Category: Photography

Photo of Korendijk Wetlands, the Netherlands, showing the sun rise above the banks of Haringvliet estuary

8. April 2015

Four Rewards for an Early Rise on Easter Morning

Getting up in the middle of the night is not something I like to do. And I suppose a large part of the population has similar feelings. But for a landscape photographer the sunrise often provides the best opportunities for making beautiful pictures. So sometimes it is wise to set aside principles and put the alarm at six o’clock. On Easter Sunday 2015, we were very royally rewarded for that bravery. The aim of the expedition were the Korendijk wetlands, a nature reserve on the island of Hoekse Waard, near Rotterdam. A large part of the area is only accessible… Read More

Photo of a chestnut tree near Lijnbaan in the center of Rotterdam, made beginning of May, when the tree is in full leaf

Photography

9. March 2015

My Favourite Tree – a Springtime Animation

My favorite tree is a chestnut in the park in front of my apartment at the Lijnbaan in downtown Rotterdam. Every spring I am amazed about the speed with which nature operates. Within a few weeks time a metamorphosis takes place: the barren tree gets buds, leaves and a short time later flowers which then also pretty quickly disappear. Last year, during the months of March, April and May, I took a photo every day at nine a.m. from the walkway in front of my appartment on the sixth floor. In a perfect situation I’d use a weathertight protected fixed… Read More

Photo taken low above the ground in a snowcovered Park in Rotterdam, illuminated by a low sun shining through the trees

Photography

30. December 2014

The Winter of ’14: Two Days of Snow, Ice and Slush

And so we had a White Christmas after all in Rotterdam. Well, almost, because the first snow flake fell shortly after midnight on the 27th of December. But it felt a bit like the third day of Christmas anyway. It was the beginning of a winter that would last for two days. Not too long, but already now there has been more snowfall than in all of last winter. And it was long enough to add a few nice photos to my collection Winter in Rotterdam. On that first day the temperature was just above freezing so there was a… Read More

Photorealistic HDR image of the sunset over the Rotterdam skyline and Lake Kralingen

Photography

5. December 2014

HDR Photography, an Exercise in Self-Control

I have been doing a lot of HDR photography lately. In case you didn’t know: that acronym stands for High Dynamic Range. On an HDR photo it’s possible to show details in both the bright and dark portions of an image that would get lost on a “normal” photo. The human eye is in fact still superior to a camera sensor when it comes to the detection of differences in brightness. In HDR photography, you merge different shots to create an image that is more consistent with how we see a scene with our own eyes. My workflow There are… Read More

Buispanorama van Het Park, Rotterdam, met twee nijlganzen en de Euromast, gemaakt op een zonnige dag in de herfst

Digital art / Photography

14. November 2014

All Year Round Spherical Panoramas

I’ve been making a lot of spherical panorama’s lately, often referred to as “little planets”. But of course I have not invented the concept myself. I’m certainly not the only one who makes them; anyone with a camera and a recent version of Photoshop can produce them quite easily. And of course I do want my panoramas to add something, to stand out among the many other small spheres that are being made. Wet asphalt One of the ways I try to do that is by showing the influence of the weather and the seasons. The panorama below, for example,… Read More

Spherical panorama of Gelderseplein in Rotterdam, featuring the White House, the reconstructed Wijnhavenhouses, the Old Harbour with the Cube dwellings and more

Digital art / Photography

26. September 2014

Gelderseplein Rotterdam: Another Spherical Panorama

Gelderseplein (Gelderland Square) is a new square in the center of Rotterdam. It’s on a site that lay vacant for years after the construction of the railway tunnel. Around it we find a diverse catalog of architectural styles. Most prominent is the White House, which was the tallest skyscraper in Europe after completion in 1898. At that time it was criticized by many as “too American”. The building survived the 1940 bombing but was nearly demolished in the seventies for the construction of a huge roundabout that fortunately never came. Next to the White House there’s a row of eighteenth… Read More

Spherical panorama, composed from 24 photographs, stitched together and mapped to a sphere in Photoshop, of the market square and town hall in Gouda, the Netherlands

Digital art / Photography

28. August 2014

Spherical Panoramas: How to Make a Little Planet

Spherical panoramas: you see them quite often nowadays. Little planets, they are sometimes called. Photos, apparently made with a huge wide-angle lens, on which the Earth seems to have shrunk so much that there’s room for only oa few buildings.Only eight months ago I made my first spherical panorama, of the Schouwburgplein in Rotterdam. These days I even make them in commission. Time for a little tutorial. The Big Picture The great thing about spherical panoramas is that they give an overall view. They show a place in one single glance, unlike tradional widescreen panoramas where you have to pan… Read More

Photo of the multi-colored and rather varied architecture of Bristol, England, with the Floating Harbour in the foreground

Photography / Various

7. June 2014

Colors of the City

Because of my ten-day tour through England, work on blog, twitter and other websites has somewhat stalled during the last weeks. Sometimes it is good to take some distance to all those social media. But during such a trip, I can not help looking with an architect’s eye at the things around me. Like at the colors and materials that are characteristic of certain cities. St.Ives, for example, a popular tourist destination in Cornwall, is almost entirely built with just three materials. Brownish stone, white plaster and gray (sometimes turned greenish) slate, used quite randomly. That results in a pleasantly… Read More

Close up of moss and other small vegetation on an old brick wall in Delfshaven, Rotterdam, with boats, quay and houses out of focus in the background

Photography

9. April 2014

Urban Nature in Delfshaven

When thinking of urban nature, most people envision trees, gardens and parks. But also on a smaller scale beautiful landscapes and ecosystems can be discovered. This picture was made in a downtown Rotterdam neighbourhood called Delfshaven, at the roadside terrace of city brewery De Pelgrim. Inspired by a delicious glass of their Dubbellam beer.

Evening has fallen over Rotterdam; still from a time lapse movie with a dark blue sky over the Old West and Erasmus Medical Centre

Photography

7. April 2014

Rapid Nightfall – a Time-Lapse of Rotterdam

I am a big fan of time-lapse movies, with those rapidly moving people, cars, clouds and stars in breathtaking landscapes. You don’t need very specialized equipment to make them. After some study in the manual of my Nikon D5100 I discovered the shooting interval option that allows you to define exactly how many frames you want with any given interval. A tripod is of course essential, and a reasonably presentable view is also useful. And then you have to wait for the right weather for a nice evening twilight, just about halfway between a bright sky and a thick cloud… Read More