The Buildings of San Miguel de Allende – Part 5

In this photo essay I will show some of the colourful and wonderful architecture of San Miguel. The town population is about 80,000 not including the outer developments which brings the total population about 140,000. About 20% are expats and English speaking.

There are no front lawns or even being able to see back yards and therefore the looks inside as you walk along the streets is always filled with little wonders.

While I collected many images of the great and varied doors in San Miguel, there is a local photographer who has made a wonderful book on just such a theme.

Some homes may look desolate on the front, but are still very well kept inside.

The majority of buildings are painted very vividly and color is one item they don't seem afraid of being bold with

Only a few homes have strong rich colors. More have the muted terracotta and yellow as seen in the photo below.

A typical street near the central part of town with more business ventures out of their buildings. It seems almost everyone who has a front door also has a store of some sort.

It seems that almost everyone photographs this building. Why not, as it sure tells you where you are.

The next series, which will be the last, is more of a potpourri of photos.

Niels Henriksen

Canadian Architecture and the Delta Stone Mill

Whenever I head out of town I always have my camera with me, as you never know when a photo opportunity will present itself even travelling well-worn routes. But I must admit that there are times when travelling down the road that I realize too late that I should have stopped. I have gotten better as I do try to stop more often, but for some reason I still miss opportunities. I really need to listen more to that inner voice.

Leaving a friend’s place early one morning, with the top down which makes sightseeing that much easier, I came across a building I had seen many times before. But this morning with the early light and the rich greenness of the late spring landscape this building seemed to beg to be photographed and I did listen.
While I’m not an architectural expert, I do remember that there is really very little true Canadian architecture, at least historical. The one item that did stand out in my memory was the Canadian Barn as pictured above. The main architectural feature being the double angled roof structure.

It was good to see a farm structure that was still showing that there was some life still left in that old building. It even had a fresh coat of red paint. What could be more Canadian. In the unreduced version it is easier to see the fine details of the flowers in the tall grass. If you scan carefully you will notice another red building peeking through the trees.




A little further down the dirt road was a more typical farmhouse rendition, at least in eastern Ontario, of what we have come to expect of old farm buildings. There is lots of character but not very liveable. I should probably ask permission one day to try and photograph some images form inside those dusty and dilapidated rooms. Nothing like a little dust in the air with sunbeams to create instant impact.

Delta Stone Mill

In the village of Delta they have restored the old mill that produced flour for the local inhabitants many years ago. As part of their restoration work they hope to have parts of the mill actually working. This mill is to be on the next Canadian stamp. Unfortunately though, not my image.
The link to the Delta Mill site is here Old Stone Mill

The above is a faux IR image. The orange, yellow, green sliders were set to maximum luminance in ACR. The sky was quite washed out in the morning so I added a gradient to replace the sky and create more of a normal IR sky (dark). The darker sky highlights the white foliage and lighter building better.
This is almost as captured but I did slightly increase the yellow and green luminance.

Digital Storage Solution

Costco in Canada has a very effective external storage solution. It is a Western Digital 2TB Drive that is mirrored as RAID 1, to give you an effective storage of 1 TB. The benefits of this type of solution is that should one drive fail and as far as I know all drives will eventually fail, there is still one drive that will still work. No permanent failure unless a major catastrophe such as lightning or huge power surge. There is software for automatic backups but I don’t use it in this mode. Cost is $309.00 CDN.

I will be away next week on a 5-day oil painting “en plein air” workshop in Lyn Ontario. This is my first time taking any type of workshop and the weather should be good for most of the time. While this is a small village there is an old mill and I will bring my camera because at least this item should be able to make some good images.

Niels Henriksen

Blog Award and Photographs that You Need to Explore

I was very honoured last week to receive the ‘noblesse oblige’ Blog award from what I consider to be a very fine artist.





Life can seem strange in a good sense at times. Here is a blogger and artist whom I always visit to see his inspirational works of art and at the same time obtain motivation for my own creative juices. With this award from I now surmise that Lorainn finds my own artist interpretations, mostly with a camera, in a similar vein.

Do visit his site loriann signori's painting-a-day as he has an excellent impressionistic approach to rendering landscape scenes. This is a fluid style that I hope to one day to be able to render in my own approach. Even on the web, which tends to dull vibrancy at bit with the sRGB colour space; his images are vibrant and alive. I can only imagine that to stand in front of the original works, the colours must just sing.


With the 2nd pat of the article title I hope to present some images that encourage the viewer to spend some time to take in all the elements. I’ll discuss my approach to creating interest and maybe one or two will create this effect for you.

