Ronny Gabriels Photography

NEW SITE AND BLOG

2011-02-21T22:44:00.000+01:00

As many of you might have noticed, I have neglected this blog a bit. There are some really good reasons for this. I will explain them in later post. The most important thing is that this blog is being moved. So instead of coming here to get your updates, you can find updates, new photos and stories at the following address:

www.ronnygabriels.com

This site incorporates the Smugmug photo website and my new blog. If you want to go to the blog pages directly, go to: blog.ronnygabriels.com
The site is new, so give it a test and please let me know what you think. I will be making updates to posts and the interface throughout the next months.

Hope to see you all there!!

PS: for those reading this in an RSS feed reader, the new feed is: blog.ronnygabriels.com/?feed=rss2

Blossoming Orchid in Timelaps

2010-06-15T11:14:00.000+02:00

Lately I'm doing some trials with timelaps photography. It's actually harder than I thought, especially the changing lighting conditions when you do it during the day are a real pain. I have put my first attempt on my site (watch it below).
I'm not gonna give up in trying to make some really fun videos with timelaps, but I think I'm gonna need to do some more research. Hope you enjoy this first try. Let me know what you think and if you have any more tips for me on how to control the conditions, please let me know. I'm very open to suggestions about this.

12 hours of the BTCS

2010-06-14T13:47:00.000+02:00

The first weekend of June saw the highlight of the still very young season of the BTCS championship with the 12 hour race at Spa-Francorchamps circuit. Saturday was jam packed with great races leading up to the big event. It started with the European GT4 Cup. GT4 might not be as popular as the GT1 or GT3 championships, but it's a unique race nonetheless, since the GT4 calendar is not that packed.

Nissan 370Z racing in the European GT4 Cup

After the GT4 cup, the Belcar Endurance race was held over 150 minutes at the Ardennes circuit. Not only did we see the wonderful Belcar fields rolling out, the field was extended with cars from the British GT and Aston Martin Challenge to make for a very large and diversified field that actually had to start in two waves.

Audi R8 GT in the Belcar Endurance Championship

But then at around 2PM, the BTCS cars got the green flag to start their 12 hour race. Sadly I wasn't there for the start. I actually drove to Spa twice that day because I had to attend a wedding reception in Mechelen in the afternoon. But I got back about two hours before sunset and I must say that it had something magical. The golden hours of the day did not only make for nice pictures, but also for a wonderful atmosphere. I had to say I was a bit disappointed in the number of spectators, but it was great nonetheless. I actually didn't shoot too many pictures of the BTCS because it was just a treat to watch the race go by at dusk. As always you can find more photos on my site. The direct link to the gallery is: http://ronnygabriels.smugmug.com/Public/Racing-Season-2010/12H-of-BTCS

Volkswagen Scirocco in BTCS

Volvo S60 in BTCS

Cool new online gadgets

2010-06-11T09:20:00.000+02:00

This week has seen some great new gadgets online from both Google and Microsoft. One more interesting and useful than the other, but both cool nonetheless.

Google

The coolest thing Google did was to enable people to put a photo background on the Google search page. OK, Bing already has this, but what Google did was let you upload your own photo besides giving you the options of choosing from their own galleries and stock photos. The upload is done to a Picasa Webalbum and from that moment on, the photo appears on the Google search page. A little criticism is that the photos are not scaled very well and therefore displayed at 100% when the browser is full screen. For some reason it does scale if the browser is not at fullscreen albeit not for all formats. That means that for a big 10 megapixel photo the bottom of the photo drops of the page (unless you have a huge monitor of course). Take that into account when choosing your background photo. So my searchpage now looks like this.

Microsoft

Besides some great updates to Hotmail, like for instance let you send 10GB of documents with one mail (the docs are uploaded to SkyDrive and then linked to the mail), the coolest news is that they finally listened to me and made some major updates to SkyDrive. If you are going ... "Sky..what?", maybe a little explanation is in order. SkyDrive is the online storage Microsoft gives it's subscribers (so anyone with a Hotmail address has a SkyDrive). Now why is this a cool feature? Well, because it allows up to 25GB of online storage. That's right 25GB!

Up to now however, it was a little hard to use, mainly because you couldn't download everything in a folder at once. So if you shared a folder with 200 photos, you either had to download each one individually, or the person sharing them had to put them there in zip files. Since the limit for one file is 50MB (to prevent SkyDrive from being used to share illegal movie files etc.) that wasn't always too handy either. I think I made about 20 suggestions to the SkyDrive team (as probably did many other people with me) to get a "one-shot" download for all files in a folder and now ... it's there!! You have the option of downloading all files in a .zip file or via Photo Gallery (a free program not unlike Picasa from Google). So now, SkyDrive has become a very handy and very easy to control online sharing platform that I will use much much more because of this update.

Worldwide Photo Walk - 24th of July

2010-06-09T11:38:00.001+02:00

On the 24th of July Scott Kelby, photoshop guru/instructor, is organizing his third annual Worldwide Photo Walk. In Belgium there are already 4 walks to choose from. Antwerp, Leuven, Turnhout and Kortrijk each have their own walk already with Brussels or Ghent probably to follow soon. Last year, I attended the Antwerp photo walk and I have to say it's a great event. It's fun to meet people that are into photography as well and see how everybody takes pictures in his or her own unique way. It surprised me last year how many different types of pictures were taken on the same walk.

So the idea of this WWPW is to get 50 people together in each city and make a two hour trip through the city taken photos. After the walk you all meet up for drinks somewhere to compare your work. I'm 100% sure I want to do this again, the only question that remains is "where?". Of course Antwerp is the logical choice since I live there, but on the other hand, it would be nice to explore another city. Since Kortrijk is a little bit too far away and Leuven is actually very familiar to me, the choice now is between Turnhout (the city where I was born and went quite a lot when I was small) and Antwerp (the city that I currently live in).

Anybody have a suggestion? Anybody else going on one of those walks? I will be deciding this weekend, so let me know as soon as possible. Hope to see you there, whether it's in Antwerp or Turnhout.

So if you're into photography and want to spend an afternoon with likeminded people, I really urge you to participate. The official website is http://worldwidephotowalk.com/

Oh BTW, you can't register for two walks sadly, so that's not a valid option ;-)

1000km of Spa - Le Mans Series

2010-06-07T11:19:00.002+02:00

Almost a month after the fact, I finally got through all the photos of the Le Mans Series. I know it took quite a while, but I really let myself get dragged into shooting way too much frames. Over 4000 in one day amounting to over 12GB of harddisk space (luckily I don't shoot RAW at the races). But hey, I'm not complaining since I got some great shots, found some new angles of the Spa circuit that deliver high quality shots and in the end had a great time with my favourite of championships.

My price shot of the day must be this shot of the BMW M3 GT2

Here are some other good ones, and as always, you can find a lot more on my site. The direct link to the photos is: http://ronnygabriels.smugmug.com/Public/Racing-Season-2010/1000km-of-Spa-2010. Enjoy!

De Liereman - Oud-Turnhout

2010-05-31T13:33:00.004+02:00

Last week, my sister invited me to go and shoot in a small nature preserve in Oud-Turnhout called "De Liereman". As good nature photographers, we got up way too early in the morning to go and shoot the sunrise.

De Liereman - Early morning

Sadly, the sun never broke through the clouds that morning, so it wasn't as spectacular as we had hoped. Of course that didn't stop us from getting a few shots of.

Dewdrops in the morning

You can find some of the shots on my site. Enjoy.

Debby in action

Straatfeesten Kalmthout - Concertphotography

2010-05-25T12:47:00.007+02:00

Last weekend I was invited by my buddy Kris to go and shoot a local festival with him. The "Straatfeesten" in Kalmthout is a three stage local festival that was at it's 34th edition this weekend. Kris is more or less the official photographer of this festival, so it gave me not only the opportunity to try my first concert photography, but also get some tips from someone who has done this quite a few times before in the meantime.

Shotgun Party @ Straatfeesten 2010

The first thing I quickly learned that fast lenses are vital for concert photography. So I worked with only two lenses all day, my "24-105 f4" and "50mm F1.4" and even with those lenses, ISO's had to be pushed towards 1000 or more quite often. So a camera that can handle those ISO settings without too much noise is a nice addition to your kit. And all this because artists don't like to flash, tssss. My respect for concert photographers has grown considerably since Sunday.

Starclub West @ Straatfeesten 2010

Luckily I had two seasoned phtographers there to answer my questions and give me tips. I have to say that concert photogrpahy is unlike anything I have done before. The rules of aperture, shutterspeed and light seem to be completely different because of the fast changing conditions of the lighting and actions of the artists. So it was a bit trial and error, but in the end the photos I brought home were not as bad as I had feared.

