Oslo Streets

One of my first impressions of Oslo (capital city of Norway) was that there are so many beautiful, renovated buildings. I spent first days in here just walking around and looking. Most people never look up and are more interested in clubs and pubs or just look at marked monuments and museums. ..duh…

Old parts of Oslo, namely Frogner or Majorstua are full packed with lots of tenements. In Polish we have exact word for such buildings – kamienice. Norwegians call it bygaard but it’s obviously too general word meaning block of flats.

Most of these building were built during the 19th and the beginning of 20th century. The reason why all of them can shine nowadays was quite calm course of both first and second World War in Scandinavia. Furthermore Norway honestly takes care of how Oslo and other main cities look like. Facades are freshly painted and full of color. Many buildings are still under renovation which may mean that Oslo will look even better in the future!

Poland has suffered a lot during World War II, lots of this kind of buildings got destroyed during bombardments and demolition. I don’t want to bore you with all facts so if anyone’s interested you can read about it here, here or here.

But enough about Poland. South of Norway had no bombardments and devastation was really marginal. Good for them as they have some great architectural photography opportunities. My friends have probably already noticed that I love shooting tenements under perfect blue sky. I don’t use filters besides clear UV. I usually shoot when the sun is high, shadows and light can be boring for most photos but it’s perfect for me. When the sun is high, almost every direction gives me great, polarized sky, sometimes it gets so dark it looks unnatural.

My second favorite time for taking pictures starts just after sunset and lasts for next hour or so. During that hour it’s much harder to get good pics. Most important factor is artificial lighting. The more lights inside flats/offices, the more interesting it can look. Some building can even have outdoor lights directed on walls which makes scenes even more exciting!

This is a shot of National Theater in Oslo shot hand held at 21:42. Camera was Nikon D40 with 18-200 VR lens shot at ISO 200, F/3,5, 0,62 sec. It’s around 40-50 mins after sunset, quite long shutter speed for hand held shot made me take few frames before I got good enough sharpness. Wider and less distorting lens could have made better picture but I’m rather happy with the result for the all-in lens.

More about Oslo soon. Hope you enjoyed, cya next time!