FAQ

Let’s start with the question that I get asked the most. At the moment, I'm shooting with a Canon R5. I recently switched to this system from a Nikon Z7 because I got the idea of doing more with video. Turns out, I don’t actually do or want to do video. Especially not in 4k120 and those huge files.

Other cameras I’ve owned and used to capture the images you see in my portfolio are, in chronological order since 2009:

• Canon 550D

• Canon 70D

• Nikon D600 & D610

• Nikon D750

• Nikon Z7, later converted to infrared.

• Nikon Z6

• Hasselblad X1D 50C II

• Canon R5

You see, it doesn’t really matter which camera I use.

• I switch gear all the time.

• There is no perfect camera that does all things equally well.

• Cameras do not create art. People do.

So why do I switch at all? I’m a weird one. I focus stack 90% of my images. I was fond of the D750 until the Z-series came out and focus shift/bracketing was built into its operating system. That’s the reason I never tried Sony.

I got the idea to convert it to infrared, but then I missed shooting color and added a Z6 to my bag. Then I got the idea to explore video after being fed up with photography altogether.

Turns out video wasn’t for me and now I’m selling all that gear and exploring new options for what I actually do: abstracts, forests, nightscape composites, mushrooms and mountains. The idea of medium format speaks to me, but no lens is fast enough for capturing the northern lights well enough. Also, no lens can focus close enough for me to get those insane perspectives that I love to do in combination with focus bracketing the shit out of every flower and crack in the ice I can find.

I’m currently looking to switch back to a Nikon Z6 II for daytime photography and a Canon R6 II for nighttime shots.

It’s a similar answer, but I switch lenses more often. The short answers is:

• A wide, fast one.

• A long, light one.

• A macro lens.

That’s really all I care to lug around.

If you’re interested in learning more about lenses, I’ve written a number of blogs about that.

• The best lenses for landscape photography

• The best wide-angle lens for the Milky Way / northern lights

• Nikon 14-24 vs. Sigma 14-24

First and foremost, you really should shoot more with the gear you already have.

Despite what you read above here, I'm really not that kind of a gear nut myself. Worrying over gear is a necessary nuisance, that comes with being a photographer.

Professional photographers are not camera salesmen. It’s exactly what frustrates us about this question. We do the research only for our use cases, which is to say that I probably use my camera and lens in different ways than you do. I know my buddy Kai Hornung for example never focus stacks his images, while I do it almost exclusively at apertures of about f/9. That’s one of the reasons he’s content with shooting Sony. Isabella Tabacchi shot with Nikon and Hasselblad as we’d shoot together. Inge Bovens shot Nikon with a super zoom to never change lenses. Ellen Borgreve loved the Leica system, but likes the lower weight of the Fuji X.

Everybody is different. If you want to copy my images exactly, you can, but you’d have to be inspired by the same things I am.

You have to be really interested and aware of new cameras and lenses in order to know which one is the best for any specific goal.

I'm a tough client. A good wide-angle lens should really do everything in my eyes: Minimal aberrations for night photography, huge aperture, wide and especially sharp. My experiences with Samyang, Sigma and Tamron have been good if you're ever considering a new lens. Tamron's 15-30mm, Samyang's 12, 14 and 24mm and a very honorable mention goes out to Sigma's 35mm f/1.4 Art. As for a nice telephoto lens, I like to use light lenses. So an f/4 would be my preference if I can choose between an f/2.8 or f/4 lens. I do not use “standard” lenses between 35 and 85mm. I have used an 85 in the forest for very specific shots, but most can be done with a 70-200 f/4 and you’re more versatile.

Forget about peak sharpness. Start creating art and working on your portfolio.

Please be aware that I don't have the time to give everyone critiques, nor can I afford to give free advice. My time is the most precious commodity I have. There are great social media sites for this, if that’s your thing. It just don’t participate in the race anymore.

Originally, Den Helder, about an hour and 15 minutes north of Amsterdam in the Netherlands. It's a small town surrounded on three sides by the sea. I'm now located a little more to the south. In a small village, 15 minutes away from the beach in one direction and 15 minutes from reasonably dark skies in the other.

English isn't my primary language, but I've been accustomed to speaking and writing in English since I was very young. I guess playing those computer games did some good after all.

