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© 2024 Mikko Leinonen. All Photos are copyrighted. All rights reserved. Pictures can not be used without explicit permission by the creator.
Cropped to get tighter focus. Then used normal oil painting effect at 70%. Then, on that same screen, used the overlay setting for the first time, which intensified all the colors. Finished with a wider mosaic border.
Created for Photoshop Contest 912: Long and Winding Road
www.flickr.com/groups/photoshopcontest/discuss/7215772191...
Many thanks to Paul Cowie for the source:
www.flickr.com/photos/paulcowie/4693643114/in/datetaken/
I mirrored Paul's image in PSE21 and then added a car from pngwing.com., then used a DDG style filter, then Flickr "Moss" filter to soften it a bit.
Thanks for your visit, faves, and kind comments!
Press L and then F11 for a large view - then you can fully enjoy this picture!
Thank you so much for your views, faves and comments !
For more of my photos take a look at at my website: mikkoleinonen.com
Website and photos of my aquariums
© 2024 Mikko Leinonen. All Photos are copyrighted. All rights reserved. Pictures can not be used without explicit permission by the creator.
Then you take me in your arms..........
Song:
HIM - When Love And Death Embrace (Greatest Lovesongs Vol. 666)
www.youtube.com/watch?v=AiwWRk0a4nI&list=RDBPwZaQfoIb...
Greetings: Ramsa Luv
Another of the cooperative subjects at Red Moss Nature Reserve. Fortunate to get a series of bracketed images before it flew off. This is 30 images focus bracketed in camera then focus stacked in Helicon Focus Pro.
A waiting passenger, his left arm in a sling, manages to get around alright at the Quincy Station 'L' Station in Chicago's Loop.
Nikon D5100, Tamron 18-270, ISO 320, f/10.0, 220mm, 1/60s
Directly contrary to the Greenbergian strictures of Abstract Expressionism, whereby critic ( not artist ) Clement Greenberg declared that ALL great abstract work should be perfectly flat, without modelling or any references in terms of texture or gesture to Nature, the new abstraction charts another course. This image is an exercise in breaking Greenberg's Procrustean pontifications.
Image created April 29, 2022.
Zoom in for an immersive view.
____________________________________________________
© 2022, Richard S Warner. All Rights Reserved. This image may not be used or copied or posted to another website in any form whatsoever without express permission of the creator of this work.
...then I decided to take off the skis and get over here to get this path that seemed endless!
...dann entschied ich mich, mich den Skiern zu entledigen, um auf diese Seite zu gelang, damit ich diesen endlosen Weg aufzunehmen!
IMPORTANT: for non-pro users who read the info on a computer, just enlarge your screen to 120% (or more), then the full text will appear below the photo with a white background - which makes reading so much easier.
The color version of the photo above is here: www.lacerta-bilineata.com/ticino-best-photos-of-southern-...
THE STORY BEHIND THE PHOTO:
So far there's only been one photo in my gallery that hasn't been taken in my garden ('The Flame Rider', captured in the Maggia Valley: www.flickr.com/photos/191055893@N07/53563448847/in/datepo... ) - which makes the image above the second time I've "strayed from the path" (although not very far, since the photo was taken only approximately 500 meters from my house).
Overall, I'll stick to my "only-garden rule", but every once in a while I'll show you a little bit of the landscape around my village, because I think it will give you a better sense of just how fascinating this region is, and also of its history.
The title I chose for the photo may seem cheesy, and it's certainly not very original, but I couldn't think of another one, because it's an honest reflection of what I felt when I took it: a profound sense of peace - although if you make it to the end of this text you'll realize my relationship with that word is a bit more complicated.
I got up early that day; it was a beautiful spring morning, and there was still a bit of mist in the valley below my village which I hoped would make for a few nice mood shots, so I quickly grabbed my camera and went down there before the rising sun could dissolve the magical layer on the scenery.
Most human activity hadn't started yet, and I was engulfed in the sounds of the forest as I was walking the narrow trail along the horse pasture; it seemed every little creature around me wanted to make its presence known to potential mates (or rivals) in a myriad of sounds and voices and noises (in case you're interested, here's a taste of what I usually wake up to in spring, but you best use headphones: www.youtube.com/watch?v=AfoCTqdAVCE )
Strolling through such an idyllic landscape next to grazing horses and surrounded by birdsong and beautiful trees, I guess it's kind of obvious one would feel the way I described above and choose the title I did, but as I looked at the old stone buildings - the cattle shelter you can see in the foreground and the stable further up ahead on the right - I also realized how fortunate I was.
