ND Awards – Neutral Density Photography Awards 2015
I’m thrilled to announce to all my friends and readers that I’ve been awarded with as many as four honorable mentions in the 2015 edition of the ND Awards – Neutral Density Photography Awards.
This year I’ve submitted various kind of photographs, choosing as main themes the natural sceneries and the ancient architecture captured in Italy and in Japan. I’m glad that these works have been selected by the ND Awards’ judging panel, and I hope that you too will find them aesthetically and emotionally compelling.
The ancient wine cellars of Tuscany – Part I
If I say “Tuscany”, the first thing that comes to mind will be probably the image of a lonely covey of cypresses in a land of wavy hills, or the image of a farmhouse on a hilltop, in a bright and misty morning. Well, in this article (as in the next one) I’ll not show you the same old postcards of Tuscany, but I’m going to bring you inside the most “sacred” places of the millennial italian art of winemaking: the ancient wine cellars.
During my travel through the wonderful Tuscany, I’ve focused my attention (and my camera too) on the region of Val d’Orcia which, in my opinion, is far more amazing than the popular Chianti, both by the landscaping point of view and because it has some unique places that are particularly fascinating, by a winemaking standpoint. The entire area in the nearby of the ancient town of Montalcino is a concentrate of history and traditions. There I’ve found an example of a young winemaking company that have embraced the ancient tradition: Solaria farm.
The misty forest of Mount Amiata
If you travel in Italy by car, you have to keep in mind one important thing: avoid the motorways/tollways. Just by taking a country road, Sara and I found ourselves in the fairytale forest of Mount Amiata.
Italy is a country so much rich of natural and artistic hidden gems that rushing through a motorway to reach the destination will preclude you from discovering the majority of them. So, during our outward journey to southern Tuscany, we took the slower and longer route that led us through Mount Amiata, in which I’ve found the perfect conditions for taking some nice shots.