Undefined @ Straatfeesten 2010

Neeka @ Straatfeesten 2010

I uploaded the best photos to my site. You can check them out on my site. But the photos were also added to the official site of the festival. There my photos are paired with those of the other photographers Kris and Patrick. This can give you an idea of how my photos stand up to those of the more experienced guys. The website is http://www.straatfeesten.com/.

Balthazar @ Straatfeesten 2010

Buscemi @ Straatfeesten 2010

Lastly, big thanks to Kris for the invitation! You can find his work via his blog http://raptordigital.blogspot.com/ or website http://digital.raptor-tec.be/.

Kris in action @ Straatfeesten 2010

Antwerp Zoo - Episode 1

2010-05-21T09:47:00.000+02:00

The end of April marked the occasion of getting our first membership cards of the Antwerp Zoo. We go several times a year and now with the membership we can go whenever we want without paying anymore, ... sweet. That means that you will be seeing some more animal photography this summer. OK it might not be as spectacular as last year’s trip to the US, but hey, the animals still fascinate me.

Our first trip was to the Antwerp Zoo (Planckendael in Mechelen is also included in the membership). Now the Antwerp Zoo's main attraction these days is the one-year old elephant Kai-Mook. A cute little fellow and something you can watch for hours especially the interaction with the other elephant. I'm always a little sad to see the pen being a little small and fenced in (Planckendael is better in that respect), but for the space they have in Antwerp, they have some room to play nonetheless.

Kai-Mook's balancing act comes to an end.

I'm always surprised in how many different animals are actually in the Antwerp Zoo and although the big cats are probably some of the most impressive, there are others that, if they can be viewed outside like the hippos below, are very impressive as well.

Ready for your close-up Mr. Hippo

There is also a lot of building going on. Some animals are getting new pens and those include the lions. Their current pen is just not big enough in my opinion, so I'm glad the see they are getting the upgrade.

What are you looking at?

But a Zoo is not only the big animals, but the small ones as well. The most industrious little buggers were definitely the meerkats. If you have ever watched the wonderful BBC documentary series on these animals you know they are busy animals in the wild. I must say, they are just as busy in captivity. Sadly because they have no predators to worry about, standing on their hind legs is not something you see often at the Zoo, but hey, they're just fun to watch anyway.

Meerkat thinks he found a treasure (it was a piece of bark)

For more photos from our first trip to the Zoo this year, please check out the gallery on the website. You can go there directly by clicking here.

In the Picture: Bambi's Cousins

2010-05-18T12:51:00.001+02:00

Wildlife is not only found in Africa. It can be just around the corner. Normally when you think of photographing wildlife, you get visions of safaris, rugged mountain ranges and open meadows, but actually most of us don't live in an area that has any of those things available. Does this mean you can't shoot wildlife? Of course not. Although the wildlife isn't that wild in most cases, it doesn't prevent you from taking nice pictures of animals. You can debate whether photographing animals in captivity is wildlife photography, but for me the biggest thing here is honesty. If you shoot a beautiful lion in the zoo and tell everyone that it was taken on a safari, you're just scamming everyone and therefore it can't be tolerated. However if you just tell everyone it was taken in a zoo, it will still be a beautiful picture and for me it still qualifies as a wildlife shot even though you can probably not send it in for a wildlife photo contest, but who cares. Honesty is the best policy. And wildlife is wildlife whether they are behind a fence or not.

The photo above was taking in a small stretch of woods in Brasschaat. The deer you see here, were behind a fence which makes me think they are not wild, but hey. I really like the photograph nonetheless. There were quite a big number of animals there and I got some great shots. I really like discoveries like that. Finding something interesting to shoot "around the corner" that you didn't know was there. Therefore I think it's important to take a walk around some area that you think you know very well and watch the details. You never know what you might find. I've uploaded some more photos of that little walk on the site. You can find them here.

World Series by Renault photos on the site

2010-05-16T11:36:00.002+02:00

What a difference a couple of days of holiday make. I finally got through all the photos of the World Series by Renault on the Spa-Francorchamps circuit on the first days of May. About a 150 photos for your enjoyment ;-)

Brendan Hartley - Formula 3.5

You can find all the photos here. Enjoy!

Photographic wisdom by Ansel Adams

2010-05-06T12:10:00.002+02:00

The voice of the masters of photography is very often forgotten and replaced a print of their images. We see those prints and take them as a true representation of what was. Then we start comparing those to digital work and very often you hear about crusades against post-processing (often referred to as "Photoshopping").

The truth is that behind those "classic" images, often as much work was done in the darkroom as we do now on our computers. So why did they do it and why are we still doing it? Why can't we just make a picture we take for what it is? Many people have tried to explain, many have failed, and I for one am not going to try. A blog post from Jim Goldstein (read it here) actually pointed me to an interview with the "Grand-master" of nature photography Ansel Adams who can explain it rather perfectly. If you have any interest in photography I urge you to watch all 4 of these videos. This is photographic wisdom like you are never going to get it from anyone else. Like Jim Goldstein indicated in his blog post, in part number 2 the most profound wisdom is displayed when Ansel talks about "intentional manipulation".

Watch and learn!

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Source for this article: Jim M. Goldstein. Be sure to visit his website or his blog to check out his work.

World Series by Renault - Spa-Francorchamps

2010-05-04T12:11:00.000+02:00

Last weekend, the 1st and 2nd of May, the Spa-Francorchamps circuit welcomed the World Series by Renault. An entirely free weekend of motorsports organized by Renault. Although it is more or less focused on people that normally wouldn't come to a racetrack, it still has quite a bit of interesting races. You have got the F4 Eurocup 1.6 (for drivers between 15 and 20), the Formula Renault 2.0, the Mégane Eurocup and as top of the bill, the Formula Renault 3.5 which has been the step-up class to Formula 1 for many a driver. This is intertwined by demos of the Renault RS Sport team, the actual Formula 1 team (in Spa, local boy and Renault test driver Jérome D'Ambrosio drove the F1 car) and some other stunt teams. Clearly the focus was family entertainment and actually that was something that was made even clearer when you looked at the audience. A lot of families, young people and even elderly people were there. Not really people you see at the track every weekend.

Renault Formula 1 R29, driven by Jérome D'Ambrosio

I think Renault deserves a lot of praise for that, and if you know me a bit, that is very hard for me to say since I'm not a Renault fan at all. Getting people interested for racing by organizing a big event like this is something that I as a race fan can only appreciate. Sadly for most of those people, this is the only weekend they come to the track, but if only 5% of people get interested and return, it has been entirely worth it. Sure this is, first and foremost, a commercial stunt for Renault to show of their entire line-up (including Dacia and their sport cars) and tie in customers a bit more, but if this helps the racing scene in Belgium forward, who am I to argue.

Formula Renault 2.0 - B. Bosi

For me, this weekend provided me with some photographic opportunities that I otherwise would not have had. Open wheel races are not that common and having three categories in one day is just to good to pass up. Unlike other weekends, I went on Saturday and that turned out to be a pretty good gamble. Sunday was drenched in rain and although Saturday it rained in every part of Belgium, Spa remained dry (except for 5 minutes of small raindrops, but in Spa, that's not rain).

F4 Eurocup - winner Stoffel Vandoorne

I will be uploading my shots as soon as I can get through them, but I'm a bit behind with my workflow and next weekend, the Le Mans Series comes to Spa, so I will be there again. The photos in this post are some teaser photos from the World Series by Renault, but I will make another post when the final edit of shots is uploaded to the site.

Formula Renault 3.5 - D. Move (Lotus Junior Racing Team)

Gordon’s Finest Race – Zolder – April 11th, 2010

2010-04-19T22:02:00.004+02:00

Two weeks after the BTCS and Belcar Championships were officially presented in the streets of Leuven, they both had their start last week in the Gordon’s Finest Race at Zolder circuit. The BTCS had rounds 1 & 2 of the championship on the calendar that day and the Belcar Endurance Championship had it’s first 150 minute race.

What was clear from the get-go was that both championships had a good starting field which was especially the case for the Belcar. Although this new season actually merges the former Belgian GT and Dunlop Sport maxx championships, to me it seemed as the new Belcar was greater than the sum of it’s parts. The starting line-up was, for lack of a better term, impressive. Not only the cars, with the Dodge Viper, Porsche GT3 RS, Aston Martin DBRS9, Audi R8, Lamborghini Gallardo and more, the driver line-up was probably even more impressive. Next to the well known names from earlier season like Jeffrey Van Hooydonck, Bert Longin, Pierre-Yves Corthals, the Wauters brothers and many more, there were some more international sounding names as well starting with Anthony Kumpen (FIA GT), Marc Goossens (IndyCar) and Jaap Van Lagen (FIA WTCC). So all the ingredients were there to make a great racing weekend and a great start of the season.

