Tag: Brussels

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Carnival Culture Photo Walk Photography walk

09MAR2013 Photoresk – Brussels Photography – going to Tournai (the Belgium Burning Man?)

History and Carnival: Photoresk – the Brussels Photography going Tournay

Tournay, the 2nd oldest Town of Belgium (after Tongeren). The picturesque medieval city center. The beautiful market place, the the river Escaut (“Schelde” in Dutch), some UNESCO world heritage sites and –
Carnival? Yes, Carnival!
When nearly everywhere in the rest of the world the carnival season is over, the inner part of Tournai is closed for traffic to celebrate carnival. Probably a good idea to wait ’till spring and definitely something not to miss while in Belgium. Details about the carnival in Tournai can be found here (in french) http://www.carnavaldetournai.be/

There was an parade starting at 14:30 at four different places heading towards the centre. This was be a fantastic opportunity to take great picture of Belgium habits 😉 and the city.

We took the train from Brussels central at noon and returned to Brussels at around 20:00. Trains Brussels – Tournai are ever hour.


Easy by train – Brussels, Turnay every hour, one hour ride

 


Gare Tournai


guarding the monument


green meets techno


Die Schlümpfe


girls dancing everywhere


this Pharaoh in the confetti rain


carnival doggie


what’s standard in Brussels can be considered as costume in Tournai


 


every car has powerful confetti cannons


 


 


 


three super nanni’s


 


 


 


 


 


South wallonian shoe design


 


 


colours, colours


 


better more


 


 


 


is this “serious picture taking”?


 


oh, sorry, my French is not perfect… 😉


a Viking


another one


and the female too


 


overload?


overload!


 


 


to keep warm…


the the river Escaut (“Schelde” in Dutch)


 


seen before?


 


peace!


 


remember those Bunnies?


thank you!


 


 


lovely music everywhere


again – thank you for the pose!


 


 


and you too!


 


mysterious ballony


getting colder


drink and drive!


yes, it’s a whoopy


up, up in the sky



 


later – they will burn


he is doing it now already


the parade continues


 


 


 


 


 


reaching the centre


 


 


the beer for 1,50 EUR


carnival can be a serious business


now – burn, burn, burn


wet…


 


artistis


now it’s burning


uuuuhhhhhh


 


 


 


 


 


slowly


 


 


 


 


 


 


you could feel the heat even from the distance


 


ok, back home to Brussels…. and plan the next Photoresk meet-up

If you want to learn more about Photoresk – Brussels Photography, check out this site: http://www.meetup.com/Photoresk/

 

 

 

Categories
Art Culture Photo Walk Photography Technology Things

02MAR2013 Photoresk going Museum Night Brussels

Brussels museum’s open from 19:00 to 01:00.
Photoresk met at 19:00 at the MIM (Music Instruments Museum) and ended at 00:00 at Autoworld (after 5 hours museum too tired for the after party starting at 02:00)

 


workplace


 


wonderful instruments


 


 


 


 


at 22:00 people still cueing (we got our ticket at the internet)


we ran unexpectedly into a fashion design show


and the models where happy to pose at this public event


nice designs


 


nice venue


 


 


 


 


later – Autoworld!


 


not only beautiful vintage vehicles but also flying artists


 


 


happy landing


 


 
If you want to learn more about Photoresk – Brussels Photography, check out this site: http://www.meetup.com/Photoresk/

Categories
Art Uncategorized

17FEB2013 Terracotta Army: a spectacular reconstitution of the terracotta army of the first emperor of China

Exhibition of the warriors, horses and chariots of the famous terracotta army of the first Emperor of China in Brussels.

very nicely made expo in Brussels


also some mystical lamps


ordinary worriers


worked in the details


 


 


all weapons were stolen


hierarchical fight order


 


even life-size horses


 


changing light


 


 


 


 


 


 


small sculptures


decent colours


 


worked to the detail


the mystical frog

Categories
Dinner Food gerneral information Uncategorized

16FEB2013 Aligot!

Luca invited:
Dear friends,
it is my pleasure to invite you all to a nice evening at my place to taste a delicious dish prepared by Hugh (some of you may know him already).
The dish is about a lot of cheese, potatos and sausage.
I attach a link for your convenience: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aligot
The max number of friends we can feed is 10, therefore we will accept only the first 10 that will reply YES to this kind invitation AND come to the dinner.
You will just need to bring your best smile, some wine and please no heavy desserts, better just some light ice cream or hot spirits to help our stomachs 😉
I and Hugh look forward to receive the quickest 10 of you and have another amazing evening at my place!
See you soon!
Luca & Hugh

In the elevator. I am not sure if I understand why? Why would someone lit an fire in an elevator?


Potatoes are smashed with a special tool


Sausages


that’s how well smashed potatoes should look like!


cream, and more cream


 


mixing it well


and always check the consistency – this is NOTHING


add more cheese


better!


perfect!


hmmmmmm – sooo tasty!

Categories
Photo Walk Photography photography Uncategorized walk

Looking for Brussels Photography Meetup?

If you want to learn more about Photoresk – Brussels Photography, check out this site: http://www.meetup.com/Photoresk/

Categories
Photography Technology

New Year 2012-2013 Brussels Firework Photographies – the making-of

Automatic shooting

The making-of
We are already at the second day of 2013. After I posted a few of the firework pictures to facebook, I’ve got some questions how those pictures were done.
Here is a short making-of.


The plan
I’ve planned to take nice pictures of the firework but and not to spend the first minutes of the year behind the camera and to have a nice Yew Years party.

Automatic shooting
All the pictures were taken automatically while I was enjoying a nice glass of champagne, watching the fireworks and party.

The smallest camera did all the work
Even I carried a lot of gear (those who know me, know the story) to the friends place where we had this nice view, the most impressive pictures came from the Canon Power Shot S90, not from the Fujiifim  X100 nor the Nikon D300. The Canon S90 is very similar to the G9 but is lighter, has less controls and no optical viewfinder. Even after surviving some minutes underwater in a river in Thailand, my G9 died recently its final death after an plane crash – that’s why I took the S90.


Tell me your secrets
I’ve put S90 on a small tripod (normally I don’t recommend those, but in this case it was ok), set ISO to 200, f7.2 and 5 seconds exposure and started the motion-detection / lightning detection script.
Motion-detection / lightning detection script – what the heck?
Since a few years, there is an modified software available for the Canon Power Shot cameras. It is some kind of ‘un-official’ and not supported by Canon. It installs on a memory card (which can be a bit tricky) but really worthwhile the effort.
It provides a lot of interesting features, like pre-defined functions for bracketing or specific RAW settings but also the possibility to create user defined scripts, accessing the camera functions and much more.
You find more details here: http://chdk.wikia.com/wiki/CHDK 

As mentioned before, the setup was ISO to 200, f7.2 and 5 seconds exposure, RAW format and using the fast lightning / motion-detection script. This scripts releases the shutter each time something significant happens in the view of the camera. Even you can set different thresholds or specific areas, I left it with the defaults.

Go and take the pictures, I’ll have a drink
The firework lasted 20 minutes. The Canon S90 took automatically roughly 60 pictures with a “good” rate of nearly 50% and a “woow” rate of maybe 15%-20% (I stayed with the default set-up).
In the meanwhile I had at least three glasses of Champagne and plenty of “Happy New Year Kisses”.

What came after
There was minimal post-processing, mostly limited to little contrast enhancements  and cropping.

Happy New Year 2013!!!

If you are interested to learn more about photography, share knowledge and meet other people interested in photography in an relaxed way, check-out http://www.meetup.com/Brussels-Photography/ and join the group or leave your reply for specific questions.