BrownNoisePhotosBrownNoisePhotosPersonal photoblog with pictures from trips, holidays, travel, daily life with some backgroundinformation and depending on the subject links to more detailed online information, average updates once a week Articles
Tokyo Ska Paradise Orchestra (Great fun)
2007-06-30 22:54:00 Didn't took much pictures the last two weeks that were worthwhile to share. But last night we had a a great night with musical fun.Last Night N., two friends and also former roommates and yours truly went to a concert of the Tokyo Ska Paradise Orchestra in our hometown Utrecht. For those who are not familiair with their music you can describe their music as Madness meets The Pogues with a bit of punk-, jazz-, soul-, funk- and bigband- and even klezmerinfluences added to the overall mixture, creating a live performance that turns every musicevent into a partying, jumping and dancing whole.N. and I saw the Tokyo Ska Paradise Orchestra for the first time two years ago at the Parkpop Festival, a free music festival at The Hague, which is always held at the last Sunday of June every year. Although they were playing early in the afternoon, they got the whole crowd jumping and dancing, including me and that's quite an achievement if you know that I'm not a big dancinglover. They have a... More About: Music , Japan , Great
Pubcats again
2007-06-13 00:13:00 In this, this and this posting I posted about pubcats before. Last Thursday we met another pubcat in our hometown Utrecht . Like most pubcats this one was spoiled too. He or she (we didn't check and we didn't ask) was treated like a king/queen by the pubowner. While the cat was sitting next to us on a chair he/she was brought water at the table, shortly followed by some catfood. It was funny to watch. The cat obviously enjoyed all the attention from the owner and from us and behaved like a regular customer of the pub.After some time he/she thought it was about time to get some fresh air and the cat walked out of the window. You should know that the pub is next to the canal and the groundfloor of the pub is about 7 or 8 metres above the water. Outside the window in the back at the canal there was only a small sloping roof with a windowsill. The cat looked very relaxed and confident and did this obviously more often. So the cat just sat down the end of the windowsill and enjoyed the ...
Utrecht sunset
2007-06-08 07:18:00 Just a few pictures that I took last Mondaynight from the sunset as seen from our conservatorybalcony with the outlines of the playground, the railways, and the children's farm.For a second the sun was gone More About: Photography , Sunset , Utrecht
Boattrip (part2)
2007-05-31 04:51:00 Here is part 2 with the rest of the pics from the boattrip on the river Linge near Leerdam that I made 18 days ago with my mate Andy from England. Some background information about the trip and the area you can check in the previous posting.My mate Andy while the boat just passed a lock.Some more gloomy skies More About: Nature
Boattrip (part 1)
2007-05-30 04:43:00 Since our wedding I didn't took much pictures. The week holiday I had from work after the wedding I mostly used to relax and catch up some sleep . My friend Andy from England stayed until the Tuesday after the wedding.The monday before he left we went on a two hour boattrip on the river Linge at Leerdam the city where I grew up and lived for 17 years and where my parents and sister and her family still live.As a child and teenager I often went on bicyclerides along the riverdykes that surrounds the river Linge. It's a gorgeous part of the Netherlands. The area is called "De Betuwe" and is famous for it's fruitproduction. Especially in the Springtime when the orchards and fruittrees are blooming it's very gorgeous to take a walk or bicycleride along the riverdykes around the Betuwe. If you're ever near the area around springtime it's highly recommended to take a tour around the area.Unfortunately the weather wasn't so good, but gloomy skies also can enhance the atmosphere and ... More About: Nature , Camera , Canon , Nikon , Part
Catching up posting pics (part 2)
