When it doesn't go on and on and on...

View, originally uploaded by jiihaa.

Flowers, originally uploaded by jiihaa.

Glass, originally uploaded by jiihaa.

Myyrmanni, originally uploaded by jiihaa.

Now that I have one good new battery for the LX3, all is not good. Namely, the asymmetry. Today I had one of the old batteries in the camera, and of course it was good for only a couple of dozen photographs. Well, one learns all the time. Maybe I need to get another new one and get rid of the old ones - or try to be more careful about the batteries.

As you can see from the photographs, I didn't get much out today. Well, I hope tomorrow will be better.

I have been pondering - this has now been going on for several days - the comment by Sven W which made me go "yuck" yesterday. It was this bit: "If I believe I've already taken a similar photo and this one is going to be no better than I don't press the shutter."

I haven't been thinking about this at all, but now that I think, I must admit that sometimes I feel that this is a scene I have seen too many times already. But then I take a photograph anyway, thinking that there is always something different, something to learn, especially when something is familiar. One has to be able to learn to see known things new.

Where does the yuck come from?

Wire, originally uploaded by jiihaa.

Roadside, originally uploaded by jiihaa.

Fallen, originally uploaded by jiihaa.

Lamps, originally uploaded by jiihaa.

Pole, originally uploaded by jiihaa.

House, originally uploaded by jiihaa.

Red, originally uploaded by jiihaa.

Here is one photograph from yesterday and six from today. We went for a walk with the wife. It was a snowy day, once again, and the blue moment after sunset was once again quite special.

I got comments to the "worst photograph" posting, here is a quote from Sven W's: 'Post-process your photos to improve them (minor changes, don't attempt a "rescue mission"). The process of thinking through the edits should improve subsequent photos.'

I don't know why but I got a shuddering feeling when reading this - "yäk" is the word in Finnish, I guess "yuck" in English. And then I started thinking why it is so? Maybe it is that I just have too little skills of using iPhoto, Photoshop, LightZone, and the like. But I have spent some time with these programs, during the years, and can do stuff - I just don't want to.

Maybe the explanation is that I have fun when taking photographs, and I don't have fun when doing stuff to them on the computer. One reason for this is the exercise: I go for a walk (or skiing or ...) and take photographs on the go. And this you can't do while using the computer. I guess I just need to get out and get physical.

Black woodpecker and other activities

Black woodpecker, originally uploaded by jiihaa.

Star, originally uploaded by jiihaa.

Birches, originally uploaded by jiihaa.

Fence, originally uploaded by jiihaa.

Branches, originally uploaded by jiihaa.

Twigs, originally uploaded by jiihaa.

Blurred, originally uploaded by jiihaa.

When going for a walk we heard quite a racket, and it didn't take long to find the reason: a black woodpecker was eagerly searching for food. And there were signs of her work visible elsewhere as well, for example in the second photograph.

I have been exploring motion blur quite a lot recently, and not only because the dimness makes sharp photographs hard to take these days. Here are some specimens - the last two are a bit different from the usual, having much more blur. I'm not sure whether I like the painterly effect, but this may be worth exploring as well.