As I don’t tend to do a lot of kids or communion shoots, I always like to get the best out of the ones I do. Two weeks ago I had the chance to do the communion-session with the great little guy called Albert. He really enjoyed being there for his pictures and co-operated perfect, resulting in a nice series of pictures. You could notice that he wanted his mom to be proud of him… so cute!
Yesterday I was invited at the official introduction of the book “Mijn 10 geboden voor elke interieur” by the well-known Belgian architect Filip Deslee. Did I have plans to rebuild my interior? Well… not at this moment…
A while ago I met Filip for my “faces” project, what was a very nice meeting with some beautiful pictures as a result. A few weeks ago, I got a mail from Filip with the question if he could use one of my pictures as cover-photo for his new book… Euh… did I get the message right? Of course he could! So we made an agreement and yesterday was the big day!
I got my copy of Filip’s new book… and I do have to admit: the made it just the way I could have imagined it!
And it are those moments when I get fulfillment of my job as a photographer…. when people really like your pictures! And if it’s a well-known person or just the man in the street… it doesn’t matter! It’s the smile on his/hers face that counts when the see their pictures… that’s what really makes me happy!
And now… all go out and buy a copy of this beautiful book on interior-achitecture! (just kidding)
Last week I wanted to have a go at a new shoot with a promising model, Marine from Modelsoffice. So I went out looking for a nice location and checked the agenda’s with my make-up artist Peggy Timmermans and stylist Bjorn Verlinden to find a empty spot…
Didn’t take long to find a date and last Sunday we had our shoot!
Marine, Peggy and Bjorn did a great job, only the weather let us down… so we had to stay inside. No worries, the location was really nice to have a blast!
Thanks to the crew… and as we said before… see you next time! The results were really stunning!
To bring back a bit of the (late but beautiful) summer into these cold and dark winter-days, I’d like to share a few pictures of the summer give-away session. It was a beautiful day at our belgian coast with a nice and sunny feeling. The happy family in the picture made the day complete, just by showing their happiness and lovely smiles to be captured.
All pictures were taken on Fuji Pro 400H film, with the Hasselblad and the Nikon F5. It was a pleasure working on film again and the future will sure be more film for me!
A few weeks ago we had a great shooting day @ the Rentaloft studios in Anwterp.
This location has an awesome range of possibilities for shooting with natural light. The loft-building has lots of huge windows, which offers lots of light. Also the light interior colors only add to the positive influence in lighting.
Together with Bjorn Verlinden for styling and Peggy Timmermans for makeup, our models Nathalie, Lucie and Tosca did a great job! It was really a day with tropical temperatures, but the whole crew stood out and performed like never before.
For me it was a great experience to enlargen my portfolio with some nice shots!
With this post I would like to thank again all the boys and girls who helped me out that day:
Many years ago, when I started out at photography school, digital photography was still at very beginning. No huge sensors, incredible amounts of pixels and everything in digital was really expensive!
Nowadays, anyone out there can afford a brilliant camera with enough pixels to print a wall-size poster! Is this bad? No, technology evolves and it goes faster and faster, you can’t stop evolution… just as life… goes faster and faster… time flies by!
Sometimes it’s that part that really annoys me, that everything has to be done at a really high speed. That’s why I decided to go back, and take time again for my pictures… think, frame, focus and push the button. And yes…look at the back of the camera to discover that there is no LCD-screen! Right, I was shooting film! 
I decided to get back to the beginning of my education and started getting out with a film-camera again. A few months ago I purchased a Leica M2 and took it with me on holiday to see if it did what I expected it to do! No light meters, no nothing… only the sunny 16. Also the Hasselblad 500C, it had to be taken on a test-drive to after all those years of digital madness.
As I wanted to do test on color negative I tried the new Kodak Portra 400 with my Leica and the Fuji Pro 400h with the Hasselblad. Why this choice? Well, I think the Portra is better suited for scenery, landscapes and vacation shots as the Pro 400h is better at portraits. The Hasselblad has his test-drive at a fashion-shoot, so portraits it would be!
As I can only develop B&W film myself, I relied on the services of Richard Photo Lab (California) to give me the best they could. And they did a good job! I certainly will have to get used to work with film again, but I think this was a quite good start for the first 2 rolls.
The hasselblad will be used more often again, the Leica needs a CLA. Some of the shots (at slower shutter speeds) lagged, resulting in a dark left side of the frame. But hey, the camera is already over 60 so a few minor mistakes are allowed. Only 4 of 36 frames suffered from the lag.
To give you an impression of the try-out, a few of the shots…. I can assure you one thing. More of this will follow!
No editing aftwards had been done, only resize for web.
A series from my holiday in Rota, Spain, shot with the Leica M2 on Kodak Portra 400
One of the frames suffering from the shutter-lag, resulting in the dark part at the left-side (bottom in portrait stand)
And some of the Hassy shots, shot on Fuji Pro 400 H… the sun was very strong in back-light so I took a risk, but it ended out quite good I think.
A few seconds ago, Quick Calcs decided who would be the number one in the list of participants for the Summer 2011 Give-Away!
With the Easter Give-Away, number 11 was the lucky one…. this time, the random number generator decided it would be number 9 !
Number 9 in the list was Yvonne! So, Yvonne, better get ready and prepare yourself for a nice and sunny (huhum.. let’s hope the weather changes soon!!!!) summer shoot!
I would like to thank you all for taking your chances… and as last time, I can only give you one good advice… keep following the blog as more is to come!
A mail to Yvonne and the rest of you is on its way and the results will be on the blog soon after our shoot!
Thanks again for taking part!!!
As promised… It’s time to present you the sequel of the previous give-away session.
For the Summer Give-Away, we’ll go back in time… way back! You have the chance to get a full portrait-session on film. We leave the digital era behind and take time to give you the feeling of the traditional black & white again. Just you, me and the camera make the best of a fun and casual shoot!
What’s in for you?
Who can participate?
Anyone of 18 years and older… man, woman, young, old… doesn’t matter! The only thing that matters is that you look forward to a fun shoot!
How to participate?
Post your comment here on how long it has been that you have had a really nice picture of yourself and what makes a picture of you a success.
A random number generator will do the difficult work… pick the winner The winner will be announced on Sunday July 17 at 20.00h CET.
So I’d say… bring on your comments and keep your fingers crossed!
A few weeks ago, I had a shoot with Tahnee, very good and nice model. I wanted to make a few beauty head-shots and some “casual” fashion-stuff outdoors. The weather was nice, so that wasn’t any problem at all. Tahnee has already built up a nice experience as model, so it didn’t take much of an effort to get her where I wanted to be.
For the make-up, I asked the professional services of Peggy Timmermans.
A small impression of a fun day:
A few days ago, the winner of the Easter give-away session, Pink Fairy (author of the Pink Fairy beautyblog) came over for the shoot she won.
It was very nice to meet her and her boyfriend… and later on even the super-cute doggie joined us! After a chat of about an hour, we went out for a walk and… of course to make the pictures I promised her. She told me it was the first time she ever really “posed” for a series of pictures, so there might have been a bit of nerves at the beginning. I do know for sure… they were gone at the wink of an eye! She did her “job” excellent and we had a great time! It was just a super-fun shoot and I haven’t regret for one moment that I launched the give-away idea! So keep on track… another give-away will be following. This time it will be something different! Keep following!
And then I asked her boyfriend to join in…
And yes… also the doggie wanted a picture of himself!
