Those of you in the know, who spend time processing photos in your digital darkroom, probably know that it is possible to "correct" images for some types of distortion, including vertical corrections (for which a tilt lens is usually required). With careful thought, and a bit of luck, it is possible to avoid corrections altogether and position yourself (and the camera) in such a way as to ensure that vertical lines appear vertical, and buildings do not look like they are falling over.
This practice is basically pointless in Amsterdam. The buildings are all over the place!
I left you last time, on tenterhooks, wondering where I was going. On Thursday we booked flights and three nights in a nice looking hotel in central Amsterdam, rather than waste the weekend on eBay looking at lenses and so on. I also decided to just take my RX1, and concentrate on not concentrating—on just having a good time. I took 54 photos, and have designated 30 as worth keeping. Those will be presented in the blog over the next week or so.
I know for sure that one of my readers, a fellow blogger (Björn), will recognise this place. He should do—he lived there for many years. I started to follow Björn's inspiring daily photoblog (you should visit it—he's now in Kuala Lumpur!) back when I was in Tokyo, and he in Amsterdam. It was always "on my list" as a destination worth visiting, but when the weather forecast looked good for the weekend, the 40 minute flight seemed like a no brainer.
I wasn't aware that Amsterdam actually has more canals than Venice. Were you? I've not yet been to Venice, but I really did like how the canals broke up the city, and made a nice change from the standard car-centric layout of many cities.
These beautiful buildings really are one of the signatures of this fine city.