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The Hasselblad Way
As the readers of this blog know, I seldom talk about gear because since the very first post on this blog I made a point of stay focused on (shooting) pictures instead of musing about pointless technicalities such as Camera A vs Camera B ISO performance, Lens X vs Lens Y sharpness, APS-C vs Full Frame and so on, but today I do an exception because of an old Hasselbld 500 C/M that I have been given to try (and that probably will buy.) There is only one way to shoot with a Hasselblad: following its rule. The film has to be loaded in a certain way, the magazine…
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London Panning
Pure Luck. Sometimes happens.
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Behind the Beer
Behind the beer’s sockets, a barman discretely fulfills the order placed by his clients.
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Christmas Time at Covent Garden
I caught this moment at Covent Garden during the run-up to Christmas—a place already soaked in atmosphere, now further steeped in the low murmur of seasonal anticipation. The light was dimming, not quite golden hour, but soft enough to let the scene breathe. Shot with the Leica M9, the CCD sensor rendered the colours with that particular tonal grit that makes digital files feel almost filmic. You can sense the density of the blacks without them ever falling into shadow-mud. What first caught my eye was the woman in the red coat. Not just the brightness of the garment—which naturally draws the eye—but the posture, the precise angle of the…
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A Curious Bystander
Rue de la Regence, at night. A fast pace calls the attention of a bystander.
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Late Afternoon Workers
At Place de la Monnaie, in Bruxelles, late-afternoon workers look their life go by, while the rest of the world, enjoy the fun. This photo felt less like a building and more like a roll of exposed film. Fifteen windows, side by side. Fifteen little theatres. The framing is perfect—not by accident, but by architecture. A row of lives unfolding under fluorescent light. You can almost hear the hum. Some rooms are empty. Some are dim. In a few, people remain—cleaning up, wrapping gifts, turning off screens. There are Christmas trees, forgotten chairs, coats slung over partitions. And above all, stillness. Each window holds its own shot. Unrelated, disconnected. A…
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A Bookstore in the Gallery
Taken in Bruxelles with a Leica M9, this photograph is as much about the atmosphere of a winter evening as it is about the subject itself. The bookseller, wrapped in a red scarf, is absorbed in the simple act of handling a book — a gesture that feels timeless, insulated from the passing crowd outside. The “Joyeuses Fêtes” decoration strung above her offers a seasonal frame, hinting at the warmth inside against the cold beyond the window. The composition is direct and frontal, using the shelves of books as both background and structure. The vertical and horizontal lines create order, their rhythm occasionally broken by a tilted spine or a…
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Waiting to Go Home
The gate is still close, a long wait before boarding, is easier to bear when seated comfortably.
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Shopping in Bruxelles
Early afternoon in Bruxelles, The best moment to go shopping.
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Landed
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A Winter Outdoor Chat
In the late afternoon light, when the sun sat low and cast a warm hue across the scene, two men are captured in conversation: one standing, bundled in a heavy jacket, the other seated, his green woollen cap and dark windbreaker contrasting with the golden glow. Their exchange appears informal, unposed, an everyday moment shaped by the season’s chill. Technically, the image benefits from natural light. The exposure leans toward warmth, enriching skin tones and enhancing the textures of clothing and tree bark. Shadows are long but not intrusive, while highlights avoid excess glare. Compositionally, the tree trunk on the right acts as a vertical anchor, framing the seated figure…
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When the Rubbish Basket is full…
I made this photograph with the lens barely above the surface. The irony hit me only later: a crumpled, rusting bin—designed to contain waste—floating free, stripped of purpose, drifting like a rejected artefact in a river that had no interest in borders or rules. This wasn’t a chase-the-light moment. It was more of a document-what’s-happening moment. But even in documentary photography, composition matters. The crumpled bin sits dead-centre, emerging from the water like a reluctant symbol. The surrounding wash of grey-brown is indistinct by design—an oppressive field of repetition, without texture or detail, forcing the viewer back to that sodden, disfigured centre. Technically, I shot this with a long lens…
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The Day After The Tide
After the tide, the river comes back to normality, while the boatmen account for the damages. I waited for the light to fall low enough to cut across the hulls and expose what the flood left behind. This isn’t a storm photo—it’s what follows. Boats grounded sideways, lines tangled, some afloat, some tilted into the banks. Nothing dramatic. Just consequence. Shot from the opposite bank with a 300mm telephoto, compressed enough to layer the damage. The image stacks: river in the foreground, boats mid-frame, wreckage and crane behind. The eye bounces between verticals—poles, masts, supports—and diagonals—listing decks and snapped canopies. It’s cluttered by design. Recovery never looks clean. Exposure leaned toward…
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Holding Against the Tide
Time was running short and felt compressed. The tide was coming in faster than expected, and the sailor’s movements had lost any trace of routine. Urgency reshaped posture, gesture, and balance. The man is bent forward, his body pulled into the rigging as if negotiating directly with the boat rather than controlling it. His grip is firm but not elegant. There is no choreography here—only necessity. The frame excludes his face entirely. The choice was not deliberate, however it didn’t matter, since identity is secondary; what mattered was the physical negotiation between human weight, rope tension, and a changing shoreline.
