Amersfoort 2008
Een stadsbezoek aan Amersfoort? Waarom Amersfoort? Ik zou Amersfoort nooit zelf uitgekozen hebben, kende het alleen van het station. Het idee kwam dan ook van een vriend van mij.Achteraf moet ik zeggen, wat is Amersfoort mooi. Het heeft een prachtig oud stuk, met mooie oude steegjes, een winkelcentrum voor de shoppers onder u en grachten waarover je een rondvaart kunt maken. Wat we dan ook gedaan hebben.De cultuur stond even op een laag pitje, want het Armando museum was net afgebrand en bij een ander museumgebouw was men bezig asbest te verwijderen. Van het Mondriaanhuis was ik niet echt onder de indruk. Ons bezoek aan Amersfoort bestond dus uit een wandeling en een rondvaart. Het weer werkte perfect mee zoals te zien is op de foto's. Amersfoort is een stad gebleken om zeker nog eens te bezoeken. Wat kan Nederland toch onverwacht mooi zijn.

A new camera
I've been thinking about buying a new camera for ages now. So far I've been working with a compact camera and the pictures on this blog all have been taken with a Nikon Coolpix 4500. Yes, that's an oldie, five years I'm guessing. I've been reading a lot about compacts lately but haven't been able to find one that suited all of my wishes.Every one of them had one or more flaws, and every one of them had that small sensor responsible for noisy pictures (save for the Sigma DP1, but that one has a fixed focus lens). So, as you may have figured I just could not decide what to do. I had focussed myself totally on the compacts because....yes because they are compact, which for me is a big plus. Anyway, I started thinking about a DSLR when I couldn't find a suitable compact. It had to be a compact and light camera. And I found one - the Olympus E 410. It is the lightest DSLR you can find at the moment, has lots of features, live view and a number of other options I still have to find out about. Also, the kit version was going for a very decent price. So, now the learning curve for using a DSLR is starting. Hopefully I will be as pleased with this camera as I was with the Nikon Coolpix.The macro image of the "Maid of the Mist" (printed on a wooden box, you can even see wood shining through) was made with the Nikon, hope you'll like it.

Kurhaus
The Kurhaus is a beauty of a building. If I'm not mistaken it's more than a century old. Nowadays it's a luxury hotel and you can probably imagine why. The quote "A room with a view" is very appropriate in this case. The picture you see here has the appearance of an old postcard - it's the photoframe that does it. Enjoy.

The Hague

I’ve just been to the Hague for a couple of days. My brother and sister-in-law from Canada were visiting, so it seemed like a good idea to do something silly, something out of the ordinary. Like visiting The Hague and Scheveningen. Scheveningen, which is part of the Hague is situated on the coast. So it has lots of beaches and a pier. Very nice. We did all the stuff tourists do when they have nothing else to do and are in the Hague: did the town , went for walks, visited museums and so on. The weather was beautiful, though still a little cool. But hey we didn’t complain. Spring was definitely in the air. A visit to this town is highly recommended with its art, beautiful architecture, government buildings and beaches. In this picture you're seeing the Mauritshuis and part of the skyline of the Hague.

Limburg revisited
Another snowy image. I tried to photograph as many trees as possible, it made for a nice composition I think.

Limburg

Two weeks ago, Easterweekend, I visited Limburg, the southernmost province of Holland. Very close to the Belgian border. It's beautiful, rolling country. It's the most hilly part of Holland, the rest of our country is basically flat, flat and flat. Most unusual for the time of the year we had snow, which totally changed the atmosphere of the land. It looked like we were in a foreign country, very strange. We made a couple of long walks and I took a lot of pictures. A few of which turned out OK. The river in the picture is the river Gulp. It bordered our back garden.

Paint Shop Pro
One of my alltime favorite programs. I really love to play with it and never know in advance what the result will be. Sometimes I like it, sometimes I don't. For the image you see here I used a photograph I took last year in Tuscany. It's one of those quaint little villages of which there are still quite a number. The atmosphere totally changed by what I did to it. I kinda liked the outcome, hope you do too.