It's hard to imagine now, because Switzerland is one of the wealthiest countries in the world today, but the men and women who had carried these stones and constructed the walls of these buildings were among the poorest in Europe. The hardships the people in some of the remote and little developed valleys in Ticino endured only a few generations ago are unimaginable to most folks living in my country today.
It wasn't uncommon that people had to sell their own kids as child slaves - the girls had to work in factories or in rice fields, the boys as "living chimney brushes" in northern Italy - just because there wasn't enough food to support the whole family through the harsh Ticino winters.
If you wonder why contemporary Swiss historians speak of "slaves" as opposed to child laborers, it's because that's what many of them actually were: auctioned off for a negotiable prize at the local market, once sold, these kids were not payed and in many cases not even fed by their masters (they had to beg for food in the streets or steal it).
Translated from German Wikipedia: ...The Piazza grande in Locarno, where the Locarno Film Festival is held today, was one of the places where orphans, foundlings and children from poor families were auctioned off. The boys were sold as chimney sweeps, the girls ended up in the textile industry, in tobacco processing in Brissago or in the rice fields of Novara, which was also extremely hard work: the girls had to stand bent over in the water for twelve to fourteen hours in all weathers. The last verse of the Italian folk song 'Amore mio non piangere' reads: “Mamma, papà, non piangere, se sono consumata, è stata la risaia che mi ha rovinata” (Mom, dad, don't cry when I'm used up, it was the rice field that destroyed me.)... de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaminfegerkinder
The conditions for the chimney sweeps - usually boys between the age of 8 and 12 (or younger, because they had to be small enough to be able to crawl into the chimneys) - were so catastrophic that many of them didn't survive; they died of starvation, cold or soot in their lungs - as well as of work-related accidents like breaking their necks when they fell, or suffocatig if they got stuck in inside a chimney. This practice of "child slavery" went on as late as the 1950s (there's a very short article in English on the topic here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spazzacamini and a more in depth account for German speakers in this brief clip: www.youtube.com/watch?v=gda8vZp_zsc ).
Now I don't know if the people who built the old stone houses along my path had to sell any of their kids, but looking at the remnants of their (not so distant) era I felt an immense sense of gratitude that I was born at a time of prosperity - and peace - in my region, my country and my home. Because none of it was my doing: it was simple luck that decided when and where I came into this world.
It also made me think of my own family. Both of my grandparents on my father's side grew up in Ticino (they were both born in 1900), but while they eventually left Switzerland's poorest region to live in its richest, the Kanton of Zurich, my grandfather's parents relocated to northern Italy in the 1920s and unfortunately were still there when WWII broke out.
They lost everything during the war, and it was their youngest daughter - whom I only knew as "Zia" which means "aunt" in Italian - who earned a little money to support herself and my great-grandparents by giving piano lessons to high-ranking Nazi officers and their kids (this was towards the end of the war when German forces had occupied Italy).
I never knew that about her; Zia only very rarely spoke of the war, but one time when I visited her when she was already over a 100 years old (she died at close to 104), I asked her how they had managed to survive, and she told me that she went to the local prefecture nearly every day to teach piano. "And on the way there would be the dangling ones" she said, with a shudder.
I didn't get what she meant, so she explained. Visiting the city center where the high ranking military resided meant she had to walk underneath the executed men and women who were hanging from the lantern posts along the road (these executions - often of civilians - were the Germans' retaliations for attacks by the Italian partisans).
I never forgot her words - nor could I shake the look on her face as she re-lived this memory. And I still can't grasp it; my house in Ticino is only 60 meters from the Italian border, and the idea that there was a brutal war going on three houses down the road from where I live now in Zia's lifetime strikes me as completely surreal.
So, back to my title for the photo above. "Peace". It's such a simple, short word, isn't it? And we use it - or its cousin "peaceful" - quite often when we mean nice and quiet or stress-free. But if I'm honest I don't think I know what it means. My grandaunt Zia did, but I can't know. And I honestly hope I never will.
