Reading list

The week really went by crazy quick. We are again at a Friday, so what book I got through this week?

Fist I finally got though Ready player one by Ernest Cline. Now I can watch the movie :). But, honestly, it was not as great as I hoped. I still liked it, but even though I love the 80s music, movies and even some games, the constant references to random 80s stuff was a bit much. Still, worth the read.

From non-fiction, I listened to Pandora’s Lab by Paul A. Offit. It’s a collection of 7 historical stories where science went wrong, or better said, where it was used in a wrong way. If you like history and science stuff, as I do, this is a book for you. It actually reminded me a bit of Bad Science by Ben Goldacre, which I read a while ago. But that one is even more disturbing.

I have not yet decided what I listen to next. Maybe I go with Parallel Worlds by Michio Kaku or Zero World by Jason M. Hough. Will see.

What are you reading this week?

Early spring day in Hoorn

I visited Hoorn in Netherlands only once. Hoorn is a smaller town in the north of Nehterlands, about 35km from Amsterdam. It was just for a short day, and the weather was not the best. But I still tried to get a nice photo. As I could not stay there for the evening, I tried this, right before the sunset.

This is a two shot vertorama, combined in Lightroom, finished in Photoshop.

DxO releases Nik Collectoin 2018

I have been using Nik Collection plugins (especially Color Efex) for years now. And when they sold the company to Google, it was quite the disappointment. Google does not make software for professionals, and as I feared, they never once updated the collection at all (since 2012).

So it was quite a positive surprise when DxO bought the Nik Collection from Google. And they also promised to start updating it again. And that day came yesterday.

So DxO just release the Nik Collection 2018. And of course I tried the demo right away to see whats new. And to tell how it is, nothing. This is only a support update, so the collection now officially supports the latest versions of Adobe software. That’s it.

So should you get it? Depends. Do you want to show support that they know they should update? Get it. Do you want to buy a version for cheaper introductory price before they update? Get it. Do you already have Nik Collection installed? Wait until they show something new.

That’s what I’m doing. The old version still works for me, and the moment DxO shows something new and better in their version, I’m buying it immediately.

Btw. be warned. If you have the old Google Nik Collection installed, and try the demo of the new DxO versions, it will overwrite the one you already have. Like this you will loose your license, and will get a trial window each time you open a plugin. Happened to me yesterday, but luckily I kept the old installation files on hand, and I could return to what I had before.

It’s really great to see that DxO is keeping to their word and started updating the Nik Collection plugins, I just think they would have done bit better if they waited a bit, and release and update only when there was something new to show. Still, there is hope it will happen, so let’s see where they going with this.

The tallest building in the world

It’s just crazy how the Burj Khalifa is tall compared to everything else. Of course it’s the tallest building in the worlds, but still. And if you think about it, that even the buildings around it are skyscrapers, it’s even taller. I’m quite curious about the new one they are building, that should be even taller. Dubai looks like a city from a sci-fi movie more and more every day :)

For this photo I used the tilt shift lens, where I shifted it up vertically. Like this I got no perspective distortion here, and I got the whole tower in the shot. This is a single exposure, edited in Lightroom and Photoshop.

Keukenhof

If you read my Top photography spots in Amsterdam list, I mention Keukenhof there. It is a park next to Amsterdam, that is just full of tulips. It’s just so beautiful. And since it’s also quite big, even with many people there, you can still get nice photos.

But there is one catch. The park is only opened during the tulip season, and that is already over. The park wont be opened again for around 10 months. So if you want to visit, go to Amsterdam between 21 March ndd 19 May 2019 and check keukenhof.nl for updates.

Few more tulips from Keukenhof

But for those who missed it this year, here are few photos I took over my multiple visits there :).

I quite like to share photos like these, as there are quite different from the normal photos I upload. You catch just so many color in one spot there.

All these shots are single exposures, edited mostly in Lightroom.

Top photography spots – Wachau Valley

I have added a new Top photography spots page to the blog today. This time it’s not for a town or a city, but for an area. To be exact, it’s for the Wachau Valley in Austria. This is a beautiful area with castle ruins, vineyards and small towns country around the Danube. And you can get here by can in about 1 hour from Vienna.

As always, I not only mention the spots, but you also get example photo from the locations together with the GPS coordinates and links directly to google maps.

You can check out the new list here: Top photography spots – Wachau Valley.

Sparkling lights on the Eiffel tower

For today I chosen one a bit older photo for you. This one I took around three years ago (in 2015), while in Paris. And I actually did a lot of photos that evening, that did not work out at all. The Eiffel tower as it is already creates a lot of glow around it. And when the sparkling lights are on, it even worse. And that day, there was so much moisture in the air, that my lens kept on fogging over.

You can check out the image I added to the side here, to see as most of my photos form that evening looked like :)

This is a blend of two exposures, edited in Lightroom, blended in Photoshop.

Clever Instagram spam

While spam everywhere is crazy annoying, in a certain way one has to admire how clever it sometime is. Someone had to code a nice text generator, that not only creates the usernames, but also the messages so they don’t look like spam.

But on the other side, that person was stupid enough, to not make very simple mistakes. Like not sending the same message from multiple accounts to the same target. How can someone be so smart and stupid at a same time is a mystery.

Btw. when did social media got to be only about getting followers? Each day I get followed by many accounts, that just un-follow the next day. I don’t know how it is for others, but I rather be followed by 500 people that like my photos, than 5000 that don’t care.

This stile of trying to get followers just by following someone, hoping they follow back and then un-following again is just annoying. If you really so desperate for worthless followers, just pay for them. Will take less time and has the same effect in the end.

Down by the river

I have not posted a photo from Bratislava in a while so here is one. This is an early spring panorama, taken in the middle of the city, right next to the Danube. I got down completely next to the water and got it.

This is a two shot panorama, combined in Lightroom, finished in Photoshop.

And here are few details: