Maple leaf

Maple leaf against the sky

A quick update for Friday afternoon before I have to get going.

Here’s the second image from the autumn series I shot a month ago. When it comes to autumn and mobile phone photos, a hand holding a maple leaf against the sky or sun is probably one of the most common photographic clichés. Still, the weather was so nice and the leaves so colorful that I had to make my version of it. I’m not sure if I was able to bring anything new or personal to this shot, but at least its my hand in the image. I’m also happy about the color contrast between the blue sky and the yellow leaf.

That’s it for today. Have a nice weekend, and if you’re in Jyväskylä, come and see singer-songwriter Heikki Hallanoro, a friend of mine, perform at Vakiopaine tonight. I’ll also be there to take a few photos. Hopefully I’ll have some nice ones to upload next week.

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Autumn at Lake Palokkajärvi

A boat covered with autumn leaves

Autumn is almost over and the leaves are already gone, but I haven’t had time to post any autumn images yet. I’m going to fix that by posting a series of images I took on a beautiful morning in early October. This boat is one of many boats on the shore of Lake Palokkajärvi. I walk by it almost everyday during my commute, but this time the golden leaves and the morning light created such a beautiful scene that I had to stop and try to capture it. I took a number of shots from different angles, but this one stood out.

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Long and winding road

Winding dirt road lined with trees

I’m trying to catch up with posting images I’ve post-processed recently. I took this one in May only a few hundred meters from where I live. I liked the original version, but thought it was a bit too light. Because the image already had a painterly quality to it, I decided to emphasize it by adding a texture on most of the image. I think it worked nicely, making the image a bit darker and giving it a more tranquil mood.

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Apartment buildings lit by the setting sun

Kuokkala

Sunset reflecting on windows of apartment buildings in Kuokkala and apartment buildings reflecting on Lake Jyväsjärvi. This photo was taken on Kuokkala bridge from where there’s a nice view to both the city and the lake. This in an older image that I’ve previously published on the old incarnation of this website, but I recently reprocessed it and decided to post it again.

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The first spring flower

New life

This image of a coltsfoot in spring forest is one of the older photos I’ve been post-processing recently. It was taken on the same evening as the series of spring leaves I’ve been uploading on my Tumblr blog. Originally this image had warmer light and it was a bit soft, so I accentuated the details on the flower and the piece of wood next to it and adjusted the white balance to make the ground look desaturated. I also added a lens blur filter on the background to give a “Lensbaby” look.

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A bohemian waxwing eating a rowan berry

A bohemian waxwing eating a rowan berry

To continue the bird theme of the previous image I posted, here’s an older one from last winter. Unlike the last one, this image hasn’t been modified if you don’t count slight cropping. A flock of waxwings were feeding right next to the road one morning last October and provided a good opportunity to get some close-ups. I haven’t seen any this year, but perhaps it’s still too early. This autumn, there haven’t been as many rowan berries as last year either, but hopefully there’s enough to attract a few waxwings to our neighborhood.

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Great tit on a red fence

Great tit on a red fence

Birds are one of my favorite subjects. I’m not particularly picky about what birds I photograph as long as I’m happy with the final image. Because I’m not taking these photos for a competition or National Geographic, I don’t mind adding things to the images or removing stuff in post-processing if I think it will make the image better. In this image there was a dark pipe that splitting the red background, which I found really distracting, so I removed the pipe in Photoshop. It’s still not an award-winning photo, but it is a lot better with a clean background. At least I like it better this way.

For those of you who care about the technical side, this was shot with Sigma 150-500mm f5-6.3 DG OS HSM, which has turned out to be a nice lens for the price, as long as you stay between 150-400mm and f/8-f/11. It you shoot it beyond 400 mm or wide open, it gets a little soft.

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Meet Myyrä the Cat

Myyrä looking attentive

This is Myyrä the cat, the newest member of our household. The photo was taken when she was a bit over 11 weeks old, a week before she moved in with us. She’s now 16 weeks old and growing up to be a fine cat.

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Reeds and falling snow

Reeds and falling snow

I took this photo very shortly after I purchased my first DSLR, but it’s still one of my favorites. It is one of the few of my early images that came out the way I wanted despite my very limited skillset and now after post-processing it again, it looks even better. The photo was taken at Pitkäruoho nature reserve in Jyväskylä on a relatively cold day in February.

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Black-headed gull diving into water

Black-headed gull diving into water

I see these gulls circling over the lake almost every day and had planned on spending some time with them. Last May I finally took a moment to photograph them at a bay near our house. Not a perfect shot, but probably the best out of the bunch. Next time I have to reserve more memory cards and time, though.

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