The Croatian landscape is beautiful, especially in the southern part and on the islands. But the national parks in the hinterland are equally interesting. Whenever I go to Croatia with my family on holiday, I always remember to take most of my photographic equipment. But more importantly, I have to set aside a few evenings just to take pictures.
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Makarska Riviera
The landscape in southern Croatia creates incredible contrasts between the seacoast and mountains up to 1400m high. In the photo, you can see the peninsula "Sveti Petar", which is also the largest park in Makarska.
I took this photo in 2020 but I deliberately adjusted the colors to give it a bit of a retro look, because you can find bright photos of Croatia with rich colors on every corner of the internet.
This minimalist landscape photograph is shot using the long exposure technique. Specifically for this photo, I used an exposure time of 30 seconds. This makes the sea surface blurry and so do the clouds.
I took this photo in 2020 from a cliff above the sea near Makarska, Croatia.
Another long-exposure photo. This time from the beach and the outskirts of Makarska. I took this photo with a tripod of course and using an ND filter, which allows you to shoot long exposure. This makes the photo of the sea waves and railings a dreamy image. I used an exposure time of 30 seconds to create this dreamy atmosphere.
Another landscape photo was taken from my favorite beach on the outskirts of Makarska. The photo symbolizes the summer holiday atmosphere and especially enjoying life in contrast to the boring routine that many of us experience at home while going to work. Even though I took the photo late in the afternoon, the coast was still full of life. In the distance you can see a ship coming in, a fisherman catching fish on a rock, someone flying behind a boat on a parachute, and others riding a paddleboard. Just beautiful.
This is the most beautiful photo I took in Croatia at that time. I like the composition and the stories it suggests. I used a Nikon D7100 camera with a Tamron 70-300mm lens, which I set to 210mm. I set the aperture to f/14, the shutter speed to 1/250s, and ISO 100.
I took this minimalistic seascape photo from the cliffs above the sea, near the town of Makarska. I used a neutral density filter to extend the exposure time. This makes the surface of the sea dreamily blurred, giving the whole photo an abstract feel.
Notice also the small boat in the left part of the picture. It was a fisherman who went out fishing every afternoon. He was alone in a small boat bobbing on the waves. He would sit there for long hours, waiting for his catch. When darkness fell, he lit a lantern. And that was the only thing you could see on the open sea at night.
More photos for a long time. This time I used a 30-second long exposure using a 10-stop ND filter. This turns an ordinary photo of a rocky beach into an almost artistic photograph.
This is one of the few photos I took early in the morning. Although I like to take pictures of landscapes, getting up early is not one of my favorite activities 🙂 So I usually shoot more in the afternoon and try to shoot around a golden hour as much as possible.
But this time it was different. I figured that for once I would get up really early and go shoot. So I got up at 5 am and headed out through the center of Makarska to the main beach. What I saw was unreal. The otherwise bustling city full of tourists, bars, music, and various crazy attractions was suddenly completely different.
The sea surface was completely calm, with no tourists anywhere and beautiful silence and beautiful morning light everywhere. The only people I met were a few bar and restaurant employees cleaning up after the nightly parties and a few people enjoying their morning swim. And it was this peace and harmony that I tried to express with this photograph.
This magnificent view of the town of Makarska and the huge rock wall behind it can be seen when you reach the edge of the concrete pier at the entrance to the town's harbor. From there, you have a wonderful view not only of the city but also of the rocky peninsula or of the boats arriving at the harbor.
In addition to this photo, I took a few long exposure shots from there, as well as a silhouette photo of a couple and a fisherman, which you can also see in this article.
Another photo was taken from my favorite pier in the harbor of Makarska. This time I used a Tamron 70-300mm telephoto lens and took a silhouette of a man resting on a paddleboard, which he uses as a kayak. In the background, you can see the silhouette of the island of Brac.
Šibenik
Sveti Filip i Jakov
Murter
