When we got to Venice, we checked into our hotel (B&B Diamante - very nice but a little loud), and then took the vapretto (water bus) out to Murano for some glass shopping. It was cold but didn't rain. I was so happy about that.
Here's one of the few pictures from the island of Murano (with Aaron, of course). They had several of these glass sculptures around the island as a Christmas thing. They were pretty cool.
We returned to the main islands of Venice around 5 because I had spent all of Aaron's money...hahaha...just kidding. Actually, I was just tired and didn't feel like shopping any more. We took some pictures when we got back to the main island.
Here is one of the two of us near Piazza San Marco. This is along the lagoon, and it was actually a decent time of the day. Please ignore the darkness of all the photos today...I worked on them on a different computer where the brightness must be set higher. I'll fix them at home and repost them later.
This is a shot of the clock tower in Piazza San Marco. I thought it was interesting.
Aaron in Piazza San Marco. The light in the background is kind of cool I think.
This is Piazza San Marco where most of the events are held. You can see the stage in the background. On Friday they had acrobats that put on a show while we were there.
This is me in Piazza San Marco during the show. They were lighting up Basicila di San Marco and the crowd. This picture caught me lit up with pink and the church with yellow. Interesting how it turned out...
These are some of the costumes from Friday. People really spend a lot of time making these things (and probably also getting into them each night). We did see some people with repeat costumes, so at least they get their use out of them. There are balls around the city that you can attend, but since they start at 200 euros (plus you have to rent a costume), we didn't attend one. We did look in the windows at one, and wow, people really get into it.
We also walked around the city to take some pictures and enjoy the sites. My favorite part of Venice is just wandering around. Aaron and I found some great streets and canals while wandering on this trip. The last time we visited, we didn't do much wandering. I'm glad we got to experience more of that this time.
This, however, was not found my wandering. When you are standing on the edge of Piazza San Marco and looking at the lagoon, you see this church, Chiesa di San Giorgio. I think the hazy sky makes it look pretty cool.
This is the Ponte dei Sospiri (Bridge of Sighs). It is the bridge between the courts (more or less) and the prison at the Doge's Palace (leader of Venice). You can read more about some of the legends associated with it if you want.
The two of us on the bridge in front of the Bridge of Sighs. You can't see much of the bridge but you can see us!
The Rialto Bridge was the next stop. It was very empty, which is quite unusual. I guess everyone either left for the evening or were at the Carnival celebrations.
These last two pictures really irritate me because they looked awesome on my computer at home. Oh well...you can suffer looking at this crap :) Anyway, this is me by the Grand Canal right next to the Rialto Bridge. This was around a corner from a bar, and this is the canal that has the main boat traffic plus the bridge. When we got there, there were two guys "relieving" themselves. I was laughing so hard. Yeah, wouldn't you pick the Grand Canal as your bathroom? Anyway, we waited until they left and then took these pictures. The story is better than the photos!
These are just some of the buildings on the Grand Canal. I think Aaron took a good portion of this day's photos. I think he is much better at this than I am!
That's all of the excitement on our first day. I will do some additional picture work tonight, and hopefully, I will be able to add yet another post tomorrow.
Ciao ciao!
Venice, Friday, February 1, 2008
4 comments:
How jealous am I? I would love to go back to Venice with my SLR and just take time to get the shots I wanted. But I think we did pretty well with the G7.
I like your night shots - they're very nice. I'm glad to see the tripod getting some use. The shot of the Chiesa di San Giorgio is pretty cool. You must of been using your super-duper zoom lens. I also like the picture of the Rialto Bridge and Grand Canal (last picture). Brings back so many memories *sniff, sniff*. Keep up the nice work.
Regarding a couple of the photos that Nha mentioned, the shot of Chiesa di San Giorgio (you know, St George, the dragon slayer) was actually taken with the "kit" 18-55mm lens. Kelly could probably dig up the settings.
The Realto Bridge shot looks a ton better than in person. Did you work some digital magic Kelly? I'd be curious to know what the settings were on that shot. Looking at the picture on the blog I'm wishing that I'd used a smaller aperture and slower shutter... probably could have sharpened things up and gotten rid of the people. Oh well, guess we'll have to go back up this weekend ;)
Looking forward to Kelly's posts of the Sunday photos. The weather was craptacular so the tripod stayed at the hotel. Ended up free shooting a bunch of photos from St George's. Hope they turned out!!!
Come Butta?
Grazie Kelly for my tour of Venice. I enjoyed the picture of the clock tower and the Grand Canal. Oh yes, and all the shots of Aaron. The people in the costumes for the Carnival are fantastic, a little scary. I did go to Wikipedia and read a little on the Ponte dei Sospiri (Bridge of Sighs). Where to next???
Ciao,
Pattie
This is a neat trick. I don't know if you know this, but I'll put it out there anyways. You probably do....
The last picture of the Grand Canal - you see how those point sources of light have become stars? This is because you were using a small aperature (large fstop) and a higher exposure time. As a result, the water looks like glass. The "star-effect" becomes more noticable as you continue to decrease your aperature.
You did a really go job in this picture. My only suggestion would be to do the same thing just before the sun goes down so you're able to capture the warmth and detail of the buildings and sky. Similar to what you did for the picture of both of you near Piazza San Marco. Fill flash would have worked too...I dunno - don't take me too seriously. :)
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