Dikkie.net

blue & beautiful

Dikkie — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 20:57:47 +0000

The eyes of my girlfriend. I love them (and her) so much.

I took this portrait on our trip in Prague, somewhere on a terrace. I used my 100mm macro for it, which is actually a great lens for taking portraits.

I did the PP of this shot entirely in Lightroom and decided to really go all the way with it using lots of local adjustments (which I don’t do that much because I want to keep portraits as natural as possible). I first removed all the blemishes on the skin with the spot removal tool. Then I started with the eyes: I lifted the exposure and the saturation. Under the eyes, there was some blue shade which removed by lifting the exposure and desaturating a little bit. I added a little extra red on the lips. Finally, I softened the skin a little bit by lowering the clarity. Here is a before/after screenshot from lightroom. Let me know what you think!

jet

Dikkie — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 22:27:15 +0000

Shot this jet/plane during a small exhibition a couple of weeks ago at the Antwerp Airport. Public was allowed so close to this jet, my 17mm wasn’t almost enough to get the entire plane in the frame. Shot it with the camera all the way down to the ground without being able to look through the viewfinder. After a couple of times trying aiming, this composition came out, sort of what I had in mind. PP-wise this shot has seen a single frame HDR tonemapping in Photomatix together with a serious desaturation. Original image can be found here.

Prague’s Old Jewish Cemetry

Dikkie — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 21:47:01 +0000

In the Jewish quarter in Prague, there is the Old Jewish Cemetery. It is an impressive graveyard that was in use from the 15th century until 1787. It consists of many layers of tombs and rises up to 11 meters above street level. There are about 12.000 visible tomb stones and more or less 100.000 graves on this site. This place makes you silent…

The Star of David at the entrance:

An overview:

A tombstone with Hebrew inscriptions:

A lot of stones just lean against each other:

A Jew praying:

A small pebble on a tomb stone (some were packed with pebbles):

More impressions:

Old fashioned trams in Prague

Dikkie — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 19:32:48 +0000

After the metro and the bus, the third type of public transport in Prague is the tram. And they still have these old fashioned models over there. You can find plenty of red old trams in Prague and boy are they photogenic. And they invite for post-processing an old fashioned look.

Peep!

Dikkie — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 21:35:40 +0000

“I’m a cute peacock living in a Prague in a park I forgot the name of.”

“And I got a small boy as well.”

red station

Dikkie — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 22:22:54 +0000

The last ones, I promise

benches in the station

Dikkie — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 11:43:45 +0000

waiting

Dikkie — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 21:29:56 +0000

… or caught up in a reverie? Who knows…

red stripe

Dikkie — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 22:22:40 +0000

In the new part of the renovated Antwerp Central Station (all the way in the back), there is big red platform (sort of, don’t know the name of an inside “bridge”) in the grey concrete mass. Had some fun there with my lensbaby muse. I’m getting used to this little thing now and its extreme soft look. It’s great to make abstract photos.

big hug

Dikkie — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 22:13:54 +0000

Shot with the Lensbaby Muse in Antwerp central station.