Author Archives: Raoul Pop

Places

A jaunt into the Danube Delta

Years ago, we took a quick day-trip into the Danube Delta which involved some boating (hence, rowing). It was a fun little trip to the edge of the Delta. It was early spring, so the full beauty of the place wasn’t readily apparent, but that also meant that there were no mosquitoes, which was a huge plus for me. Enjoy the photos!

An oar strikes the water, making a splash. This is a very short exposure, which freezes the splash mid-air.
The convoluted and twisted branches of a tree are set against a bright blue sky.
A villa sits on an island in a man-made lake near the Danube Delta, in Dobrogea, Romania.
Herd of goats
Reeds waving in the spring breeze.
Ligia stands by a lake, dressed in a black blouse and jeans skirt.
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Places

A hike through the hills of Moldova

These are photos I’ve taken during a couple of hikes through the hills near the village of Strugari in Moldova, Romania. Here’s a map of the area.

A map of the region around Strugari, Moldova

A map of the region around Strugari, Moldova

It was the middle of March (the 14th and 15th) and spring had just arrived. Most of the grass was dry and leaves hadn’t sprouted yet. As a matter of fact, no buds were even apparent on the branches of the trees in the area. A friendly little mutt that belonged to friends of ours accompanied me on the hikes (you can see him in the photos). A late snowfall introduced an element of adventure to one of the outings. It’s lovely to be in the middle of nowhere and to be suddenly surrounded by myriad falling snowflakes. A magical quiet sets in, sounds are muffled and a feeling of wonder takes over.

Enjoy the photos!

Tall grass, dried by the long winter and downed by strong winds, on a hilltop somewhere in Moldova, Romania.
A crumbling old country house sits unused at the bottom of a hill in a little village in Moldova, Romania.
A late winter snowfall starts to cover the hills and valleys.
A thick forest of conifers cover the hill in the background while a quiet little stream winds its way through thickets and sparse trees in the valley below.
Snowfall caught me in the middle of a walk in these hills, somewhere in the region of Moldova, Romania.
Moldova, Romania
Atop a large hill, a wide plateau is used for farmland. In winter, it sits unused and barren.
Tall grass, blown every which way by the wind and dried by the same, covers this abrupt hillside somewhere in Moldova, Romania.
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Website – Raoul Pop. 
Photo Catalog – Raoul Pop Photography.
Puffy white clouds cast shadows on the hills and valleys below on a sunny winter morning.
A shepherd tends to his flock of sheep on a distant hilltop.
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Places

Italian road trip – Day 5 – Crossing Italy from Grottammare to Rome

After a hearty breakfast, we explored the Grottammare fortress and beach, then got on the road to Rome. That’s right, that day we planned to cross the whole of Italy, from the coast of the Adriatic Sea almost to the coast of the Tyrrhenian Sea, which we would reach on our sixth day after exploring Rome. I believe we took the route highlighted on this screenshot from Google Maps, the one marked with blue.

Route from Grottammare to Rome

Route from Grottammare to Rome

We crossed the mountains, took a quick tour of Tivoli by car and could not stop anywhere, apparently there was some sort of local holiday that day and the streets were packed with people. Since I was driving, I have no photos from there. We pushed on and reached Rome just in time for the evening traffic, which meant it took till after dark to reach the historic part of the city. Because at that time things like online maps viewable on phones and GPS navigation and being able to do instant searches for hotels on phones weren’t available, we had a most stressful time finding a hotel. They were all full or were asking astronomical prices. We finally ended up paying a taxi driver to lead us to a hotel by driving ahead of us. By the time we were in our rooms, it was past 9:30 pm, we had spent most of our day in our car and most of that in terrible city traffic. But we were grateful to finally have a bed to sleep in and a shower with hot (or somewhat hot) water.

Now you get to enjoy the photos. If you’d like to see the other posts from our trip, here are days 1, 2, 3 (part 1 and part 2) and 4; and here’s the overview.

Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy
Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy
Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy.
A black cat from the medieval city of Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy
Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy.
Adriatic Sea near Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy
Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy.
A wonderful and sociable tomcat from the medieval city of Grottamare, Italy. Remarkably similar to our own Bubu.
Grottammare, Italy
Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy
Grottammare, Italy
Grottammare, Italy
Another adorable cat from the medieval city of Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy
Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy
Grottammare, Italy
Adriatic Sea, Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy
Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy.
Artesian fountain, Grottammare, Italy.
Grottammare, Italy
Over Grottammare, Italy.
Grass, after rainfall. On the road between Grottammare and Rome, Italy.
On the road between Grottammare and Rome, Italy.
An ancient castle and town, nestled on a tall hillside in the mountainous Abruzzo region of Italy.
In the Abruzzo region of Italy, on the road to Rome.
You get a real sense of the size of these mountains if you look at the little village nestled at their footsteps. On the road between Grottammare and Rome, Italy.
A town nestled at the foot of the mountains in the Abruzzo region of Italy.
Taken from one of the hillsides surrounding Tivoli, Italy.
Above Tivoli, Italy.
Above Tivoli, Italy
Above Tivoli, Italy
Rome, Italy.
Rome, Italy
Rome, Italy.
Rome, Italy.
Rome, Italy
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Places

This morning’s hoar frost

Hoar frost is a strange term, isn’t it? It comes from Middle English, circa 1300, is actually spelled “hoarfrost” over in England, and it means exactly what you’ll see in the photos I took this morning in our garden. Enjoy!

Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Frosty, foggy winter morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
Hoar frost on a cold January morning, Medias, Romania
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Thoughts

How Google’s AI can eliminate the need to keyword photos

Here’s a video I made that points the way forward when it comes to indexing and searching our photography libraries:

Google has built some truly amazing object and scene recognition AI (artificial intelligence) into its Google Photos service. By comparison, the drudgery of manual keywording we currently have to do, not only after we import our photos into the software we use to manage them (Photos, Bridge, Lightroom, etc.), but also when we upload our photos to stock photography websites (for those of us who do that) is downright archaic. The artificial intelligence algorithms that Google uses on the photos uploaded to its service do all of that automatically. They index every photo and identify every object, scene, face, logo, etc., whatever you can think of, and they’re constantly being improved.

You don’t have to be a pro photographer to take advantage of this AI. Even your personal photographs become easily searchable once you upload them to Google Photos, without any manual keywording. Try it and you’ll be amazed, just like I was.

By the way, Google is not paying me to say this. I just love the work they did on their photos AI. Furthermore, I wrote a post critiquing their buggy desktop Backup and Sync software which uploads our photos to their platform.

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