Kirkjufell on a sunny Sunday : )
I mentioned recently on my facebook page that I don't have a fancy camera, just a 14mp pink compact Lumix and my iPhone 5.
Well, the iPhone, which I'd been using more often for conveniences'-sake, has been absconded by house-elves (in Icelandic búálfar - like in that movie The Borrowers) so on our recent trip to Snæfellsnes I only had my Lumix.
I have to say, though, that after all the HDR and ultra-saturation, all the sharpen and define and added contrast available via basic photo apps these
days, it's refreshing to see the soft, easy glow from a simpler camera, albeit one with fairly high pixel count for its time (I think mine is a 2011 model). Still not at all like real film, but closer. And sometimes, what you see with your true eyes isn't crazy sharp, ultra vivid landscapes and scenes, but a more gentle overall atmosphere, an ambiance, that crispy images can't describe. I guess it's why the filter craze took hold a few years back - people were trying to give a normal, clearly defined and too-true-color image some feeling, some heart. It was us pre-80's kids trying to go back to the film era, where you had to wait a few long days (before same-day developing) to see what you'd managed to get with your instamatic. And for the younger set, like my daughter who was born in '97, filters added that old-timey retro feel of the photos found in shoeboxes in attics and garages, blurred maybe, fading, images that would be deleted today, but were maybe the only decent ones from a certain moment in time, or of a person otherwise long gone.
days, it's refreshing to see the soft, easy glow from a simpler camera, albeit one with fairly high pixel count for its time (I think mine is a 2011 model). Still not at all like real film, but closer. And sometimes, what you see with your true eyes isn't crazy sharp, ultra vivid landscapes and scenes, but a more gentle overall atmosphere, an ambiance, that crispy images can't describe. I guess it's why the filter craze took hold a few years back - people were trying to give a normal, clearly defined and too-true-color image some feeling, some heart. It was us pre-80's kids trying to go back to the film era, where you had to wait a few long days (before same-day developing) to see what you'd managed to get with your instamatic. And for the younger set, like my daughter who was born in '97, filters added that old-timey retro feel of the photos found in shoeboxes in attics and garages, blurred maybe, fading, images that would be deleted today, but were maybe the only decent ones from a certain moment in time, or of a person otherwise long gone.
So my Lumix gives a certain relaxed feel to the photos it takes (with my help) and in this instance, actually registers the fact that there was a very gentle haze in the air, the remnants of the morning fog that literally shrouded all of Kirkjufell until burning off into wispy clouds just as we got up close enough to take this photo.
I'm bummed about my missing phone - poor lost thing! - but I'm happy that I've rediscovered my other camera, and am getting images like this one, almost totally unretouched. As an added bonus, I'm spending much less time poking at a gadget when I have a few free minutes (and even when I actually really don't) and am looking up instead of looking down, and I'm witnessing the sky and the sights and the passers-by, in true color, less than vivid, almost as if I'm in a very realistic dream.