The BTCS held some superb new additions as well. Especially the new Volkswage Scirocco, that we got to see in Leuven already, was a very nice addition to the line-up, but probably the most anticipated new car was the (world premiere of) the Volvo S60 Racer. OK, it’s just a race car with a Volvo S60 body-kit in essence, but it was stunning to see. Volvo and Volkswagen for that matter could not have chosen better representation in the Belgian Touring Car Championship. There were other newcomers as well. I personally liked the pretty inconspicuous Mitsubishi Lancer Evo and hope to see a lot more of that car in the next races.

For me personally this is going to be an exciting season as well I hope. Hopefully my “Day-at-the-races” is a bit of a success and there is quite a lot of variety on the agenda this year as well for me. But this first weekend of the season is mostly a practice session to get re-acquainted with the gear and the way of shooting. Brushing up the panning techniques, looking for the angles and getting the camera settings sorted out, means the first race is often a low on quality shots. This years however, I must say it was not that bad and so I gladly redirect you to the photo gallery on my site. Go there directly by clicking here.

It was an action packed weekend that was plagued with a little bit too much technical difficulties to become really nail-bitingly exciting, but it was a very action-packed weekend nonetheless. I saw a couple of race marshals almost get run-over when they towed an Aston Martin out of the gravel pit in the first corner and a accident in the chicane (which sadly I did not get a photograph of). So I can’t complain, and more importantly, I’m looking forward to a very interesting season in both the BTCS and the Belcar Endurance championships. Next race I hope to announce the first Day-at-the-races, so keep an eye on the Blog.

Oh yeah, I also tried something in post-production that makes the cars seem like an HDR rendering. Example below. Please feel free to let me know what you think.

More photos on Gordon's Finest Race Gallery on SmugMug

2010 BTCS and Belcar City Demo Leuven

2010-03-29T22:25:00.003+02:00

Last Saterday, the BTCS was in Leuven for their second city demo. That means that the streets of Leuven were filled with the loud roars of the race cars participating in the BTCS (and some in the Belcar Endurance Series) this year. It’s always fun to see these cars outside their natural habitat, the racetrack. This year was no exception. There was quite a lot of people there from all around the country (and surroundings). I did have the idea that only a small portion of the participants had showed up, but even then, there were enough nice cars to make the trip worth it. Especially the new VW Scirocco GT was a very nice newbie in the pack.

Renault, Volkswagen, Porsche, KIA, BMW and Lamborghini were present including some of the major sponsors of the BTCS and Belcar Endurance championships.

KIA even brought their most famous driver, Koen Wauters, to do an autograph signing. He was not the only one of course. Other drivers included Steve Van Bellingen, Bert Longin, Marc Goossens, and many more.

So now that we got a glimpse of this year's cars, the wait is on for the first race of the season on the 11th of april in Zolder. We may just be in for a great fight for both championships this year.

For more photos see: http://ronnygabriels.smugmug.com/Public/Racing-Season-2010/BTCS-City-Demo

German novelties

2010-03-16T14:48:00.001+01:00

This weekend we had a little holiday weekend in Germany. Now Germans are not really known for their humor, but instead of mints on our pillows they had these:

Sleep sheep ... Who thinks of this stuff :-)

My revenge on the sunset

2010-03-10T22:27:00.000+01:00

On Sunday, Antwerp harbor was the site of a gorgeous sunset. Sadly I was in the car and without a camera. Although I felt a bit of a warm glow seeing it's beauty, my inner photographer died a little bit.
Yesterday, I got my revenge. I went out to shoot a panorama of the Antwerp skyline and in doing so stumbled upon a sunset rivalling that of Sunday. Not quite as perfect, but hey, you can't have it all. The photos here are from about twenty minutes after the sun disappeared behind the horizon and were taken on a location that I drove after my panorama shots were taken.

Beautiful right? Not only the sky itself, but also the entire setting. So I decided to even include my car. I washed it by hand on Sunday so actually I was just showing off a bit ;-)

Aah well, one more for the road ...

I'll be uploading some more of the photos of that shoot (including the panorama's) later this week on the website. So stay tuned.

In the Picture: Kolonie Wortel

2010-03-05T11:54:00.000+01:00

This picture was taken on an outdoor walk with my dad. The house you see in the background is an old house built as part of the old drifter's colony, in Dutch "landloperskolonie". This was probably the house of a high ranking officer because "the colony" was treated more like a prison than a shelter or refuge. Since the official status of "drifter" is no longer recognized in Belgium, the buildings there first became a real prison and now I believe they are a place where children hold agriculture camps (or something).

The fact remains that these houses are still beautiful and worth photographing. Now actually this picture is not a very good example of that since the dominant subject in this picture is the sky. I like this photo very much just because of the fight between the sky and the house for dominance. The house as this seemingly tiny thing against the mighty sky and the sky is pulling out all the colorful stops just to show how beautiful it can be. The sky obviously wins, but it gives this photo a third and maybe more important subject in my opinion which is humbleness. Even this big house can be made to feel small when you measure it against nature. If size matters, nature will always win ;-)

This is not by any means the best shot I've taken of a sunset, nor the best I've taken of a house in the open plains, but I like it because it goes just that little bit deeper than just what shows up visually.

New on the Site – Antwerp Justice Building

2010-02-28T14:07:00.002+01:00

Finally some new photos on the site and this time they are from a shoot I did in Antwerp a couple of weeks ago. The idea was to shoot the Antwerp justice building at dusk. It was something I wanted to do for a long time since I drive by that building every day and it is, in my opinion, one of the iconic buildings in Antwerp. Another reason for the shoot is the fact that I’m making a series on Antwerp for a photography store that shows different scenes from Antwerp in not the most obvious way. I think the justice building is not only a good subject at dusk, but the hyper-modern face of the building shows of the contrast between the old historic side and the new modern side of Antwerp.

A little “tourist” information about the justice building, "Justitiepaleis" in Dutch. The building was designed Richard Rogers, the man behind designs as Centre Pompidou in Paris and the Millenium Dome in London. It was opened officially on the 28th of March 2006 and is considered one of the most important architectural highlights in Belgium of the 21st century.

I love the building but I have to say that it’s a bit of a challenge to get a good shot of it. The most accessible side of the building is on the Bolivar place in front of the building and in this shoot I limited myself to that vantage point. You can get shots from behind the building, but that’s much more difficult because most of the space behind the building are highways and private grounds. It won’t be the last time I shoot this building, but I have to say I am happy with the result of this shoot.

You can find the album on my site here. Enjoy and let me know what you think.

Behind the Shot: Delicate Arch

2010-02-16T09:48:00.001+01:00

Delicate Arch in Arches National Park is one of those things that has been shot a million times before. If you go to any search engine and type in "Delicate Arch" you will get thousands of hits. What you will also notice is that most of these hits show you the arch from its best known side, which is right in front of it with the mountains in the background. The reason I like my rendition is the fact that it's still clearly a picture of Delicate Arch, but not from a side or in a composition you have seen before often. Now of course, there is a little story behind this shot.

When we arrived in Arches National Park last year, the shot I really wanted was actually the very well known shot with the mountains in the back at sundown. The vantage point for that shot however was a 1.5 hour hike up the mountain. Now normally that wouldn't have stopped us for a minute, but after two and a half weeks of hikes in National Parks, that night we decided not to go up and instead go to the upper viewpoint on the base of the mountain. We were tired and even the walk to the viewpoint proved harder than we had anticipated. But we got there, with very heavy winds seemingly trying to blow us back to the parking lot. We stayed there to watch the sunset and I took a number of pictures of the arch. At first I was a little disappointed and I tried to zoom in with my long lens to get the arch to fill the frame, but by doing so, I noticed that a lot of people were up there "spoiling" the picture. So I decided the blur those people out by taking some shots like you see above. And I have to say it worked. We talked about maybe heading up to the other vantage point the day after, but we never got there due mostly to fatigue. I have to say that actually I wasn't sorry because the drive of "I really have to get that shot" was gone. The shot I really wanted, I never got, but the photo I got, was much more original! So all I have to say is, don't get too hung up about a particular shot you want. You might be surprised what other opportunities lay just on the other side of the mountain.

