Harold Davis's Blog, page 144
November 22, 2015
Canyon Conundrum
The seaside village of Vernazza, Italy makes its living from catching fishes and catering to tourists. Carved into the rocky ledges of the Ligurian coast, behind the village facade facing the sea is a warren and maze of narrow, dark passages with twisting stairs and low tunnels.
Canyons of Vernazza © Harold Davis
Wandering into this maze with my camera and tripod, I felt an eerie sense of having faced similar photographic challenges before. With the narrow, enclosed spaces and the mere glimmer of the sky, the compositional and lighting challenges were much the same as those in the slot canyons of the American southwest.
Both environments present a dynamic range from blackest black to brightest white, and both involve creating images that turn narrow spaces into interesting creative expressions. Strangely, while taking my time in the depths of Vernazza I could almost feel the dry, sandy breath of Antelope Canyon, on Navajo territory near Page, Arizona.
Structure of Time © Harold Davis
Related stories: Orange Juice on the Cinque Terre Trail; Structure of Time; Slot Canyon.
November 21, 2015
Vernazza
Coming from the north, Vernazza is the second town in the Cinque Terre (“Five Lands”) on the Ligurian coast of Italy. Of the five lands, I think it is my favorite (although each one has its distinctive attraction). There are no cars in Vernazza. To make this photo, I walked back along the trail to Monterossa, and from above the railroad tracks waited for sunset with my camera on tripod. As I darkness fell, I hopped the train back to the hotel (and group) in Monterosso.
Vernazza © Harold Davis
Exposure info: Nikon D810, 21mm Zeiss Distagon T* f/2.8, 4/5 of a second at f/8 and ISO 64, tripod mounted.
November 20, 2015
Venice and Waterlogue
Photographing Venice, Italy with my iPhone 6s camera, and processing the images using the Waterlogue app on the phone, is great! In fact, you could say that Venice via the iPhone and Waterlogue are a classical combination, like…Bogey and Bacall, Romeo and Juliet, Simon and Garfunkel, and peanut butter and jelly. Quick, let’s see a suite of six iPhone Waterlogue Venetian images before I come up with more word pairings! (I almost committed “Spock and Kirk”: What are your favorite two-word combos?)
Venice Gondola © Harold Davis
Canals of Venice © Harold Davis
Venetian Mask © Harold Davis
Venetian Barque © Harold Davis
Along the Canal © Harold Davis
Burano © Harold Davis
November 19, 2015
Florence and Venice
Florence and Venice, two great Italian cities, one photographed at the beginning and one at the end of my recent trip to Italy!
Florence and the Arno River © Harold Davis
Related story: Harold in Italy.
Venice in a Silver Light © Harold Davis
Related story: Venice of Dreams.
November 18, 2015
Female Gondolier in Venice
There aren’t very many female gondoliers in Venice. You can probably count them on the fingers of one hand. So it was very exciting to meet and talk to a new female gondolier. Chiara is shown in the photos on the first day of her new job as a gondolier.
Chiara 1 © Harold Davis
Chiara 2 © Harold Davis
November 17, 2015
Venice Perspective
At the tip of Dorsoduro, the Venetian Quarter across the Grand Canal from San Marco, sits the Dogana di Mare. The Dogana di Mare is a colonnaded customs station built in the 1600s that now houses a museum (as so many grand buildings in Venice do).
Venice Perspective © Harold Davis
On Saturday when I visited the promenade outside the Dogana di Mare an old sailing vessel was tied-off. I put my camera on the tripod, added a neutral density filter and a polarizer, and made a long exposure (3 seconds). My idea was to capture the softness in the motion of the boat in the waves, while leaving the stone colonnade of the old customs house steady and strong.
For me, the title of this image, Venice Perspective, has two meanings. First, there’s no doubt that lines of perspective are crucial to the composition; the eye follows the lines of the promenade towards the colonnade at the end of the Dorsoduro island. More significantly, Venice is one of those rare geographic places that can shift one’s conscious—your perspective, if you will—simply by the act of visiting and being open to what Venice has to offer.
