Intro
My time in Amsterdam was limited so I mostly invested it in building connections and having fun with the people of hive fest 7. But on wednesday afternoon and in between the days I had a few spare minutes to take photos of the cities atmosphere, its architecture und people. The following pictures where taken mostly on Wednesday when the weather was still sunny, no rain at all and a lot of people on the streets to enjoy their afternoon. The last 4 are taken on Suday morning while I waited in the city for my train and I barely had the chance to take my cam out of the pocket. It was raining a lot.
πΊοΈπ Icons for further interaction
There are icons I have included two icons underneath each photo:
- πΊοΈ will lead you to google street view of the (almost) exact spot I took the photo.
- π will open the image in a larger scale.
π πΊοΈ
π πΊοΈ
I mean: I have searched for the location of a very small tree and saw how little it has been one year ago via street view. The interwebs is wierd some times.
- πΊοΈ will lead you to google street view of the (almost) exact spot I took the photo.
- π will open the image in a larger scale.
It took me way more time to enable these actions for you. But I will continue with this in my upcoming photo posts because I think it's nice to have a street view link + smaller images load way faster and save bandwidth on your end. Bu feel free to share your thoughts and if the effort is worth it!
Dam
First stop near my hotel in the Warmoesstraat was this place which happens to be the most famous square in Amsterdam.
This was my first picture of a great vacation. The guy at the left took it very serious with feeding the birds at the Dam Square obviously. Annoyed by the tourists and children running around trying to disturb the birds they actually disturbed him. He took a huge bag with snacks for the birds with him and gave his best to server everyone equally. A real honorable man with a sense for the small creatures of our planet. (okay well that was a cheezy start into a post oh my...)
Amsterdam is rich of very old buildings. Some of them are 400 years old and not just a few are ones where people actually still live in. The church Oude Kerk is the oldest building in Asterdam and it is over 800 years old. No matter where you are or in which direction you look you will see such an old building in the streets of Amsterdam. There is a pretty cool website to visualize the age of buildings in Amsterdam if you wanna learn more about that. I took photos of those two famous old buildings:
Munttoren
Then I went to buy a second hand jacket which I really really really like and a few people complimented on it as well :P I also bought sunglasses and various other stuff at the Waterlooplein Market (forgot to take pictures of it though..). After this haul I continued to take pictures in the city center with its bridges, wierd crooked houses and peculiar shops ;)
Equipped with my new jacket and a cup of coffee I enjoyed this view with Munttoren in the distance and the Halvemaansbrug in front. You can defintely recognize that I have used a longer focal lenght (85mm) as the background is pretty compressed but not too abstract like if I would have used 135mm or longer. The 85mm is almost perfect for my kind of photography because I am too shy to point the cam directly into the face of people but I like people in my phots. With the 85mm I can stay a few meters away and the people walking into the shot don't mind me because I look like I take photos from the cityscape (what I usually do and they happen to cross my line).
Only a few steps away from the view above is a bridge called "Bijvoetbrug" where I took this photo through a bicycle frame. If you look closely you can see a red sign "te koop" which means "for sale". It seems a quiet romantic idea to live on a boat but for me it is not that practical.
Only a few steps away from the view above is a bridge called "Bijvoetbrug" where I took this photo through a bicycle frame. If you look closely you can see a red sign "te koop" which means "for sale". It seems a quiet romantic idea to live on a boat but for me it is not that practical.
π πΊοΈ
Staalmeestersbrug
This bridge is actually a bascule bridge so it can get lifted to let ships through underneath. It is pretty unusual for my eyes that it's made out of white painted wood but it seems stable enough to let people walk across haha! I did not get the many love locks hanging on both chains in the frame. But if you open the image via the π in a larger view you can spot them at the bottom of the chain on the left. Over the past weekend I often walked across this bridge since it connects a big road I took when I left the Volkshotel and the part of the city where my hotel is located. Those lonely walks through Amterdam at night have been very refreshing and calm regardless of the usual rain we had over the weekend. I had time to think about a lot of things always observantly for the bike lanes because the bikers are ruthless and will never break for a pedestrain!
Aluminiumbrug
I did not take many photos of this bridge as a whole but I captured a lot detail shots of it and the objects related to it. For example I took around 7 images of this bike from various angles and 2 different lenses. I took shots of the wheels, gears, front and rear lights but this image is my pick. You can almost feel the used up leather handle. As many bikes in this city this one gets obviously used a lot. Amsterdam is made for bycicles with it's bike lanes, car free roads and the people who are very aware of the unspoken law that bikes always have the highest priority on the road.
π πΊοΈThose two photos are my personal favourites of this series. I like to take detail shots with a slight hint of the surrounding not too much to disctract the viewer but enough to tell a story. This "style" is something I want to include in my work more often because I was always interested in the little things we usually do not recognize. Those little things "build the bigger things" and should be even more important than the images of bridges, ships and human. I will make a dedicated post about this in combination with a photo walk through Hamburg soon to emphasize on this idea.
Now this is a place which looks different on google street view but I am pretty convinced it is located close to the Aluminiumbrug. The bike parking spots are actually built on top of this planted metal structures. Btw: I really dig the idea of those planted structures. You can find those at many places in Amsterdam and I think they have been used when ships docked there. Or it was planned to build terraces on top of them - I really dont know. If you have an idea or you even know then please let me know in the comments. I am genuinly interested!
