Techniques for atmospherical photos of Venice

Austerby

Austerby

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I'm off to Venice (Venezia, not Beach) for a weekend at the end of Feb - purposefully chosen to see the place in a relatively quiet time. I've been a few times before and this time I specifically don't want to take sharp, detailed, colourful photos of the place: I'm after capturing atmosphere.

I'm sure someone's about to ask what I mean by "atmosphere" - for me, it's the essence of the place, a sense of history, scale, and the Venice of the imagination. That could mean hazy, out of focus, low contrast shots but it can be captured in other ways. It's a bit like the famous definition of pornography - I can't define it but I know it when I see it.

I'm probably going to take my M3 with some old lenses - a collapsible summicron, a DR summicron, a Summitar, Summar and Summarit f1.5 are all part of my set, as is a hazy 3.5cm Elmar. I also have modern Zeiss 21/4.5, 35/2.8 and 50/1.5 available. I have a 135/4 Elmar for the long shots.

For film, I'm considering Tri-X (developed in Rodinal) with some Adox CHS50.

I'm interested in learning how you go about capturing atmosphere - and any suggestions about which lenses I should take for my trip.
 
Try to get up early so you have less tourists in the shot Venice at Dawn offers some beautiful atmospheric shots. Dusk is another good time for athmospheric shots. The Ghetto usually has less tourists but some hidden parks and beautiful architecture. Don't forget the tripod.
Domenico Foschi has some nice shots from Venice on his site
http://www.dfoschisite.com/Lingering Past 18.html

Have a nice trip

Dominik
 
Lenses wide open, slight overexposure and maybe an UV filter with a thin layer of Vaseline - the Vaseline trick takes a little trial and error to master; try it out before the trip - and have a nice trip.
 
December is often a good time for pictures different from the usual sunny, saturated touristy pics. You can get mist rolling in from the Adriatic, more muted colours [Edit] & possibly fewer people. Oops, sorry about the smiley in the title bar
 
Check out the Venice pictures of both Ewa Zebrowski and fellow Canadian Peter Martin. They both took very unusual images.
 
Early morning. I can already see the Zeiss C Sonnar 50 doing something nice. Of my lenses the other I can see delivering some atmosphere is the 90 Elmarit M. I find the Elmar 135 f4 probably too long and I can't recall any shots of mine with 'atmosphere' with that lens, but perhaps compressing a lost of dsitance with some morning mist it will work well. My oldest lens is a '50s 90mm Elmar collapsible with some haze in it. It can only do atmosphere.
 
Go into the back streets. Look for individuals or families looking around as a focal point: it can be a bit diffuse otherwise .

Cheers,

R.
 
Right, back now a couple of weeks and most of the film has been souped and scanned.

My kit in the end was M3 and M2 for 35mm with 21/4.5, 35/2.8 and 50/1.5 ZM lenses plus my 90mm thin tele-elmarit. I also took an Agfa 6x9 folder and the Harman Titan pinhole camera.

I used a variety of film - Tmax400, Tri-x, FP4+, Adox CHS 25 and Acros 100. All developed in Prescysol. It was a bright sunny weekend I was there and the contrast range in the narrow streets and around the canals was very strong - I think the Prescysol has handled the challenge very well.

The shots I liked the most actually came from the pinhole camera - whether it was the longer exposures or the diffuseness of the results, I felt they worked really well. I was also pleasantly surprised by the Agfa - the Apotar lens has a lot of character, providing you can manage the limitations well (principally flare). The 35mm worked well - though I think the 21mm is a little too wide for me.

Some results on my Flickr page: http://www.flickr.com/photos/vidwatts
 
Take a look at the moody shots of Ewa Zebrowski. She said she did them with an old 5mp Sony. I find them inspirational. Enjoy Venezia, and start out well before the tourists arrive en masse.
 
Well done Austerby. That 6 x 9 folder shot is beautiful, but I agree the pinhole ones are the cream. You start a thread, listen, ignore our advice and do what you wanted in the first place, and return with great results. That's good.
 
Austerby, I took a quick look at your flickr shots of the Venice trip and really enjoyed them. I'll look again this evening when I have more time. Thanks for posting the link!
 
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