About me
ADRIANNA OJRZANOWSKA
To begin with I am an architecture student based in Warsaw who has a handful of hobbies and is stubborn enough to keep up with them. This blog, for instance, is one of them. It is a result of passion for photography and gathering a massive colletion of photos that maybe would be worth sharing. I also like to look back to the places I've visited and having this blog form makes it very easy for me.
I have to fairly admit that I live for pleasures, and luckily enough having hobbies is considered in my mind as pleasure. I shoot, I draw, I play. Doing things makes me feel fulfilled and complete, drives my engines and fills me up with deep satisfaction. The action itself is somehow more important then the effect. I'd rather figure my own method of doing things than learn the proper way. This is a blessing and a curse, trust me.
PHOTOGRAPHY
I don't want to call myself a photographer because I have no qualifications and no formal education in the field. I would like to finish some courses and have these qualifications, but before that I never bothered, really. Anyone up to hearing the story of my photography skill development?
I first started shooting when I was in my mid-teens. I got a small compact Sony CyberShot camera and took shots of my dog, mostly. To be honest I still do that. I also shot daily objects in our house, nature etc. Then my parents got themselves a DSLR. It was a canon 1000D with a kit 18-55mm lens and I obtained ownership of it quicker than my parents would like. I started to use it really often and experiment on my own. Then I met a friend in high school who was deep into photography, and I grasped knowledge and passion from her and made my progress really quick. I saved up money to buy a 50mm 1:1.4 Canon lens and I fell in love with what it did. Everything was perfect until 2012 when (because of my inattention and foolishness) I have lost the camera and both lenses while we were on a family vacation in the US. For a year I was camera-less and in deep despair because of that. Then for my eighteenth birthday I have received another DSLR as a birthday gift from my parents. It was a Canon 550D with a kit 18-135mm/3.5-5.6 IS lens and I use it up to this day. I bought an analogue Pentacon 50mm/1.8 lens I could use with the DSLR (with an adapter). I took shots of my daily life, of my friends, on trips. I started to travel more, at first with my mum and then with friends and finally on my own. I shot and shot and shot. I still do.
Back then I didn't really have any goals what I would like to achieve with my photography. I never tried to imitate any photographer because I honestly didn't know many back then. I just wanted for my shots to look more or less consistent to make one of my photography social media profile as aesthetic as it could be. It probably sounds immature or unprofessional on some level but like I said, my main aim in shooting was having fun and saving the moments I wanted to remember later. Monochrome shots was something that instantly stole my heart, as you can notice I still shoot in black-and-white a lot. I tend to set my digital camera to a monochrome mode instead of desaturating the images in the post-production process which would probably cause a heart attack to many professional photographers. Oh well.
For a DSLR with an APS-C sensor I have eventually discovered what my favourite focal length is. I bought a prime Canon 35mm/2.0 lens and I fell in love. On a cropped sensor it gives a relatively similar angle as 50mm lens does in a full frame. I shoot basically everything with it, when it comes to digital photography, I don't even take any other lenses to my trips anymore. This is probably unprofessional, but oh well.
I currently shoot with a Canon 6D DSLR camera I had purchased when I realised that I deserved a better equipment to my skill. I still find the 35mm focal length as my absolute favourite, even though it is much wider than it was on a my previous DSLR, I assume that my shooting preferences shifted as well. My arsenal of lenses keeps growing and changing with both digital and analog lenses. For certain occassions I use 20mm, 50mm and 135mm lenses.
At some point I realised that what appeals to me in photography the most is street photography and reportage photography. Suddenly, it hit me that "hey, this is exactly what I'm trying to do!". I tried to apply Cartier-Bresson's rule of The Decisive Moment before I even learned about it. I like to observe people, i'm fascinated by small scenes that happen when I'm passing by. Well, I think I don't personally have the guts and courage to become more professional in these areas because you have to be either bold enough to ask people could you take a picture of them or utterly invisible so that you shoot and nobody notices. I think I'm somewhere inbetween, but i'm still trying to do my best. Of course as an architecture student I'm also fascinated by buildings, their details, spacial compositions.
I made a spontaneous decision of taking up analogue photography. Within half an hour I made up my mind and ordered online a Practica Super TL2. A few months later I purchased a Zenit. A few months later I purchased a Minolta X700. My analogue adventures continue. It's a very powerful tool and a great but unforgiving teacher. It taught me to be more deliberative and humble when taking shots. In a ready-made world having to wait a week or a month to see the results of your work is something immensly exciting.
Back then I didn't really have any goals what I would like to achieve with my photography. I never tried to imitate any photographer because I honestly didn't know many back then. I just wanted for my shots to look more or less consistent to make one of my photography social media profile as aesthetic as it could be. It probably sounds immature or unprofessional on some level but like I said, my main aim in shooting was having fun and saving the moments I wanted to remember later. Monochrome shots was something that instantly stole my heart, as you can notice I still shoot in black-and-white a lot. I tend to set my digital camera to a monochrome mode instead of desaturating the images in the post-production process which would probably cause a heart attack to many professional photographers. Oh well.
For a DSLR with an APS-C sensor I have eventually discovered what my favourite focal length is. I bought a prime Canon 35mm/2.0 lens and I fell in love. On a cropped sensor it gives a relatively similar angle as 50mm lens does in a full frame. I shoot basically everything with it, when it comes to digital photography, I don't even take any other lenses to my trips anymore. This is probably unprofessional, but oh well.
I currently shoot with a Canon 6D DSLR camera I had purchased when I realised that I deserved a better equipment to my skill. I still find the 35mm focal length as my absolute favourite, even though it is much wider than it was on a my previous DSLR, I assume that my shooting preferences shifted as well. My arsenal of lenses keeps growing and changing with both digital and analog lenses. For certain occassions I use 20mm, 50mm and 135mm lenses.
At some point I realised that what appeals to me in photography the most is street photography and reportage photography. Suddenly, it hit me that "hey, this is exactly what I'm trying to do!". I tried to apply Cartier-Bresson's rule of The Decisive Moment before I even learned about it. I like to observe people, i'm fascinated by small scenes that happen when I'm passing by. Well, I think I don't personally have the guts and courage to become more professional in these areas because you have to be either bold enough to ask people could you take a picture of them or utterly invisible so that you shoot and nobody notices. I think I'm somewhere inbetween, but i'm still trying to do my best. Of course as an architecture student I'm also fascinated by buildings, their details, spacial compositions.
I made a spontaneous decision of taking up analogue photography. Within half an hour I made up my mind and ordered online a Practica Super TL2. A few months later I purchased a Zenit. A few months later I purchased a Minolta X700. My analogue adventures continue. It's a very powerful tool and a great but unforgiving teacher. It taught me to be more deliberative and humble when taking shots. In a ready-made world having to wait a week or a month to see the results of your work is something immensly exciting.
TRIPS & TRAVELS
I love to travel ever since I was a child. My parents took me on trips around Europe that implemented my wanderlust and hunger for adventure. I try to see as much as I can grasping any opportunity for a trip. Either its with my parents, friends or even sometimes alone. Either for tourism, visiting friends or for architectural workshops, exchange programmes etc. I have been to Erasmus in Horsens (Denmark) for 5 months, took part in Athens Exchange Programme in Milan (Italy) and participated in an International Design Workshop (Italy). I'm up for more. I always feel there are still so many places out there I want to visit. In Europe, and maybe beyond?