2007-05-17 23:02:00 I have a busy period behind me. Last Friday I got married with the love of my life N. and although we didn't had a very big wedding there was still a lot of organization involved. We had a few guests from Japan, England and my brother came across from Israel and they all needed to be looked after. But everything went smooth and we had a marvelous day with a nice ceremony and an enjoyable party with good food and drinks in a quiet and pleasant relaxed atmosphere.For those who are curious about our weddingpictures I have to disappoint you. I'm not going to post pictures from our wedding on this photoblog. Not that they are not worth seeing, but because N. and my mother in law doesn't like it when their pictures are shown to everybody on the internet. I probably might post some of them on an online private photoalbum where only invited people can enter.So you have to do it in this post with part 2 of my catching up pictures. This time a selection of pics from a cycling trip that I ... More About: Nature , History , Wedding , Utrecht , Forts
Advertising new weblog and one preview pic
2007-05-06 02:14:00 Just a quick note. First I want to advertise my new weblog BrownNoiseMusic which I started last Monday. If your familiar with BrownNoisePhotos the name doesn't need much explanation, I guess. BrownNoise is of course the nickname I choosed when I started this photoweblog in August 2005. In this post I explained where the name BrownNoise comes from. So when BrownNoisePhotos is about pictures and photography then it won't surprise you that BrownNoiseMusic is about music. At BrownNoiseMusic you'll find future reports about new musical discoveries I did (old and new stuff), reviews about new CD's I've listened to, music-DVD's I've watched, interesting or fascinating musicvideos I found on the net. You can find posts about classical music, jazz, pop, rock, indie, singer-songwritermusic, world music etc...In the near future I also might start a weblog about movies and one about books/literature. It probably won't be hard to find out what the name of those weblogs will be.To finish ... More About: Photography , Advertising , Weblog , Preview
Not so foggy pictures
2007-04-22 01:38:00 I still had to post the rest of the selected pics as a sequel to the "Foggy Pictures "-post. The pics that I'm going to post now were made during the same bicycletrip that I made on Easter Sunday. These pics were taken a little bit later on the day when most of the fog was gone and sometimes the sun was getting through. It's a bit of a mix of animals (birds), still life scenes and houses (mainly country estates, originally built in the 17th and 18th century by merchants from Amsterdam) which I saw cycling down the river Vecht.Most of the pictures speak for themselves, I guess.These two windmills which you can see on the back between this tree view through are the biggest and the smallest windmills of the Utrecht province.This is castle Nyenrode and is the home nowadays of the Nyenrode Business UniversityI assume this swan had a nearby nest, because the swan was behaving very aggressive. I was standing on the footpath about one and a half meter from the waterfront and every time I m... More About: Nature , Photography
Yamato - Impressive Drumgroup from Japan
2007-04-16 00:04:00 Basically this is a photoweblog. So besides some short announcements most of the time I post pictures with some backgroundinformation. But occasionaly I'll make an exeption. Once I wrote about the Egyptian weblogger Alaa and several others who were detained by the police while demonstrating peacefully in support of the independence of the judiciary in Egypt (see here). And I wrote e few times about the International Film Festifal (IFFR) in Rotterdam (see here).Tonight I want to write something about a show that a friend and I visited Sundayafternoon in our hometown Utrecht from Yamato, a Japan ese percussion/drumgroup from Nara. Unfortunately my girlfriend couldn't join because she had to work.Nara was one of the former capitals of Japan before Kyoto, Kamakura and current Tokyo, although stricly speaking Kamakura was officially not a capital city, but the chief city during the Heian period of one of the shogunates. BTW Heian in Japanese means peace or tranquility. But don't let's... More About: Politics , Culture , History , Drum
Vote for me
2007-04-12 09:01:00 Just a short request to my regular visitors and to the visitors who get here by coincidence. If you visit here and if, for some odd reason, you like what you see, please hit the "Vote for me"-button in the right sidebar. It looks like this:It will give this weblog a higher ranking and I've notice on my webstatistics it will draw some more visitors.Other buttons that involve blogdirectories are:and:You'll find these buttons also on the right sidebar a little below the "Vote for me"-button. Clicking on these buttons also will give me a higher ranking and possibly more visitors.There is no pricewinning involved. It only will make me a happier weblogger.Thanks!