I'm sorry I led you down such a dark road; I usually intend to make people smile with the anecdotes that go with my photos, but this one demanded a different approach (I guess with this latest image I've strayed from the path in more than one sense, and I hope you'll forgive me).
Ticino today is the region with the second highest average life expectancy in Europe (85.2 years), and "The Human Development Index" of 0.961 in 2021 was one of the highest found anywhere in the world, and northern Italy isn't far behind. But my neighbors, many of whom are now in their 90s, remember well it wasn't always so.
That a region so poor it must have felt like purgatory to many of its inhabitants could turn into something as close to paradise on Earth as I can imagine in a person's lifetime should make us all very hopeful. But, and this is the sad part, it also works the other way 'round. And I believe we'd do well to remember that, too.
To all of you - with my usual tardiness but from the bottom of my heart - a happy, healthy, hopeful 2025 and beyond.
The Max Local pokes along at 10 mph with over 12,000 tons of freight bound for the CP interchange at Max. Here the job is about 8 miles from Max as they cross one of the many small lakes scattered thru out the North Dakota landscape. This job has a 2nd crew on board now that will work thru the night. Once they deliver this train the plan is to pull twice out of Max. The 1st pull will be a grain empty for Garrison, and then the 2nd pull will be the regular manifest. DMVW has 125 car max limit on this line, so the crew will have to pull twice tonight from the CP. That will take most of the night, and crew will make it as far as Coleharbor for the day crew tomorrow.
The last of the whoopers - this family of whoopers settled for twenty minutes on lough Neagh, off set by the rumbling thunderstorms behind. They then flew due north, beginning their migration across the Atlantic to Iceland.
I just finished walking our Siberian Husky Chloe this morning and it is one damn bitter day. Chloe didn't mind but I couldn't wait to get back inside. This shot was taken on a similar day and I wasn't long out of the truck that time either. WC train TO-11 rolls east near Hermansville on February 4, 1996 with 6006, 6526 and EMD 1565 leading 67 cars in the frigid winter air.
131-1 N. Xiangyang Rd., Shanghai
The "QR code for the place" on the wall outside the window is a new-born relic of the past, after six months of monitoring the lives of the residents, as China has completely abandoned its anti-epidemic restrictions.
Theoretically, each customer was supposed to scan the "QR code for the place" with his/her smartphone, which then displayed a so-called "health QR code": if it was green, it meant there is no problem, if it was yellow, the customer would be refused and, if it was red, everyone, whether the customer with the red QR code or the shop assistants who were present, would be arrested and taken to a concentration camp for quarantine.
And then there are days when you get up super early and hit the road.... and you actually ARE standing in the RIGHT spot... with the WRONG lens on your camera, because you lent it to a friend. So close.... oh so close to getting the shot! Couldn't crop it enough.... lost clarity just to get this close. The quest continues.....
Now off to work... ugh
♫
Then a light broke through the black
I was standing on a track
That little light began to grow
There was no where I could go
And the ground began to shake
No time left to hit the brake
That little light was closing in
And suddenly I'm floating
Love I see you now
You found me here
Underground
🐝･ﾟ ･ﾟ·:｡･ﾟﾟ･ﾟ ･ﾟ·:｡･ﾟﾟ･ ꜱᴘᴏɴꜱᴏʀᴇᴅ･ﾟ ･ﾟ·:｡･ﾟﾟ･ﾟ ･ﾟ·:｡･ﾟﾟ･🍯
Couch - BackBone - Velvet Harmony Sofa - Available @ FaMESHed
Paris, Cork, Busan, Seoul, Barcelona, Tokyo, Beijing, Dublin, Galway, then, now, and tomorrow foreverness
A contrast in architectural eras: The columns of Union Station, opened in 1927 frame the RBC bank's head office tower completed in 1976 on Bay Street, Toronto's financial district. Processed in PS.
Then followed that beautiful season... Summer....
Filled was the air with a dreamy and magical light; and the landscape
Lay as if new created in all the freshness of childhood.
-- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
I realised I was thinking of you
I began to wonder how long you'd been on my mind
Then it occurred to me
Since I met you, you've never left.