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A HDR Experiment
This is my first – and possibly, last – attempt of using HDR to post-process my pictures. Unless I’m able to get a more creative outcome, there is no reason to have pictures that look deadly similar to those of the other users of Nik Software Collection (as I am:))
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Clandestine Seagull
I took this photograph in the harbour, late in the afternoon when the light had already started to fade into that bluish, uncertain zone. The boat was clearly not preparing to set sail, yet there was this lone seagull perched as if ready for departure, almost waiting for a conductor to come and check its ticket. That hint of anthropomorphic humour is what made me stop and press the shutter. Compositionally, the bird sits roughly on the intersection of thirds, naturally drawing the eye amid the clutter of fishing gear, ropes, and rust. The machinery around it frames the subject without enclosing it, lending a sense of depth and context.…
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The Traffic Controller
The man in the reflective uniform wasn’t posing, wasn’t waiting. He was simply doing his job — coordinating chaos with the quiet authority only experience provides. The scene unfolded quickly: the fire brigade’s crane on standby, the red and blue lights diffused by daylight, the line of hesitant cars waiting for a signal that only one person could give. I didn’t have much time to frame this; sometimes a good photograph is more a matter of presence than planning. I shot slightly underexposed to preserve the detail in the brighter areas of the sky and keep the colour temperature cool and flat, emphasising the mundane over the dramatic. Compositionally, the…
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A Couch in the Yard
When the winter falls, a lonely couch only hosts a few leaves.
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An Altar for the Propaganda Machine
A powerful weapon, that equally served the good and the evil. I centred the composition with purpose. The typewriter is the object of worship—flanked symmetrically by twin candelabras, topped by a crude wire-and-canvas sketch. Every element builds the metaphor. This is not furniture. It’s altar, theatre, relic. The machine is a vintage Olivetti. The light picks out its curves softly from camera right, bouncing off the keys and reinforcing the tactile weight of metal. It’s flanked by yellow candles—unused, deliberately vertical, unnaturally pristine. The contrast isn’t subtle. Industrial memory and ornamental symbolism in rigid balance. Above it all, the artwork floats: childish, abstract, gestural. Possibly a bicycle, possibly nothing. I included it…
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Up Where the World Unfolds
Some things — and some beings — refuse to stay where they are expected. This small mushroom, instead of emerging humbly from the soil like its kin, chose a perch on a weathered branch, lifted just high enough to see more of the world. I don’t know if fungi can be ambitious, but the sight of it certainly suggested a story of quiet defiance. I positioned the camera so the log would slice horizontally through the frame, letting the mushroom rise like a solitary sentinel against the blurred green backdrop. The shallow depth of field was essential here: it isolates the subject while allowing the texture of the bark and…
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Common Fate
There is a certain poetry in abandonment, a quiet narrative that emerges when objects, once part of daily life, are left to weather the seasons. Here, a potted plant—its container fractured but still holding its fragile inhabitant—leans against the white planks of a wall. Beside it, an old wooden chair, tipped forward, legs worn and uneven, stands as if caught mid-fall. Both share the same exile: placed outdoors, exposed to the damp green creep of moss and the chill of winter air. Their once-practical roles—providing comfort, holding life—have shifted into symbols of transience. The wood of the chair, scarred by years of use, echoes the plant’s brittle stems. Each has…
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Night Shift At The Gas Station
The cold was real. It soaked through the synthetic layers, condensed on every metal surface, and wrapped this frame in its own damp silence. What drew me to release the shutter wasn’t the uniform or the pump, but the stillness — a kind of pause in the machinery of necessity. This man, anonymous but emblematic, stood under the artificial glow of sodium light, framed by geometry and function. Technically, this isn’t a sharp image — and I’m glad it’s not. The slight blur works to its advantage, echoing the condensation on the glass through which I shot, or maybe just the fatigue of a night too long. The colours, though,…
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An illuminated escape path will help you to reach the exits …
After a night of steady rain, the city had fallen into that reflective state that only wet streets can produce. The pavement was still slick, holding onto the water as though unwilling to let it drain away. Streetlights scattered across the surface, each one elongating into streaks and patches of colour, turning an ordinary walkway into a shifting canvas of muted golds and greens. What caught my eye first was the faint line of embedded lights tracing a curve through the centre of the frame. They weren’t bright enough to dominate the scene, but they did give it direction—a subtle guide through the reflections and irregular textures. The rain had…
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Portrait of a Lawyer
Not every portrait needs a full frame. Sometimes, it’s what’s just out of focus that tells the most. Shot close—uncomfortably close—this image doesn’t try to flatter. It doesn’t seek symmetry or polish. The man’s on the phone, mid-thought, caught between reaction and restraint. His eyes are sharp, but not fixed. His hand rises instinctively to his face, as if shielding or steadying something unspoken. The photograph is grainy, the depth shallow. One lens, one second, one expression pulled between two worlds: the one he’s hearing and the one he’s trying to shape with his response. You don’t hear the voice on the other end, but you can sense it—by the…
