Today is a travel day. My first #WordCamp in a very long time. #WCCH
Journal
This week me and the girls are home alone – without Ulya. She is in Turkey right now, helping her family deal with the earthquake aftermath. We are very fortunate that everybody is fine, while so many others were not. She brought a six-person tent and yesterday they managed to set it up next to the house – which is still standing, but they are afraid to sleep in it, until it is properly inspected and declared safe.
There Is No Perfect Backpack
I am with Paolo. I love backpacks, and I have used a fair share of them over the years.
I used the Peak Design Everyday Backpack 30 l for quite some time, but it is too sturdy and heavy (~2.1 kg when empty) for me. I found that I like to optimize for weight, so my choice for a long time was a Heimplanet backpack, called the Motion Arc (20 l). I love how it looks and it is probably the most comfortable backpack to carry ever, also because it is very lightweight at just just 740 g. It has gotten a bit too small for my needs and I have had some quality issues with it – the waterproof coating on the inside was coming apart after a couple of years of heavy use – but Heimplanet sent me a replacement for free!
Now, the Tom Bihn Synapse had been on my list to try out for a very long time. I think I had it in my head since I read a blog post many years ago, where the author used it as their one-bag travel bag. Last year I finally pulled the trigger on a Synic 30, which is kind of the improved successor of the Synapse. The price – and especially the shipping to Germany – are quite outrageous, and the main reason I didn’t get it sooner. But I am glad I bought it, because I like it a lot. It is not the prettiest bag, but it is very well made, very versatile and the organization is exactly what I need.
What I don’t need, is anything special for my camera. I usually just dump it in the main compartment with the rest of my stuff. When I am carrying more gear, I use a pouch made by Crumpler, which I bought for very cheap at a photography trade show. I find it more versatile than having a dedicated photography backpack, that is only really useful for camera gear. Also, when travelling I can just pull out the pouch and leave it at the accommodation.
With the Synic I like that for my daily carry, I still have enough room to do some light grocery shopping and it fits most handicrafts the kids make in kindergarten.
Even though it is not perfect (eg. no waterproofing) I am planing on using the Synic for a very, very long time and (for now) I am successfully resisting the urge to watch any backpack reviews, whenever I come across them on YouTube.
I recently added some stats to my photo blog: https://florian.photo/stats
I was surprised to find out, that the current streak (117 days and counting) is not the longest to date. Turns out that between 2016 and 2017 I managed to post 151 days in a row! I did not track it back then and that’s probably why I missed a day – and then continued to post for another 25 days straight.
I bought a ticket for WordCamp Europe 2023 in Athens! After missing last year’s #wceu, I am looking forward to exploring a city I have never been to and meeting many of the people I haven’t seen since 2019!
I got a friendly email yesterday from a reader of my photoblog (or is it viewer, because there is not that much to read… well, I digress), which made my day! I stopped tracking views, so I have no idea how many people are looking at my images. I generally post for myself, mainly to keep me making more, new photographs. But getting a compliment from a complete stranger still feels nice! Thanks!
2022 Retrospective
In 2022 I archived1 21,469 photos, 4,846 of which, I marked as favorites. (2021’s numbers for comparison: 22,097 archived, 4,809 favorites. That is pretty consistent, I’d say.)
35 % of images are tagged “home”, which means I took them at and around my home. (46 % in 2021). 45 % of all of my 2022 images have at least one of my daughters in them, which further indicates that documenting my family is by far the most important part of my photographic practice.
Last year I got a new camera, the Fujifilm X-E4, which I used for roughly 34 % of my images. The Leica M is still number one at 49 %, the Q accounts for 13 % of photographs taken in 2022. (The remaining 4 % are various cameras I only used for testing, etc.)
I took the most images in May, 2,948 to be exact.
(See 2021)
Books I created in 2022
- Elvan Matilda Lumi 5: Fifth year in the life of my daughter Lumi, 232 pages, March 2022
- beyond moments Berlin 2022: Event documentation of beyond tellerrand in Berlin, 68 pages, September 2022
- Türkei 2022: Documents our visit to our family in Turkey, 188 pages, November 2022
- Zila Erna Suvi 3: Third year in the life of my daughter Suvi, 238 pages, December 2022
(See books I created in 2021 and 2020)
- I shoot way more. These are just the ones I am keeping.↩︎
I Am Not a Fan of Consuming Photography Online
I am not a fan of consuming photography online. Which probably sounds weird, coming from someone who just finished 100 days of posting daily to his photoblog. I should probably clarify this a bit:
I do not like looking at photographs in a feed like application like Instagram or Mastodon (as I learned just recently, when I tried to follow some photo related hashtags).
My main issue is with presentation and image size: Photos are way too small to appreciate them really and they are all in the same format and context.
Also I am missing intentionality. I am not looking at photographer X’s work, I am just looking at everything at once – and whatever some algorithm deems right for me at the moment. (Not on Mastodon, but following hashtags feels pretty much the same.)
Don’t get me wrong, I do not have an issue looking at photos on a screen – although nothing – nothing! – beats the printed image – but I would rather go to people’s websites, where they present their images in a way that they think fits their work best and that they put a little bit of effort into.
So I guess, what I am trying to say is this: Create a dedicated place for your photography online. Get a website going, start a photoblog and share your images in a format that they deserve.
If you already have a photoblog, please share it with me. I’d love to follow along.
A couple of my wrestling images have been on display at collective.ruhr for almost month now. It is always so nice to see my work printed and framed!
Still very much enjoying our Tern GSD (cargo e-bike). Used it today to haul some stuff to the recycling yard. (I am always the only one on a bike. 😂)
