My favorites from 2011

December 31, 20114 CommentsSlovakia

My favorites from 2011

Another year has passed. And since I managed to add a new photo every day, there were 365 new posts this year :). So to the next 365 photos and a better 2012. Happy new year :)

And here are few of my personal favorites from this year:

After sunset in the Sunflower fieldI really wanted to take a show with the sun still above the horizon, but we were traveling on a highway, and could not stop by any of the fields, and by the time we reached this one, the sun was already down. But I still like it :). Everything is a little more blue, but still fine :). Photo taken somewhere between Trnava and Bratislava (I have no idea where exactly :))HDR from three shots, taken with Canon 450D with Sigma 10-20mm lens, from a tripod.

St. Peter and Paul's Cathedral after sunsetI couldn't hope for a better sky after the sunset, the broken up clouds, with this gorgeous colors. I was so satisfied :). This is the St. Peter and Paul's Cathedral (Katedrála sv. Petra a Pavla) in Brno, Czech republic.At first I took photos only during the day, but I had bad luck. A small group of tourists always moved, so they interfere with my shot. And when I moved away to a new place, they followed me. It was so annoying. So I decided to go back to the cathedral later on, and i had luck :). I was the only one there.HDR from three shots, taken with Canon 450D with Sigma 10-20mm lens, from a tripod.

Boats and the CityThere was such a lovely sunset this Friday. I went to the Strkovec lake in Bratislava as it's not really far from my flat. This great clouds first gave me great photos and then a nice walk in the rain, as I was returning home :). But as it was a warm summer day, I didn't mind at all :)HDR from 4 shots (-4 to +2), taken with Canon 450D with Sigma 10-20mm lens, from a tripod.

PortalI think to most of the people who ever visited Prague, this is a very well known place :) For everyone else, this is the elevator and stairs in the Old Town Hall Tower (the one with the astronomical clock on it :) ) It's really great for HDR photos, and nobody minds if you use a tripod in there :)HDR from three shots, taken with Canon 7D with Sigma 10-20mm lens, from a tripod.

The beauty of NatureI just love this one turned out. It even is my current desktop wallpaper (and I never use my own photos as wallpapers :) ). This was such a lovely sunset last weekend. All the green colors, with the sun shining through. It was just beautiful. The only thing I regret, that I forgot my IR filter, because I think that It would create great results in such light. Maybe next time :)HDR from 7 shots, taken with Canon 7D with Sigma 10-20mm lens, from a tripod.

Blue carAs each year, around this time, there are carousels in Bratislava. And for the second time, I was taking photos there :). Last time I didn't had the courage to go with my tripod into the middle of this. But in a year a lot has changed :). All the people around me didn't bother me at all anymore. And a great thing about taking shot at night, you can't see any of them :)I took quite a few shots, so there will be more from there :)HDR from three shots, taken with Canon 7D with Sigma 10-20mm lens, from a tripod.

Prague TwilightJust got back from Prague. I spend the whole weekend taking photos there, and I think some of them look quite alright :). So here is the first one, of the Staromestské námestie (Old Town Square), taken right after the sun hid behind the horizon. HDR from three shots, taken with Canon 7D with Sigma 10-20mm lens, from a tripod.

Inside the Church of the Visitation of the Virgin MaryThis photo was taken inside the Church of the Visitation of the Virgin Mary in Postorna, in Breclav (Kostel Navštívení Panny Marie v Břeclavi). I had really luck with timing with this one. We were passing throught Breclav, when I noticed this church (I will upload a photo from the outside som time later, as it's really beautiful), so we stopped, to take few photos. There were some people standing in front of the church, with the priest standing by the entrance. We were not sure if its open, but when we entered, nobody stopped us. So I took few photos form the center of the church, and when I moved to the side, a wedding started :). Then was the first time I noticed that there are some extra decorations in the church :). We just quickly moved to the side of the church, waited till everyone entered, and quietly left :)HDR from three shots, taken with Canon 450D with Sigma 10-20mm lens, from a tripod.

St. Egidius ChurchTwo days ago I uploaded a photo taken from the tower of the St. Egidius Church in Bardejov. This time I'm uploading a photo of the church :). I took this shot last weekend while visiting relatives there. This was taken around 1 hour after the sunset, so still in the blue hour. The church was already lit up, but all the clouds have vanished. So I tried to use the best sky color from the original shots, to make it at least a little bit interesting :)HDR from three shots, taken with Canon 450D with Sigma 10-20mm lens, from a tripod.

Sky after the stormThe weather here last week was was a combination of really warm weather during the day and strong storms in the evenings. So the sunsets were just beautiful. HDR from three shots, taken with Canon 450D with Sigma 10-20mm lens from a tripod.

and a bonus one :)

Almost full moonMy plan for last weekend was also to take photos of the stars, as the 7D has quite nice performance on higher ISO levels. But I didn't account for the very bright almost full moon. It was so bright, that the stars were almost not visible. So I took photos of the moon instead :)I actually felt quite stupid when I took this. The reason was, that the setup I used, the 7D with a Celestron telescope, could only capture something above half of the moon and you couldn't zoom out. And it took me quite a while to remember, that I can create a panorama from multiple shots, to capture the whole moon :) This is not a HDR shot, I took multiple exposures, but the didn't align properly and the HDR from a single RAW didn't look right to me. So I just created a panorama from two shots, removed the distortion and did few steps I usually do in HDR post-processing.Panorama from two shots, taken with Canon 7D and Celestron CPC 1100 GPS telescope.

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