Foggy pictures (some of them)
2007-04-11 00:46:00 I went cycling again last Sundaymorning. It was an impulsive decision. I was awake early, watched outside, I saw it was foggy and thought maybe this could give me some nice photo opportunities. And because of Easter it probably wouldn't be very crowded on the road early in the morning. So I got up prepared some of my photogear, took a shower, packed some fruits and drinks for during the trip, got my cycling outfit on and off I went.It was quite waterkoud as we say in Dutch or clammy in English, so I was glad I took some gloves with me. I took almost the same route as one week earlier. So I cycled from my hometown Utrecht again through Oud-Zuilen, Maarssen and Breukelen and then through Loenen and then to Nieuwersluis.Short after about 4 kilometres I spotted the grebe-couple again with their three youngsters from last week. I guess it was the same couple again, because it was exactly at the same spot I saw them a week before. It's amazing how quick the youngsters grow. If you look... More About: Pictures , Nature , Photography , Them
It's been a while
2007-04-04 03:01:00 It's been a while since my last post. Been pretty busy both with work and private. I cycled a lot, but I didn't took much pictures lately. Until last weekend. Last Saturday I went out on the bike early. the weather was looking good. It was a bit chilly in the early morning, but the light in the early morning and late afternoon/early evening is the most gorgeous for photography I think.I'm still in the middle of getting to know my new camera, the Nikon D200. This semi professional camera has, let's say, a little more steep learning curve than the point and shoot compact digital camera's. But finally it's worth the whole learning process, because it will reward you with much better pictures. But I'm still at the beginning of this learning process. But I must say that I was not unhappy with the first results of my first serious photo cycling trip from last Saturday.I cycled from my hometown Utrecht through Oud-Zuilen, Maarssen and Breukelen and then through Loenen (aan de Vecht)... More About: Nature , Photography , Camera , While
Listen to the radio (update)
2007-03-11 12:49:00 Update: made some changes in paragraph 3 of this post.My Girlfriend was on Japan ese national radio yesterday. She appeared on NHK-radio. NHK is Japan's national broadcasting company, to compare with the BBC in Great Britain. My girlfriend's contribution was recorded last week on the phone and was broadcastred yesterday. It's a programme about Japanese living abroad. The persons who appear on the programme give a short report about the hometown or country they are living or answering questions. Some time ago she was asked to prepare a report for the programme.My girlfriend's report was about our hometown Utrecht and about the famous Dutch designer and architect Gerrit Rietveld and his Rietveld-Schröder-house. This house is also on the Unesco's world heritage list. During the broadcasting of my girlfriend's report the radiostation showed webcamimages on the internet of the studio and at the same time they showed some pictures my girlfriend provided. She made some screenshots of ... More About: Radio , Architecture , Update
Some maintenance and some animalpics
2007-03-06 07:14:00 I have been doing some maintenance on my weblog. Since January I'm using the New Blogger . One of the new features is the use of labels. The past few days I went through all my previous posts, added labels and added also some extra links to backgroundinformation related to the subject(s) of the post. If you click on a label you'll get all the posts with the same label.This time some animalpics that were shot in our hometown Utrecht both by my girlfriend and me with her camera. She took care of the dog pics and I took care of the cat picsLooks like I've created a monster. A typical case of shooting a picture at the wrong moment. If you didn't know better you would think that the cat was very vicious and ready to scratch my eyes out. But she was only yawning. This is how the cats looks like when she's not yawning.I've posted about the cat and the bulldog before in this post.The dog didn't look very clever, but he compensated it with his friendlyness and enthusiasm If my owner wo... More About: Weblogs , Anima , Maintenance , Tena
The end of an era
2007-02-27 21:12:00 Last Saturday we went for the last time to our favorite pancake- and poffertjes (tiny pancakes) shop in our hometown Utrecht . The place was called Victor Consael and was a well known local place. Due to a new restructuring plan around their location and because they didn't want to fight (again) with the local authorities about a new location, they decided to quit. The stand and the household furniture have been sold. They will start a new place, but unfortunately it will be outside Utrecht. I wish them well and hope their new business will succeed.This is too bad. Little by little the city is taken over by property developers turning characteristic city centres into the same looking boring shopping centres with the same store chains you find in lots of other cities.I also feel disappointed because of nostalgic reasons. Victor Consael is already existing since 1850 (!!). They use to have a mobile stand traveling from fair to fair. Since 1974 they have a stationary stand in the city ... More About: Food , Culture
