Europe: the charm of the Old World

[drumma]

yeah.. it happens like this at times. northern lights can be seen in the mid parts of finland as well.. so i'm not very surprised that u can catch it in kiruna. in fact i would think that in places like tornio, northern lights can be seen too! but hey, it's getting warmer now!

 

[shawn207]

I actually chose Sweden because of academic issues (course matching and course availability etc.) as well. Which Swedish university are you looking at?

Yup it's relatively safe, and the people, while not overtly warm and friendly, are mostly very nice and helpful. They are actually quite similar to Singaporeans in many aspects in terms of mentality, as compared to say, Mediterranean Europeans like the Italians.

university of gothenburg, near the coast on the west.

yeah man i agree with you. the spanish i encountered werent v friendly when i was in spain.

 

[P1840]

'because you've worn me down'

Hi, nice series u have there! Did you adjust the colour tone of the picture, reduce the saturation or anything? It is really nice!

 

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university of gothenburg, near the coast on the west.

yeah man i agree with you. the spanish i encountered werent v friendly when i was in spain.

That's a pretty good location because there's a ryanair airport in Gothenburg (although it has less destinations than Stockholm); go for it!

 

[verselines]

Hi, nice series u have there! Did you adjust the colour tone of the picture, reduce the saturation or anything? It is really nice!

Thanks. I adjusted the white balance, and used the split toning adjustment in Lightroom, along with the basic sliders.

 

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At the hostel in Kiruna, Sweden

 

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In the wilderness of the arctic circle

 

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'Lights Will Guide You Home' - the aurora borealis aka the northern lights. The photos do not do justice to what many call 'nature's greatest light show'. Seeing the magnificent green lights dance across the night sky, I was humbled and profoundly reminded of my humanity and insignificance.

(on a geeky note: this is where I missed my DSLR the most. the horrible low light performance of the micro 4/3 sensor is really evident, and the snail-like processing time for long exposures was really a pain.)

 

[conqueror]

Very nice series you have!

 

[SK1968]

Firstly I must say I like all your street shots!!

Hi there. I'm using a micro 4/3 set up - panasonic gf1 with 20mm prime which I use most of the time, and 14-45 zoom mostly for wide angle coverage. It's nice and compact (great for taking ryan air flights and you appreciate the light weight when hauling your backpack from train stations to hostels) but there are compromises in image quality of course.

I would recommend wide angle or even ultra wide coverage for Europe - good for landscapes, architecture and candid street shots to give you more dof.

Your 'basic' setup has certainly done better than many much high-end ones !!

Thanks

To be honest I wouldn't recommend Sweden. It's really expensive in terms of cost of living, and they use a different currency (SEK) rather than the Euro. Plus if you learn Swedish its pretty useless since only Sweden and some Scandic countries use the language. There's also not much to see in Sweden itself compared to other places in Europe. Not to mention the long and super cold winters (its supposed to be spring already but it just snowed again a couple days ago... -_-)

The plus points are that the people here are really nice (although not warm and friendly in an overt sense), almost everyone young and old speaks excellent english, and of course, the scandinavians are really good looking

I'd go to somewhere like Germany where its relatively cheap for European standards, has a good location right in the middle of Europe which is great for traveling, and learning the language there is useful because its used pretty widely.

You are right about the Swedes. They seem cold but when you get to know them, they are really really nice people. I spent a good 3.5 yrs there 10 yrs ago and still miss the place up till today! For me, the cold didn't bother me a bit, I simply love the icy cold feeling..haha

'Lights Will Guide You Home' - the aurora borealis aka the northern lights. The photos do not do justice to what many call 'nature's greatest light show'. Seeing the magnificent green lights dance across the night sky, I was humbled and profoundly reminded of my humanity and insignificance.

(on a geeky note: this is where I missed my DSLR the most. the horrible low light performance of the micro 4/3 sensor is really evident, and the snail-like processing time for long exposures was really a pain.)

Nice! You are very fortunate! I went to the Arctic Circle twice (Kiruna and Rovaniemi) and saw nothing, nothing at all.

Shoot more while you are still there and post here ....

 

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view from the bus ride back to small town jonkoping.

 

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