Adrienne stirred, the scent of wine lingering in the thick underground air. Her eyelids felt heavy, her head throbbing with the dull ache of indulgence. What a weird dream… more like a nightmare.
She nuzzled into the warmth pressing against her side. Then realized she was waking up somewhere unfamiliar. Who had she gone home with this time? She shifted slightly and felt an arm draped over her waist, their bodies tangled in the deep cushions of the worn leather sofa. Relief washed over her as she realized she was still dressed. Then she turned—Kayla---and the nightmare rushed back into focus.
Kayla groaned beside her, stretching lazily. “Remind me,” she muttered, voice rough with sleep, “whose idea was it to finish that second bottle?”
Adrienne let out a low, tired laugh. “Yours.”
Kayla cracked one eye open and shot her a suspicious look. “Liar.”
Adrienne smirked, shifting onto her side to face her.
Kayla stirred, stretching before offering a small, knowing smile. “Did you sleep well?”
“I slept.” Adrienne rubbed her temples, willing away the weight pressing against her skull. She exhaled slowly, then muttered, “Tell me yesterday didn’t happen.”
Kayla’s gaze softened—ok but only for a second. “You need to practice.” Her voice was quieter now, more serious.
Adrienne sighed, pressing her fingers to her forehead. “I know. But maybe we could just lay here for a while longer.”
Kayla sat up, pulling Adrienne with her. “You did great with the teleportation last night, but you have to learn to focus. If you don’t land exactly where you intend to jump, we’re dead.”
Adrienne inhaled sharply through her nose, the weight of responsibility settling against her chest. She was learning, but learning wasn’t enough. She had to master it.
Kayla pressed a firm hand to Adrienne’s knee, grounding her. “You were born for this. It’s in your in your blood. Now, close your eyes.”
Adrienne felt the hum of her device start, a faint vibration against her skin. She obeyed, letting the quiet of the apartment wrap around her, pressing in but never suffocating.
“Find the thread,” Kayla continued. “Focus on a place—then feel the pull. Don’t chase it. Feel it.”
Adrienne inhaled deeply, centering herself. Focus. The place, the pull.
She felt it—faint, distant, like the whisper of something just beyond her grasp.
“Let it bring you to the edge,” Kayla murmured. “But don’t fall. Just stand there. Balance.”
The air shifted around her. The apartment walls grew thinner—like layers peeling apart, revealing glimpses of elsewhere. The scent of dust and old books filled her senses. The university library. The room. She could see it, smell it.
She was about to jump.
“Not here. Not now,” whispered Kayla. “Just to the edge.”
Adrienne’s breath hitched.
Kayla’s fingers pressed against her wrist, steadying her. “Hold it. Stay.”
Adrienne felt it—the pull, the tension—but she didn’t jump.
She controlled it.
Kayla exhaled, nodding in approval. “Come back to me.”
Adrienne slowly let go, her awareness settling back into the apartment. She rubbed her head. “Ouch.”
Kayla smiled, satisfaction flickering in her gaze. “That was perfect. I think you must remember from times past.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
You can view Quantum Fold episodes in order from the beginning in her album titled, Quantum Fold:
www.flickr.com/photos/199076397@N02/albums/72177720326169...
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This is an A.I. image generated using my SL avi.
I hope my pictures make you smile ♥
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The Litomyšl Castle is an outstanding example of an arcaded Renaissance country residence, a type of structure first invented in Italy and then developed in the Czech Lands to create a mature form with special architectural value. Situated at an important communications junction on the main route between Bohemia and Moravia, in the Pardubice region, Litomyšl was a fortified centre on the hill where the castle now stands.
The work on the Renaissance building began in 1568 under the supervision of Jan Baptista Avostalis (Giovanni Battista Avostalli), who was soon joined by his brother Oldřich (Ulrico). Most of the work had been completed by 1580. The castle interior underwent alterations between 1792 and 1796, based on the designs of Jan Kryštof Habich, but he was careful to preserve the fine building’s Renaissance appearance with impressive gables.