Update on my IFFR-post (2)
2007-02-26 18:20:00 In my International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) (2)-post about 4 weeks ago I gave a short comment on the movie "Das Leben der Anderen". In my short comment I said that in my opinion this movie would make a good chance on an Oscar for best foreign movie. Obviously my judgement was right, because last night "Das Leben der Anderen" (English title: "The Lives of Others") won the Oscar for best foreign film. Well done! My congratulations to the director Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, the excellent cast (among others Ulrich Mühe, Sebastian Koch and Martina Gedeck) and the crew. More About: Movies , Oscars , Post , Update
My latest aquisition
2007-02-21 10:01:00 It's been awhile since my last post, so I thought I better post something. I haven't any pictures to share yet. Maybe I'll scan some older pictures later this weekend.Anyway I want to show you my latest aquisition. I was planning to get a digital SLR-camera for quite some time, but I was waiting for a good offer. In December Nikon had an interesting offer. If you bought a Nikon D200 you would get a booklet with vouchers which gave you discount on many accessories, like lenses, software, flashlights etc.. The total discount that I would get on the accessories (which I already planned to purchase) was more than I would get if I waited if the D200 body maybe would drop a 50 to 100 Euro. So I decided to purchase the camera. I also bought a AF-S VR 70-300 f/4.5-5.6G IF-ED lens and I have the AF-S VR 105 f/2.8G IF-ED in order at my local photoshop.An important reason to get the D200 was that I already had some Nikon lenses which were given to me about 6 or 7 years ago by my mother in ... More About: Photography , Camera , Test , Late
International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) (3)
2007-02-04 13:35:00 The International Film festival Rotterdam (IFFR) is finished. My task is accomplished. I watched 33 films in ten days. I know it's a dirty job, but someone's got to do it. It was a good festival. Most of the movies I watched were worthwhile. Today after I slept in I slowly had to adjust to my regular daily life. I had square eyes after seeing all these movies and I had withdrawal symptoms. But I'm doing okay now. I guess I probably won't see any movie this week. But although some people might see this as a punishment to watch 33 movies in 10 days, it wasn't a big burden for me. I've enjoyed it and saw some nice, gorgeous, funny and interesting movies.Thursday my girlfriend and I stayed in a hotel for one night, because we had two movies on Thursdaynight and Fridaymorning we also had two movies together and the first one was starting at 9:45 A.M. So to avoid the early train during rush hour we decided to check for a hotel on the internet. We went to Rotterdam in the afternoon to... More About: Movies , Food , Festival
International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) (2)
2007-01-30 04:24:00 Here is a list with the movies from the International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) that I've seen so far with my ratings. Those who are interested in the content of the movies can click on the title for an English description.The rating goes from 0/+ to +++++ meaning:0 = very bad+ = bad++ = not so good+++ = good++++ = very good+++++ = excellentElection (+++)Election2 (++++)The bare footed kid (+++) Justice my foot (+++)Throw Down (+++)The last dining table (++1/2)Hana (++++)Anxiety (++++)No Mercy for the Rude (++++)The story of my son (+++)PTU (++++)Strawberry Shortcakes (++++1/2)Living in Fear (++++) Summer Palace (++++) Ex-drummer (++++)Fourteen (++++)Unfortunately had to skip Fourteen because the movie before this one got delayed and then I would have missed my last train, so the rating is based on the contents and other reviews I saw. Hopefully I will be able to watch this one some other time.The Matsugane Potshot Affair (++++)Freesia (+++)Due to a headache I decided to skip ... More About: Movies
International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR)
2007-01-28 05:21:00 Since Thursdaynight I spend a lot of time at the International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR). The IFFR wil finish on Sunday February 4th. This year I will set a record by watching 33 movies(!!!). When my mother heard that I was going to see 33 movies she said yuck. Actually she said something else, but this is a proper and decent weblog (wink).I saw 2 movies on Thursday, 5 on Friday and 5 today (Saturday). So 12 down, 21 to go. Here you can check the festivalprogramme. The festival has a wide range of different movies from all over the world. My main focus is Asian cinema, so the most movies I normally watch at the IFFR are from China, Japan and South Korea and sometimes from Taiwan, Malasia, Thailand (this year a lot from Hong Kong) depending on the supply. That doesn't mean that I try to watch all. It also depends on the subject/story of the movie. The IFFR always has a wide and interesting range of movies from the Asian region. But I also watch movies from other countries if I ... More About: Movies , Food