Writing music and lyrics also help in expanding my vocabulary, but this had really taken off during my education and later writing weekly essays for Fstoppers.com, which got redacted by native speakers. Also, all our media is in its original language and not dubbed like in Germany, France and Italy. That means the understanding of English comes naturally. Speaking remains a matter of practice which I get little of.

Damn, I miss my mountains. Don't get me wrong, I'm happy with the landscape we have (again) and I'm an admirer of National Parks which we have plenty of. We also have a long stretch of beach and stunning dunes all along the west coast. The best part about the Dutch natural landscape though, are our forests, where I love to crawl under ferns, looking for mushrooms or come when most people are still sleeping.

It's a neat little side-project that generated a lot of international interest. Although I'm a landscape photographer at heart. If you're interested in the entire workflow, then I suggest getting the processing video, that includes a lengthy article describing every detail about doing that yourself.

I’ve started doing that almost immediately when I got my first DSLR camera, in 2009. Since that, it’s been copied many times. In part because I teach about this techniques in workshops and in e-books.

Ah, another discussion that never dies.

The word "Photoshop" got a negative connotation over the years, as it stood synonymous for trickery. I’m a landscape photographer, but an artist foremost. I take considerable artistic liberty in post-processing because I actually like the results myself. There is no motivation for me to either hide the truth that much of my work is heavily edited or to tell you that it is when I share an image with you.

Let me be transparent here. I use Photoshop, Adobe Camera Raw and other software:

• …Because previsualization an end-result is more important to me than recording reality.

• ...Because photography does not end with the press of a button. Analog (film) photography also needs developing. In that process, all kinds of decisions are being made to recreate an image according to somebody’s tastes and preferences. What most people tend to forget, is that digital photography too, has to be developed. Digital camera's make decisions for you if you shoot JPEG's. I want to be in control of my results.

• ...Because I want to be in control as an artist. I want to show you a bit of myself instead of showing a location per se.

• ...To overcome the technical constraints of the camera. Not even the most modern camera can shoot directly into a setting sun and correctly expose fore- and background at the same time. My solution is to use multiple exposures and put them together. Others rather use grad filters. There isn't a right way.

• ...To accentuate or to subdue parts of the image.

• ...Create art instead of registration footage.

• ...and to enjoy the moment of the shoot more intensely than by just looking at the picture again.

Post-processing is an integral and essential part of every form of photography. To me, using composite techniques, or other forms of heavy processing are part of my process. To each their own. Post-processing has been a part of film photography and it will only play bigger roles in the future. Probably AI will get more involved in the editing process as well. How much and to what end is a question of taste, experience and skill in the software you use and the language of the visual image. If you want to get better at post-processing on your own images, then I suggest heading over to processing videos.

And recently, I dabbled in generating AI images. A whole new topic of controversy.

I do not allow this for the following reason: The resolutions on monitors continually increase. If I would show my work on these resolutions on this website or anywhere else online, it would be quite possible to print a decent quality image yourself. Even though I'm working hard and with great joy to produce the finest prints available. Within no time at all, fake-Laanscapes are circling the web. My images are copyrighted and I have lawyers actively using AI to scan the web for unlawful used of my images.

I saw my first sunrise on December 30th, 1984.

I’d rather photograph alone. I do offer workshops in which I have no secrets.

Shoot me an outline of the project and I'll let you know! Whether it's hosting a workshop together, writing a review of your product or publishing branded content for your travel destinations. I've worked with publishers like Fstoppers, PetaPixel, Expert Photography, PixFactory, 500px and travel agencies like Scan Brit, Magazines like Zoom.nl, Natuurfotografie.nl, Landscape Photography Magazine and brands like Haida Filter, Sigma Lenses, Colorado Tripod Company, Breakthrough Filters, Fornax Mounts, Hasselblad, BenQ monitors and MSI laptops.

I've also written articles containing interviews with many world-renowned professional photographers and social influencers like Erin Babnik, Thomas Heaton, Paul Hoelen, Simon Baxter, Ryan Dyar, Ted Gore and Alexandre Deschaumes. Most of those are on Fstoppers.

Contact me with your proposal here.

Somewhere my wife is laughing. Where to start?

Hobbies: Music. I play guitar, bass, drums & synths. I own a few Mayones guitars and a wall of hardware synths and effects. I like trail running, my health and love my cats and wife. Ideally, I would never leave home.

Interests: space and rocketry, altered states of consciousness, global electrification, novel ways to generate or save energy, possible alien (NHI) life, usability (UX design), mushrooms, metal and dark synth music.