Richard Vanek - Black and White Photography

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Archive

Sunday, 8th July, 2007

I'm back now, for a few days
[posted at 20:25 GMT]    

After little travel 1500km there and back we have returned home yesterday late night. I saw old friends and my parents, sister and many nice people. Now I will be in The Netherlands for next 10 days and than I am flying to Tokyo.

Monday, 16th July, 2007

Birthday
[posted at 07:54 GMT]    

And yes today I have birthday. I am forty years old. I must say numbers are terrible, especially these numbers. I do not really care how old I am, but sometimes one feel it.
Some of my friends and even Viera has complained that I am writing here only bloody technical stuff, dilution of developers, papers and things like that. Well even I do not feel it is that much I will try to limit it and write something from deep of my soul.

Sunday we visited friends above Amsterdam. The friend who is arranging contacts for my exposition there for next year. We actually went to look at exposition place. I must frankly said that I expected something little bit, not really bigger but... How to say it. The walls are not empty so that means disturbing view for observer. That is actually only thing which makes me bit uncomfortable. The building is very nice old 17 century town hall.

At the beach
[posted at 09:17 GMT]    

Yesterday we spent some time on beach above the Harlem (The Netherlands). Among other things we also visited interesting shell exposition. Each shell had inside player playing story, music. Thanks to the different shapes of the shell glass, sound was coming out differently. Also each shell had different story or music playing. I made some shots with my phone.
You may find some of them interesting, leave a comment if you do. I like to know what do you think about images like these.










Thursday, 19th July, 2007

In Tokyo
[posted at 04:31 GMT]    

I just arrived in Tokyo after 10 hours flight and some train I am sitting in hotel. I am tired even I got some hours of sleep in the airplane. I will write more later, now I need to get shower and something to eat ;-)

Saturday, 21st July, 2007

As a human
[posted at 13:47 GMT]    

With the decision to write as a human and not as photographer I posting here few images from Tokyo where I am now. This weekend as a tourist I have more time than I will over the working week days.
I visited few places in Tokyo area today and had some experience in previous two days as well. I must say I like it here quite a lot. I try to enjoy as much as possible and trying to avoid all wester culture. That means I am eating japan's food, visiting normal places and trying to avoid shopping ;-) Well yes I went today to few shops to buy presents.


I just returned from dinner and being alone in restaurant I had to use only my fingers and pictures to make order. I have got excellent food and even I was bit uncertain what to order the two couples in next table made my day. I have order japan's food raw salmon with some fruit and than excellent soup which I have no idea what was it in, but tastes great. The four people in next table made order or cheese fondue. And there were fighting with it, not knowing how to eat it, when they decided to stop with it and made order of some traditional japan's food which they attacked with chop sticks :-)

I must say that I am looking more for places where it is less people, but it is rather difficult ;-)

I am making pictures with my Nikon, but also some with my phone to send home immediately some pictures over email. You can see few of them here. Quality is very low, but time to publish very short :-D



Segafredo Cafe
[posted at 13:55 GMT]    

As I wrote I am enjoy everything what is from japan when I am here now. I am drinking a lot of green time and eating raw fish, rise and similar. One thing with which I didn't depart is espresso. I am happy to say that just next to the hotel at the entrance to Shinagawa station is small Segafredo Cafe. They making perfect espresso. I am enjoying it every day. Personal is very friendly. Very nice small place, exactly what I like. If you ever in Tokyo and you like to have great espresso, come here:

Monday, 23rd July, 2007

Nikon Paradise
[posted at 14:06 GMT]    

After work today I went quickly back to hotel took a shower and than went on train to Akihabara, where yodobashi camera has huge place. First time I had chance to have Nikon F6 in my hands. I have only one thing to say WOW. That is THE CAMERA. Viewfinder is such we can only dream about and you from digital world, you can write science fiction about. It is a bit more heavier than my Nikon F100, but not too much. It sits perfectly in hand and the shutter is not silent, but it has very pleasant sound. Sound you expect from long lasting shutter. So take a look at the Nikon Paradise. And of course not only Nikon, but I was mostly focusing on that.
I bough also some inkjet papers just for testing in small formats. I had chance to see images on Epson Ultra Smooth Fine Art Paper and it is great paper indeed. Feel is perfect and images (black and white) looks very nice on it. Smallest size is A3. They had A3+ and A2. Price is too much for me, even here in Tokyo. Maybe one day when people start buying my prints regularly, I can start using this great paper, which one sheet will go as much as five euro.
I also saw monitor which really had extremely nice presentation of images. Samsung SyncMaster XL20. Costs here as much as 1000 euro, but images where great.





Friday, 27th July, 2007

Packed
[posted at 12:35 GMT]    

So today is my last evening in Tokyo. Tomorrow morning I am flying back home to The Netherlands. It was a great week. I knew now nice people. Tokyo and especially its people made very nice impression to me.
I also met Dirk Rosler in person. Very nice and friendly guy, which I know over internet for few years. I didn't spend much time of taking photographs as dark is here from 19:00 and I was daily busy with work until 17:00 or sometimes bit longer. Anyway I know the place a bit now I need to learn few more words in Japanese and next year I may extend my one week of work with one week of holiday.

Going through my email I have added few nice images to my delicious section you can see on front page. Now I am almost packed, need to get in bed earlier to get some extra sleep before tomorrows 12 hour flight.

Sunday, 29th July, 2007

My site in b&w magazine
[posted at 21:52 GMT]    

Today my friend Jacco send me information that this web page is published in August issue of Black and White Magazine in UK. I am pleased. Thank you very much. They write quite nice about it, well just read it in attached image.
After one day I am leaving for short holiday. One week in Italy and week in Slovakia. Now I realize they write (in b & w magazine) that I am Czech photographer, but you know I am from Slovakia :-)