As to the “Who dat” and “Saints” theme – just see this post.

Home made star at the top of the tree. Zuzka made the star from a cake cover, Lukas added the beer cork :-) Actually there’s a characteristic feature of artists in New Orleans – recycling. You can find so many sculptors there made from trash, mainly from metal stuff… just like beer corks – usual decorating things… :-)

Different framing… the star with pictures from Lukas and Zuzka’ wedding that I took more then two years ago on Pentacon Six camera :-)

The only cover possible in New Orleans (instead of snow)… oh and yeah, I like my shadow :-)

The “Who dat” theme…

Zuiko 24/2.8 has strange flares under some conditions…:-(

Lukas shooting his favorite theme :-)

Very “alternative” framing… :-)

Cute… whatever you choose :-)

People of New Orleans…

“Saints”

A man in a kilt… really it was a man… despite the breast :-)

Loads…

Self portrait – take a closer look

Another one – more conventional

Lukas

We were waiting for Zuzka… just killing time

Yes, really… there’s nothing more than my shadow here… :-)

We went to see horse-racing with Lukas. For me that was the first experience with horse-racing.

Spot me

This was the first “sample” roll :-) …so more to come.
Hope you all are OK… in New Orleans or anywhere else.
Jakub.

This roll of Kodak Tri-x traveled with me from Prague to the US… inside Olympus mjuII camera which I’m starting to like more and more now. Before I left for New Orleans I spent some time with my friends in Prague…

OK we had a beer or two… but that’s not the reason why this shot looks like it does. There are just some limitations of the little fella, point-n-shoot mjuII. But I still like it… and I still like this shot as well :-) “Prague ghosts”

Well again, I swear I was not so stoned, mum :-) I tried some abstract long exposure shots… intentionally!

OK back to some more normal shots… this is Jena

Well not so normal again… :-)

Anicka

And…ME. Anicka stole my camera…

Since that’s very rare opportunity to show also my own face, here’s another shot of me taken by Anicka

And one more… narcissism :-)

Leaving the music club called “Wagon”

In another pub. Anicka had enough of being photographed

And Jena had enough… :-)

Since Anicka is not from Prague and I was lazy… and it was already about 5am, we decided to spend night (or rest of the night) at Jena’s

The next day (actually the same day technically) on my way home

In the evening I went to Avishai Cohen concert. You can’t see much details here but it was great experience. I bought their CD after that, I simply love this music (and I finally gave it to Lukas and Zuzka as an Xmas gift)

Self portrait with two ladies

Another reflection with even more strange look

And my American Xmas is about to start… at the Prague airport about 17 hours before me

Usual airport shots… kinda habit

Again I knew the focus wouldn’t work here… but anyway I took these two shots

Little fella waiting for the same plane to Amsterdam

And finally! The first shot from New Orleans – Lukas in their flat

Zuzka installing her laces… on the way to buy some clothes because my luggage got stuck in Amsterdam :-)

Sherlock Holmes was there too

Zuzka took some pictures for our new gangsta-hardcore-hip-hop-trance-deathfunk music group’ web profile on MySpace

OK maybe not really gangsta… but definitely modern and progressive (and as you can see – also right-oriented)

My new-orleanian look. I’m not so thin – this was due to the mirror

Wild-Caught Seafood, ho ho ho ho ho ho…

Definitely not perfectly framed (<=hip shot… or hip hop shot), but whatever… this entry is not serious at all anyway

I had many other rolls from the US so more, more, and more to come :-) The annual grant reports are over now so maybe, MAYBE I’ll have a bit more time to post.

Stay tuned and take care, J.

Packing my things

Waiting for the bus to the airport

Milu at the Prague airport… I don’t know what this pose was supposed to mean :-)

Majka and Erik (our personal guide) :-)

Self check-in not so “self” this time…

…and we got our boarding tickets

Last shot at the Prague airport

Of course there where mirrors at the toilets…:-) Look at my stylish t-shirt :-)

I liked the light

Fortunately he was sleeping…

The first shot in Havana. Shuttle driver who took us to the hotel

In the hotel the next day… Weird guy wearing black clothes and sweating like a… well actually pigs don’t sweat, they don’t have sweat glands at all…

Contrast

Hip shot… hence the bad framing

Three blonds :-)

Serious street stuff at last! :-)

In La Bodegita del Medio… but the mojito wasn’t splendid… actually we didn’t have a decent mojito in Havana… funny

OK but back to the streets…

I like this one :-)

Cuba libre!