Many viewers at first glance, especially if you’re looking for that ‘wow factor’, the above image may not grab a hold of you the right way.

If you do take the time to examine and reflect you will realize that this image has many compositional elements that does keep your eyes moving over the scene and that is what many of us try to achieve in our photographs. Wow is great but with my own tastes, this can become boring quickly and an image that causes me to take in the features is one I enjoy more.

At first you see the strong diagonal lines created with the cast showdown of the roof structures. The line of square box shape shadows form diagonal columns, which is repeated with the shape of the brick column. Next the sun lit part of these columns form triangles pointing back to the shadow patterns where texture and colour are strongest. The green bushes support the patterns of the light rectangular patterns and colour is complimentary to the Reddish (orange) brickwork.
The left and right side of the image has darker objects that help frame the pattern. At first, the viewer may be left wondering in what setting this was taken but upon closer inspection you will notice that on the right in the dark recess is a patio with tables and chairs.


The above image is simpler with its harmonious colour scheme. The focal point is the lamp and the texture on the grey pipe, but I am not sure if that is what the eye goes to first. I do find that the lower right pane in the window on the red wall does hold my interest. Working on an image, you sometimes tend to loose your own first impressionistic instincts. There is texture and lines on the left, which is repeated on the red wall but here, there are dark areas to explore and maybe gaze inside these rooms.


In this image, I enhanced the blue/grays of the bridge to compliment the yellow/greens of the distant sunlit area. I also wanted to create a little mystery with the blue cast of the shadow to make you wonder about going over the bridge.


The above bicycle image is fun on many levels. The blue and yellow are complimentary colours, and also, the red and green pair. The red of the bicycle is re-enforced with the red in reflections and on the signs. The strong reflection in window almost creates a portal down another street, like you are on an intersection, which is not apparent just seeing the store front.


I hope you enjoyed the images and the attempt to create a little mystery or intrigue with each of these photographs.


Niels Henriksen

The Original LegoLand – Denmark

One of the big tourist attractions when you visit Denmark is to see LegoLand where it originally started. It’s on the same scale as the Taj Mahal or Petrus but it is one place that you should visit, especially if there are young kids or you have not quite left that mind set.


Legoland is all about colour and even these carts for parents to place their kids are brightly coloured.

While most of the day was spent with the family and the young kids running around looking at scale model of buildings, train rides and amusement activities, I thought I would also see if I could use my camera to render parts of the park interestingly.

Reproduction of Nyhavn tourist harbour in Copenhagen, Denmark


The lego trains ride around on the tracks and the old locomotives even exhausts steam.


Under the water are tiny cables and the boats move on a course through the canals.


There are models of Fredensborg Castle were prince Fredrick Henriksen (hey that’s my name but no relation) lives with his wife Mary. The Danish royalty only use their first name and it was when prince Fredrick lived in USA that he was forced to take a last name. He chose Henriksen, an old historic Danish name.

A photo of the real castle is shown below, but at a more realistic street angle.



It’s not all about Denmark as throughout the park are many other models such as the Taj Mahal, Eiffel Tower, 4 US presidents and many others and of course, the NASA Space shuttle and launch pad.


Legoland is just not about the recreation of famous locations in Lego blocks. There are also marching bands

and fun water events at least if you are standing and watching.



From the top of the rotating tower, there is a view of one of the Lego sets.



Thanks for viewing today and through all the year.


To all, whether just up-coming or recently past, have a festive and joyous Christmas, Hanukkah, Islamic New year Muharram and to all other events I may have missed.


Niels Henriksen

There will be no article next weekend but the following in the start of the New Year.

Heddal Church Norway - D300 at ISO 6400

The completely wooden Heddal Stave church just outside Notodden Norway gave a good opportunity to test out the capabilities of the D300 at iso 6400. I did bring my tripod with me but for the many day excursions it was a lot easier to just attach the Nikon 18-200mm vr lens and increase the iso to compensate for low light situations.




These Stave churches were built from the early 11th century to the 15th century. At one time there were approximately 800 to 1,000 of these churches built and now only 25 remain. Since these are built entirely of wood many were easily destroyed by fire.

iso 6400, 1/40 sec, f4.5, 24.0mm

This is a view from inside the main chapel. There is no electrical light in the church and it is all lit by the window openings at the top and a few candles near the altar. It is extremely dim inside and a perfect test for the camera capabilities. The metal tubes you see in this image are part of the current sprinkler system to prevent it from being burnt. On the outside along the entire roof sections are other sprinkler nozzles.

Being all wood it was easy to limit the colour noise by de-saturating the colour a bit and then adding a light reddish brown layer set to colour to bring out the warm tones. In Adobe Raw I did set the colour and noise to almost max settings.

