Waterpipes from tunnel construction - Leipzig

Bank and University building - Leipzig

Glass Front Construction, Museum - Leipzig

The monitor - Things

Sun through the glass railing - Leipzig

Leading the blind - Leipzig

You find these on most streetcar stops in Leipzig. If you are blind you go over it with your stick and it leads you to the entrance of the streetcar.

The tower on the right is from Leipzigs New Town Hall.

Brühl No. 68, backside - Leipzig

See part of front here!

Most amazing Cloud Picture

Have a look at this:

http://www.clouds365.com/3-24-10-part-2

Entrance University - Leipzig

(Ahh, striations. Lovely, aren't they?! *grumble*)

Hills on a tree - Leipzig

I shot a whole film of this tree. So be prepared for some more tree pics.

I got my cross-developed film back, it seems to be pretty amazing. But since I still don't have a filmscanner and there are no paper pics, you'll have to wait to see. Sorry.

New City Hall - Leipzig

A stroll in Hyde Park - London

Canon DIGITAL IXUS 75

One of my all time favourites, so I had to share. I took it November 2007.

analogue vs. digital : Round 1

The digital picture, taken with my Canon DIGITAL IXUS 75 (7.1 MP, 5.8-17.4 mm, 1:2.8-4.9) on a Wednesday in early February this year.

The analogue picture, taken with my Lomo Fisheye 2 also in February but a few weeks later. I stood in exactly the same place and held the camera in the same angle (at least I think so) like the IXUS.

Which one do you like better?

Nicolai street - Leipzig

Whoops, nearly forgot to post a pic for you.

This morning I finally got around to sort my photographies and negatives. I thought I still had tons of archive sheets for negatives ( I used to shoot b&w at the end of the nineties, I still found unused films from then a week ago!), but I was mistaken I had only 10 left. Whoops. Well, I'll meet tomorrow with BFF and she needs archive sheets too, so we'll order them together over the internet.

chocolate jar

Museum - Leipzig

Screws and Nuts

Lightswitch - old house in Leipzig

Sherd and Bike - Leipzig

Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy Monument - Leipzig

Striations due to the scanner.

Door, St. Thomas Church - Leipzig

New fountain - Leipzig

Lamp Day - No. 4 - Wohnmacher Store Leipzig

Lamp Day - No. 3 - Wohnmacher Store Leipzig

Lamp Day - No. 2 - Leipzig

Lamp Day - No. 1 - Leipzig

Three other lamps coming up today. Welcome to my new Followers, thanks for stalking. ;-)

The three R's - My green Starbucks Tumbler

The Three R's are: Reduce, reuse, recycle.

Double Exposure

I wish it was Spring...

Against the sun 2 - Leipzig

Tree - Leipzig

St. Thomas Church - Leipzig

Leipzigs world famous boys choir usually sings here. Not my kind of music, I prefer Shawn Colvin or Puddle of Mudd any day.

Doorknob - Leipzig

It's in the details.

New Townhall - Leipzig

Went out shooting this afternoon, shot 3 films. Perfect conditions. You can be curious.

Building lot - Leipzig

Sorry about the striations in the sky, the scanner seems to have a problem with blue. The originals are striation free.

Part of old door - Leipzig

Okay, I've got a new Lomo Fisheye2. Seems my "old" one never worked properly. The scroll wheel of the new one works a lot easier. I love it already.

Nice Dreams.

? - Leipzig

I don't know what I shot here, but it sure looks cool.

Crap!!!

Perfect Lomo weather = Sunshine and Snow but my Lomo is BROKEN!!

Good thing I still have two other film cameras (Nikon F90 and Exa 1a) and my digital Canon Ixus (7.5 MP).

Thankfully I still have the receipt of my Lomo, so when I go to my friends birthday party in half an hour I'll stop at the store and get them switched. If they want to give me back the money: I'll tell them that I want a new LOMO Fisheye2. Even if I have to wait a week.

Because I was at the other photography store today and the Lomo LC-A was gone... It would have cost only 70€ too, since it was second hand. So there is no use for me getting back the money. Fortunately I have enough pictures for this blog to go for weeks.

Hope your cameras work and that you enjoy your weekend shooting.

Against the sun 1 - Leipzig

I don't know how you feel about this picture, but I love it.

Scanning in 7 films yesterday, which took about 2 1/2 hours, I realized that I really like shots against the sun. It's funny, digital cameras never get good against the sun shots but the cheapest analogue camera comes up with shots like this.

BTW, todays store window Photosafiri is canceled due to heavy snowing. I shouldn't have complained that I haven't build a snowman this winter. St. Peter seems to think that I have too and gave us 10 cm of fresh snow last night. I wanted to wear my t-strap heels today... there goes fashion.

Breuninger, Leipzig - Store Window Project

Obviously the leather jacket is the new blazer! Well, at least that's what Breuninger is saying here.

Railing - Markkleeberger See

Mirrored Building - Leipzig

Shadow & Chain - Leipzig

Store windows - new part of The Man-Made Project

When I walked to class through the city this morning I did a bit of window shopping while all stores were still closed. I love this quiet time, you get to really look at the displays and think about what they show there, without having to move on because you're late or move because someone is standing in your way.

What I recognized was that most stores had nearly the same window decoration. A picture in the back, some trademarks and mannequins with the current collections and price signs. There are also bare windows with just some pictures or trademarks.

(http://bobbintalk.typepad.com/.a/6a011279470c7b28a4011570831c34970b-500wi)

I can't help but wonder when I see these imagination-free store windows. Times are hard, especially for fashion stores. People spend less money, but are still trying to look different. Which means that the big players can't churn out tons of the same clothes at a low price, because people won't buy. And still the stores have clothing that is mostly the same style (which does make sense to a certain point) and they have often the same prices and to make matters even worse for them, they have exactly the same window dressing. This is something I don't understand. Why would you want to have the same window as everyone else has?

There is exactly one store which has a totally different and styled window. The store is a bit more expensive but essentially it sells the same stuff as everyone else.

(http://www.sitebits.com/images/2006/nyc_shop_window_3.jpg, not the store I was talking about)

In the last century (sounds weird, doesn't it?) you could learn the occupation of the store window dresser in Germany. This job is long gone. So yes, it does cost money. But the window is still the first impression your store leaves, shouldn't you as storekeeper or -owner do everything to make the potential customer recognize you? Don't you want to draw your customers in. And make it absolutely clear which store you are?

There are two chain stores, no make this three chain stores, who leave the same first impression. Black window background, 2 or 3 mannequins and some interior stuff (like a frame or a vase). If you wouldn't see the storename, you wouldn't know what chain this is. The three chains are promod, mexx and ah I don't remember the name of the third one. Not a good sign for this company if you ask me. (It's Mango, I checked later.)

Even the big department stores like Karstadt or Galeria Kaufhof, are just plain boring. And I bet that in every city they have the same boring windows.

In any case this inspired me to begin a new photography project as part of The Man-Made Project. I will take pictures of store windows, to show the world the normal, boring and imaginative ones. Store windows come and go, they are fleeting pictures of fashion, imagination and cities. Time to preserve them in time and watch them change. I've started to take the pictures today and I will do so from now on. I even took some window pictures last week without knowing that I would start this project. I will post the store windows pics here, starting this weekend.

Do you recognize nicely done store windows? What do you think about them? What do you like and what do you hate?

Broken window pane - office building in Leipzig

The digital photographer - BFF at the Markkleeberger See

We went on Photosafiri (yep, safiri not safari) together. She used mainly her Canon DSLR, but also her old Praktika, to take lots of pictures. It was a fun evening.

Sign - Markkleeberger See