Diptic

Diptic is a tool I use sparingly. When I look around on the interwebs it doesn't seem to be as popular as it once was. Diptic, a nifty little app that does only one thing, and that is making collages of pictures. Now there are many more apps that do the same and sometimes even more and better. But Diptic was one of the first and it's still my preferred tool for this job, because of its simplicity and style. With this blog I'll show you some of my favourite Diptic collages and the story behind them.

This is my dog Nikki. When she chews on her bone, she makes the weirdest faces. Juggling around the bone in het mouth, as these small bones are too small to clutch between her paws.

Shot on one of our winter holidays in a cabin in the woods. I laid some peanuts on the table outside, to lure the birds to it and make some pictures of them. I had the intention of shooting many photos and to select the best one. But after I saw this series I decided it worked much better as a collage. 

Also on one of those dark winter days I decided shoot a series of photos inside the house with the theme red. My (late) wife Eveline wore a red shirt, happend to drink red wine, had red hair and read a magazine with red lettering. Also Nikki was resting on her red pillow. As individual photos not very interesting, but as a collection it works.

When I tested the macro capabilities of a vintage lens, I shot several pictures of my favourite model Nikki. After I looked at these I used the one with her eye in my review/blog. Afterwards, I saw that a photographer had made a collage of different parts of the body of a model. That inspired me to do the same with these pictures.

This is a panorama, displayed as different panels, displaying the city of Den Bosch in the south of the Netherlands. These pictures were taken when they had restored the cathedral and gave people the opportunity to walk on the roof of the cathedral and admire the ornaments up close.

This picture was a submission for the DigiDirect photography challenge which I won :) See Blunty discuss it at 6 minutes and 46 seconds. I won an Instax camera. The pictures where shot outside of a comic book store in Cologne Germany.

One time I got the idea to make a collection of pictures featuring water, electricity and gas signs. While walking the dog and riding my bike, I saw them everywhere and thought of funny background stories. I used Diptic to collect them and convey my (funny) thoughts. 

Diptic is also very suited for comparing situations (before and after). When Nikki outgrew her bench, we decided to buy a new one for her. I remembered I shot a picture of her in the bench and thought it would be fun to shoot one last one with her in that bench and show them side by side. The first picture was shot on December 16th 2007, the second one on the 18th of April 2008.

Or differences in sleeping habits between two of our dogs.

And finally a before and after of myself taken some years ago after doing a diet for months. I lost quit a lot of weight and my wife came up with the idea of taking pictures of ourselves with similar clothes, in similar situations and surroundings as on our vacation before our weight loss. A couple of years later and I'm not as thin anymore as I used to be. Not as bad as picture number one, but a long way off from picture number 2. That reminds me, that would make a good New Years resolution :)