Respire
Peaceful
Posted by Soph (Enghien, Belgium) on 1 August 2007 in Cityscape & Urban and Portfolio.
It's the tranquility of the daily photograph of MaryB that made me think about that photo I had in my old files.
It's a place where nuns live and it's in Brugge (hello Stijn)... Imagine that you walk in the city, full of tourists and you see a big big door all in wood, you pass it and you discover a big place with trees, flowers and those little white nuns' houses. There are panels that ask to keep quiet and people really do.
I'm not Christian at all but after one minute in that place, I feel like on another planet.
When I was a child and we visited the cities of Belgium with the school, I learned that the nuns of there beated themselves with a whip. It traumatized me! I wondered why poeple could do that to themselves for a god. I thought that a god had to give love and kindness to the people who believe in him, like we learned it at school. I think that place gave me my atheism.
ColNed Pictures from Amersfoort, Netherlands
It's indeed a very nice dreamy hot, very nice playing with the amount of light and shadows, great angle, lovely work !
1 Aug 2007 7:38am
stijn from brugge, Belgium
oh yes sophie wonderfull i tried to capture this light too it like you were there at the same time i was :D its amazing when that sun hits the trees like that when you enter the gate first you are blinded by it and then that fades its wonderfull
just so you know that place also helped people who were in trouble in medieval time it shelterd people who were running from the law .. it helped the people by giving food away ( then the church did good :p )
i'm not christian too i cant understand why you would hurt yourself for a god too but hey aslong they dont hurt me for it its all good they may believe what they want :D
1 Aug 2007 8:02am
fONfEk from Near Paris, France
Très sympa aussi celle-ci ! Ca me donne envie de retrourner à Brugge, je n'avais pas vu cet endroit...
1 Aug 2007 8:02am
MaryB from Staffordshire, United Kingdom
A lovely capture Soph, I could imagine it to be very peaceful here, love the way you angled this, and the shadows from the trees are wonderful.
Thank you also for your continued support on my p-blog :)
1 Aug 2007 8:10am
Soph from Enghien, Belgium
thank you all
@stijn, yes funny that we were at the same place. It's a strange photo, I saw today that the shadows were not all in the same direction. I don't know if it's because of the big angle or something else, maybe it's really another planet... near the photo, it's written 27 mm but it's a 18 mm, I don't know why it's written something else.
@Fonfek: quand tu es à la gare, tu vas vers le Minnewater par le petit parc, au Minnewater, tu prends à gauche, vers le parc où il y a tous les cygnes, et au coin à gauche de ce parc, tu verras la grosse porte en bois, il faut passer sur un petit pont pour y accéder, ça s'appelle le Béguinage... fais des photos!
1 Aug 2007 8:12am
Sriram from Chennai, India
Lovely shot, Soph!
Very neat work on all our recent ones!
1 Aug 2007 8:13am
@Helen: Thank you Helen!
Rebecca from Leicester, United Kingdom
beautiful photo...there is a breathtaking sense of hush and be still when i look at this...awesome!
1 Aug 2007 10:20am
Richard Irwin from Belper, United Kingdom
Very peaceful scene, the absence of cars makes it stand out. I also like the play of light through the trees and on the ground
1 Aug 2007 10:29am
kairospix from Singapore, Singapore
Hi Soph,
Thanks for visiting my pblog.