Funny side note, when we were standing there watching the arch, Merel actually spotted a woman in her wedding dress posing under the arch. With the binoculars and long lens we saw that there was indeed a photo shoot going on under the arch of a woman in her wedding dress wearing no shoes. We're not quite sure how she got there (and where, if anywhere, she changed her clothes), but it was a strange sight, a photographer, an assistant holding a reflector and a bride high up on the mountain that can only be reached by hiking up there. Some photographers have to really work for their money ;-)

Announcing “Day at the Races” initiative

2010-02-11T19:57:00.001+01:00

Photography is a lot about comfort zones. People shoot what they are familiar with or what comes natural to them. But the best way to learn is often to leave this comfort zone and explore others fields. With that in mind I’m announcing the “Day at the Races” initiative I will set out in 2010. It’s basically an opportunity for you as a photographer to leave your comfort zone and shoot something you might have never shot before … car races. Upside is that you wont be alone to learn, but I and hopefully a bunch of other people will be there exchanging ideas and learning in the process.

Why races?

Well, there are two main reasons.

Car races is something a lot of you have never even attempted and ideal for learning. Panning shots, high speed action and other techniques used in sports and wildlife photography are great skills to have as a photographer.
It’s an outdoor activity so you get to spend a day in the outdoors which is not only healthy but also relaxing (yes even with the loud cars going by ;-))

I’ve been doing this for a couple of years now so I feel comfortable giving tips from my experience. And although I’m not at all at professional level, I’m sure it can be a great learning experience and a fun one to boot. So what the “Day at the Races” will be entail is the following:

A couple of weeks before a weekend of the BTCS or Belcar Endurance Series (which are racing categories in Belgium) I will post an invitation on my blog to participate in the “Day at the Races”. You can just send me a message to say whether you want to participate.
When there are a couple of participants, we will make the arrangements to get to the track (which will be either Zolder or Spa-Francorchamps) and I will provide details on how to get there and when.
We spend a day shooting the races and learning from each other, exchanging tips, techniques and some good stories ;-)
I will prepare a place for you to show of your best shots in the week following the event so you can show everybody how you did.

So why BTCS and Belcar?

There are a couple of reasons why I selected the BTCS or Belcar weekends. First of all most of the BTCS and Belcar events are free, meaning that you don’t have to pay to get into the racetrack. That makes it little easier when thinking of reasons to go. Furthermore, you have access to the entire circuit, including the paddock area, meaning you can go wherever you want. Most of the international race series are not free and most of the time you have to pay extra to get into the paddock.

Secondly, the BTCS are touring cars which are kind of like cars you find on the road in a racing jacket. The most important advantage of that is that the cars are not mind-bendingly fast. A big advantage if you are just starting with panning shots. The Belcar Endurance Series are faster GT cars, but since these races last longer, you get more time to get it right. So, keeping the phrase “walk before you run” in mind, we start with these races before going into the big leagues.

Thirdly, the BTCS and Belcar series are completely belgian organizations who mainly use the Zolder and Spa-Francorchamps circuits. In a race weekend, most of the time, there are several extra races and side-events to diversify the day a bit. So it won’t be too boring even for people who don’t want to watch cars racing around a circuit all day. (And for the ladies, Koen Wauters is one of the competitors in these series, and since you can get into the paddock … :-)).

When and where will these “Day at the Races” session be?

I will post an invitation on this blog a couple of weeks before a race, but you can take a look at the calendar for the 2010 season on www.btcseries.be and www.belgiangt.com (season starts in April and ends in October). I won’t be going to all races, but like I said I’ll keep you posted on what races a “Day at the Races” session will be held. By the way, I got three extra seats in the car, so if you don’t have a car or don’t want to drive yourself, there are options ;-)

What do I need?

What you will need is a DSLR camera (sorry but point-and-shoots just can’t make these shots) and a long lens (as long as you got, but I would say you need at least 200mm). If you are a Canon shooter, I have a 100-400mm lens you could try during the day. Besides that, I would suggest a monopod or tripod with ballhead, good walking shoes (especially for Spa-Francorchamps circuit) and since it is still Belgium a raincover or plastic bag to protect your camera from the elements.

What about me leaving my comfort zone?

I know, this is about leaving your comfort zone, but I’m not leaving anything. Right, so what I would like to propose is that if you like this initiative, organize one yourself for a discipline you would like to share with other photographers.

So keep your eyes on the blog for updates, but please let me know already if you like the initiative and are thinking of maybe joining. Just for me to see whether there is interest in this type of sessions or not.

TechTalk: What to get? An Apple iPad or Small laptop

2010-02-09T17:25:00.001+01:00

I decided to write this post because I actually have gotten this question quite a few times lately. It’s always dangerous to write something about an Apple product especially if you try to compare it to other products. Apple lovers and haters come out of the woodworks and starting pointing everything you missed in your argument. So before I even begin, I want to stress that what I will write here is my own personal opinion and is by no means a definitive answer to the question. I just try to compare the products in ways that those people asking might not have thought of to give those people a comprehensive answer which allows them to answer the question for themselves. I don’t believe it’s my place to make a decision, but rather to inform the best I can. So here it goes. If you ask me “What should I get, an Apple iPad or a small (10” to 13”) laptop?” this is what I would answer.

The Comparison
Actually comparing a small laptop (and I’m not talking about a netbook here) to the iPad is not really fare. If, for instance, you want to choose between those two to replace your current computer, the best answer might just be: “Get both.” The fact is that the iPad is not a computer as you and I know it. It should be seen more like a big format smartphone (without the phone) or a big format iPod Touch. I know this is not really a good analogy, but the fact remains that you will not be able to replace your computer (PC or Mac) by an iPad. The iPad is a peripheral device, meaning that you will need a computer to put things like music on it (via iTunes). Sure you can download stuff from the web immediately, but you will always need a computer to sync, upload or configure it. So comparing that to a laptop computer is not fair unless you have a computer at home and want to buy an extra device to carry around. Let’s take that as a vantage point for the rest of the comparison since this evens the playing field a bit.

What purpose does it need to serve?
Probably the most important question you need to ask yourself is: “What do I want this extra device for?” If the answer is “surf the web (and everything that comes with it today), check my email, watch videos, read some digital books and listen to some music” than I think the iPad might be the best fit for you. It’s probably great at all these things but be ware if you want to do much more. This is were Apple fanatics will start to attack me but bare with me. In the end, the iPad doesn’t run software, but apps (via the AppStore) like the iPhone or iPod Touch does. There’s probably an app for everything, but you can’t expect them to behave like complete software products. For instance, as an amateur photographer, I like to watch and edit my photos. Sure there’s an app for viewing and editing, but those are no way near what I expect photo editing software to be. So if you have a hobby that requires some serious software, the laptop is the only option. If however you don’t, it’s best to read on ;-)

User experience
This is the point were the iPad has the clear advantage. Or has it? The touch user interface is superb, I will never deny that. For browsing, messaging and those things it probably the absolute best experience that you will ever have. It’s responsive, intuitive and just plain easy to use. But what if you write a lot? Blog, e-mails, chats, etc. tend to require a lot of typing, and for me personally, an on-screen keyboard just doesn’t cut it when you have to do a lot of typing. OK, so I haven’t used it on a device this size, but still the fact the put the keyboard in an angle to the screen (like a laptop of separate physical keyboard) is a big drawback for me. Sure there is a separate keyboard available for the iPad, but you buy these devices for portability and ease so how many times are you going to forget that separate keyboard? Right, always. By now you probably have a feel for what MY choice of device would be. The fact remains that if you don’t do a lot of typing, the user experience on an iPad will probably blow the laptop out of the water (even the ridiculously expensive tablet-PC’s).

Multiple users?
This is were for me the laptop wins it. See if more than one person in your house wants to use the device you buy, the choice gets a lot easier. You will only have to buy one laptop, but you’ll have to buy one iPad for every person using it (given they all use it to the same extend). Let me explain. Like I said earlier, the iPad is like a big smartphone. Which means that you configure it for your email, your contacts, your music, your books, … If anybody else wants to use it with their own settings (own email account, own music, etc.) you are out of luck. OK, if you’re the only user or other people just use it for surfing or other not personal stuff, this does not apply for you, but still it’s something to remember. With a laptop however, one person logs out and the next one logs in with his settings, his e-mail etc. So the lack of multi-user support makes that the iPad can not be used as a coffee-table computer (what I think it would be best suited for).

So the verdict?
I’ll summarize some of the pros and cons of both systems (based on some features) so you can check the boxes you think you need to make an informed decision.

