Dolomites

Mid July my Photoclub (Fotografie INN Fokus - FIF) organized a weekend photo walk to the South Tyrolean Dolomites.  We left Austria on Friday for the Alta Badia region. We hiked up to the Pisciadu hut in the Sella Mountain Group. Friday night we had the best weather for stars and wasted no time so set out directly after an awesome dinner. Here 2 of the better pics I managed to get.

Pisciadu Hut at the blue hour.

2 Exposures blended to get the most out of the foreground

Saturday morning after a very good breakfast I decided to go and check out the peak next to the hut – Cimu Pisciadu 2940m. It took a nice leisurely stroll to the top with a lot of “photoshoot” stops. Beautiful area to do some hiking – make sure you have proper hiking boots. Here a selfie at the top.

Pano of the Sella Mountain Group

Definitely a place to visit with great food at the hut. Looking forward to the next photo walk FIF will organize.

What happened in the last month of the Rugby Season

16th May was the Bavarian league game against Nördlingen in the middle of Innsbruck at Fenner. We get the opportunity very few times a year to show case our club in Innsbruck and we then make a big event of it. Nördlingen were the lucky team to get the draw (we can not select dates, we take what we can get). In the end it was a comfortable win for the hosts against a side that has improved over the season.

Here some of my favourite photos of the game.

 

A Few weeks later we hosted the Austrian champions to Innsbruck – this time we got a pitch in Reichenau. It turned out to be a beautiful day in more ways than one ;-) We have struggled to beat the Champions ever since our addition to the Austrian Bundesliga. We came close a few times losing 7-3 in Vienna a few years ago and met them in the Bundesliga final three times but losing all three.

Well we finally did it! RCI played a solid hard game and had Donau on the backfoot for most of the game. There was one moment when a lapse of concentration let Donau in for a try and I thought to myself, oh bugger here we go again but the RCI boys pulled it back and played their hearts out to pull off a win against the champions in the last Bundesliga game of the season! RC Donau went on the win the title yet again in the final against RC Stade.

It was also a day of saying goodbye to a few players like Ewan (who did most of the coaching this season), Anton and Guro. A few others will be away for a few months to a year – studies abroad but they will be back! Here a special Thanks to Ewan, Anton and Guro for bringing in their own way something special to RCI.   

Saturday is a Rugby day!

On Saturday the 16th May Rugby Club Innsbruck will host Nördlingen Meteors at Fenner in Innsbruck - Kick-off is at 14:00. Come and support your local rugby club!

The Facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/1444583692521904/

Last week RCI had a tough game against the favourites Rugby Stade Wien in Hatting and I was there to get some pictures of the game. Here two of my favourites pics  of the day:

Lucas Huter - avoiding tackles

Lucas Huter - avoiding tackles

Mathias Märk trying to bust a tackle.

Mathias Märk trying to bust a tackle.

For more photos of the game please visit the clubs Flickr page here. For the match report please go to the Rugby Club Innsbruck website here.

On Sunday my wife and I went for a hike in the Rofan mountain range. The weather was not great but the area is beautiful. We ended up hiking for about 17km and here two of my favourite photos I got on the hike.

For more photos visit my flickr page.

For more photos visit my flickr page.

Babysitting

Spent the long weekend babysitting my daughter’s Jack Russell and came to the realization that having a dog is just too much work. Love having him for the weekend but gratefully gave him back on Sunday. Give me a cat any day!

Took the dog on a walk up to Höttingeralm near Innsbruck and thanks to a lot of cloud movement I had an opportunity to try out a time-lapse. Using my trusty RicohGR pocket camera I used the internal camera timer to run the time-lapse. This worked without a glitch and here is my result:

I went for B&W to give the video imagery a more contrast and moody feel. The timer I set for a picture every 5 seconds and using my ND filter I was able to get a slower shutter speed to make the transition smoother. Unfortunately I only managed to get 10 frames per second on my video editing software (iMovie) and will have to get myself a better editing app to get 24 frames a second for future time-lapse videos.

