What's (in) the Picture?

Chris Breebaart Photography – finding stories

Posts tagged ‘Nikon D70’

Elgin Marbles

England, London – September 2004

These sculpture (nicknamed The Elgin Marbles) are originally from the Parthenon in Athens. Lord Elgin supposedly bought them from the Ottomans, who occupied the present Greece at that moment. The Greek try to return these marbles for decades, the UK government refuses, saying it’s British heritage. Last week a meeting of the UK prime minister with the prime minister of Greece was cancelled, after the Greek PM reiterated the ownership of the marbles. How mesmerizing and wonderful must it be to see these ornaments in the place they belong, on top of the Acropolis over Athens.

The lens artists photo challenge #278 is ‘unique’.

shot with Nikon D70, edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.

Stonehenge Digital

England, Stonehenge – August 2006

This week LAPC #254 is ‘spiritual places’. In August 2006 I was lucky to visit the inside of Stonehenge at sunrise. It was rather cloudy but it was a beautiful experience to be within the circles of stone, without crowds of people around.

Shot with Nikon D70, edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version.

Hill of Tara and Stone of Scone and Coronation Chair

Ireland, Hill of Tara – October 2008

The Hill of Tara was the location for the inauguration of the High Kings of Ireland. The candidate should lay his hand on the stone, and if earth roared in acceptance, the candidate should be King. The present stone is not the original one. The original Lia Fáil (Irish for “stone of destiny”) used at Tara for inaugurating the High Kings of Ireland, was taken by the King of Scotland and move to Scone. In 1296, during the First Scottish War of Independence, King Edward I of England took the stone as spoils of war and removed it to Westminster Abbey, where it was fitted into a wooden chair – known as the Coronation Chair or King Edward’s Chair – on which most subsequent English and then British sovereigns have been crowned. For the full story I refer to Wikipedia’s Stone of Scone.

shot with Nikon D70, edited using Snapseed and Marksta. Click the picture for a larger version

Strandhill 2008 (available light)

Ireland, Strandhill – October 2008

This weeks challenge #186 is ‘Low Light’. Using the available light is primarily a question of creativity and secondarily the available technology. The advice when using a Kodak Instamatic (a very old point and shoot film camera in the 1970’s) was to keep the sun in the back. My advice is not to do that. When using film it was a calculated guess (the result came after developing of the film). Nowadays in digital times the result is immediately available on your camera, hence a source of more playing around and tweaking. Playing with light is playing with the source of light. This photo of Strandhill was taken on a ‘normal’ sunny day. The angle used makes it much more dramatic. This photo ‘See Sea’ gives an idea of the light as it was that day. The fog and dark sky added to the atmosphere (in the Archive Ireland you can find two more photo’s of this perspective taken at the same moment).

Strandhill in Sligo is a small town, looking out over the Atlantic Ocean to the West. Rising over it is Knocknarea with Queen Maeve.

shot with Nikon D70, edited using Snapseed and Marksta.  Click the picture for a larger version.

Red Stone Window

France, Caussade – September 2006

The weekly LAPC (Lens Artists Photo Challenge) #183 is ‘memorable events’. One of the ‘themes’ I always look for is ‘windows’; all kinds of windows, showing different styles of houses, culture and local weather.

shot with Nikon D70, edited using Snapseed and Marksta.  Click the picture for a larger version

Rusty Window

France, Cordes-sur-Ciel – September 2006

The weekly LAPC (Lens Artists Photo Challenge) #183 is ‘memorable events’. One of the ‘themes’ I always look for is ‘windows’; all kinds of windows, showing different styles of houses, culture and local weather. This is Cordes sur Ciel in the south of France. As all photos on travel, they keep memories alive.

shot with Nikon D70, edited using Snapseed and Marksta.  Click the picture for a larger versio

Wall

Greece, Lesbos – July 2007

The weekly LAPC (Lens Artists Photo Challenge) #183 is ‘memorable events’. One of the ‘themes’ I always look for is ‘windows’; all kinds of windows, showing different styles of houses, culture and local weather.

shot with Nikon D70, edited using Snapseed and Marksta.  Click the picture for a larger version