Ost-Indische Huisbrug
In many places in Amsterdam alcohol consume is prohibited and you will get a fee of 100β¬ if you violate that. I am a huge fan of that! Not only because I am a dry alcolic but I also see a big potential of broken glass on the streets. Since bicycles are the main means of transport in this city glass would be even worst for the people who live there. It is also to prevent people make noise while sitting around in th streets and I guess this could be hard to cope with as someone who lives there. And then we have the obvious reason: Drunken people sometimes become violent or piss/puke/.. in corners. There is actually also a 100β¬ fee if you get caught pissing on the streets. There are many public toilets you can use to get relieved.
The street signs in Amsterdam look different most of the time. So different that they even look self-made somehow. They can be material for a huge photo series because every single sign has its own character. The one on the left looks like someone crossed out the "centrum".
Bushuissluis
Close to this bridge I took the only portrait street shots of the whole weekend I wanted to include in this post.
Time
You can find many of this urban trees and wild herbs in the streets of Amsterdam. I like when a city keeps the little sprinkles of nature in the concrete landscapes. Actually it took me a while to find the exact location of the left photo but now while writing and recapping the photo walk I have finally found it and guess what? The tree has been smaller. I know what a surprise.. But in this small size you actually see the difference and I don't know why but that fascinated me just now.
I mean: I have searched for the location of a very small tree and saw how little it has been one year ago via street view. The interwebs is wierd some times.
Varkenssluis
When I remember correct there have been two shops located on this bridge: A hot dog stand and a flower/souvenir shop. If you stand on this bridge and look west you can see Palais op de Dam.
I was glad that I happened to see it through the windows of that flower shop and thought it will be an amazing photo. I think it's okay but seriously not amazing lol.
Actually I was a bit surprised to not see more flower shops in the capital of tulips. I know flower season is kind of over but when you can buy tuplis in Germany these days that has to be because of the countless green houses in the netherlands and globalization. Usually flowers in cold months are coming from Africa which is economical really not a good thing. Perhaps the netherlands actually care more about nature than money - who knows ;)
The image on the left is within my top 3 of this series regardless of the missed eye-focus. This cute little guy was visting Amsterdam with his human german weed-loving friend. The doggy was really curious about me and the camera and when the human talked to him I recognized that he talked in German. So I said "moin was geht?" and he told me that they visit Amsterdam now for 4 weeks already and he does not plan to return to his hometown Cologne innear future. He was a nice guy but a bit too high for my taste but this kind of freedom is enviable for me. I would not be able to to this kind of unplanned vacation to another country because of financial reasons. Maybe some day in future I will be that free - who knows..
Zuiderkerk
People from the hive fest will recognize this church which has been our venue on Saturday. I gave it another visit on Sunday morning to get a photo I talked with @priyanarc the day before. I wanted to shoot this perspective with a 11mm wide angle lens. It worked out 45% so I am not really satisfied with the image. I had to go really close to the ground and not far enough to get the whole church in frame but with that the gate is cut on the left and right (and even at the top).. But yeah - let's say I tried my best with the gear I had with me.
I pretty like the close up on the left. It is a part of the gate I have shown above and it follows the golden ratio as you probably recognize. I am really looking forward for my planned post about "the little things" and the photo walk I will do for it. Feel free to subscribe to not miss it - I think I will learn a lot and I will try to transport my experiences I will make with it.
Last but not least
In Amsterdam not only sex and coffee shops are common - you also see a lot of LGBTQ+ / trans / gay / nonbinary / etc flags all the time. Private balconies and shops show their support for this part of our society and I really dig how many I recognized on the streets.
Check my other profiles on the interwebs: https://linktr.ee/tibbifox
On Saturday a volunteer of the organization Hivos talked to me on the streets and we had a chat about global lgbtq+ rights. It is disturbing how many countries still have a death penalty on openly expressing your sexuality and what else happens to people just because of their sexual orientation and gender. Also we have talked about what Hivos does to support LGBTQ+ people all around the world and because of that I offered my financial support. Next to the donations I have done for various NGOs I never had the chance to support a LGBTQ+ rights focused organization. If you stand on our side and think that the world has to change then make sure to check out their website: https://hivos.org/ and their link tree: https://linktr.ee/hivos
Thanks
If you have read this post and you are still here - thank you so much. I really aprreciate your time and your input in the comments. It took me multiple hours to compile that post, prepare all the links and most important: actually write words in a logical order. I was offline for so long that I really have to get back into it but with pracise that will come automatically, right?
Please answer a few questions for me so I can learn from your feedback and upgrade my quality next time:
Please answer a few questions for me so I can learn from your feedback and upgrade my quality next time:
- Which one is your favourite photo of this series?
- Did you use the πΊοΈ and/or π and do you think the effort is worth it? I exported every image in small and large + I re-scouted the location of the image via google maps. I personally think the effort is worth it - but what do you think?
- Do you know why those planted metal structures exist on the side of the lakes in Amsterdam?
- Did you have been in Amsterdam once and did you experienced something interesting there? Let's have a chat!
If you are interested about DIY related posts on Hive then make sure to give @diyhub a visit!
We also have a discord server: https://discord.gg/c7cRwHv
We also have a discord server: https://discord.gg/c7cRwHv
Check my other profiles on the interwebs: https://linktr.ee/tibbifox