Feature	iPad	Small laptop
easy to use	Touch interface is unbeatable for normal use	physical keyboard very handy for intensive typing
multiple user support	only one user can configure everything	as much as you like
Browsing experience	Perfect on big clear screen	no touch means having to use a mousepad
Reading books	Excellent because you can tilt the entire thing to portrait mode (if you like reading books in digital form)	No changing to portrait mode means worse experience
Music	it’s like a big iPod, enough said	MediaPlayer, … enough said
Social media, messaging, etc.	Very good (if there’s not too much typing)	Good especially when much typing is involved
Speciality software	almost none and all depends on Apple	Free as a bird
Portability	too big to replace phone	too big to replace phone
storage	max 64GB (even an iPod has more … why?)	whatever hard drive you can find (+ upgradable)
stand-alone functionality	needs computer for sync	100% standalone
Battery	up to a month stand-by, + 10h in use (WOW)	max 5 hours in use
Upgrades	Forget a new hard-drive or even a USB drive to connect to it, let alone swapping the battery, memory etc.	When bigger and better is available, just put new stuff in.
… the list goes on

So what’s the verdict? I think for a lot of people who use a computer mainly to surf the web, watch the occasional video etc. the iPad will be a perfect device (with the small drawback of having to have at least one computer in the house to sync iTunes with). So for them, I would very much recommend it. For other people, I think the iPad can be the dawn of a new age, but it’s not there yet. Wait a year or two and there will be a device like this for you as well. And for the tech geeks out there. It’s certainly not for you, but you’ll buy one anyway because it’s pretty, new and shiny ;-)

In the Picture: Kasteel van Brasschaat

2010-02-08T11:53:00.000+01:00

In "In the Picture" I will highlight a photo I have recently taken. The first in the hopefully long series of photos is this picture I took last weekend in the public park of Brasschaat. It features the lovely castle that has been a landmark of Brasschaat for a long time. The weather was very drowsy and the fog actually lasted all day. But fog is just a very interesting condition to take pictures in. It has this very dark and mysterious feel to it and makes for an interesting subject on its own actually.

Kasteel van Brasschaat - Ronny Gabriels Photography 2010

The photo was taken just before noon and because of the fog it was no way near bright enough to photograph it decently without a tripod. Luckily I had one with me. It's a drag to carry around, but it more than makes up for it in image quality. I tried this photo handheld and even with IS on, I wouldn't publish it, even to show you the difference. Hopefully that says enough :-)

Now why do I highlight this photo? Well actually for two reasons:

To talk about a bit of outdoor photography
To talk about post-production

Outdoor photography

I think this photo proofs a very valid point when it comes to the statement that bad weather can make for some great shots. Whether you like the photo or not, you will probably agree with me that it wouldn't have been quite as interesting if the skies had been nice and blue. Bad weather has another big advantage. Since far less people go out in bad weather, you can actually make interesting and "new" shots of landmarks that have been shot to death. Think of the Eifel tower for instance. I don't think many people can make a photo of that tower that we haven't seen before, but how many shots of the Eifel tower have you seen in the rain, fog or a storm. Far less because most people don't go out.

So if you want to make you pictures a little different and more interesting, I suggest you go out when nobody else does. (Oh and don't forget to protect your gear, 'cause although you can take some rain, your camera most often doesn't)

Post-processing

Hopefully most of you figured out that this photo didn't come out of the camera looking like this. That's because I worked on it in Lightroom and Photoshop on it to get it to look this particular "aged" way. Now in post processing lays one of the most difficult challenges for me. That challenge is to choose what you want the photo to look like as a finished product. I know for instance that a lot of you out there might not be a fan of this aged look, whereas others might love it. For me, it just works on this photo. Not just because of the subject (being a castle) but the combination between the subject and the mood of the photo. I could have left it in colour, but I don't think it would have the same atmosphere to it.

So whatever you do in post-processing, I'm convinced you should do what you want, not what necessarily everybody else will like. You see a lot of photos nowadays being finished in a particular style because that style is popular. But whether it's right for the picture is much much more important in my opinion. So I recommend making it clear for yourself what you want it to look like, before looking how others process their photos. You'll learn a lot more from your own vision than you will from other people's.

This picture is all about mood for me and that's the way I finished it.

2010 … A new beginning

2010-02-04T18:29:00.001+01:00

Finally, the revamped blog has arrived and so it’s time to start anew with this blog. I started in October 2008 with the Smugmug site and this blog and over the course of one year tested out what I could do with both mediums. I must say that it all worked pretty well, but not entirely like I had hoped. This mainly because I focused so hard on the site and the galleries (which of course are the “main event”) that I neglected the blog. The blog turned out to be more of a “What’s new on the site” than anything else. And that’s exactly what I want to change in 2010. I know it’s already a month in, but it took me quite a bit more time than I had anticipated.

So what can you expect? First off, the “What’s new on the site” will still be a part of the blog, but in addition, I will post much more. From individual photos I took to reviews and impressions of stuff I tested or just want (I’m on a budget ;-)), from things I find on the web to opinions about photography and what’s going on in the world of photography. I will try to minimize the personal opinions about other stuff to a minimum, but I can’t guarantee anything ;-).

The idea behind the entire revamp is to make the blog the center of my online universe. This universe includes the following online spots:

The website: http://ronnygabriels.smugmug.com, the place where you can find all my actual photographic work.
The blog: http://ronnygabriels.blogspot.com, the center where I will post new photos, critiques, opinions, site updates, stories, etc.
The Flickr gallery: http://www.flickr.com/photos/elron187, this will get a revamp as well to show less of my work, but more of the “special editions” and portfolio material.
The Twitter account: http://www.twitter.com/ronnygabriels, where I will post small updates, moods I’m in, links to new blog posts, etc.
The Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com, become my friend and see updates. Warning I use this very scarcely, but I will be posting photographic events I will attend throughout the year.

So that’s my online universe for now and in the following months I will be trying out exactly how and how much I will be using all these media sources, so please bear with me. What rests is to finish this post and start writing some interesting material.

See you soon, Ronny

PS: I started a series of post last year about our trip to the USA and its national parks. You can see all the photos on the site, but I won’t be finishing that series as most of the details would take me way too much time to remember. I will share the best stories of that trip as I post some of the individual photos from that trip later on.

American Roadtrip 2009: Stage 1 – Zion NP

2009-10-13T22:08:00.001+02:00

It had been a long day of travelling when we finally arrived in our hotel in Las Vegas on the 6th of September. The waiting in airports and long flights combined, we had pretty much been travelling for 24 hours. Only to realize when we drove our rental car over the Las Vegas Strip that it was in fact Labor day weekend. Possibly one of the busiest weekends in Las Vegas. Ah well, what’s a traffic jam at 9PM in Las Vegas when you can start your 3 week vacation right? Right!

That Monday was spent walking and driving. The walking in the AM in Las Vegas and the driving in the direction of Zion National Park. Our first official stop of the vacation. But first Vegas. Let’s just say that I’ll never become a fan (or maybe when I had too much too drink and couldn’t tell reality from fiction). It is so unbelievably over the top that you are going to have to see it for yourself to believe it. And because the difference between the indoor air-co’s and the outside heat made for an almost sickening environment I was glad to get going for Zion. I’m glad I saw Vegas, but I wouldn’t be too disappointed if I never got back there.

So Zion. We arrived in Springdale, were our hotel was located, in the late afternoon. The hotel was called “Majestic View Lodge” and it more than delivered on it’s name. You can see some of the photos in the “Zion National Park” gallery on my site. It was the last stop of the Springdale shuttle bus to the park so that meant we could leave the car at the hotel and make our way to the park by bus and there take the shuttle bus into the park itself. All of the smaller parks in the US should implement this. It’s convenient, fast and a great way to have an almost guided tour of the park. As an extra bonus you eliminate cars from the park which is great for visitors and wildlife alike.

View from the Majestic View Lodge in Springdale, UT

I don’t know whether it was just because Zion was our first park on the trip or not, but I was pretty impressed with it. Zion was one of the parks I had done almost no research for beforehand, so I didn’t really knew what the park had to offer. A lot as it turned out. Most of the canyon parks are build on the rim of the canyon. Zion national park is actually located on the floor of the canyon which gives you straight cliffs reaching up hundreds of feet right beside you, while having a very green feel at the ground level with lots of plants, trees, a river and wildlife.

Bighorn sheep near the Zion National Park East Entrance

The first night we explored the park just from the bus because we had limited time. The second day we made quite some stops and started our hiking with the riverside walk on the far side of the park and the emerald pool trail later that same day. It was a great warm-up for the rest of the vacation and it gave a pretty good idea of what the park was all about. On day three we started the Observation point trail early in the morning after a golden tip of one of the bus drivers. Although it was the trail with the biggest elevation change and also took the longest to complete in the entire park, we felt up to a challenge. The only thing I can say is that the view was worth the 5hour hike. Look at the photos and dare to disagree.

