(Double) Photo Critique: Landscapes

Welcome to our online written photo critique!
I wanted to thank all the people that sent us their pictures for the flowers theme. Critiques will be published on the 18th of June. Céline will critique here, depending on her availability. Beware of the change of mail address!

June 11 – July 02: Email us a photo at least 600 pixel wide that matches the theme given, not matter when it was taken or edited. You can add a link to the photo online in your email, or a watermark on the photo ; if not, your photo will be posted anonymously.
July 03 – July 08: The photos are judged and edited if we find it useful.
July 09: The photos are posted in order of preference with a written critique and the best ones are featured on the main page.

By Sebastien Grobelny

Double Photo Critique: Flowers

Welcome to our online written photo critique!

June 04 – June 10: Email us a photo at least 600 pixel wide that matches the theme given, not matter when it was taken or edited. You can add a link to the photo online in your email, or a watermark on the photo ; if not, your photo will be posted anonymously.
June 11 – June 17: The photos are judged and edited if we find it useful.
June 18 – June 24: The photos are posted in order of preference with a written critique and the best ones are featured on the main page, and go read Céline’s critiques on her website.

______________________________

04 Juin – 10 Juin: Envoyez-nous par email une photo d’au moins 600 pixels de large, qui correspond au thème donné, peu importe quand elle a été prise ou éditée. Vous pouvez ajouter un lien vers la photo en ligne, ou un filigrane sur la photo ; sinon, la photo sera postée anonymement.
11 Juin – 17 Juin: Les photos sont jugées et éditées si nous trouvons que c’est utile.
18 Juin – 24 Juin: Les photos sont postées par ordre de préférence avec une critique écrite et les meilleures sont affichées sur la page d’accueil et allez lire les critiques de Céline sur son site.

Liebster Award: My First Nomination!

Don’t think I have ever been nominated to anything before, so I’d like to thank Jenn from Overcoming the Odds a lot for this!

Here’s the rules for this awesome honor:

1. Each nominee must link back the person who nominated them.
2. Answer the 10 questions which are given to you by the nominator.
3. Nominate 10 other bloggers for this award who have less than 200 followers.
4. Create 10 questions for your nominees to answer.
5. Let the nominees know that they have been nominated by going to their blog and notifying them.

Here are the 10 questions from Jenn and my answers.

1. If one movie could describe your life – what is it? What are the elements of this movie that remind you of yourself? I don’t think that there is today a movie that would describe my life and if there was I’m pretty sure it would be a very ordinary movie. I wish it was a blend of Dance with the Wolves for the loner discovering the beauty of the unknown, Fight Club for the split between what I see and what happens and Blade Runner as I want to see myself as a “Badass”.
2. What are your biggest pet peeves and how do you react when faced with them? I have some issues with people that are never on time for meetings. It is a courtesy for everyone involved. If I’m faced with such people and am the leader I will adjust my starting time with their usual delay 😉
3. What is your favorite day of the year and why? What do you do on that day that makes it special? The 17th of October as it is my wife’s birthday. I’m very lucky to be with her and I try to make her day special by going to fancy restaurants, gifts and a written letter usually.
4. What is your biggest dream you are still striving for? I would love to spend more time with the wife and travel more. It may be cliche but with all the places we want to visit, it may be easier to take a sabbatical and a do trip around the world.
5. If you could travel back in time – what era would you want to live in or experience? Why? I always wonder with these questions if we retain our knowledge we have today. Can you imagine if you could travel to Middle Age with all your science? You may look like a warlock or witch because you know how to make a match or understand electricity or predict an eclipse. I would love the European Renaissance (if I was among the nobles) to meet the famous artists. If I had to pick one time, I may choose the Rush to the West and bring along some kevlar with me. I would love the idea to discover a land and make it mine.
6. Who is it that inspires you the most – famous, or close, anybody – and what is your message for them? Celine, my wife. I love you and owe you more than I will be able to repay you.
7. What would you do if you came face to face with a person you’ve always wanted to meet – living or passed? Who is that person and what would you say? I’m going to exclude dead people and fictional ones as there is 0% chance they will stumble upon that post and invite me to meet them. I’ve already met with Morgan Spurlock thanks to Lyly from Choup and Lyly and it was an incredible experience. I think I’d love to meet the Dalai Lama, ask him if I can take a portrait and the meaning of life.
8. Describe your motivations in blogging and how they have changed – if at all. Long ago I was blogging with Celine to keep a trace of our roadtrips around the USA. Nowadays I blog with photography in mind. I’d like my pictures to be seen (and why not sold) and some of interesting links to be seen by more people. I realized after 8 Long Exposures or so that I was basically only writing for myself, so I changed my posting and only post when I feel like.
9. Do you consider yourself an introvert or an extrovert? What makes you so? I am an introvert and I don’t think anyone could tell you otherwise. I love empty landscapes, silence and could spend days at home with the wife and cats without anyone else.
10. What’s your favorite weather condition? I prefer cold to warm weather as I think it’s easier to adjust to cold. I like a little rain as it keeps me quiet and thinking but I prefer snow above all. I don’t like it when it snows as the snowflakes and wind don’t make for a good combination in NYC, but I do like when the white snow is there. It’s pure and peaceful but you know it won’t last.

