A beautiful summer day in the greenest nature this country can produce. I followed a well-known path along the creek called Pøle Å, but this time I continued beyond the point where I usually turn around. I really had no idea what I would come across. My astonishment was great when, after another few minutes of bike riding, I came across the most beautiful section of the creek I’d ever seen. Green leaves from the shore reflected so sharply in the water, you could hardly tell where the leaves ended and the reflections started. More green foliage from overhanging branches completed this wonderful, extremely photogenic location.
After shooting the first two images (and several more), I continued a few hundred meters down the path along the creek to where it flowed under a small bridge. I set up my tripod on the bridge, put on the 300 mm lens, captured the third image, which I think turned out nicely.
The last image was a panorama taken back at the first spot, but in the opposite direction as I was heading home.
I will most certainly visit this place again, not least in the fall when the leaves turn orange and yellow.
A long walk in the forest that started with me taking shelter under a tree to keep myself and my camera dry from a rain shower. After that, I spent most of my time in a pine forest, which I absolutely love. Unlike a lot of other forest, pine forest is usually very clean looking without the chaos that other types of forest often present. Pine forest is straight lines and mossy, uncluttered floor.
The second image was taken as I was leaving the pine forest. There was just something about that wall of trees, where the pine forest changed into deciduous forest, that kept me there for a long time experimenting with various settings. That included the third picture, where for the first time I played around with moving the camera during a long exposure to make it blurry. That seems to be a whole discipline within forest photography. I think the exposure should have been longer than the five seconds I used to make it really great, but I was reasonably happy with it for a first attempt.
Last but not least, an image from a spot in that forest that I cannot walk past without shooting pictures. It's like, within a 30x30 meter area there are 3-4 stellar compositions that are all quite different. I posted another image from that location a while ago shot in the opposite direction.
I drive by this area every day on my way to work (yes, there is a big highway five meters behind the photographer) and have recently noticed that the herd of cows roaming around has grown. So on this evening I specifically went out to see if I could capture some cow pictures. Now, you can't be sure that you will see them. It's a big area, and the cows are often way out of sight. But I was lucky. The cows were out and about, grazing and drinking water. Thanks to my 70-300 mm lens and some beautiful golden light, I caught some really nice images, I think.
A fairly short walk experimenting with my 70-300 mm lens within a forest, which can be difficult with so much getting in the way. In the first image I had a clear view of maybe 100 meters and used it to create this image. It was made stacking three individual pictures to make it sharp front to back. I had to hurry as it was pretty windy and the sunlight between the trees kept coming and going.
The second image is just an example of the nice bokeh effect that I can achieve with the 70-300 mm. Nothing spectacular. And last, a fence that I have shot many times before, but never quite as succesfully. For some reason, fence images often turn out better when you use a long zoom.
My first visit to the nearby nature area/abandoned farm since discovering that they are turning it into a new residential area. Fortunately, the builders had not made as much progress as I had feared, and there is still plenty of open land left, so untouched that the weeds are as tall as small trees. It was difficult to walk through, it was quite windy, and the sun was still high in the sky, so conditions for photography were not great. I was afraid I wouldn't come home with anything worth keeping, but I'm actually quite pleased with these three images. In the last two, I tried to experiment with some pretty tight crops. It goes against my nature, but I think they turned out well.
Friday offered a welcome change from my several recent trips into the forest. My workplace had decided to spend an afternoon touring the local Fredensborg Castle and its surrounding garden. For security reasons we were not allowed to photograph inside the castle, because the Queen actually uses it during much of the year. Same goes for the part of the garden that we visited, but here there was no photo ban. So that actually was a great opportunity for some pretty unique images.
Unfortunately, I had not brought my own camera, but it didn't matter too much. Instead I used my workplace's camera, a Lumix G80 that is more than adequate. The only problem was that I don't know it as well as my own camera, so I shot on auto mode for most of the time. Still, the result was very pleasing. The two first images are from the private garden, which is open to the public only in July, and the last one is from the royal orangery.... a beautiful and unique building in itself.
The other night I got on my bike and rode deep into the forest to do some shooting at an enclosure named Ulvedalen. Ulvedalen translates to Wolf Valley, which sounds dramatic, but there really are no wolves. I don't know if there ever were. In return, there are foxes... or rather, their gloves. Foxgloves. The most magical clearings full of purple and white foxgloves. This was absolutely delightful for a photographer. I unfolded my tripod and got to work, thinking these images would be stellar.
They were not.
This is what one of the better images looked like straight out of the camera:
Now, there's nothing unusual about a RAW image looking less than amazing without at least a few enhancements, but this? What a horrendous mess! Looks like someone sprayed youghurt on the camera lens.
I was not pleased and almost marked it "Rejected". This was nothing like I remembered the scene. Where was the magic that I had felt when I was standing there? The whole scene had been so spellbinding that even the risk of having to ride my bike home through a pitch dark, unknown forest hadn't been enough for me to quit shooting. And now it looked like it had all been for nothing. Not even my usual arsenal of post-processing tricks did anything to improve things. I needed to completely rethink my editing in order to save this disaster.