View from Observation Point in Zion National Park

An overview of the entire park and beyond, observation point is though to reach but worth every step. We did see people coming up the mountain in the sun when we were going down around noon and by the look of their faces it save to say “START EARLY”. Before 10AM most of the trail is in the shade and my god does that make a difference :-) We took the afternoon off and stayed by the pool only to go back to the park at sunset for some photographic opportunities (I couldn’t resist).

Evening shot in Zion National Park (Riverside walk)

Two full days was all we had at Zion National Park before we had to leave and go to Bryce Canyon. Now because Bryce and Zion are so close together we made a “little” (read 5hour) detour via Grand Canyon North Rim. If you are every looking to visit the Grand Canyon in peace, this is the way to do it. The North Rim is arguably a lot smaller than the South Rim, but because of the fact there is only one hotel and pretty much nothing else in a two-hour drive radius, it beautifully quiet, plus a lot more beautiful nature-wise in my opinion. As an added bonus the drive up to the North Rim travels over the absolutely stunning North Kaibab National Forest road. So despite taken 6 hours to get from Zion to Bryce (which is basically a 1 hour drive), it was a great day. The photos from the North Rim will be included later with the other Grand Canyon photos.

So with Stage 1 complete, Bryce Canyon was the next beautiful stage in this three week trip. Check back soon for the story about Bryce.

Hope you enjoy the photos! See them here!

The 2009 American Roadtrip – What’s to come?

2009-10-01T14:48:00.001+02:00

From the 6th until the 26th of September, Merel and I undertook a big 3 week roadtrip along some of the US’s most famous national parks. Starting in Las Vegas we drove by Zion, Bryce, Yellowstone, Grand Teton, Arches, Canyonlands and the Grand Canyon, visiting Salt Lake City, Monument Valley and Hoover Dam along the way, to end up in Las Vegas again for the trip home.

Of course a lot of photographs were taken (2018 to be precise) and in the next days, weeks (and months if things don’t go well) you can expect a lot of them on my site. I will prepare them national park by national park in the order that you saw above. Since they were all shot in RAW, please have a little patience because it will take a while to get them right and posted. I’m currently working on the shots from Zion and so you can expect them here hopefully by the end of the week.

What can you expect from the photographs? Expect a lot of landscape and animal shots. I don’t take too many “people” shots, so don’t get your hopes up too much for those.

Hope to see you back here or on the site very soon.

Ronny

Total 24h of Spa - July 25th, 2009

2009-07-31T10:56:00.000+02:00

Finally, the FIA GT came back to Belgium in what was going to be a great racing weekend. The 24h of Spa is probably one of the most famous races on the European continent and after missing it the last two years, I finally made it.

Maserati MC12

A weekend featuring European GT4, British Formula 3, Lamborghini Super Trofeo and of course, the full FIA GT circus is a feast for everybody who loves racing. Not only do you get the some epic racing cars from the likes of Maserati, Corvette, Aston Martin, Porsche and Ferrari. This year the field was extended with the GT3 spec Alpina B6, the monsterous Ford GT (including one in 2010 spec) and the trackside Godzilla that is the Nissan GT-R. Add the GT4, Britisch F3 and Lamborghini Super Trofeo cars and any of you interested in racing know why you should have been there.

Bruxelles corner at sundown

As more often than not, weather conditions made it quite tricky on Saturday, not in the least for the photographers. The weather change constantly from sunny, to dark overcast to rain. This meant that every 10 minutes I had to change the settings on my camera to get some decent exposures. Sadly this didn’t always work out too well. When you have to push the ISO up to 400 to get properly exposed shots (of moving cars), you’re almost guaranteed to have lower quality shots. The end result was that only about 10% of the photos I took made it through the first cut.

The winner of the 24h of SPa – Corvette Z06

In the end I didn’t get all the great shots I wanted, but the result was nonetheless not that bad (after setting my goals from “Professional publication shots” to “Great racing shots made by someone behind the fence”). You can have a look at the final cut of photos on my website in the Photos - Racing Season 2009 menu. I hope you enjoy them.

As a PS a little story about, in my opinion, the best shot I got the entire weekend.

Godzilla (Nissan GT-R) in the Pitlane

This shot was taken while standing on top of the Formula 1 Pitboxes. I got up there by buying a more expensive “Paddock” ticket and joining the “24h Club” which was free with a “Paddock” ticket. The shot was taken while the cars where getting to the starting grid. All the pro’s and VIP’s where at that point either on the track or in the pitlane. So ironically if I had gotten press credentials, I would have never been there to take the shot. I like this serendipity. I was jealous of the “credential” people all day, but in the end, my best shot would have never been taken if I had been one of them.

Scott Kelby's 2nd Annual Worlwide Photo Walk Antwerpen - July 18th 2009

2009-07-28T12:53:00.001+02:00

50 people started on what would be a very interesting photo walk through Antwerp. It was the second annual Worldwide Photo walk organized by Scott Kelby and it was a record breaking edition. Over 900 cities participated and Antwerp was luckily one of them.

It was my first photo walk and although I was sceptic about it, it turned out to be a great meeting between a lot of photographers who just like photography. When it comes to photography, I’m not the most social of the bunch. In my personal opinion, photography is very much about your own personal vision. A lot of times when photographers come together it ends up being a (unhealthy) competition. Ironically, the World wide photo walk also has a competition attached, but I must say that not too many where actually thinking about that.

So it was a nice exchange of ideas, some chatter and just a nice afternoon of photographing a beautiful city.

Make sure to check the photos on the website. The best of these photos are also uploaded into Flickr.

25h of VW Fun Cup – Spa – July 11th, 2009

2009-07-18T10:54:00.001+02:00

The first race weekend for me in over a month turned out not to be everything I was hoping it to be. The VW Fun Cup 25h has quite a nice line-up. With the Belgian GT and the BTCS racing as an opening act followed by the biggest “amateur” endurance race of the season it promised to be interesting to say the least. But this still is Belgium and at the Spa-Francorchamps circuit there is one thing you can never discount, the rain.

For my third race weekend in a row, the rain spoiled a lot. Where I was hoping to stay at least ‘till after dark, by 4PM I had been rain-soaked twice and my knees were killing me (what happens in very humid weather). So what should have been a long day at the track, turned out to be a short day.

Too bad, because the atmosphere was there, a lot of entertainment and some great racing. I got shots from the Belgian GT and BTCS races and some more shots from the paddock where VW was ever-present. So all in all it certainly wasn’t a waist, but it could have been so much more. The photos can be found, as always, on the site under “Photos --> Racing Season 2009”.

So I’m driving to southern France tonight (after the Scott Kelby’s Photo Walk here in Antwerp) and will get back to Spa next weekend for, I hope, a rain-free and spectacular 24h of Spa FIA GT. So hope to see you all there for one of the most famous endurance races in the world (damn Le Mans ;-))

In memoriam

2009-06-26T07:18:00.001+02:00

This morning the 26th of June at around 5AM CET, not a week after his 78th birthday, my grandfather past away.

Herman Gabriels

June 20th, 1931 – June 26th, 2009

Scott Kelby’s Worlwide Photo Walk Antwerp

2009-06-22T16:16:00.001+02:00

A while ago Scott Kelby presented his second annual worldwide photo walk on July 18th. The idea is to have photo walks in cities all around the world on the same day as sort of a massive social photography event. This year, Antwerp has it’s own photo walk, to which I have already subscribed. I would like to invite everyone in the Antwerp area to join as well, since this is a great opportunity to get to know some other photographers from area.

I just checked and there are still 33 places left, so join today. More information can be found here.

Hope to see a lot of you there and may the weathergods be with us that day ;-)

BTCS 12 hours of Spa

2009-06-22T16:09:00.001+02:00

Fairly late, but just to let you know that the photos from the 12 hours of Spa on June 6th 2009 are online (and have been for some time). It was a new BTCS weekend and again the rain was there. The 12 hours of Spa started on saturday afternoon and raged on until 3am. Of course I was planning on staying at least until after dark but the rain prevented that plan. After more than 4 hours of rain with little sleep the weeks before, I trew in the towl and set my sights on the 24 hours of Spa (FIA GT) for night shots of the Spa circuit.

I did get some nice shots of the Belgian GT race, the BTCS and some paddock shots. So I hope you enjoy them nonetheless.

New Renault Megane Silhoutte at 12 hours of Spa

Zolder Star Festival – BTCS

2009-05-26T20:19:00.001+02:00

For the first time this racing season it was raining on Sunday morning. Since I have been postponing buying a rain cape for my camera and lens this left me with a bit of a predicament. Was I going to get stopped from shooting a race by the most Belgian of weather conditions? Of course not! Enter my good friend the clear plastic bag. I ripped a hole in it were the lens went through, screwed the lens hood on and pulled the bag over my lens and the entire camera. Problem solved and on we went.

