Portraits at Limoncello

Limoncello Delicatessen is a small Italian shop downtown Szentendre (Hungary) named after a lemon-flavored liqueur for some reason. They sell really good coffee, ice-cream and a wide sort of premium Italian grocery.

I visit the place quite frequently because of the truly remarkable coffee they make which is quite unusual in Hungary unfortunately.

I have quickly realized that this place is a really good spot for portrait photography as many nice and interesting people used to come together here. On top of it, a huge white wall on the opposite side of this narrow street acts as the perfect reflector many times during sunny days. As I almost exclusively shoot using available light, this is a really nice feature to have.

I shoot people only who I know enough as I don’t want to ruin the business by acting as a paparazzi. Still, I have managed to put together a small pile of portraits already I shoot there. I think the shoots can reflect a bit of the atmosphere of the place as well as the emotions and personality of these lovely people I asked being model back.

This time all images are digital, but as usual, you can find the names of some manual lenses among the descriptions of the images.

Eszter (Limoncello, Szentendre, Hungary) Canon EOS 450D, CZJ Pancolar 80mm f/1.8  @ f/1.8

The following collage is published here in color for the reason that colors really contribute to the overall look and sensation of these images which I missed so much when I tried to make good a B&W version. The matching colors of her eyes and the scarf, as well as the warm tone of the hair light on the left image, were obliviously last at every attempt of B&W conversion.


Eszter (Limoncello, Szentendre, Hungary) Canon EOS 450D, Hansa 135mm f/2.8 @ f/4

Underpass music

I admire very much photographers who are able to do street photography of any kind either shooting invisibly or by asking strangers for a photo. Although I love these kinds of photographs I did not dare to do anything like this, therefore. As you have probably noticed already I shoot my friends and relatives most of the times as the same persons appear many times on my blog. All in all, talking to and taking photos of strangers is somewhat natural for some but for most of us including myself it is a challenge.

This is fine actually, but I always try to do new things and find challenges in my photography and the temptation of getting wonderful shots on the street raised so high that eventually I asked someone for a photo and hopefully I will keep doing this practice.

It was easier than I thought, nothing bad had happened, he was very friendly and allowed me to take the shoots below. As you can see he is a musician playing guitar in many places like this underpass  I used to walk through regularly.

I know this is not really a traditional street shoot but can be considered as a street portrait similar to those Ade used to shoot with his medium format Pentax and publish on STREET PORTRAITIST blog I really like.

The camera I used is the latest member of my collection an Olympus OM 4Ti with a stellar Zuiko 50mm f/1.4 lens. It was the very first roll of film I moved trough of this little thing and I am quite happy with the results.

 Olympus OM 4Ti, Zuiko 50mm f/1.4, Kodak Gold 200, Canoscan 9900F
Gábor (Szentendre, Hungary), Olympus OM 4Ti, Zuiko 50mm f/1.4, Kodak Gold 200, Canoscan 9900F
 Olympus OM 4Ti, Zuiko 50mm f/1.4, Kodak Gold 200, Canoscan 9900F
Gábor (Szentendre, Hungary), Olympus OM 4Ti, Zuiko 50mm f/1.4, Kodak Gold 200, Canoscan 9900F
 Olympus OM 4Ti, Zuiko 50mm f/1.4, Kodak Gold 200, Canoscan 9900F
Gábor (Szentendre, Hungary), Olympus OM 4Ti, Zuiko 50mm f/1.4, Kodak Gold 200, Canoscan 9900F