Some delayed pictures
2007-01-23 23:41:00 Here are some more pictures from our last visit to England around New Year, as I promised.Meet Noodles, my friend's cat, a bit of a chicken-cat, but cute and funny.And this is Sushi, a less chicken than Noodles and very playful.A part of the church belonging to the tower from my former post.And a detail from one of the sides of the towerThis was our New Year's Eve dinner, soba noodles, very yummy.Compared to Holland the fireworks was minimal, but there was some nearby. I manage to shoot this picture without a tripod. The first time my friend from England experienced the fireworks in Holland at midnight, he thought that World War 3 broke out.For some reason I always have to think of Mr. Bean when I see a MiniThis picture and the next three were taken at my friend's parent's place, a small countryside village in Devonshire, which name I forgotOn our last night we went to a nice Indian restaurant in my friend's hometown Weston Super Mare. More About: Pictures , Travel , Food , Some
Quick Post
2007-01-17 08:05:00 It has been two weeks since my last post. It's not that I didn't had anything to post about. I made quite some pictures the past few weeks, but I simply was too busy with other things.We were in England from December 28th till January 3rd were we visited a friend around New Year. I haven't sort out all the pictures yet, but here are two pics for now to keep my visitors happy :-).I will post more pictures soon, I promise.Bye for now.This is a pic from the tower of the Parish church of St. Mary Magdalene in TauntonAnd this one was taken near my friend's parent's place in Devon, a county in South-West England. More About: Travel , Great Britain , Post , Quick
Just removed some stuff
2007-01-02 18:27:00 Welcome and a happy New Year to all my visitors!I just removed the Neo Counter- and the Neo Earth- banners. I knew when I signed in I could try the paid version for two weeks and after that it would change to the free version. But I didn't expect that the free version would look that crappy, so I just removed the banners. Although the paid version looked nice, there is no way I'm going to pay 30 Dollars ( a year) for some nice banners. More About: Internet , Stuff , Some
Some maintenance and Blogger trouble
2006-12-26 15:48:03 The past three, four days I had trouble logging in at Blog ger . This is pretty annoying. The past weeks I hardly had time to post and now I have time I can't log in to post. I'll keep it short for now. You never know how long this will be working.I did some maintenance on the template. I removed a banner on the right side, which was slowing down the loading time of the weblog very much. Instead of this banner I add banners from Neo counter and Neo earth. These banners show the flags of the countries of your visitors and the Neo Earth banner shows a map with the location of the city of your visitors. You have some flexibility to change the lay out of the banners. I think they look pretty nice.To all my viewers/visitors I wish everybody a merry X-mas and for later of course a Happy, Healthy and prosperous New Year.See you later! More About: Main , Maintenance , Logger
Advertising other websites/blogs
2006-12-09 15:36:10 I didn't took much new pictures the past weeks and I also didn't scan much slides or negatives. So this time I would like to make some advertisement for two weblogs. I also added their URL's on the sidebar on the right.The first one is a cartoonweblog made by my partner and future wife Noriko. I copied three images from her cartoonweblog. The rest of her cartoonweblog can be checked here. The story based on the daily life in Utrecht is in Japanese right now, but maybe there will be an English version in the near future.The style of the comic is known as Manga, the Japanese word for comics or print cartoons.This is just an example of three images of the cartoon. the rest of the cartoon can be seen here.The second weblog is a photoweblog run by my mother in law in Tokyo.I copied a few images to here but there are loads of pictures overthere, so if these copied pictures here made you curious, you can check the rest here.There are some really nice pictures on my mother in law's phot... More About: Website , Advertising , Other , Blogs , Blog
More Forts (8)
