Luminous Landscape Forum

The Art of Photography => User Critiques => Topic started by: Slobodan Blagojevic on October 29, 2018, 05:01:59 pm

Title: Belgrade
Post by: Slobodan Blagojevic on October 29, 2018, 05:01:59 pm
Visiting my home town Belgrade - a city of long and tumultuous past and huge contrasts.

Yes, Russ, these are pure tourist shots, sorry. Probably high on the vacuity scale. They are also made 90% on (gasp!) an iPhone Max.

These are not intended as artsy shots, nor my intention is to give a well-rounded portrayal of the city. I usually shoot wondering around and whatever catches my fancy - the good, the bad, and the ugly.

I hope some might find it interesting to see an area not well known to the rest of the world.

I’ll start with a few shots with a full-frame camera, Canon 6D. The first three shots are about street performers. The forth shot is a quintessential Serbian “top shelf” bar display: pršuta (prosciutto) and wine 😋🍷
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: Slobodan Blagojevic on October 29, 2018, 05:30:39 pm
1. New
2. Old
3. Too old (reminds me of Havana)
4. New on top of the old - gives a new meaning to the phrase “to top it off.”
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: Slobodan Blagojevic on October 29, 2018, 05:46:24 pm
Visit to a farmers’ market. When I saw the lady in the yellow jacket walking into the scene, I knew I had to press the button.
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: Rob C on October 29, 2018, 06:15:30 pm
Sounds close to the Italian word; can you hack Italian too?

Some Romanian words come close as well... Julius C must have travelled a lot.

:-)
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: Slobodan Blagojevic on October 29, 2018, 06:27:19 pm
Sounds close to the Italian word; can you hack Italian too?

Some Romanian words come close as well... Julius C must have travelled a lot.

Apparently, 17 Roman emperors and one Caesar were born on the territory of today’s Serbia.

P.S. More pictures to come... it is getting late here in Europe and it is awfully difficult to compose and attach images on an iPad
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: degrub on October 29, 2018, 08:21:40 pm
that Akita is such a ham...
what a lead in to #4
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: armand on October 29, 2018, 09:13:14 pm
Apparently, 17 Roman emperors and one Caesar were born on the territory of today’s Serbia.

Source?
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: Alan Klein on October 29, 2018, 11:38:19 pm
Nice shots.  Hope you had a great time.  Do you put them together in a vacation tour slideshow?  That's what I do with mine adding music that fits, intros, credits, a whole story.  Show it on 4K TV.  It's like reliving the trip.
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: Eric Myrvaagnes on October 29, 2018, 11:51:59 pm
A very appealing set of images, Slobodan. Thanks for sharing them.

The dog in the hat is adorable.
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: Slobodan Blagojevic on October 30, 2018, 12:12:40 am
Source?

“Around the 6th century, Slavs appeared on the Byzantine borders in great numbers. Many Roman noblemen and statesmen were born in present-day Serbia, including 17 or 18 Roman Emperors (Vetranio wasn't universally recognized as an emperor, but was proclaimed a caesar).”

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serbia_in_the_Roman_era
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: Slobodan Blagojevic on October 30, 2018, 12:33:48 am
If anything, Belgrade is known for a huge number of restaurants, cafes, bars, and night life.

2. Thousands upon thousands of outdoor tables
4. Restaurants and churches... two immutable staples of Serbian life.
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: Alan Klein on October 30, 2018, 12:35:50 am
Slobo 0kb each photo can't see them. 
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: Slobodan Blagojevic on October 30, 2018, 12:56:06 am
The scourge of modern times - graffiti. Well, that would be too nice a word for what most of it is: idiotic hooliganism, just mindless scribblings by football fans, puberty-driven professions of love, occasional political statement, mostly done on freshly renovated buildings.

3. Proliferation of English, immediately followed by Cyrillic, unpronounceable in any case by foreigners.
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: RSL on October 30, 2018, 06:02:09 am
A really fine travelogue and history lesson, Slobodan.
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: John R on October 30, 2018, 09:13:09 am
A really fine travelogue and history lesson, Slobodan.
I agree. Cell phone or not.