This is the Heddal church, built in the12trh century, is a triple stave church and is now the largest remaining church.


Close-up view of the outside hand cut shingles covering all the roof and wall sections.

ISO 6400, 1/40 sec, f4.5 , 24.0mm

The above image is of the altar, which is mostly lit by candles and the top window light does not reach into the altar enclave.

iso 6400, 1/20 sec, f4.5, 24.0mm

In the image above you can see the rose painting covering the inside walls. This painting covers some of the more Norse Viking type scenes that originally decorated the walls. It was repainted with the new abstract patterns as the Viking images became out of favour and the Christian teachings and Viking mythology slowly disappeared.

You will notice how the WB has changed from the walls at top being lit by outside light and the post at bottom being lit by candles and therefore a redder tone.

iso 6400, 1/30 sec, f5.0, 24.0mm

Around the bottom of the church is a corridor that runs around the whole of the chapel and there are different doors to go in. This is part of the carvings that surround these giant 10 foot doors.



Near the church is a site where they have moved several log cabins as an historic site. You can see the brightly lit rose painting or rosemailing. This is the same as in the church but here we have many windows that provide more light into the interior.



This is a shed on the site but the larger log cabins are built the same method.
You will notice that the log cabin sits on stills and then there is a log split in half and with a flat side on the bottom. This is to prevent rodents from getting into the houses. Note how the steps do not attach to the building, which also keeps them out.

The D300 does a good job of image capture at the higher iso setting of 1600, 3200, and 6400. They are nosier than lower settings but still produce great shots. If you shoot with film and I think the highest was 3200 B&W, these shots would normally not be possible and if you did have very fast film the grain would be very pronounced. I do like the B&W film grain better as the luminance speckles were more random in size and tended to produce better patterns.

You do need to use the luminance and colour noise reduction to improve it. The use of sharpening is not recommended, as it will enhance the noise.

The best method is still to use a tripod and go for longer exposure, but when not possible having an image stabilized lens and high iso, you now are able to get very reasonable images that would not be normally possible.


Niels Henriksen

Skagen Denmark ‘The Land of Light’

First I would like to thank very much all those who are regular readers of this photography blog. I have decided to post the blog membership of readers as presented by Feedburner. For the last month the total has remained over 500, which for me is a form of acknowledgement that the images and articles provide some enjoyment to you.

Feedback, whether comments on articles or as represent by number of readership, helps to keep me excited about continuing the weekly writings.


The SoFoBoMO project was a bit all consuming for a period of time and except for those images I have not been able to get out and take new photographs as I normally would.

As photographers, we are sometimes just ordinary tourists and this week I want to show some images I took from the very unique spot at the tip of Demark on the main land peninsula known as Jutland. The nearby picturesque village known as Skagen lends its name to the area.


This 4 km long point of land is where the waves and currents from Skagerrak (west) and Kattegat (east) smash into each other. Because of the wind and wave action the seas tend to be in opposing directions and there is great crashing and convolutions of a disturbed area. This sand tip has grown 1 km longer in the last 100 years as the sand is swept up the western coast of Denmark. Occasionally a small sand island will form off the tip, commonly known as seagull island, but will disappear within a few months.


Picture of my wife Claudette with the 2 seas colliding behind her. If you have ever witnessed large river rapids these waves have a similar form. The 2 seas each have their gentle rolling waves, but at the tip they crash together forming standing waves


Below are many of the tourists walking along the sand spit to the tip.



This is a map of Demark with Sweden on the right.

There are no cars allowed in the protected area and you need to embark on a sand trolley to head out to the sand point. The map below from google earth shows some of this landscape.


During the 19th century many painters were attracted to this area because of its special kind of light by which it was given its nickname ‘Land of Light’ and an artist community formed to capture its unique quality of life.

The village of Skagen is extremely beautiful and in many ways very representative of the traditional Danish houses, small, almost cottage like, but with pure white trim and brilliant yellow walls and red tile roofs.



While many people do drive to Skagen, for the locals bicycling is a main mode of transportation within this village, which can be seen in several of the images below.



There are very many small restaurants with patios where you can enjoy the quietness of a picturesque and small village. To stroll around is be in another time where the hustle of everyday life has failed to venture this far north.


Being a fishing community, fresh fish has always been an important ingredient in the food of Skagen. Fried fish is served with delicious specialities from the moors, such as honey-preserved cranberries. Also the famous Danish open-face sandwich can be obtained with the artistic approaches to decorating the toppings.

The bright blue summer skies and the red and yellow buildings make for classic colour combinations as photographic images as this church image demonstrates below.