2006-12-02 15:32:10 And now my second post for today with pics from the fortified city of Naarden, also part of the Dutch Waterline (Hollandse Waterlinie). It's a well preserved fortified town, one of the best in Europe and mostly intact. We went to the Netherlands Fort ress Museum (Het Nederlands Vestingmuseum), located on a huge part of the city walls. You could wander through the tunnels, some exhibitions and around the walls. From the walls you had some nice views. There were also some demonstrations of an old cannon that was shot by some soldiers dressed in historical costumes. We also joined a trip on a small boat around the double moats around the town, which was very nice. We shot quite some pictures as you can see.The first one is again a copied image from Google Earth. From above you can see the typical shape of the town with it's double moats and arrowshaped defensepoints.The second pic is a detail from the so called Spanish House in the town of Naarden. The image on the front of the house ... More About: Forts , More
More Forts (9)
2006-12-02 15:32:10 Things have been busy the past two weeks. The National Fort s Month is finished for almost two weeks, but I still didn't post all the selected pics from our last three visits to the different forts. After this post there will be two more posts and then the forts will be done for some time till next year Springtime (I assume).Now some pics that I shot in and around Fort Blauwkapel, Fort Blue Chapel. The fort got it's name from the little church which had originally a blue painted ceiling and blue walls on the inside. The church is almost 500 years old and is the smallest gothic church of the Netherlands.The fort was built around an existing town. We had a 75-minutes guided tour around the fort. Because the guide walked a bit fast we felt a bit rushed while we were taking pictures, so after the tour we walked around parts of the fort by ourselves to take some more pictures.It's a nice fort and because of the town inside the fort it's different from all the other forts. Later we als... More About: More
More Forts (7)
2006-12-02 15:32:10 I'm still almost two weeks behind with my postings of the fortresses that we have visited the past few weeks. But I will catching up, finally. The Fort resses Month is coming to an end, so tomorrow is the last day that we can visit the fortresses that opened up for the public during this month. After tomorrow it will be all quiet on the fortresses front.I'm planning two posts today. The first one will be with some pics from Fort "De Gagel" and the second post will be with pics from "Vesting Naarden", one of the best preserved fortified towns in Europe.The first pic is a copied image from Google Earth. On this image you can see how the fortress looks from above with the moat and some of the bunkers. Google Earth is great. When I started to use it about 11 months ago there were still a lot of blur parts of Holland, but Holland is pretty much covered now.There is not so much to tell about this fort. For some more information I refer to the URL. Nowadays part of the fort is used by a ... More About: Forts , More
Dolphins, birds, cats and dogs
2006-12-02 15:32:10 This time some scanned animal pics that I shot in the past 5 years on several occasions. The first two pics were shot during a trip that Noriko and I made somewhere at the end of April or beginning of May 2000 to Miyakejima, an island south-east from Tokyo and belonging to the Izu-islands, known for it's vulcano, birdwatching and also dolphinwatching. Short after our visit the vulcano Mount Oyama became active again in July 2000 and by September that year the whole population was evacuated. After a little more than four years of activity and vulcanic emmissions, the population of the islands was allowed to return permanently in February 2005 (!!!).The actual swimming with the wild dolphins and the dolphinwatching we did from the island Mikurajima, a small nearby island with only 300 residents. This was a very memorable and impressive experience which I won't easily forget. The curiosity of the dolphins, the possibility to get real close and touch them, it was very, very awesome.T... More About: Dogs , Cats , Cat , Dolphins , Dolphin
More Forts (10)
More articles from this author:2006-12-02 15:32:10 All these posts about forts is almost coming to an end. After this post there will be one more and then it will be finished for a while. But don't get me wrong, I wasn't getting bored with all these forts. Visiting all these places was an interesting experience and it broadened my horizon about a part of Hollands national history where I knew just a little bit about.In this post some pics from Fort 't Hemeltje (Little Heaven), not a logical name for a fort, but this fort got it's name from a nearby farm that has the same name. Till 1993 the fort was used by the Ministry of Defense as an ammunitiondepot. Nowadays it's still in use as a fireworksdepot. Because not many people come here it's a good place for birds. The long eared owl is brooding here and you also find woodpeckers here and a lot of singingbirds.The first pic comes from Google Earth and gives you a view from above.Because of the high humidity you'll find a lot of fungi on the walls.This is what's left of the kitc... More About: Forts , More 1, 2, 3, 4 |
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