JR
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: Slobodan Blagojevic on October 30, 2018, 09:57:00 am
Facades.

Two faux, two real and recently renovated.
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: Slobodan Blagojevic on October 30, 2018, 12:28:20 pm
1-3. A parking garage that doesn’t look as bad as they usually do, at least not at night, when it starts changing lights.

4. A quiet, almost Parisian square, tucked in between bustling streets.
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: John R on October 30, 2018, 12:35:31 pm
1-3. A parking garage that doesn’t look as bad as they usually do, at least not at night, when it starts changing lights.

4. A quiet, almost Parisian square, tucked in between bustling streets.
The night images look kind of surreal, are using some kind of HDR mode?

JR
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: Slobodan Blagojevic on October 30, 2018, 12:56:19 pm
The night images look kind of surreal, are using some kind of HDR mode?

Not sure how you see them, they look pretty realistic to me, as I usually compare the screen image to the scene in front of me right after the capture. It was th blue hour, so sky still had some color. The other two shots, looking in the opposite direction, were taken a few minutes later, so the sky is darker.

Having said that, the new iPhones do have so-called Smart HDR turned on by default, and it works pretty darn well.

In the first shot I changed the white balance using eye dropper on the concrete, and applied auto-adjustments in Lightroom CC Mobile. Here is out-of-camera original:
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: John R on October 30, 2018, 01:58:07 pm
Not sure how you see them, they look pretty realistic to me, as I usually compare the screen image to the scene in front of me right after the capture. It was th blue hour, so sky still had some color. The other two shots, looking in the opposite direction, were taken a few minutes later, so the sky is darker.

Having said that, the new iPhones do have so-called Smart HDR turned on by default, and it works pretty darn well.

In the first shot I changed the white balance using eye dropper on the concrete, and applied auto-adjustments in Lightroom CC Mobile. Here is out-of-camera original:
I think see what made me think it was an HDR image. It is the left side tree which is being lit by the lights from the building. The rest is as you said.

JR
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: Slobodan Blagojevic on October 30, 2018, 02:11:59 pm
An interesting tidbit about that garage: those bycicles you see are free to use once you park the car, up to two per car. Nice gesture.
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: Kevin Gallagher on October 30, 2018, 02:38:28 pm
 Great series Slobodan!! Weren't you leading a workshop?  ;)
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: Slobodan Blagojevic on October 31, 2018, 05:20:17 am
A few thoughts on the iPhone photography.

In some aspects, it is not unlike when I started in photography, decades ago. In some other aspects, it is like sci-fi.

When I started, getting an SLR camera meant getting it with a 50mm or 55mm normal lens. The next addition, if any (millions stayed with their normal lens for years) would be either 28mm or 105mm to 135mm. Getting all three, the holy troika, was a dream.

Guess what? Newer phones today come with 28mm and 50mm lens equivalents. Back to my youth!

As for the sci-fi part, not only it is eons ahead of those SLRs of my youth, thanks to computational imaging, but it is in some, or even many, aspects equal or better than the most modern DSLRs.

I stumbled recently on this video (about seven minutes long) comparing iPhone XsMax’ dynamic range with Canon’s 5 mIV. It ain’t pretty (for DSLR).

https://youtu.be/v3m81493kTM

I initially tried to auto-adjust every shot, either in the native application or Lightroom Mobile, but soon realized that I am often making it worse. I now use LRm to correct verticals and sometimes to play with it’s various profiles and presents.


Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: Ivophoto on November 01, 2018, 03:20:11 am
Today, Slobodan, Is a commemorative moment , isn’t it?

Today exactly 100 years ago Belgrade was liberated from the Germans by the third Serbian army.

Here a rare picture of crown-prince Alexander visiting Belgrade.

(I recon it is not the little guy watching over his shoulders to check if no evil German is left behind)

(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20181101/d00a115f1a3289886e4cfd9cd576a925.jpg)
Title: Re: Belgrade
Post by: Slobodan Blagojevic on November 01, 2018, 03:51:38 am
Thanks, Ivo, for that historical reminder about WWI.