If I wasn’t touring the rest of Denmark with my sister and her husband I would have liked to spend several weeks with my watercolours, capturing that special light this area is known for.


On a side note, I have upgraded my D200 to a Nikon D300 camera. I am not sure that this the best use of my funds since with the upgrade cost it’s the same as if I had rented the D200 for $900 for 16 months. I knew when the D300 came out that I would be upgrading eventually because of the low noise at high ISO and better colour rendition, but I figured it would be a few years away.

I found out from Henry’s store that the previous warranty was not transferable to the new camera since it was over a year old and they were not able to include it for the new owner or even let the owner contact me to transfer for them.

I never buy warranties except for laptop computers or new digital cameras, as I was able to use it on my D70, which I still have because of its ability to capturer good Infra Red (IR) images.


When I read about the live view capability and ability to fine tune focus in contrast mode (Tripod setting only), and have it connected to a 7” DVD player, I figured that I just had to have this now. This would have been easy if I was a professional, but an amateur who only sells a few prints, it may take a long time to recover the costs.

The live view with external monitor is very akin to using my 4x5 view camera, which I enjoy very much for its ability to precisely set focus, but is a bit of a pain to lug around as I need to have the film developed at the few stores that still support view camera technology. The D300 now provides some of these benefits in a smaller unit.


I hope to have a few new pictures in the next few weeks.



Niels Henriksen

All images taken in August 2004 with a Cannon A40 2Mp point and shoot camera



There is a good web site that has many naturalist type pictures of the tip of Skagen Skagen, Denmark

Cows can Fly

Well almost at least with the help of a giant dragon. This photo was taken inside the enclosed streets that surrounded one block near the centre of Brussels. During the summer of 2003 Brussels was having a Painted Cow festival similar to the 1999 Chicago Cows on Parade festival. Throughout the city there were many full-size fiberglass cows by painted local artist. Each artist decided on their painting scheme and some were strange and weird. Even a coupe of the artists decided to cut up their cow and then recombine the pieces into one of kind groupings. I now wish I had taken more images, but at that time I was a tourist and only had one memory card.

I now no longer worry about the amount of images I take when I travel, as I make sure that I have more than enough storage and batteries.






















The above image was edited to create and even stronger feeling of absurdity. I removed the microphone (see original below) to make it appear that the Jazz singer was waving his hand and laughing because of the flying cow. The image was also straightened and cropped with a slight increase in colour sat for the soft pink walls. I wanted the wings of the dragon to glow more and therefore the saturation and contrast was increased.

Di Booth has some interesting images of these painted cows on his web site.













Brussels has many unique statues throughout the central downtown district.

If you monitor is not set to WB of 6,000K and is also set to high contrast the blue will look a bit too strong.













With the old P&S camera I was using, I had to repair some blown gold highlights on statue. I also decided to darken and increase the blue contrast in the sky, as I wanted this complementary colour to yellow, to better balance in weight of the yellow. The sky was also darkened to keep the viewer’s gaze from leaving the scene with the normal bright shy at the edge.













I find this image interesting because, while almost perfectly symmetrical (each statue is different) around the center vertical axis, it is not till you look around that you realize that there is a missing statue in the central niche. Well it was near lunch time and I guess after a few hundred years of standing around you might get hungry.

If this image was cropped at the rooftops it would make a normal and colourful streetscape and maybe a better image, but I found the rising church spire in the background created an effect like those old “B” grade horror movies were the person grows to become a giant. Well, we each have our own strange way at looking at things.


As an artist and photographer I find the most important ingredient to growth, after learning the basic elements, is to enjoy the images you create. Do not be concerned what others think. Do learn about how you might improve it in the future from other fine photographers, but still enjoy what you create, even if others don’t.

Niels Henriksen



As a change from quoting a Photographer’s Adage, I thought this week I would highlight a fellow photo blogger A Jesse . I enjoy her writings and she has a good collection of horse images on her website. Jesse is participating in the SoFoBoMo project, which I have been debating with myself about participating, but sometimes I feel that I take on too much work. It starts 1 April and with all the snow we still have around, I am not sure I can find an interesting theme. I seem to have my own creativity rut at the moment.

Simple and Complex - A Roof Photo Project

I was reading an article from one of my favourite Bloggers George Barr at Behind The Lens who regularly produces great thought providing ideas. There was an article about what are “Meaningful Photographs” and in summary, how to find that special insight that drives you to produce great works of art. Do read it to fully appreciate the message.

In this article I will explore some ideas and with an example theme that will hopefully help shape an approach that will take you down a path of excitement and discovery.