I like how you captured the fork of the path as it opens up wide into the trees! Love the shadows made by the sun! You've certainly captured the serenity and tranquility of the place. Good job! :)
About your 18mm lens - I think the reason why your shot was recorded as 27mm and not 18mm as indicated on your lens is because for most DSLR (unless it's a Full Form Factor sensor which is expensive) the size of the sensor in your Nikon D50 is very different from 35mm film size and this causes the 18mm lens to behave like a 27mm due to the fact that the sensor form factor is 1.5X (for Nikons DSLRs) compared to the 35mm film. So an 18mm multiplying 1.5 equals 27mm viewing angle. So if you really want a shot with a 18mm viewing angle on your sensor then you actually have to use a 12mm lens (i.e., 12 x 1.5 = 18mm). Hope this helps explain your puzzle. :)
Anyway back to your thoughts about self-flagellation (i.e., whipping themselves) - I guess this happens when you start to interpret the Bible from your own thinking or because someone else taught or preached to you that that is the way you should live as a follower of Jesus because as far as I know Jesus never taught self-flagellation at all if you read the Bible carefully from cover to cover. In the Bible it says that Salvation is never based on such human acts of self beatings and cannot be earned or bought that way but it is a free love gift from God (John 3:16; Ephesians 2:8-9).
So you are right that a God of love will not require us to do self beatings to earn our Salvation because He really doesn't ask you to do that at all...He has already done that for us when Jesus was whipped before He was crucified on the Cross for you, me and humanity. Hope this helps to clarify things. :)
1 Aug 2007 11:31am
Shutterbug from Chennai, India
Soph, I've been here! In this very spot that you've captured! In brugge! thank you for this image.
1 Aug 2007 1:47pm
theystops from charleroi, Belgium
juste un peu jaune,pour la dominante,mais l'idée est bonne.
1 Aug 2007 2:46pm
ubik from Bruxelles, Belgium
Magnifique composition, un peu fish eyes, non? Et ce reflet du soleil qui transforme ton arbre en poteau métallique...
1 Aug 2007 3:05pm
Soph from Enghien, Belgium
Thank you all!
@kairospix: Big big thank you to kairospix for your big comment and your explainations. It's true that someone (my teacher) tried to teach me the bible and her interpretation, it's true that it's always better to make its own interpretation, my own interpretation. But when I was 6, I wasn't able in that. I grew up with that idea in my head that they hurt hemselves for a god and so, the god for me was someone bad. My father was very christian and told us the Bible with voices, intonations, I laugh very much very he told me the stories like that, but it was just nice stories for me, I never had the impression that it had really existed. Not more than all the fairytales that adults tell to children. So, my father told me "ok, you don't believe, it's your right, but I know that you'll be smart enough to feel the metaphor and keep the message inside of yourself". So it's what I do...
@Shutterbug: So great and funny that you've been there too, on the same place exactly!
@Ubik: merci pour le commentaire, pas fisheye du tout en fait, même si ça y ressemble, c'est la route qui est comme ça, le coin est en angle aigu... Mais j'aime bien que ça y ressemble ;-) Pour le flare.. bah.. il tombe où il tombe, je n'avais pas mon pare-soleil avec moi..
1 Aug 2007 4:18pm
Craiger from Vacaville, California, United States
I love those long shadows! Well done!
1 Aug 2007 4:59pm
Brittney from California, United States
It's refreshing to see something different like this. The way the street curves around at the bottom of the photo and branches into different directions looks really neat. Great shot :)
2 Aug 2007 12:44am
Soph from Enghien, Belgium
Thank you all for your comments! I hesitated for a long time before posting this photo because I wasted it with photoshop and I didn't got the original no more. I had to do something "showable" (does that word really exist?) with Lightroom and it's why the dominance is a bit yellow. Well, it's a sunset, it was a bit yellow anyway... Again a big thank you for your nice comments!
2 Aug 2007 5:12am
Nadine from Montréal, Canada
Très belle photo, comme dans un rêve ou dans un décor de cinéma.
2 Aug 2007 3:42pm
Laurie from Lincoln, United States
Cool photo. You're right it does look calm and serene. I love those shadows. =-)
2 Aug 2007 6:20pm
Jenya from Portland, United States
I like all the lines of the trees, the soft light coming through the them, and the dainty little structures in the back. This photograph makes me feel at peace.
5 Aug 2007 6:56am
Jenya from Portland, United States
ps. Although your explaination of the photograph does the contrary!
5 Aug 2007 6:56am
Nikon D50
1/3200 second
F/4.0
27 mm (35mm equiv.)