Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary church in Nikola-Renya.

The church was constructed in 1907-1924 to replace an older wooden one dating back to 1777. Closed in 1950s, currently plundered and abandoned.

As for the place, now it looks completely wild and forlorn, with ruins of two very old houses on the southern side of the road. I even drove past them despite all my attempts to see any landmarks at night.

Nikola-Renya village doesn’t exist any longer. It was situated 6 km eastwards (I think, a bit more: count 6,5km by your mileage indicator and begin looking around, otherwise you will run a risk of missing your destination) of Lyubegoshchi village, along Sandovo-Lyubegoshchi-Vesyegonsk road and on the right side of Renya river, more correctly, a stream. The toponym is compound: its first part is derived from the St. Nicolas side-altar of a previous wooden Assumption church that had been existing 1777 to 1915, the second is hydronym.

In the village vicinity a group of 44 Vepsian mounds dating back to XI–XII centuries has been preserved.

I have to warn all travelers that at night neither church nor ruins of houses are seen, so you will have either rely on your navigator or gaze around. Your turn is here 58°35’51.51”N 36°55’03.22”E, the church is 100m away from the road.

Road conditions can be an issue. If you drive from Saint-Petersburg via Ustyuzhna and Sandovo, the local dirt road is quite good up to the boundary with Vesyegonsk district, except for sporadic puddles and fallen trees (I was there right after a thunderstorm), but right after crossing the districts boundary city cars can find themselves in trouble. My advice is that you shouldn’t try to make a deed like that in spring, autumn and rainy weather, even more to say, the previous year the road was washed out somewhere.

A field where the church is situated is used for grazing, no indications of hay mowing were detected, so grass is high, dew is everywhere. Keep high boots ready.

Night. f8, shutter speed 2s, CPL-filter, standard lens.

Dawn is breaking.

Dawn keeps on breaking.

Glimmering light.

Right after sunrise.

Another view of the Assumption church, counterlight from a shade. Here a grey gradient filter effect can be seen, undesirable in a weather like that. All the rest shots with this filter were rejected.

Foggy morning. Nikkor AIS 28 mm lens, CPL filter.

Dew is everywhere. Nikkor AIS 28 mm lens, CPL filter.

Interior.

Skylight filter worked well here.

Fog and dew. Skylight filter.

Fog and dew. Skylight filter.

Ochre-like sunrise.

Heavily shopped (to make it more correct, it was Corel, not Photoshop), of course. Clear weather is unfavourable to landscape photography, the only option it leaves us is applying several tricks with optics and software.

Waiting. f13, 1/3s, CPL + gradient blue.

Just before the sunrise. f13, 1/4s, CPL + what? I don't remember, it looks like gradient grey. The next one was taken with a skylight as sky looks more violet.

Glimmering light.  f13, 1/4s, CPL + skylight L1A. A violet spot on the top is the skylight filter's effect. I hope, it will work better with a full-frame camera, so everything will be taken again next winter. 

First sunrays. f14, 1/2s, CPL + gradient grey.

Day has begun.  

An adjacent spot, here shooting conditions are obvious to have been extreme. Too bright and totally empty sky. f14, 1/8s, CPL + gradient grey.

Pink sunrise.

Actually that didn't look so pink as here, filters, especially skylight produce this effect.
f11, 1/5s, CPL + gradient grey.

f11, 1/2s, CPL+skylight L1A.

 f13, 1/3s, CPL + gradient blue.

Views from the church hill.

The church hill – actually I have no idea of its real name, if any exists, – is an excellent spot for the panoramic photography. The first series was taken a year ago.

Settings:

1. Aperture f11, shutter speed 1/2s. CPL+gradient grey filters.

2. Aperture f9, shutter speed 1/2s, CPL+gradient blue filters.

3. Same as in the 1^st.

6 minutes passed between the 1st and 3rd. 

4. Same as in the 1^st. That’s a recent image. Back-stitched from RGB in a desperate and unsuccessful attempt to get rid of noise. It’s incorrigible.  

As for the gradient blue version, in my opinion, in weather conditions like those and at this time this filter’s usage would be of no avail. Moreover, shots like those are hard to further process in the Corel and similar software.

5. Aperture f9, shutter speed 0,77s, CPL + something else, rather of all, gradient grey. The position was below, where the road crosses a stream, the tributary of the lake you see here. It belongs to the older series. 

Earlier versions published at flickr and tumblr will soon be deleted. 

Pink hill.

Alas, I keep on failing to catch a good moment to take a shot at this place. Last year results were not impressing, this year weather proved still worse. What can be done here? The cloudy weather like that – not too much dense – is more favourable enough, the picture can easily and unhesitatingly be made sepia or umber-like, but that is not the case for a clear sky and hard frost with their refraction incorrigible by any polarization filters. Filters were the same in either case – CPL+gradient grey. 

Update. Forgot to add this one:

Olyeshi village.

The previous year I had the only chance to visit this place as road conditions proved beyond any psychiatric norm limits. Also, weather was unstable – the extensive clouds moving very slowly created unpleasant obstacles. The result you will see now. Nonetheless the series has its right to exist and may be displayed without any risk of entailing any shame unlike the previous one. Everything was taken in the manual mode with a couple of filters. I can’t remember the details, those were either CPL+gradient grey or CPL+skylight (L1A or L1Bc) – my typical combinations for landscape purposes. 

First sunrays making their way through northern clouds:

A view from the village hall emergency exit:

A former shop and residential housing: 

The village hall again, some efforts were needed to vivify the picture: 

"Office": 

Cowshed: 

This shot was named "Memories", since there is no remotest hope for revival any time ever: 

Belated spring, worse, I arrived too early: 

The same view after the sky cleared up, direction – westward:

Sun is higher:

Eastward view from the bridge: 

To resume in summer.