

cu, trshptr

1706 - comfortable ambience

setup: sony nex 7 with sigma 30 f2.8 ex dn | 30mm | f2.8 | ISO1600 | 1/60 | lightroom 4.1

if you sleep until noon you won't have a lot of time in lightness.

but on some days i don't want to worry about that. especially on sundays it should be entirely sufficient if you handle to charge up your personal batteries. if you additionally manage to set another highlight you are the master of weekend management.

well, that wasn't too difficult yesterday. a look into the fixture schedule of the european football championship gave us an evidence about our evening plan - we watched the match against denmark in the nice ambiance of the gehrenberg theatre in markdorf.

cu, trshptr

1506 - 9645km remembrance

setup: sony nex 7 with sigma 30 f2.8 ex dn | 30mm | f2.8 | ISO320 | 1/60 | lightroom 4.1

yesterday i received the message that i will get my nex7 back on friday. today is the day, a compact parcel caused huge zest. the show can go on.

as a side note today i also received the response to my service request from sony, as late as today... fortunately i've cared for a repair shop by myself.

after my exhausting one-week business trip i've used the afternoon to take an extensive rest in our courtyard and furthermore for a long running. then in the evening we visited the opening of the photo exhibition "9645km remembrance" of helena schätzle, who has followed the trails of her grandfather for the war-time and postwar. the second world war is of course an often discussed topic but helena schätzle looks back on and reappraises the era and links this issue to her personal family history simply wonderfully.

besides many impressive portraits of contemporary witnesses and landscape photos of the war scenes several quotes, interviews and a few mementos are exhibited. the old combat jacket is captioned by the quote

"i'm sitting in the barrack room with some fellows in dead silence. 

everybody's sad thoughts are in the homeland at the beloved ones."

today's pic isn't really good, but i desperately wanted to tell the story of somebody whose relatives were killed in war, so you can understand that persons are deeply moved only by words or images.

cu, trshptr

0406 - x-shaped

setup: sony nex 7 with sigma 30 f2.8 ex dn | 30mm | f5.6 | ISO800 | 1/60 | lightroom 4.1

i could just cry! today i own the nex 7 no more than for 14 days and the first big hw failure already occurred: the display detent in the tilt frame is broken. f***! more than 1000 bucks and the item is broken yet. now i have to keep struggling with the (maybe unqualified) first level support and waive several weeks without my nex. i could cry.

nevertheless the show must go on (as long as possible). as may be imagined today i didn't really fancy conceiving an innovative idea after these bad news although i had a pleasant evening with tina at the cinema watching snow white and the huntsman in the original english version. so i ended up with an architectural pattern image of a company building that is located in markdorf. tomorrow i'll be in a better mood again.

cu, trshptr

1605 - ray of hope

setup: canon eos 400d with efs 18-55mm | 18mm | f3.5 | ISO800 | 1/20 | lightroom 4

actually every week should have only 3 business days. because on thursday all the fathers - and the future ones - will paint the town red most of the employers allow a day off on friday: i really love the spring with its awful lot of feast and bridge days...

after a dinner at a new turkish restaurant in friedrichshafen we headed for the bar "lichtblick" in markdorf. its name has different english translations - f.e. it could mean blink or bright spot. if you look at the pic you can confirm that this translation could be appropriate for this location.

furthermore it could be called ray of hope or silver lining in english what in my opinion fits even better than the direct translation. the bar lichtblick is one of the rare rays of hope in the forlorn nightlife of the area around lake constance.

cu, trshptr

1005 - curved lines

setup: canon eos 400d with efs 18-55mm | 55mm | f8.0 | ISO100 | 1/250 | lightroom 4

currently we have foehn at the lake constance. today the temperature increased about eight to ten degrees, the humidity decreased and now the sky is full of cirrus clouds. i'm going to tell you more about the microclimate at the lake in the near future, i have the wish to combine this information with a great panorama of the alps with the lake in the foreground. unfortunately here at the lake constance we need very special conditions to have good visibility and one of the essential parameters is the foehn, of which more later.

nevertheless at prime weather i was seeking for a nice scenery for today's posting. the fruit farmers have already prepared their plantations for the protection against birds that perhaps consume the yield and possibly eventuating heavy thunderstorms that are also conditioned by the microclimate at the lake. for this reason they fixed meshes above their fruit trees to protect them against birds and hail. the meshes are not yet stretched but when the fruits finally grow or the forecast switches completely the farmers will be well-prepared.

cu, trshptr

0705 - downhill force

setup: canon eos 400d with efs 18-55mm | 18mm | f4.0 | ISO800 | 1/800 | lightroom 4

actually i'm a big fan of the uphill climb. that's why i own a hard tail mountain bike and a racing cycle. although i'm usually not frightened to go downhill, there are enough reasons for me to live without a full suspension bike.

besides the huge maintenance expenditure of the additional hinges, the irreversibility of the drive train, the higher injury risk while going downhill and higher acquisition costs the main purpose of my in the summer almost daily used bike was the clincher: i use it especially to get to work, to go on excursions with tina and to exercise my endurance. therefor you don't need no soft tail. that's enough of factual explanations.

after a usual working monday i had to supply my need for a little uphill tour. while i was sneaking uphill i thought about the loneliness and solitude that you can find in forests only on monday afternoons. everybody seems to have more important things to do than a walk through the trees. fortunately i had resisted the rationality and suddenly my life was enormously slowing down, if only for this brief moment.

only the downhill force awaked me from my daydream.

cu, trshptr

btw: no, the pic above was not shot with a go pro hero. 8) sadly the exposure time was set up a little bit too short to show the real speed of me and my bike of round about 30km/h. at least the fork is sharp.

0605 - cool down

setup: canon eos 400d with efs 18-55mm | 27mm | f4.0 | ISO200 | 1/125 | lightroom 4

after our weekend rituals like having a lie-in, a great breakfast and the soccer match at the afternoon tina and i went to a village fair in markdorf, called dixiefest. it is a yearly trade festival, all shops have opened till 6pm although the day of the event is always sunday.

we had a get-together with nice people, above all the coffee specialist who explained us everything about coffee roasting won our hearts. after the roasting process in the cylinder the beans have to cool down in the catch tank. at that the beans are stirred vigorously. it's too bad that pics don't smell.

cu, trshptr

2904 - green lungs

setup: canon eos 400d with efs 18-55mm | 18mm | f9.0 | ISO800 | 1/125 | aperture priority | raw files cropped, aligned and processed in lightroom 4

again at last the first night in my own bed after the return of two weeks of travel. once i had ended the first session of post-processing of the accrued pictures at 0130am and my subsequent sleep at 0900am i considered the next big bunch of pics that i had shot in sardinia. unfortunately i'm still not half-done. cheer up, the way is the goal. learning by doing, that's what it is all about.

at 0300pm tina took me out to an excursion to a keep-fit-trail in the middle of the forest of the hill gehrenberg. we really had a lot of fun while we were running through the course. 13 sporty stages had to be done.

the 14th one was called breath. always keep breathing.

cu, trshptr