The first BTCS race started in the rain and for about 2/3s of the hour and a half race, the rain kept coming. And then it stopped. The track quickly dried up and it turned out to be a pretty good day at the races. What I liked about the rain though is that it got me some new kind of shots. OK, they were still pretty basic, but the rain gave them a whole different feel. Shooting on a clear day is nothing like shooting in the rain, so the resulting photos are not going to be the same either. At the long end of 400mm is quite hard to autofocus in the rain because the camera is caught of guard by the water on the track, the lights on all the other cars and finally by the spray the cars leave behind. So concentration is key to getting good shots in these conditions.

Kia Pro C’eed in the rain

As I said before, the rain stopped for the final half hour of the BTCS race and never came back. So I hiked along the Zolder track discovering new places from which to shoot at the circuit during the VW Fun Cup race that followed the BTCS race. It got me some great shots and a lot of good ideas for further races at the Zolder circuit.

VW Fun Cup

During the entire day, the paddock was filled with animation with a stunt show, a miss mechanic “sexy” show and a tuning show. I went to see all three events, but it wasn’t really for me. The stunt show with motorbikes was pretty cool. It was too crowded to get shots though. The sexy show was, … funny actually and that is not what you want with a show like that. We’ll leave it at that. And finally the tuning show. Well I know “tuning is not a crime” but what they do to some of those cars should be. I’ll never get why you buy an Opel Corsa and spent thousand of euros to get body-kits, engine tuning, exhausts and so on for it. Just buy a decent sports car and have fun with that, plus you don’t look like … well I’ll let everybody fill that in for themselves. I just will never get it, sorry.

After the VW Fun Cup followed the second BTCS race and with the positional scouting I had done during the VW Fun Cup race, I got some very nice shots from that second race, if I may say so myself.

BMW M3 in the second BTCS race

They are of course all on the website, so just go and have a look. They can be found in the “Photos” menu under the “Racing Season 2009” subcategory. Enjoy, and let me know what you think.

1000km of Spa – Le Mans Series

2009-05-22T09:04:00.001+02:00

On the 10th of May, the Spa-Francorchamps circuit was filled with the roaring sounds of the Le Mans Series. After the F1 Grand Prix and the 24h of Spa, this was maybe the third most important event of the racing season at Spa. It’s hard to describe what makes the Le Mans Series so attractive, but for me it stands a lot higher than F1. Sure F1 is impressive, but with 20 cars on the grid that all look and sound more or less the same, it gets boring real fast. I think that’s where the Le Mans Series have the edge. Not only can you see a lot of the incredibly impressive machine that are the LP1 en LP2 cars (bigger and heavier sounding than F1, except for the Diesels when it comes to sound) there are also a lot of GT cars in the mix, so even after hours of racing, boredom is not something you think of.

The day in Spa started of misty and damp in the morning for the race of the European GT3 and GT4 cars. Basically this was a race of the Belgian GT extended with some cars from the British GT championship. The conditions were less than optimal especially for taking pictures. Sad surely, but in the end this day was not about the GT championship.

Audi R8 GT in the mist

By the end of the GT race, the skies and the damp cleared and it was time for the Formula Le Mans. A championship contested by a lot of LP2 prototype cars prepared by Oreca in France. It’s supposed to be a springboard to the actual Le Mans Series for young drivers. In my opinion it’s the best opener for the Le Mans Series you could think of. A lot of young eager drivers in some awfully fast machine make for some very exciting racing. By then the sun had also come out in full force and it looked like it was going to be a beautiful day at the races. The cars glistening in the sun gave for some very nice crisp shots that you can check out at the website of course.

Formula Le Mans

Finally it was time for the big boys. The Le Mans Series took the stage for a 1000km race, or 143 laps around the most beautiful circuit in the world. With the two Lola Aston Martins from Aston Martin Racing (in nostalgic Gulf orange and blue) and the two official Peugeot Diesels the field was pretty well equipped for a dry test run of the actual 24 du Mans. Sadly the new Audi R15’s were absent because for reasons beyond any European racecar fan, the only test in the American Le Mans Series. Nevertheless, the race was on. And although the racing was interrupted by several safety car procedures, the race was very exciting the entire afternoon. The sun was burning, literally, and the racing stayed pretty close right up to the end. I got some fantastic shots out of it and although I had sunburn on my face and arms, I got to go home knowing that I had seen one of the big events of the season.

Lola Aston Martin

The photos of that day are now finally up on the website, so have a look (Photos menu and subcategory racing season 2009) and let me know what you think! And check back here later this week for a report of the BTCS Zolder star festival last weekend in Zolder.

I’ve got some catching up to do

2009-05-18T09:48:00.001+02:00

It has been a little quiet here hasn’t it? I know and I’m sorry. The last two weeks have been a bit hectic. There were some photos that had to get priority in post-production and publication. This means I now (including the ones I shot yesterday at Zolder) have about 2500 photos to go through for post-production and publication. And of course I want to write a small blog post for all the shoots I did over the last two weeks. Luckily in Belgium, this week has a holiday in it, so I hope to be up to date again by the weekend.

What can you expect this week? A report on a shoot for a first communion party. The pictures of this are online, but are password protected due to the private nature of them. Second a report and photos from the Le Mans Series race at Spa-Francrochamps on the 10th. Some of the photos of this race can already be seen on my Flickr page, but check back here or on the website for more and high-res photos. And finally, there was the Zolder Star Festival yesterday at … Zolder of course. So photos and a report of this event are also coming later this week.

Hope to see you back here soon.

Belgian Race Kick Off - April 26th

2009-05-05T21:52:00.001+02:00

As mentioned in the previous post, the Belgian GT started their season on Zolder this of the 26th of April with the Belgian Race kick off event that not only featured the Belgian GT cars, but also the Benelux racing League, the Belgian Historic Cup and the Dunlop Sport Maxx Endurance cup.
Although the the day didn't pass without a hitch (again see previous post), I did manage to get some nice shots from the Belgian GT, the BRL and the BHC.

Flaming Aston

As I was a little late with this post, I’ll stop talking and just let you enjoy the photos. Check them out on the website under the photos menu and the Racing Season 2009 subcategory.

Embarrassment at Zolder Circuit

2009-04-28T10:07:00.001+02:00

Sunday on the Zolder Circuit. Great races of the Belgian GT championship, the Benelux Racing League and the Belgian Historic Cup. Great photo opportunities. Me shooting away and then it happened. The most stupid thing that can happen when you’re a photographer. My batteries went dead. Now normally that’s not a problem, because I always carry spare batteries that I can put in the Battery grip I use for my Canon 400D. The thing is, I have never had to use the spares and no they weren’t dead either. I loaded the spare batteries in the special holder and put it in the battery grip. So far so good. I tried turning the camera on and nothing happened. I took the special holder out and put it back in again, still nothing. So I took it back out and took a close look. What I didn’t see the first time (or ever before) was that on the bottom side of the holder, there were slots for two more batteries. So the holder took 6 instead of 4.
There I was with only 4 batteries that might as well be dead too, because without the two extra ones, the camera wouldn’t turn on. After looking for batteries in all the shops around the circuit I had to come to the conclusion that my day of shooting the races was over. Stupid and embarrassing. So now I will not leave the house with a) fully charged camera batteries and b) ENOUGH spare batteries.

The moral of the story is of course, try out everything before you leave, even the spares. I will not forget this lesson easily, and I promise you that if it would ever happen to you, you won’t forget either.

So I took a lot less photos this Sunday than on other racing events. That doesn’t mean there were no good ones. They will be posted later this week, after I had a chance to have a look at them. So see you back here later on for the report of the races that I did get to shoot.

PS: the red in my cheeks is finally fading after two days ;-)

BTCS City Parade Leuven – April 18th,2009

2009-04-21T10:43:00.001+02:00

Contrary to wath the Belgian weather service had predicted, Leuven's “Grote Markt” square was bathed in sunshine and thus the perfect setting for an very unusual sight. On the square, several of the competitors of the BTCS (Belgian Touring Car Series) were parked. It didn't take too long for a nice crowd to form around the cars. Some who knew this city demo was happening (identifiable by the cameras they brought), some were quite surprised to see racing cars in the city center. And that last part of the crowd, was what this demo was all about. Bringing the championship to the people who might otherwise never get to see them.