The castle is a four-winged, three-storeyed structure with an asymmetrical disposition. The western wing is the largest, whereas the southern wing is a two-storeyed arcaded gallery, closing the second square courtyard (a feature that is unique to Litomyšl). The groin-vaulted arcading continues around the western and eastern sides of the courtyard. The south-eastern corner of the eastern wing contains the castle chapel. One of the most striking features in the interior of the castle consists in the fine neoclassical theatre from 1796-97 in the western wing. The original painted decoration of the auditorium, stage decorations and stage machinery have survived intact. The house has richly decorated interiors, basically Renaissance in form and with lavish late Baroque or neoclassical ornamentation in the form of elaborate plasterwork and wall and ceiling paintings.
The buildings associated with the castle were all built or rebuilt during the course of the modifications that the castle itself underwent over time, and this is reflected in their architectural styles. Among the ancillary buildings, the most interesting is the Brewery, the birthplace of Bedřich Smetana, one of the greatest Czech composers of all time. It lies to the south of the first courtyard. Originally constructed to complement the castle, with Renaissance sgraffito decoration, it was remodelled by the well-know
n architect František Maximilián Kaňka after the 1728 fire and received what is its present appearance. The ensemble also includes the former French formal garden with its saletta (pavilion) in the Baroque style and an 18th-century English-style park. (whc.unesco.org/en/list/901/)
Press L and then F11 for a large view - then you can fully enjoy this picture!
Thank you so much for your views, faves and comments !
For more of my photos take a look at at my website: mikkoleinonen.com
Website and photos of my aquariums
© 2025 Mikko Leinonen. All Photos are copyrighted. All rights reserved. Pictures can not be used without explicit permission by the creator.
FOTF Jan 2022. I chose this months theme and then forgot I will be away on holiday on the 5th. As luck would have it I brought my camera that had several older photos on the SD, including this photo of the rose I planted for my mum. Always together!
First cropped, then used vignette effect, then used normal oil painting effect at 40%. Enclosed in a halftone 1 frame at 80% strength. Rose located in rose garden of a nearby neighbor.
Then another westbound loaded grain train. This years' grain harvest must have been a good one as we saw many of these monster trains during our trip.
Press L and then F11 for a large view - then you can fully enjoy this picture!
Thank you so much for your views, faves and comments !
For more of my photos take a look at at my website: mikkoleinonen.com
© 2021 Mikko Leinonen. All Photos are copyrighted. All rights reserved. Pictures can not be used without explicit permission by the creator.
Bay Line 3018 takes the Hilton Turn over W Church Street in Columbia, AL roughly 1-2 miles from their destination of Hilton, GA.
In Hilton, they will interchange with the CIRR and HAL then turn back west to head back toward Dothan, AL for the day.
Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden is a large park with an eminent garden in Shinjuku and Shibuya, Tokyo, Japan. It was originally a residence of the Naitō family in the Edo period. Afterwards, it became a garden under the management of the Imperial Household Agency of Japan. It is now a park under the jurisdiction of the national Ministry of the Environment.
The shogun bequeathed this land to Lord Naitō (daimyo) of Tsuruga in the Edo period who completed a garden here in 1772. After the Meiji Restoration the house and its grounds were converted into an experimental agricultural centre. It then because a botanical garden before becoming an imperial garden in 1879. The current configuration of the garden was completed in 1906. Most of the garden was destroyed by air raids in 1945, during the later stages of World War II. The garden was rebuilt after the war.
The jurisdiction over the Imperial Palace Outer Garden and the Kyoto imperial garden was transferred to the Ministry of Health and Welfare (now part of the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare) in 1947.
On May 21, 1949 the garden became open to the public as "National Park Shinjuku Imperial Gardens". It came under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of the Environment in January 2001 with the official name "Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden".
One of the fun parts of visiting Custer State Park was petting the wild Donkeys that roam the park freely. There are signs everywhere stating not to feed the Donkeys but people were doing it anyways.
We let the others feed them and then when the Donkeys came over to us looking for food we just petted them and they moved on.
“Ego says, “Once everything falls into place, I'll feel peace.” Spirit says, “Find your peace, and then everything will fall into place.” ― Marianne Williamson
"... be as scary as my sister!"
This is one of our boarders at work. I took two photos of her - this is NOT the photo I sent to her dad. When I asked him about Samadhi in order to feature her on social media, he said that she loves people and is the sweetest cat. In fact, "she is as sweet as her sister is devilish". Yikes.
Happy Caturday: If I could, then I would