Here are my 10 nominees, hoping that they have not been tagged already. I tried to use WordPress as much as I could. I just realized that most of the people I follow have way more than 200 followers so I will have to remove that condition unfortunately. I wanted to share what I read and people that were active. I do apologize for the ones I left out of this list. I hope I will be able to correct this in the future.

1. Celine Ruffino’s Blog : My lovely wife with her amazing pictures.
2. Greg Urbano : A photography blog that I discovered recently
3. Feet From Shore: Yael is a spanish photographer that lives on the West Coast. I really like her pictures and her texts are inspiring
4. Morgane Byloos Photography: Great pictures and a lot of challenges to participate to.
5. Dina’s City Wildlife: Lots of nature shots and birds.
6. NikitaVdV: Nikita shots often big cats and does great commercial work in my opinion. Wish her the best.
7. Jmn Artsy: I discovered Janina with Celine while running PhotoblogChallenges. She has usually strong point of views.
8. SFoxWriting’s blog: Steven is from London and very active on his blog. It can range from pictures to poems to articles to polls. I read it daily
9. Louise Fryer Photography: I love her moody shots.
10. I showed you: I started the list with my wife and I’m going to end it up with my dear friend Christine.

Here are the 10 questions I wish I could get an answer to.

1. Did you make any resolution for the new year? If so can you share some with us?
2. If your secret identity were to never be revealed, would you be a hero or a villain? Why? (bonus question what would be your Hero/Villain name?)
3. Are you close or distant to your family? Do you wish it was different?
4. What is your favorite time of the day? Why?
5. Coke or Pepsi?
6. Cats or Dogs?
7. What is your most cherished memory?
8. Do you wish upon a star? If yes what do you usually wish for?
9. What is the place in the world you’d like to go to (or back to)? Why?
10. What is the question you wish I had asked? How would you have answered it?

Hope you will answer back to this nomination!

By Sebastien Grobelny

Contest day!

Gave 3 hints on Twitter (@louloupix) for the contest…So to win you basically have to enter a URL and post your answer in the comment 😉

Sébastien Grobelny

Hope you had a good Thanksgiving day and are not overstuffed. I give up on trying to find the name of the buds in Monument Valley but not on the contest idea.

How to win : be the first one in the comment to give the correct answer
What to win: You have the choice of either a blog post on this site* or a picture of your choice with no markup on my site** (ie you just pay the printing/shipping and I don’t earn anything on it***).

The Contest: Please name this A-lister. This shot was taken by Celine, picture was amended using the photofunny.net online app.
If needed I will provide hints at noon, 2PM and 4PM on my Twitter feed. I will also answer your comments.

