the ancient Napolean City of Acre

Acre (or Akko)was a strategic coastal link to the Levant. In crusader times it was known as St. John d'Acre after the Knights Hospitaller of St John order who had their headquarters there. Acre is the holiest city of the Bahá'í Faith

it has everything from an ancient harbour to local delicacies, 

old alleys and mosques and chilled cafes.

And of course, photo opportunities galore:

I worked with my 24-70mm Sigma Zoom 

and my wonderful 100mm Canon

which was fantastic with the food shots

all natural light of course

shot with the 100mm canon macro

©all images by Ami Siano Photography

50mm

50 mm
full frame

that's the only lens you really need.
it makes your Dslr compact and efficient while travelling, it reproduces more or less what your eyes normally see.
you want to zoom in ? come closer
perhaps a wide over view ? take a few steps back, as you would with your real vision.

until they make us into cyborg, and replace our biological eyes with smart cameras, we are seeing about 42°.

it used to be the real "kit lens" of the analog age.
you buy a nikon F2 - get a great 50mm with it.

unless you're shooting extreem architectural shots, or landscape, you don't need anything shorter.
it has little if any distortion, durable and easy to use. and it can be fast. very fast.

You can produce stunning images with a good old fixed lens. Better for some video work even.

I have a few 50mm.
even the cheaper ones from canon are getting me excellent result, and the better, analog nikon one (with adaptor) produces exquisite result.

Canon 5D MK II with the 50mm canon 1.8
Jpeg original file

Canon 5D MK I + nikon 50mm 1.4 manual focus.

journey through Rajastan

re-learing the view camera

Borrowed a Toyo View Camera to study it.
It's a bit anachronistic, it seems, these days, with all the corrections you can do in Photoshop and such, but I think it's a knowledge you have to possess and preserve.
I am going to shoot a studio project using not 4"by5" but rather a 120mm film cassette.I'll try to relearn the basics and the advanced features, such as using the tilt shift, a lens that can close up to f64 !!!!
working with an upside- down view (camera obscura) isn't going to be easy but all in all-
I am very exited.

Shooting jewelry for a client

Shot with the Canon D5 MK II 

Daylight on a piece of glass

tilted about 4° above the desk.

The camera was put on a tripod

to enable long exposures and deep depth of Field

experimenting with food photography

Food is a great creative outlet.

challenging in many ways: light, composition, styling

here are some of my attempts to keep it simple and tasty

a sculpture exhibition

Yesterday, while waiting for clients to arrive

I saw they were hanging works of art in a nearby gallery.

I went in and was really impressed with the works of sculptures featured.

something very expressive, familiar and powerfull about them.

I've spoken to the artist, who originally came from the wild north of the argentinian amazonas. 

His work, mainly based upon his memories from the region

portraits the Indigenous people of the area and the wars about the Rainforest there. 

check out more of his work here .

with his permission, I shot it in daylight, canon 5d with the lovely 50mm glass on it
which gave me this beautiful narrow depth of field, isolating the sculptures from the background.

works by BORIS VOLCOFF