Hotel swimming pool at the night

Security man and other guys peeping into the hall where we had an official dinner

No, that’s not the official dinner :-) It was back in our hotel

OK let’s try some color stuff… my favorite lonely bottle theme… Bucanero btw. – very good beer I’d say

Catching some customers

Nice contrast :-)

Unofficial taxi

Well here you can see only some parts on Marketa :-)

This was something like supermarket

Back to B&W. Of course he wanted some money…

Real street photographers!

And the real cigar roller… well not so real maybe… rather a tourist attraction

I like this shot!

And also this one

Empty shelfs in a public store…

Fruit and vegetable market… much more stuff but fruits and vegetables didn’t look so great

Model of a rum factory in the museum of rum

Erik arranged a trip to Varadero beach but it was raining that day morning so before our car arrived we decided to go to Vignales instead

Gas station on the way to Vignales, the weather turned sunny meanwhile so it was a very nice trip at the end. Vignales is a place in the midland with plantations and great nature

In a cave

Perhaps not the best idea to fire the flash right to the helmsman’s face :-)

Back in Havana, in a sort of music bar near our hotel… there was not a soul there… and I again tried some abstract long exposure with flash

Dad number 1… wtf :-)

Another trip – to Cayo Largo island

At the airport when we arrived there.. again a nice contrast :-)

Well there where just beautiful sandy beaches, warm sea and palm trees… nothing that fits my analog stuff you know:-) So here’s the airplane back to Havana in the evening:-)

I like this shot… but I didn’t like the flight. The airplane was old as hell and the emergency exit door made noise like jackhammer and circular saw together… not to mention the disgusting stinky fluid on the floor where I put down my backpack

In Havana city center again

Canadian guy who stayed in the same hotel

“Comrade Che”

Obsession

I like this one

“Jesus loves revolution!” Two symbols one by one: Che and the saint man. This is my most favorite picture

Hmmm

The last day in Havana, Milu solving a sudoku while waiting for our transport to airport

Barack Obama in the TV in Cuba – I was pretty surprised

At the airport… like I said before – obsession!

I was watching some french movie… nice girl.

A bit of Paris… toilets at the CDG :-)

Guy with two hats… bad exposure though

I knew that olympus mjuII couldn’t focus through the window but I shot these pictures anyway to see what would happen

Back home… Mr. double hat again :-)

Some other day on my way from work… yes 0:19am… jetlagged

Autumn leaves #1

#2

Abstract

I went to Pilsen on the weekend to see my family… and there were still some frames of velvia left in my OM2..

The paper says: “Adelka, I went to look for you. Stay here. Mum”

Kinda self portrait at the end :-)

I could not believe I managed to upload the pictures and write the comments in one day! …since I had almost no energy to post lately :-)

Hope you like it and hope you all are well.

J.

Here is my recap post… a bit late (as always), and actually my idea is also a bit different. The point is that I was visiting Lukas and Zuzka in New Orleans for Holidays and New Year’s Eve. I spent three weeks there and yes – we were shooting our cameras like Rambo his machine gun :-) So I have several recently exposed films, but still lot of pictures from summer and fall ready to upload. This rather long post is therefore a summary of yet “unpublished” stuff from summer.

When I came back from Lisbon, we had a little get together:

Milos, Katka and Charlie

Zuzka and Lukas came back to Czech Rep. for summer for a few weeks

Charlie and Katka – most likely telling some humorous stories :-)

Serious conversation…

…and Charlie got bored…

Few days after we were having a beer with Lukas in Pilsen

Looking at some pictures of Czech photographer Tereza z Davle

I also had my new Mamyia m645 to run the first test roll through it (Fuji 400H btw.):

Lab scans… hence the poor quality…

Look at that nice line on the left running across the all frames… hmm

Street shot on Mamyia :-)

Sort of portrait of my brother

hand #1

hand #2 :-)

My mum feeding “wild animals”

My grand day

Still life with a cat and rabbits :-)

Back to the black&white film (Nikon FE + Neopan 1600):

If you think that it’s weird to take pictures like this…. you’re probably right :-) But still it could have been even worse! :-)

Another mirror ID

Part of the stairs in our institute (it actually won some design prize)

Race!