Exposure and processing info: 28mm, +4 ND filter and circular polarizer, 3 seconds at f/20 and ISO 250, tripod mounted; processed in Adobe Camera RAW, Photoshop, and using Topaz plug-ins.
Related image: Venice of Dreams.
November 14, 2015
Burano
My friend Mauro and I took the vaporetto across the fog-bound Venice lagoon to Burano. Just like a trip to a remote part of a city served by an on-land metro, this involved several changes of boats—including a synchronized switch at the Lido. Burano is a quiet suburban island with colorful houses, each painted a different color, on a small network of canals. In other words, it is a Fauvist dream. Besides its colorful houses, Burano is also known for lace making, fishing, and oyster farming.
Burano © Harold Davis
About the image: My thinking was to create an image using in-camera photographic techniques that echo the colorful qualities of a Fauvist painting. To achieve this look, I used my Nikon D810, a 28-300mm zoom lens at 48mm, a 4 EV neutral density filter, and a polarizer (which helped to amplify the reflections in the canal and saturate the colors). The exposure time was 2.5 seconds at f/18 and ISO 500. I hand-held the image, with my elbows resting on the railing of a canal bridge, and moved the camera slightly during the exposure.
November 12, 2015
Venice of Dreams
Coming into Venice after a long day on the train from Naples was a dream-like experience. From southern almost summer time I was transported into an early November dark world of chill fog that hit me like a blast as I walked from the train to the boat landing on the Grand Canal.
Venice of Dreams © Harold Davis
As the vaporetto chugged down the Grand Canal I felt the sweetness of a waking dream. If a place can be a romance, it is Venice, probably the best preserved historic city in Europe (and maybe the world)—and one without cars, where transportation is by foot, or boat, or not at all. The shifting light and translucent fog makes Venice truly a photographer’s paradise.
November 9, 2015
View from Ravello
Ravello sits about 1,000 feet above the town of Amalfi on the stupendous Amalfi Coast of Italy. Back in the 1200s and 1300s, when Amalfi was a geopolitical powerhouse, Ravello was the summer home for the Amalfiese aristocracy. Later, it was hard enough to get to that it fell into decay.
View from Ravello © Harold Davis
Rediscovered toward the end of the 19th century by itinerant British travelers on the Grand Tour of Europe, many of the great villas were restored, including the Villa Rufolo. I made this image from one the the belvederes in the extensive gardens of the Villa Rufolo, which was restored by Scottish industrialist Francis Neville Reid, with an eye towards encouraging vistas of romantic decay in his restoration.
Of course, today Ravello is well known and beloved by many, and hosts a famous music festival.
November 8, 2015
Positano
Positano has rightly been described as a town of cliff dwellers because it seems to defy the laws of gravity, with buildings connected via stairway after staircase. There are no flat roads. In the 1950s author John Steinbeck, who is more generally associated with Monterey, Salinas, East of Eden, and The Grapes of Wrath, wrote a travel article for Harpers Bazaar magazine that included this memorable line: “Positano bites deep. It is a dream place that isn’t quite real when you are there and becomes beckoningly real after you have gone.”
Positano © Harold Davis
We are here on the cusp of autumn. Most of the hotels and restaurants are already closed for the season. But the warm and sunny Sunday weather has brought crowds from Sorrento and Naples, and for me a swim on the beach along side of kids kicking balls, and couples enjoying a last snuggle in the sun before winter sets in.
As Steinbeck wrote, this place is like a waking dream, and I expect to cherish my time in Positano through the days of winter that lie ahead.
About the church and photo: Made from the balcony of my room just after sunset, this image shows the church of Santa Maria of Assunta from behind. The church features a black icon of Mary from the 1200s, supposedly stolen from Byzantium by pirates. A terrible storm came up, and the pirates heard the icon moaning and saying “Put me down, put me down”—“Posa, posa!”
The pirates landed the icon and settled in Positano, which took its name from the words of the statue. E.g., “Posa” became “Positano.” Or so they say.
Made with my Nikon D810, 28mm, 30 seconds at f/9 and ISO 200, tripod mounted, and minimally processed in Adobe Camera RAW and Photoshop.
