Mikael Rantalainen Photography
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Monthly Archives: April 2011
A short recap of my landscape photography course
Landscape photography course participants photograping pack ice
Four weeks ago I was teaching in the landscape photography course in Kameraseura. The course was arranged in three parts: 3 hours of theory on Friday evening in Kameraseura premises, 5+ hour photography trip on Saturday, and 6 hours of theory in Kameraseura on Sunday.
I started the course on Friday evening with the presentation about landscape photography equipment (cameras, lenses, tripods and other accessories) and the art of landscape photography (i.e. planning, composition, how to use light, effect of different weather conditions,…). I had also asked course participants to bring two photos with them: one successful landscape photo, and one photo that had failed although the situation was fantastic. I provided feedback what worked and what could have be improved in those photos in my opinion.
Pack ice in Suomenlinna
On Saturday we made five hour photography trip to Suomenlinna with the target to apply the lessons from Friday. We were extremely lucky with the weather, that Saturday was definitely one of the best landscape photography days during this spring: There was pack ice on the shores and nice clouds in the sky during afternoon. At sunset time we had nice colourful sunset and interesting ice formations on the rocks, they were literally glazed with ice 
45 minutes before sunset in Suomenlinna
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Posted in Art of landscape photography, Landscape, Landscape photography course, Nature, Photography course, Seascape
Tagged course, Finland, Helsinki, ice, Landscape, sunset, winter
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New galleries: ISU World Synchronized Skating Championships 2011
Team Croatia / Link to Gallery I
Team USA 1 / Link to Gallery II
Like I wrote on last Sunday, I photographed the free program in ISU World Synchronized Skating Championships 2011 on last Saturday. Here are now two galleries.
I have photographed synchronized skating earlier, but previous time was three years ago. So, at the beginning I was feeling little rusty… I was also photographing from the first row. I liked the low perspective from the first row, but there were also challenges: It was quite difficult to compose and focus on skaters when they were passing me with the high speed at the distance of few meters. It would have been also easier to get white ice as background from the higher location. If I would have photographed the also short program on Friday, I would have used different, i.e. higher location, at that time.
The atmosphere in the arena was terrific, the (mostly Finnish) audience was supporting all teams! And when the Finnish teams where performing, the supporting and cheering was incredible
Supporters of Marigold IceUnity (MIU) waving flags
Synchronized Skating: Double Victory for Finland!
I visited yesterday ISU World Synchronized Skating Championships 2011, and photographed the free program. Finnish teams won double victory
World champions: Rockettes
Congratulations to Rockettes and Marigold IceUnity!
Silver: Marigold IceUnity
I will post later a gallery, but here are some of my favourites (click to see a larger image).
Team USA 2 - Miami University Senior Team
Team Sweden 1 - Team Surprise
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New gallery: Spring Ice II
Link to Spring Ice Gallery II / Pack ice in Lauttasaari, Helsinki
The last two weeks have been rather photogenic here in Helsinki. The sea ice has melted and there has been lots of interesting subjects to photograph: icicles, packed ice and drift ice
Sunset in Suomenlinna, Helsinki
In this gallery you can see the photos that I have taken on six occasions during last two weeks: I made three trips to Suomenlinna and three trips to the southern tip of Lauttasaari. One Suomenlinna trip was part of my landscape photography course in Kameraseura. I will write more about my course in few days.