Art-deco train station in Limoges

Olympus E-510, ZD 12-60 f/2.8-4.0 @ 12mm; 1/400s; f/2.8; ISO 100

This is a picture taken during my recent round-the-south-of-France trip. There is a very nice train station in Limoges, art-deco styled.

Good things about this photo: strong linear forms in the right-hand side of the frame guide the viewer's attention towards the statue in the foreground. B&W makes this relation even more apparent.

Bad things: nothing interesting is happening in here. This photo would be much better if it carried some type of message; unfortunately it's only an appealing shot, with little meaning.

Random rambling: going back to see what other photos I posted here, I notice that so far there's no evident pattern in my 'best' photos. I'm still evolving and I haven't found my path in the land of photography yet.

Pączki

Olympus E-510, ZD 12-60 f/2.8-4.0 @ 60mm; 1/60s; f/4.0; ISO 400

Apparently, the problem with setting up a blog is forcing yourself to update regularly. Well, this is my first try at a blog, so bear with me.

This picture was taken while my wife & me were cooking "pączki" (doughnut-like pastry, typical for Poland), early in the morning.

The scene was lit by natural morning light coming through a huge balcony window about 2 meters from the table; sun has just risen and it was not shining directly on the table - hence, no hard shadows.

I specifically left the flour and unfinished pastry in the background to create a "work in progress", "homey" look.

And that's pretty much it. Huge, soft front lighting and a lot of delicious pastry. If I could change anything about the shot, I'd make the light more even across the whole scene (you can see that the left side of the scene has much more light than the right one). Sure, I could do it in darktable, but that's not the point

Badass Santa.

Olympus E-510, ZD 12-60 f/2.8-4.0 @ 40mm; 1/13s; f/3.8; ISO 400

Funnily enough, this picture is the first one I'd like to share. It is of a friend of mine, taken at a Christmas party at the university I happen to be enrolled in.

I had only one shot at this since the crowd was already moving in the direction of my friend dressed up as a Santa (or a red Ded Maroz, I should say).

I was drawn by how unnaturally he looked in the greenish cafeteria lights. The steady, grave, almost Godfather-like look and his self-confident way of leaning back on the chair contrasted with his bright-red Santa outfit.

To me, this picture evokes thoughts of photos of abandoned places, often with brightly-coloured but damaged by time toys. I hope you understand my hopeless efforts of expressing my thoughts.

First post

It's kind of funny how first post on almost all blogs is titled "first post", isn't it?

Still, I feel like I should do a similar one myself. If only to explain why I created the blog in the first place and why the heck it's called like that.

Well, why? Because I want to keep all my 'better' photos in one place and maybe get some peer reviews. And maybe - just maybe - help some of the fellow hobbyist photographers by describing the thought process/gear setup for a given shot.

The name... In Polish, we have this idiomatic expression 'robić zdjęcia do szuflady', which more or less translates into 'take photos only to put them in a drawer' (but in a metaphorical sense).

I keep learning photography. I'm not a good photographer. Sure, I've had my moments and I've taken some 'keepers'.

But most of all, I want to learn. And I hope you will be the witnesses of this process.