I also got Nikon FA camera so I pulled the Neopan out of the Nikon FE and put it to the new FA:

First shot… nothing serious going on… :-)

OK, again not much going on here… it just used to be my desk in the lab (then I moved to office). A bit messy.

Another part of the institute

I just thought it would look nice on neopan… and it worked I’d say

Ang again I was testing another camera – Olympus omG which I got for free (well actually Lukas got it for free with black Olympus OM2 which he had bought for me on eBay) – Kodak Tri-x:

Wasting some frames on the way from the photo lab… usually people wasting last frames on the way to the lab… :-)

Big brother is… you know

During summer I used to go to the work by feet sometimes… I stumbled on this crap one day

But it’s still a nice walk trough the forest :-)

And yes I was working hard (hard science, you know). As I spent most of the time in the lab I took pictures there very often

And I was also wasting some frames on the hallway in our house going home from work

…and in the streets

I thought it was some PC game advert… but I think it’s like “Czech army is calling you” in fact

I took this one with Russian Jupiter 135mm lens mounted via M42->OM adapter

And again – new cameras. I got another OM1 because my old one has a shutter problem and I shot the following picture with it:

And here’s Olympus E-P1, nice camera but… digital :-)

New camera, new self portrait

Roy Haynes trio playing at the square in Pilsen!

View from my bed – pictures from Antoni Kratochvil

At the country visiting my grand parents. This is my grand mum, I like this shot

My grand dad again

My brother again

Picture that used to hang on the wall in my room in Prague

My brother putting on his jumping stilts

Stretching and warming up

Jumping stilts kid version

Back in Prague waiting for bus from the institute

Well another bus stop – reverse direction – going to the work this time

I was watching Olympics during working in lab

Girl probably waiting for her relatives – Czech scientists demonstrating against the planned lowering the budget for research

She gave me a suspicious look

The way how to express criticism of the new research evaluating system called “coffee-mill” :-)

Don’t make a donkeys of us…

Locks left there by lovers… there’s some kind of superstition I guess

My new spot in the institute

And my new Zuiko lens – 24mm/2.8. I like the perspective but the lens has slight barrel distortion though

The hallway int the institute – I was in hurry to catch my night bus

I missed the bus so I walked to another bus stop

In another bus which took me home. It’s funny because it looks like she was crying. But she was laughing in fact

Partly street shot

I was waiting for her to turn around but I missed the right moment

Horse from Roche company – symbol of the next generation DNA sequencing… but it looks more like donkey:-) Some vigneting added by lens hood

Our new colleague – bioinformatition :-)

Funny how many new cameras I got during the time covered by this post. Partly double exposure due to changing films between OM2 and new Leica CL

I was getting used the viewfinder. Too bad that the rangefinder mirror is so deteriorated making it hardly usable…:-(

“Skate or die!!! Pyco” (pyco=bitch/cunt…). Click the pisture to see the details.

Man who repaired my OM2. Funny thing is that I had three OM cameras having similar shutter problems…:-( But I like OMs anyway.

Some street shots on Leica CL…

Framing without looking to the viewfinder, focus by guesstimate…

Moder Stonehenge :-)

Reminded me those hippie VWs from 60s…

Back to the Olympus OM system – OM2sp with 24mm Zuiko from this point on:

In my room

Photo exhibition by Czech photographer… I forgot her name unfortunately. Named “Salt hunters”, it was about hard working people from Africa

Very nice… but my framing is not so good here :-)

Child on a wire… really he had the boy tied to his hand like dog:-)

Self portrait with a kind in MCD

Nun

My desk after some time… now there are piles of papers everywhere…

Sort of photography contest held by scouts in Pilsen. The point was that you had to follow the indices to find some places, perform some tasks there and take pictures. I was covering the backstage of the team Sportiness

This was our contact… he looked pretty much like the real homeless :-)

Preparing an ash-bin shot

Final preps…

…AND… ACTION :-)

More action!