I think as artists, who use the camera to create, it is important that we have projects that at first challenge us and then allows you to explore and develop new ways of seeing and transposing to your visions.

To truly create great works, you need to dig deep into your core. To explore that urge to create a visual emotion, because at the basic level, we, as photographic artists, present to the world our feeling about what we see.


National Art Gallery, Ottawa Canada
The softness of the cool blue sky set against the rigid lines and the red fire within.

How do you find a photography project that is right for you? I really can’t answer that for you, but may I suggest some ideas or methods that might give you a start in the right direction. In reality there is no right or wrong direction, only your journey and what you can accomplish along the way.

If you are looking for a great project idea or purpose, first start by not thinking about photography. Try to list 5 or 10 passions you have. These can be both physical items, such as trains, snowboarding, old buildings, special natural locations or it can be more internalized such as friendship, love, joy. Try to define some qualities and emotions about the subject. Not the standard terms used by media, but your impressions.

Snowboarding (my impressions as I never quite left the bunny hill)
Crazy, Fast, Wild-eyed, Scary, Acrobatic, Curves, Edgy.

This might take a week or a month to accomplish, as it is important that either a memory or feeling emerges from within the core that has defined you. From your list, one item may appear to have a special meaning for you. Select this and then decide how you would go about translating your emotions about the subject into a series of photographs. Mostly likely at first it may seem hard or even impossible. This is actually a good thing as now the journey of discovery begins. I also recommend that you keep a journal as the project mostly will take months or even years to complete and your views and impressions will change over time as you explore your theme in all its facets.

As an artist who may be presenting a project later on, this journal or diary will help you contextualize your photos to viewing audience later on. Most visitors do read the writings that go along with the images.

As an example, I am using the idea of roofs as a project. While it may seem very obscure and you might wonder what kind of meaningful project could be accomplished on this subject, it allows me to explore how you could think about this as a possible project.

This is the meaning of the title, as roofs may seem too simple to be meaningful and complex as how do you take something so boring and have people enjoy the finished works. Through these images, I will explore how a photographer might find meaningful views.

Unless you are a wildlife photographer, you might find yourself not using your zoom lens as much as you’d like. Roofs do require the use of a zoom.


Almonte, Ontario. Cropping allowed me to position the white pigeon on one of the power points to create a focal interest.

Roofs of buildings are things that most people take for granted, unless the winter snow load or water leaks make you more aware of its presence. I do not think that many people really look at all the different type of roofs and even when visiting other countries, only as a different topping on buildings with its unique broad expanse of texture and colour.

Roofs are made from many different materials and can be low-tech like mud huts with stick and grass roofs, to beautiful glass domes. They can have many colours, shapes and textures. Some are solely for protection and use standard materials, some are integral to the design of the building and becomes a work of art.











Almonte Ontario. I did remove a small structure at the peak, as I did not want the eye to be lead away from curved top. The shadows across the tiles add more depth and interest.

A photo of a roof can create a sense of place and lifestyle as with the rooftop from Paris, France below. Who could not see themselves standing on the balcony below and gazing over the bustling Paris nightlife or in the morning sitting by the window having espresso with an assortment of bread and cheeses.












Some are grander like the great roofs found around the main square of Brussels, Belgium













The one dominant feature about roofs is that there tends to be repetition of features and many lines. By focusing on small sections and their complex patterns, abstract images as with these tile roofs from Skagen, Demark can be created.






Even conversion to B&W can create very dramatic and powerful abstract images.










Taken at the entrance to the Hase temple in Kamakura just south of Tokyo, Japan

By combining 2 roofs into a scene, a story of old and new can be created as with these roofs from 700 year old farm buildings near Hillerod, Denmark. (my ancestral farm)












You can focus on historical structures, such as this old Viking long-house at the historic site near Hobro, Denmark. The roof in this photo is used to unify the image and bring all the elements together.












Or this side building that is set in the ground.














Niels Henriksen

A Photographer’s Adage

As far as I am concerned, I can only say how much I regret such an admirable discovery should have come so late ! The possibility of studying such images would have had an influence on me that I can only guess at from the usefulness which they have now, even in the little time left me for more intensive study. It is the tangible proof of nature’s own design, which we otherwise see only very feebly. - Eugene Delacroix - quoted in "French Primitive Photography", Philadelphia 1969[cited in "From today painting is dead – The Beginnings of Photography" (catalogue of exhibition in The Victoria & Albert Museum 16 March – 14 May 1972 p. 48), caption to item no. 532 showing photographs of nude models taken from an album belonging to Delacroix. The models are said to be in poses arranged by Delacroix.]