Misty Morning Mood

 While I was in Venice I shot almost exclusively in black and white, but the beauty of digital photography (as long as you are shooting in RAW) you can process the final image pretty much how you want. When uploading the black and white images into Adobe Lightroom they are automatically converted to colour images so I then have the option of changing them back or working on the colour image.

I really like the foggy images in black and white although a slight adjustment to the blue channel in the fifth image of the gondolas in front of the Doge's palace adds another dimension which is really nice.

The sixth image is in colour and it highlights how much the fog has muted the colours that would normally be so vibrant along the Grand Canal.

As well as capturing the sights of the city I spent a lot of time capturing images of the people who live, work and visit Venice. I think Gondoliers make excellent subjects to photograph and although their persistent attempts to get people to take a ride  as they cry "Godola! Gondole!" (on almost every bridge over ever canal) can be a little annoying  I did enjoy snapping some pictures of them at work.

I really like the first image; three gondoliers had been talking to the guy on the path and discussing the proposed route they would take him along. During the course of this a fire service boat, with lights flashing passed by and as the tide was still quite high was having to approach each bridge with extreme caution and the one gondolier was watching the drama unfold while his colleagues continued their spiel.

Although it was mid week and still quite early in the year and tourist numbers were low there was still a number of large groups being led around by enthusiastic guides. I prefer to wander and explore on my own but I think I caught the tour group in a moment of intent interest as they craned their necks to see whatever their guide was talking about.

One of my bugbears is when people walk around constantly glued to their phones or mobile devices. The number of times I had to manoeuvre around individuals so intent on their little screens as they walked around that they almost marched into me. How crazy it is that you go to beautiful city like Venice and spend so much time looking down. Of course staying connected is important but it shouldn't be at the expense of appreciating the beauty that is around. At least the woman in the fourth image above had stopped to read or send her message rather than walking headlong into other people, if only more people had been like that. Ok sorry i will get off my soapbox now.

Hopefully that little rant hasn't detracted from your enjoyment of the pictures above. 

Out of the Fog

 On a foggy morning the atmosphere in Venice is amazing. The bright colours are muted and some of the landmarks disappear or fade and it creates the perfect conditions for some amazing photographs.

Obviously I took advantage of that and above are just a few images to get things going. There will be more but I will mix  them up a bit over time.

You can see from the third image that the ground in St Mark's Square is wet that is because the high tide had washed over into the square during the night and early hours. It didn't flood to any great depth but it did add to the excitement of being there. Especially when in the weeks leading up to the trip all the news reports about Venice had said the canals were dry. I had seen photos online of empty canals and low water but they only reflected a small part of the city at very low tide and did not really indicate that Venice was actually running dry, proving (if proof was needed) that you should not believe everything you read online.