* It can be original content or reblog. I will not however post ads or offensive content.
**…

View original post 77 more words

Contest day!

Hope you had a good Thanksgiving day and are not overstuffed. I give up on trying to find the name of the buds in Monument Valley but not on the contest idea.

How to win : be the first one in the comment to give the correct answer
What to win: You have the choice of either a blog post on this site* or a picture of your choice with no markup on my site** (ie you just pay the printing/shipping and I don’t earn anything on it***).

The Contest: Please name this A-lister. This shot was taken by Celine, picture was amended using the photofunny.net online app.
If needed I will provide hints at noon, 2PM and 4PM on my Twitter feed. I will also answer your comments.

* It can be original content or reblog. I will not however post ads or offensive content.
** I removed pictures recently but I can still print them. So if you don’t find directly on the site don’t hesitate to look at my other site.
*** A 4×6 is usually sold for 2$. You could get it for 0.99$. A 8×12 is usually sold for about 10$. You could get it for about 5$. Money goes directly to the printer. If you’re interested in some merchandise (like mugs/wallets..) I can add them

By Sebastien Grobelny

Long Exposure #7 : My first critic

On Tuesday Celine took me to our first ever photo critic. There was a bit of frenzy on Monday night to pick up what we would present. I wasn’t initially supposed to go but with a little bit of pushing here and there, I was convinced into going. It was at the B&H Event Space.

I ended presenting from my Studio Projects gallery. The idea was that I thought that a lot of people would present travel and portraits and I also wanted to be able to progress on this with targeted assignments. Thought it would be more difficult to re-shoot a landscape in Monument Valley on a whim ;).

Here are the 5 shots I picked in the same order I presented them.

1$ bill detail shot with the 100mm f/2.8 @1/10s

Processing experiment with paint. Shot with 100mm at f/11 and 1/15s

Detail of my old AlienWare laptop shot with 60mm f/2.8 @6/10s

Detail of a Mc Donalds Angus Deluxe shot with 60mm f/2.8 @1/125s

Troopers and Vador with 100mm f/4 1/125s

I thought this would be one on ones, us versus the panel of critics. Instead the pictures of everyone where put up on screens and discussed by the critics and often times other participants. Celine went first, and I thought it went pretty well. I went close to the end and left with a ton of questions. I’m very grateful for the critics and the opportunity. I was able to see what I’m up against and how to better myself. I think I’m currently following a similar process than grief and am currently between denial and bargaining. I will eventually be there, but I will need some time.

Don’t hesitate to leave your critics in the comment section or if you want to get some constructive criticism put some links of your own there.

By Sebastien Grobelny

Happy Birthday Celine!

Happy birthday love!
You’re my muse, my model, my inspiration.
Hope you will have a wonderful day!
Love you.

Shot by Sebastien Grobelny – Edit by Sebastien and Celine

If you want to wish Celine an happy birthday, you can go to her website, leave her a comment on her aminus page, participate in Photoblogchallenges.

By Sebastien Grobelny

World Wide Photo Walk

I do apologize if you were looking for your weekly long exposure fix but it will come back next week.

Tomorrow, on Saturday 5th of October I will be part of the World Wide Photo Walk. It was created 6 years ago by Scott Kelby and it will be the first one I will attend. The idea is to meet up with fellow photographer and follow a leader in a specific area. I will go with Celine and Christine and we will take part of the Greenwood walk. We will spend most of our time in the Greenwood Cemetery that is an historic landmark.

I’m very curious to see how it all goes down but last time I went to a cemetery for pictures was on a whim in New Orleans with Celine. It is a very special atmosphere to say the least.

There is also a challenge component that is fascinating. You have the opportunity to post a picture to a pool and your group leader will submit the best submissions worldwide. Last years winner was Lars from Sweden. Lars is better known on Photoblogchallenges as Larans 😉

There are apparently still openings so don’t hesitate if you want to join. Just click this link to find a walk near you.

By Sebastien Grobelny