Open Window

France, Cordes-sur-Ciel – September 2006

The weekly LAPC (Lens Artists Photo Challenge) #183 is ‘memorable events’. One of the ‘themes’ I always look for is ‘windows’; all kinds of windows, showing different styles of houses, culture and local weather. This is Cordes sur Ciel in the south of France. As all photos on travel, they keep memories alive.

shot with Nikon D70, edited using Snapseed and Marksta.  Click the picture for a larger version

Achilles and the tortoise

Greece, Lesbos – July 2007

The weekly LAPC (Lens Artists Photo Challenge) #182 is ‘interesting objects’. Zeno of Elea is famous for a set of paradoxes. One of them is the paradox of Achilles and the tortoise.

In the paradox of Achilles and the tortoise, Achilles is in a footrace with the tortoise. Achilles allows the tortoise a head start of 100 meters, for example. Suppose that each racer starts running at some constant speed, one faster than the other. After some finite time, Achilles will have run 100 meters, bringing him to the tortoise’s starting point. During this time, the tortoise has run a much shorter distance, say 2 meters. It will then take Achilles some further time to run that distance, by which time the tortoise will have advanced farther; and then more time still to reach this third point, while the tortoise moves ahead. Thus, whenever Achilles arrives somewhere the tortoise has been, he still has some distance to go before he can even reach the tortoise.

shot with Nikon D70, edited using Snapseed and Marksta.  Click the picture for a larger version

Pont de Normandie

France, Le Havre – September 2008

Pont de Normandie is a beautiful bridge over the river Seine between Le Havre and Honfleur. It towers over you as you approach it. The first time I passed it I was in admiration and also in awe.
This week’s Lens Artists Photo Challenge #181 is double dipping: send in a photo that is related to another creative challenge on WordPress. This photo is a response to the monthly Thursday special of Lost in Translation. A beautiful blog with great creative photography. Each month one can enter photo’s portraying words: in December 2021 Introspective, Anticipating, Befriending, Choices, Wish.
This photo describes anticipation and choices. If you choose to cross a bridge like this, what will it be like?

shot with Nikon D70, edited using Snapseed and Marksta.  Click the picture for a larger version

Mona Lisa, Mona Lisa

France, Paris – September2008

Mona Lisa is one of the most famous and genius works of art in the world. I was lucky to view it for the first time when the Louvre was not modernized. On a Monday morning in February 1984 me and a friend were the only persons in the room to admire her mysterious smile. In 2008 I saw her again from a distance, in a sea of pressing people, holding up phones and camera’s to get a glimpse of her. I have not been there since, but I can imagine what it must look like on a normal day before the pandemic. A wave of smartphones will be raised towards her, in a never ending stream of people on visiting times of the Louvre. Apparently 80% of the visitors of the Louvre come to see her.

I read in an article that at present people seek personal attention in combination with important objects and/or moments. A selfie is the instrument to gain that attention on Instagram or Twitter or Facebook or Tiktok. Mona Lisa/Lisa Gherardini never wanted that attention, a brilliant artist painted her portrait. And the rest is history. She must feel lonely now, no one is coming to see her. Or is she finally getting her well deserved rest.

shot with Nikon D70, edited using Snapseed and Marksta.  Click the picture for a larger version

My First WordPress Photo Publication

Greece, Lesbos Skala Sikemenias – July 2007

January 2008 I joined WordPress. This is the first photo I published on WordPress. A taverna in a hamlet in Greece. Quite obvious what struck me in this picture: all men, all apparently in thoughts. What is going on?

shot with Nikon D70, edited using Snapseed and Marksta.  Click the picture for a larger version

Shoes

The Netherlands, Naarden – June 2007

This week’s Lens Artists Photo Challenge (#161) is ‘feet and shoes’. Trying to find something that fits into this theme was difficult. I am not really into shoes or feet, let alone photos of them! However, I found one. I think. During a visit to the bi-annual photo exhibition at Naarden (FFN) in 2007 I shot these photographers clicking away on a just married couple.

Originally shot with Nikon D70, edited using Snapseed and Marksta.  Click the picture for a larger version