Concentration

And even more concentration…

And contemplation

Pilsen from above. I like this shot. It’s cropped by the scanner but I’m too lazy to re-scan it

Still life… well not really (but if it wasn’t for the running water…) :-) I like the tones and light here…

Back in Prague

Subway madness :-)

More normal version, 24mm perspective… This is the last frame of the roll on my way to the lab

OK and the last frame of this post too… Took me a long, long time to make this post as I’m again pretty busy these days… Next post will be about my trip to Cuba so stay tuned! :-)

Take care, J.

after some time (as always) here is the second part of the pictures from Lisbon. Pictures from summer… kinda new-year-flashback :-) Mostly in color – I was using Fuji Velvia 100 positive. The colors may be off because my scanner doesn’t work great with positives I don’t know why…

Nikon FE + Nikkor 35/2.8 (some redundant tech. info, but whatever…:-) ):

First shot with Nikon in Lisbon… just to warm up :-)

Still warming up… :-)

Streets of Lisbon…

I like this one

Sometimes it’s good to have a color film… for a change

Testing the automatic long time exposure of Nikon FE. Very nice feature that I miss on Olympus OMxx. For this shot I just put the camera on a table in my hotel room and pushed the trigger

Trip to Cascais, town on the very western coast of the Europe

“Self portrait with a red fish”

Street shot…

Cesta, my boss :-)

“A reader and a small man”

Coast… it was windy and cold there. So we decided to find some restaurant to get something warm

We found one… but rather pricey. One of the most expensive lunch of my life… but very, very good though. And the wine was so delicious

Olympus OM2 + Zuiko 28/2 from this point on:

Back in the streets of Lisbon

The famous old elevator connecting two quarters of Lisbon

View from the top

Subway entrance. It was raining as hell so we were waiting there for some time. But it was not get any better – so hide your camera and run!

The other day. Shot for Lukas – Vespa, n’est-ce pas?

Plantas carnivoras! :-)

Oh, like a postcard…

…OK that’s better :-)

Nikon FE + Nikkor 35/2.8 + Neopan 1600 = black-n-white intermezzo:

This is a “must have” shot from Lisbon :-)

Official conference dinner

Hynek

Milu… after another conference party

And the last night in Lisbon… still-life with empty beer bottles

Back to Olympus OM2 and color film:

Back home obviously… in lab. Our lab has number 33 :-)

Self portrait in yellow

It was rainy those days

On the weekend I went to see my grandparents… to show that I was back home and alive :-) I stopped to see an old watermill and vanishing weir across the river. When I was a child I was fishing right on this spot sometimes… it seems so long ago…

I climbed a slope above the river to take a walk through a forrest

And found this mushroom… looks nice, but you can’t eat this one – it’s very bitter

And the last shot belongs to my grand dad. He was holding an old broken scythe… I don’t remember but maybe I did it… our maybe it was another one :-)

The end of this colorful post. Looking through the window we’ve got a plenty of snow now in Prague… yes, I should post more often… as always… :-)

Take care, J.

Hynek, waiting at the gate at Prague airport

Milu

Our group – boss, Hynek, Milu. Yes, Hynek had his leg injured. I was pretty surprised he came with us for some walks around Lisbon city center (tough guy)

Taxi woman driver in Lisbon

THE BOSS :-)

First evening in the city… having a bear or two (our two together as is the case of Hynek)

Yes, another self…

Streets of Lisbon…

There was a celebration in the center the night before… here the series “celebration traces” starts…

Another “traces” :-)

Youngsters smoking at a corner

“Very nice” (means very shabby) grill at a corner :-)

People chatting…

Citroen… something fo Lukas

From behind – another one for Lukas

“Light in the tunnel”

The end of the first roll (btw. kodak tri-x exposed with Olympus OM2 + Zuiko 28/2).

Take care, J.