Berlin Holocaust Memorial (2)
Another impression of the the Memorial to the murdered Jews in Europe.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max and Nikon Zf, edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version
Posts from the ‘Camera’ category
Holocaust Memorial Berlin
Last September I revisited Berlin after 46 years. One of the reasons to come back was to visit the Memorial to the murdered Jews in Europe. I had read stories and seen photos, and I wondered how I would take photo’s of it. And what it would be like to wonder through it. This visit I had my first experience with the monument. Here is the first impression (and the coming days I will publish some more).
Shot with Nikon Zf, edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Bahn Tower Potsdamer Platz Berlin
The Bahntower on the Potsdamer Platz, headoffice of the Deutsche Bahn.
Potsdamer Platz was the vivid heart of Berlin. During World War II, it was almost completely destroyed. Since 1961 Potsdamer Platz was a no man’s land, a death strip as part of the Berlin Wall. After the fall of Berlin Wall this was the biggest property developing area in a major city in Europe.
Shot with Nikon Zf, edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Berlin Brandenburger Gate (2)
Brandenburger Gate (Brandenburger Tor) is a symbol of unity for Berlin and Germany. Nowadays the Pariser Platz (Paris Square) is a pedestrian and bicycle area.
Shot with Nikon Zf, edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Both Sides Of History – Berlin Brandenburger Tor
Brandenburger Gate (Brandenburger Tor) in Berlin was an iconic point at the time of the Berlin Wall (Berliner Mauer). The gate then stood in no mans land, and showed the alienating effects of division through the city. Now the Brandenburger Gate is a symbol of unity of Berlin. It was a pleasure to walk through the gates, and enjoy the people and streets around it. And the see the gate back at its splendor.
About the B4 retouch series:
I browsed my archive for pictures to publish. Some of them are partly retouched but most do have scratches, dust and stains.
The monochrome set of 1989 was shot with Nikon F301 on Kodak TriX. The colorfilm was Fuji, and shot on Pentax Espio 115M. 2025 photos shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the pictures for a larger version.
Berlin Gendarmenmarkt
One of the beautiful squares in Berlin: the Gendarmenmarkt. On one side you find the Deutscher Dom a.k.a. Neue Kirche (German Cathedral), and opposite the Französischer Dom (French Cathedral). The top photo reflects the latter in the doors of the Deutscher Dom.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Gedächtnis Kirche Berlin
One of the memorial landmarks of Berlin is the Kaiser Wilhelm Gedächtnis Kirche. In its simplicity it is a powerful landmark and memorial.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Bundesrat Berlin
Walking through Berlin was sometimes causing some disorientation. Lots of places that were ‘void and empty’ in November 1989 are now (re)build. In 1989 I just saw a small part of former East Berlin. It was a challenge to figure out what I was looking at. An old building, a refurbished one or a new build? I have a slight preference for old buildings. Lots of them are beautifully restored. This is one of them: the Bundesrat in the former Prussian House of Lords. As seen from the Mall of Berlin.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Berlin’s Blue and Pink Pipelines
September 2025 I visited Berlin for the second time. My first visit was in November 1989. That coincided with the fall of the Berlin Wall. After 46 years I wanted to see how Berlin had changed since ‘die Wende’.
In 1989 we just spent one day in East Berlin. This visit the first day we looked around in the former East Berlin area. The television tower still towers over the city at Alexanderplatz. There is still a lot of construction activity, and along the roads you see pipes in blue and pink. First I thought that it was a smart concrete transport system. In reality it is a way to pump out groundwater from construction sites into the Spree river.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Berlin’s Transformation: German Humor?
September 2025 I visited Berlin for the second time. My first visit was in November 1989. That coincided with the fall of the Berlin Wall. After 46 years I wanted to see how Berlin had changed since ‘die Wende’. The coming days I will publish some photos of this trip.
Friends had ‘warned’ me about the changes I would see. What in 1989 was a vast open space (e.g. the Potzdamer Platz) is now completely filled with modern architecture. But what struck me the most was the vibrant vitality the city breathes now. It is cosmopolitan and a magnet.
One of the landmark squares of Berlin is Alexanderplatz. On a building just a few hunder meters away I saw this text ‘Allesandersplatz’. Everything is different square? German humor? Or the basic conclusion after the first day. A lot changed. At face value.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Bird Under A Wire
A small bird in a big Amsterdam Central Station. The things you see while waiting for a train.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Petals
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version
Connected
On the platform waiting for a connection being connected by mobile phone.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Writing In The Sky
Sometimes the clouds turn into a abstract symbol.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Over the bridges
A more detailed view of the photo I published yesterday of Leiden. Leiden used to be famous for fabrics, and canals provided the infrastructure for the logistics. Some of the canals were filled up in the second half of the 20th century. However, there are debates about opening a few of them again. These discussions focus on sustainability and environmental quality.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
City of Rembrandt
A view on the city where Rembrandt van Rijn was born, Leiden. It was the home where he grew up. There he started his now famous career as a painter. Later, he moved to Amsterdam.