Well, the first thing the image needed was a good cropping. The center of the image actually hid a pretty good composition, with the curved leading line of foxgloves disappearing into the background. In return, all the dead branches that, on the scene, I'd thought constituted a wonderful foreground had to go. Not so with the tree stub on the right and the thick branches coming out of the ground like some creepy forest monster. Those work really well as a contrast to the pretty flowers.
Thinking back on the scene, I remembered it as being much darker and with the foxgloves drawing all the attention like little, colorful lanterns. That's what I needed to recreate. The background behind the trees, in particular, needed to be all but eliminated with some serious darkening. In fact, everything in between the foxgloves needed to be darker and much more contrasty to the bright foxgloves. Plenty of Orton effect in Luminar and darkening brushes in Lightroom were among the tools I used to ensure that. The foxgloves themselves, which I remembered as being very purple and beautiful, and not the rather pale shade of the RAW image, also needed lots of work. I not only saturated them, but also brightened them - to make them seem almost glowing - with a tool I hadn't used much before: Color Efex Pro, which is part of the old Nik tools collection.
Finally, in order to make the image less messy, I had to remove several stray foxgloves here and there. Same thing with a few branches that were working against the general front-to-back direction of the image. This is the final result:
Phew... it's been a long time since I worked this hard on one image, but I really wanted a reminder of that beautiful evening. And I think I managed that quite well. It's quickly becoming one of my favorite shots of the month of June. For me it's a great example of the difference between what the camera sees and records and what your brain remembers.
The above image may not be how it actually looked and what was captured by the camera lens, but, by God, it is much closer to what I felt while standing there. And to me, that counts above everything else. So let this also be an illustration of 1) how I do not have any ethics when it comes to how much you are "allowed" to change an image in order to make it look the way you want it to - none.- and 2) apparently I do not have the photographic skills to make an image look right coming out of the camera. I rely a lot on my post-processing skills.
Do I have a problem with that? No. Does that make me less of an artist? Some would say yes. I choose to say no. (Not that I necessarily am one to begin with, but that's another discussion.)
A not very ambitious Tuesday afternoon bicycle ride to Gribskov produced a few images that I was quite happy with. Mostly due to the nature of the light, which came through the fast-moving clouds in short cascades that meant you had to be quick on the release while it lasted.
The last of the three images is an example of my recent experiments with over-exposing my otherwise fairly standard forest images. I must admit I like it even though I would normally rather under-expose than over-expose. It can serve as a way to purify the background and make the subjects of the image stand out more.
A return to the location of my ill-fated trip in May. This place had so much potential that I had to see it in better light, so I straddled my bicycle after dinner and rode deep into the forest on this beautiful summer evening. Not only was the dull light replaced with beautiful golden hour sunshine, the free-roaming cows I had met last time had been replaced with free-roaming horses. Another highlight was the blooming foxgloves growing between the pine trees. But they were difficult to capture. The image included at the bottom didn't come easy.
Now we're talking! St. Hans' Eve... the Danish mid-summer celebration. After a wonderful dinner at a restaurant, my wife and I walked to the castle to watch the traditional bonfire, but they had started it so early that we all but missed it. Instead, we set out on a walk around the castle lake, taking in the magical mid-summer atmosphere that you can only find in Scandinavia. Once in a while I stopped to take images like the ones below, which rank among my very best photos of Frederiksborg Castle. I love them so much! And there were more almost as good as these.
Part of it may come from finally reading a little bit of theory about "correct exposure" in my new book "Understanding Exposure", which I believe is required reading for photographers. Well, I haven't read it until now, and it already made me make some adjustments in how I shoot. If the below images are an indication, it has paid off.
An evening walk during sunset. I set out specifically to shoot the below image of where the creek Pøleå goes under a road. I took a similar image in the spring and thought I could do better this time of year. I'm sort of pleased with it, but I think the one I took in the spring was better. The grass in the foreground bothers me, and there's too much dirt (plants) in the water to make a good reflection. Still, I like how it's bathed in sunlight.
I then moved on to Strødam and caught an amazing sunset. I had a blast and shot tons of images, but in the end, they didn't quite live up to my expectations. I'm happy with the ones I included here, and a few others, but I had hoped for some really great swan pictures as the swan couples and cygnets were out in force. But I must admit that my new 70-300 mm Sony lens doesn't quite cut it in low light with moving objects. I did shoot some really nice panoramas with it, as the third image proves. This was also not least thanks to my new L-bracket. I must join the choir of people who will tell you that L-brackets are absolutely necessary for panoramas.
A couple of cell phone pictures taken during a short excursion with my work team. The first one from the beautiful park at the famous art museum Nivaagaard. This was shot around noon. Imagine this during golden or blue hour. I must return! The second one was a nearby field. I loved it, especially the little red flowers that stuck up here and there, but even without those, there was still something about this field that intrigued me.