On Sunday I took the dog for another walk this time armed with my 400mm lens looking for some birds (the feathered kind). Managed to get a nice shot of a Robin which is probably my favorite bird species. It was playing hide and seek with me but I did manage to get this shot:

jtrojer-128.jpg

Also got a shot of a bird I have not noticed before - Common redstart

I missed Rugby Club Innsbruck's away game in Vienna which we won narrowly by 10-13 but will be in Hatting to support them against a very strong RC Stade this Saturday (KO at 12:30). Visit the club website for details of the last game and next fixtures at www.rugby-innsbruck.at 

Unexpected visitor...

Was a photographically busy weekend which started off with my local Photography club FIF (Fotografie INN Fokus) who met at Seegrubbe for some sunset and night shots of Innsbruck and the Inn valley. Seegrubbe is located at 1905m and overlooks Innsbruck which provides some spectacular views.

Here is my favorite of the evening, it is a pano created in the new Lightroom CC which works quite well even on my old laptop.

On Saturday it was again a rugby day where Rugby Club Innsbruck hosted Allgäu Rugby in the South Bavarian League. Was a tough game with Allgäu giving RCI a lot more resistance than the previous game - for more information on this game visit the RCI website here. I borrowed the Canon 1D Mark III from work to have an extra camera so I can take close-up shots and some wide angle shots when the action came close. Here a few of my favorites from Saturday!

Taken with the Canon 7D and 14mm Walimex/Rokinon lens

Taken with the Canon 7D and 14mm Walimex/Rokinon lens

This one taken with the Canon 1D Mark III and 100-400mm Lens

This one taken with the Canon 1D Mark III and 100-400mm Lens

For more of the same set visit the following link: Flickr

We also had a Red Kite watching from high up on Saturday.

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Icy spring - Weekend in review

Sunday I was picked up by a colleague at 5:15 in the morning to photograph the sunrise near Innsbruck . We ended up going to a spot in Paschberg (near Lansermoor) where we waited for the sun. The colours were beautiful but without any clouds the pictures are a bit boring IMO so we decided to head down to Obernberg (Wipptal) to check out the lake. I was surprised at how cold it still is up there and the amount of ice. Walking around we found a few cool things to photograph. Definitely a place to revisit this summer and certainly a great spot to do some astrophotography.

Obernbergersee

Obernbergersee

This Weekend (24th to 26th April) I have a few things coming up photographically. Friday I will be going up the mountain to Seegrubbe in Innsbruck with FIF (Fotografie INN Fokus) to get some nice sunset and night photos of Innsbruck. Maybe try my hand at some time-lapse photography and star trails. If you are interested in joining FIF on one of their walks visit the Facebook Page here.

On Saturday there will be another rugby match in Hatting in Tirol. Rugby Club Innsbruck are hosting the rugby team from the Allgäu in the Southern Bavarian league - KO 12:30. I will be there to try and capture some interesting and memorable moments on camera. For this weekend I have loaned a camera to try out, the classic Canon 1D Mark III! Yes it is old and only 10Mpics but this was THE camera in 2008 for sports so looking forward to seeing what it can do and how it compares to my Canon 7D. Come and support the local Rugby Club!

JT

Weekend Review

On Saturday I was photographing my local Rugby teams in action in Hatting. The weather was a bit overcast giving a very diffused light which was great for even light. I had my Canon 7D and 100-400mm lens and am pretty happy with the results.

The day started off with the Womens's 7s tournament hosted by WRCI - you can find the Report on their Website here with my photo gallery on flickr here

Here my favourite of the women's 7s tournament.

Here my favourite of the women's 7s tournament.

The men's game involving Rugby Club Innsbruck vs SG Fürstenfeldbruck/UFG was late afternoon with a 15:00 KO. My local Team won the game handsomely and you can find the match report here and the photo Gallery on flickr here.  

Here my favourite from the mens game.

Here my favourite from the mens game.

Next game (Saturday 25th April) RC Innsbruck will play at home (Hatting) and KO will be at 14:00. See you there. More info to follow.