Lens-Artists Photo Challenge #366 is ‘City Mouse/Country Mouse’. I am not familiar with the story. But as the brief puts it ‘there is no place like home’. Home is where the heart is.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
After Rain
The Netherlands, Scheveningen – September 2025
After rain comes sun at Scheveningen beach.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Rainy Beach
A spell of heavy rain, on the border of Summer and Autumn at Scheveningen beach.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Old Front
Detail from a front in the Breestraat in Leiden. In den vergulden Turk used to be a restaurant. It moved decades ago to a different spot in town. It then changed its name to Wienerwald. The top of the original front is still there, and recently brought back to its old splendor.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
On The Corner
A detail of a front in the Breestraat in Leiden with the tower of the townhall.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Red Yellow
Red and yellow fronts of houses in the Breestraat in Leiden.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Sunny Street: Breestraat Leiden
The Breestraat in Leiden with the townhall.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Agapanthus
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Pas de Calais
Lens-Artist’s Photo Challenge #365 is ‘longing’. This landscape is so appealing, I still feel the excitement I felt when I shot this sequence.
shot with Nikon D70, edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Blue Hydrangea
Shot with Nikon Zf, edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Outstanding
In the front garden, next to the Japanese Anemone, there is a Knautia Arvensis. It is more easily known as Field Scabiosa.
Shot with Nikon Zf, edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Star
In the front garden, next to the Japanese Anemone, there is a Knautia Arvensis. It is more easily known as Field Scabiosa. It is literally a star.
Shot with Nikon Zf, edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Japanese Anemone
To close the series of the Japanese Anemone, a last one in color.
Shot with Nikon Zf, edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Monochrome Moods
I like monochrome photography for many reasons. One of them is the ability to play with the mood in the photo. Just by adjusting the aperture time or the opening of the lens, the same light delivers a different mood. This one and the photo I published yesterday, were shot on the same day.
Lens- Artist Challenge #364 is ‘Quiet Moment’. Close ups of natural beauty are a wonderful instrument to just be quiet, enjoying the view. And to realize all is connected.
Shot with Nikon Zf, edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Delicate
Lens- Artist Challenge #364 is ‘Quiet Moment’. Close ups of natural beauty are a wonderful instrument to just be quiet, enjoying the view. And to realize all is connected.
Shot with Nikon Zf, edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Outside
Lens- Artist Challenge #364 is ‘Quiet Moment’. A bicycle ride to clear the head. Seeing the bulbs for Spring being planted.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Growing Up
The aim is to get up into the light and find your place among the rest of the garden.
Shot with Nikon Zf, edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Japanese Anemone
The Japanese Anemone in the front garden at close look.
Shot with Nikon Zf, edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
In Hindsight
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version
Final Approach
Incoming flights can be annoying, on the other hand they offer a dynamic photo subject!
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version
Polder
Meet the edge of the polder, the dyke.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version
Levels Day
During the Summer we see much more incoming traffic to Schiphol Amsterdam. Quite annoying actually, every minute a plane coming in. During day time they approach just over 600 meters, but in the evening they fly in from 1000 meters. When the wind turns West again in Autumn it will be over. However, who enjoys sitting in his garden in Autumn rain?
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version
Morning Rain
The morning sun reflecting the drops of rain that the night left behind.
Shot with Nikon Zf, edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Catch if you can
A long dry Summer with a garden begging for rain.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version
On Water
On a warm Summer’s day, there are traffic jams on the canal.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta Click the picture for a larger version.
Cley Windmill
This is the famous Cley windmill at Cley next the sea. It’s by far the best name for a coastal village. Interestingly, it actually does not have a sea front. The mill was owned by the family of James Blunt.
Shot with Nikon Zf, edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Hovering
A plant in the front garden offers months of beauty in the sunlight of the morning sun. Using the portrait mode of the iPhone results in ‘hovering’ effects of parts of the plant that seem now unattached.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version
Front Garden Beauty
A plant in the front garden offers months of beauty in the sunlight of the morning sun.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Hosta
The Netherlands, Lisse – August 2025
The garden of castle De Keukenhof.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta Click the picture for a larger version
Field of Dahlia 2
The Netherlands, Voorhout – August 2025
In Spring this field produces either hyacinths, daffodils or tulips. In Summer this year it produces Dahlia.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Castle Gardens
The garden of castle De Keukenhof.
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Keukenhof Castle’s Garden
The Netherlands, Lisse – August 2025
In Summer the garden of castle De Keukenhof is filled with beautiful Dahlia’s.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta Click the picture for a larger version
(The) Doors Revisited
This week’s Lens-Artists Photo Challenge #361 is ‘Doors revisited’. That theme was also the brief for LAPC #20. A door is a pass way to another space behind it. That space can be something we know already. Or something we like to imagine to see there when we go through. And in books you can end up in another world. In this post a few doors I met in my life. One I used for a long time, most I just passed by or passed through on holidays.
The word ‘doors’ for me is also linked to the band The Doors. The name of the band came from a book by Aldous Huxley, The doors of perception. And Huxley took it from William Blake, who used it as a metaphor:
“If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, Infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro’ narrow chinks of his cavern . Doors lead you to another side or space, break on through to the other side.”
‘Break on through to the other side’ became the title of a Doors’ song.
So a lot can be said about doors. Luckily, we still have the photos. Here are a few from my conscious memory.
This is the front door to the house I was born and lived in for 25 years. The photo is shot on Ilford XP with a Pentax K1000.
This door in Caylus is ready to be knocked. Shot on Nikon D70.
I looked through my archive. It struck me that lots of the doors I saw there are doors of small or bigger churches. This one is on Karpathos. Shot on Nikon D70.
Another church door on Karpathos, shot on Kodak TriX with Nikon F90.
A chapel door in Lesbos, also shot on Nikon D70.
Field of Dahlia
In Spring this field produces either hyacinths, daffodils or tulips. In Summer this year it produces Dahlia.
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
Night Fall
Shot with iPhone 15 Pro Max edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.
What's (in) the Picture? 