Bill Gates

Gates is the ultimate programming machine. He believes everything can be defined, examined, reduced to essentials, and rearranged into a logical sequence that will achieve a particular goal. (Stewart Alsop)

Just in terms of allocation of time resources, religion is not very efficient. There's a lot more I could be doing on a Sunday morning.(and this is by Bill Gates himself)

Henri Matisse
What I dream of is an art of balance, of purity and serenity devoid of troubling or depressing subject matter - a soothing, calming influence on the mind, rather like a good armchair which provides relaxation from physical fatigue.

Evolution
Creationists make it sound as though a 'theory' is something you dreamt up after being drunk all night. (Isaac Asimov)

Orchids
Orchids are beautiful in real life. They come in all sorts and colors and kinds as you may know. This one I took at my dad's place. He always does a good job keeping them alive. And seeing to it that they start bloomimg again. Here's the result.

Winter 2007
On dec 21st we had our first experience of winter. It had been snowing ever so little during the night and a little bit of frost did the rest. Trees overnight changed their appearance and for photographers and nature lovers it was pure bliss. The trick is trying to catch what you see in a photograph. Hardly ever I succeed in doing that, but I just keep on trying. Here you see one of my efforts. It's made with a Nikon Coolpix 4500. The shot was taken straight upward to the tops of the trees, hope you'll like it.

Texel

The first weekend of November we visited the Isle of Texel again. Our usual family weekend. There's always quite a lot of us there, which makes it a lot of fun. Walks on the beach and in the dunes, shopping, in general seeing Texel again. The weather was good, the company was good and the weekend was a great success. Also made a couple of photo's (I always do). This is a nice one I made on a walk through the dunes close to the Slufter (for you people who are familiar with the island).

Fall (2)

Nothing much to say today. No philosophical thoughts, empty. Took the picture yesterday during a walk. Rain and beautiful skies. The sun was shining through the branches which gave it the silvery color.

Fall
Fall is really setting in now. Colors are changing fast. It's always a gorgeous time. Our garden is showing off too and every year I make the same kind of photographs. And everytime I throw away most of it. It's so hard capturing how it really is. For instance, the colors aren't what they should be, or some details turn out to be wrong. But every year I shoot a couple of pictures I like. And this is how they can look like, the only thing I did on the computer was I slightly enhanced the contrast. Hope you like it.

Reading glasses
These are the reading glasses of Margot. She'd put them down for awhile and all of a sudden I saw the opportunities they offered (photographically speaking). It was the combination of the red colored glasses, and the red lettering of the paper, which appealed to me. So I took a couple of (macro) shots and combined two of them into this image.

Trees are beautiful
I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree,
And climb black branches up a snow-white trunk
Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more,
But dipped its top and set me down again.
That would be good both going and coming back.
One could do worse than be a swinger of birches.
(Robert Frost)

Experimenting
Have been experimenting again. What you see is a photograph of the beach in Italy. To be precise Tuscany, where we vacationed.I'm not sure what I did with this photo. I did use a solarizing filter among others. Anyway, I think I like the end result myself. Just let me know what you all think.

Summer
Summer is drawing to an end. Fall with its storms and rains is nearing inescapably. September is a "transition" month. I read a quote about what summer represents by someone whose name I forgot. It goes like this:

“What a beautiful, sunny morning. It makes you happy to be alive, doesn't it? We can't let the sun outshine us! We have to beam, too!”

Think about it for a moment: ‘We have to beam, and outshine the sun’. It's a philosophical thought. I think it would be a good idea to beam as much as possible, and not just in the summer, to be a shining sun in the cold winter. Figuratively speaking of course. As long as you beam, you’ll light and warm other people. In return you will be warmed by other people too. That’s the way it works. Now I realize this is all easy said, but harder done. I will try anyway, as best as I can. Life’s too short not to try. It could make the world a happier place.

Digital alteration
You probably recognize the photograph. I'm not sure what I did to it, but I like the end result. Hope you'll like it too.