Nils is 365 Days Old. Fill Flash Challenge.

What's in that box?
1/640s F2.8 ISO 100, Fill Flash

Nils is 365 days old. We celebrated his 1st birthday yesterday!

This was a party! I was a bit afraid how this little young man going to take it but he went through it with strength and dignity.

Happy Birthday Nils!

Such events are fantastic opportunity for photographers. Kids are so absorbed with their new toys and people around them that they completely do not care about cameras and simply enjoy every little moment. I tried to capture as much as I could. I shot lots of photos but they are more family ones and having Nil's mother permission I am sharing just few with Nils to explain the techniques I used.

The party started at 2 p.m. with the sun relatively high and very little clouds. We were outside so I was facing the situation of flat hard shadows pictures. I had my two strobes with me including radio transmitters.... taken just case. I wanted to capture my today's "model" so to speak in the sunlight with relatively good colours in the background but he should be well lit, especially when I was shooting into the sun. You have to use fill flash. I quickly gave up an idea of off-camera flash as there was no way to follow this man with camera and light stand (I did not have an assistant).

Stephan's Dome, Long Exposures, Panorama

Tourists River in Vienna Old Town, City Centre

Different topic today.

Total slow down from concerts, no landscapes, no nature. Today heart of Vienna city - Stephan's Dome. For anyone coming to Vienna it is I believe number one place to visit. To be honest, it is not my favourite place to visit and and shoot. 12 months a year regardless of weather conditions, this place is packed full with tourists, tons of people and limited space.

The dome is massive and surrounded by buildings all over and there is no single spot where you can really get proper angle to shoot it in full view.

John Petrucci (Dream Theater) Interview

John Petrucci & Jerzy Biń
(after the interview)

Carrying on with concert photography topic I thought I would share the interview I shot for DarkScene.at back in February this year, just before Dream Theater concert at Vienna Gasometer. My pictures are published on DarkScene site and also on my website - Dream Theater gallery.

John Petrucci interviewed by Richman (DarkScene), Camera - Jerzy Biń

Concert Photography

Wiener Blut Live at ((Szene)), Vienna

Hello there,


I love concert photography, I love it for at least three reasons that come to my mind now - I love the music and I love to capture emotions during musicians’ performances, the more action on the stage the better, and I like challenges of low light photography. On top of you have a good chance to be able to show your pictures to wider audience. Especially if bands like your work, they will be sharing your pictures to promote themselves. Eventually at one stage it can even pay off.

Mojo Blues Band at Metropol, Vienna

I started with concert photography about year, year and a half ago and have kept climbing the ladder into getting better (technically) and getting access to larger venues and finding work for different magazines, or promoter, or simply bands themselves. Since I am a fan of heavy metal and hard rock and simply rock obviously I directed myself into this area while looking for ways getting myself in. In this way I can enjoy the music and the show and work at the same time. However I noticed when it comes to shooting and I am fully concentrated on framing shots, anticipating movements, and photographing I hardly remember the music itself. All that stays are visuals in my minds but cannot really say what the first three songs were. Typically you are allowed to shoot only first three songs but it varies with bands and their management style and promoter and venue. Small clubs in most of the cases do not care and you can shoot all you want. With bigger halls, first you need to go through hell to get accreditation to even get in with the camera and then you are strictly limited three numbers in most of the cases.

Record Emotions

Hello World,

Let's start photo blog.

I keep shooting pictures, upload them to galleries, post some on facebook. Collected already large number of them but some of my favourites miss the story behind them. Perhaps this way I will be able to record feelings associated with them. Maybe also will get some comments.

So let's start.

Danube waters overflowing the bank
(Schönau an der Donau)

Last two weeks or so I kept shooting indoor concerts. It almost became like a routine; every second day day, or actually night, spent in dark arena chasing guys jumping around stages. I will blog about that other time.

So I needed a break and see some light and feel some nature and water (I love water). On Sunday early evening drove to Schönau an der Donau - few kilometres east of Vienna by Danube river. I have been there number of times but this Sunday water was really high. Small stony island where I used to position myself was completely flooded and I was able to witness fantastic water bank overflow. Normally there is a path toward the trees you see in the background.

The day was not particularly colour inspiring. On top of that almost setting sun was in front of me to the right. So I was shooting into the sun. No way to get correct exposure. Could not use ND grads because there was no clear line to hold on to. I shot two pictures with different shutter speed setting exposing for the sky and trees. To get some better colour effect I put on my Gold-N-Blue polarizer. Then blended both pictures in post production. I shot also horizontal version of the scene but this one speaks more to me.