BTCS on Leuven’s “Grote Markt”

Now what's so attractive about BTCS, you might ask? Well the main attraction of championships like these, is the fact that it features touring cars. They are built on the foundation of normal roadgoing cars you and I drive (see later). They are not hyper-designed race machines like Formula 1. Although those are also impressive, most of the people know they exist. What a lot of people don't know is that the car they drive is also racing in a championship. Confronting those people with this fact, might bring new crouds to the racing circuit, and after all that's what it's all about.
Because a lot of people believe that going to the races is expensive. It's really not! They are of course thinking of the ridiculous prices you pay for F1. You pay 75€ for a ticket that restricts you to one part of the track or even one seat. For BTCS races you pay 15€ max (for most races free tickets can be downloaded somewhere), but it not only gives you access to the entire circuit, it also provides access to the paddock. If you want that in F1, you'll pay astronomical amounts of money. That's why championships like BTCS are a lot more fun, because you can bring the entire family or go with some friends and don't have to worry about having to cancel your vacation because you ran out of money. A little analogy might be in place here. If the F1 is the huge concert in some big stadium, the BTCS is the free concert in a public park that you take the wife and kids to. Both are great concerts, both are fun, but only one is affordable for everybody.

Now back to the city demo in Leuven. Because after a couple of hours on the city square the cars took a little trip to the square in front of the station. To get there, they had to drive through the main city shopping street. Resulting in an unusual sight of racing cars riding along at walking speeds and a lot of surprised shoppers standing by and watching. The parade ended after a couple of minutes in front of the station, where the racing cars were parked next to their raodgoing brothers and sisters. Another perfect way to prove to people that in fact the cars they drive can be made into racing cars. There were of course some signing session by well known drivers, a demo of a BTCS pitstop and some goodies to take home.

BTCS driving along the “Bondgenotenlaan”

Although I must admit that most of the people there were already racing fans, I think quite a lot of people's eyes were opened to a form of racing they had never heard of. It's funny how everybody stops and stares when a proper racing car crosses their path. And despite the fact that a lot of people are now buying eco-friendly small town cars, you can see in their eyes, secretly they still want a racing machine.

BTCS next to their roadgoing counterparts

The photos of the city demo can be found on my website (under Photos/Racing Season 2009). For people who are reading this because they are trying to find out what in the hell they say in Leuven on Saturday, take a look at the BTCS website here. The next Belgian race is on the 16th and 17th of May in Zolder. Free tickets can be downloaded here.

Hope to see you all soon on the race track! Next event, this Sunday, the Belgian GT opening race in Zolder!

Francorchampions April 12th, 2009

2009-04-15T16:40:00.001+02:00

Last weekend the Belgian Touring Car series got underway with a great opening event called “Francorchampions”. Besides two races of the BTCS on Sunday it also featured two races of the VW Fun Cup and a race for the Dutch Supercar Challenge (DSC).

Although very different, each of these championships has it’s qualities. The VW Fun Cup is focused on less professional drivers all driving the same cars. Fun is really the only way to describe these races when you see them.

VW Fun Cup in action

The Dutch Supercar Challenge focuses on much heavier machines and is Holland’s number one racing championship for good reason. A very wide range of cars, several divisions and a lot of entries make this quite a spectacle to watch and hear (my ears still haven’t recuperated entirely after the hearing the sounds of the thunderous Marcos racing in the DSC). This will, by the way, not be the only time that the DSC comes to Belgium, so if you have a chance to go see them, do so!

Ferrari 430 in the Dutch Supercar Challenge

But of course the big event of the weekend were the first two races of the BTCS. A clear cut Touring car championship that features a lot of cars, some very close racing and some very well known national drivers. It’s always a pleasure to see these exiting races and since the people who organise the championship provide free tickets for almost every race, it’s cheap too. What more could you possibly want.

Mazda RX8 in the BTCS

As always, photos of the event can be found on the website. Check under the sub-category “Racing Season 2009” of the “Photos” menu. Enjoy them and feel free to comment on any of the shots or of course on this blog. See you soon!

DSMEC & GDC, Spa-Francorchamps, April 5th

2009-04-07T10:34:00.001+02:00

As mentioned in the last post, this weekend marked the start of the racing season at Spa-Francorchamps with a race for the Dunlop Sport Maxx Endurance Cup. And yesterday evening I posted the photos of that race (and some of the Gentlemen Drivers Cup) on the website.

Because I will hopefully be shooting quite some races this season, I made a seperate sbub-category under the public photo gallery named “Racing Season 2009”. Here you will find all of the photos of the upcoming races.

So please check out the photos and feel free to leave comments. I have to say that although I used new equipment, the result was better than I had feared. Enjoy.

Dunlop Sport Maxx Endurance Cup, April 5th 2009, Spa-Francorchamps

The race is on!!

2009-04-06T16:05:00.001+02:00

Yesterday, my 2009 racing started with a race of the Dunlop Sport Maxx Endurance Cup at Spa-Francorchamps. The crowd was quite small, which gave me the perfect opportunity to test some of the new equipment I will be using to shoot motorsport this season. With just a handful of amateur photographers there, most of the best sports for shooting the action in Spa where open. So I took my time to familiarize myself with the new lens and the monopod. To my own surprise, it took quite a while getting used to the equipment. The amount of good shots where very limited but I have to say that by the end of the day, I got the hang of it again. Hopefully next week, at the start of the BTCS season, again in Spa, the result will be a lot better.

Shots of the DSMEC race will be posted later this week after I have deleted all of the bad ones. ;-)

As mentioned before, next week, the BTCS (Belgian Touring Car Series) starts at the Spa-Francorchamps circuit. The race will be supported by the VW Fun Cup and the DSC (Dutch Supercar Challenge). These three events make for a very interesting race weekend. And best of all the entrance is free if you print the invitation you can find on the website of the BTCS (http://www.btcseries.be). So if anyone out there wants to join me, whether it's for the racing or just the photographic opportunities, just send me an email.

For me next week is the real kick-off of what I hope is going to be a race filled summer. My personal calendar includes the following events (in April and May). (More events later on in the season will be posted soon)

BTCS and DSC    - 11-12 April - Spa-Francorchamps
Belgian GT         - 25-26 April - Zolder
Le Mans Series   - 08-09 May   - Spa-Francorchamps
BTCS                 - 16-17 May   - Zolder

So check back soon for more racing information and of course a lot of racing photographs.

Paris trip

2009-03-28T11:14:00.001+01:00

As you might have deduced from my previous post, last weekend we went on a little trip to Paris. We spent three days there and besides visiting the Grand Palais (Warhol exhibition) and Musée d’Orsay, we walked around and generally just relaxed.

The photos of the trip are on the website under the personal section. The gallery is password protected mainly to prevent the photos from being tagged in search engines. The readers of this blog get the password completely free of charge ;-)

Try this: andywarhol

I hope you enjoy the photos and please feel free to comment on any of the photos.

Paris March 2009

Andy Warhol in Paris

2009-03-27T15:40:00.001+01:00

A brief bit of culture unrelated to photography. Actually not entirely unrelated but more on that later. I just wanted to make you aware of a brilliant exhibition that is going on in Paris. In the Grand Palais in Paris, you can visit “Le grand monde d’Andy Warhol” which features a truly amazing collection of Warhols “portraits”. You know the colorprinted or colored-in prints of famous people.

Amazing about this particular show is not only the fact that so many of these works are brought together (from musea and personal collections) in groups of four or more, but also that it includes the polaroids they were based on and some of Warhol’s other photographic and cinematic works. It’s just an unique collection on display in a setting that makes you feel just one thing: “This is how these works should be on display”.

Now I know that Paris is not on most people’s doorstep. But if you are going to Paris between now and the 13th of July, make sure you have seen it. Also, if you are a big Warhol fan, drive to Paris for one day, visit the Grand Palais and come back, it will be worth it!

A word to the wise concerning photography. It’s not allowed inside! Although no clear signs are posted that you can’t shoot photos inside, I got to talk to a very angry guard demanding that I put away my camera or leave. (I still got of one shot, that I will post later on the website).

Information:
Exhibition “Le Grand Monde d’Andy Warhol” by Andy warhol
March 18th, 2009 until July 13th, 2009
Price: 11€
Grand Palais, Champs Elysées, Paris, France
more information here.

Antwerp in March … Revisited

2009-03-10T21:32:00.001+01:00

March started very well on the photography front for me. As mentioned in my previous post, after two months of virtually shooting nothing, I found some nice shots on a Sunday afternoon on the first day of the month. Last friday night, I actually revisited the same area to shoot some night shots.

As you might have learned from earlier work, see project “Antwerp by Night”, I really like shooting night shots. Not only is it much quieter in the streets at night, most of the time the results just come out a little nicer than in daylight.

The results were quite satisfactory and you can see them in the same gallery as the earlier photos, namely the Antwerp in March gallery. So check them out and let me know what you think. One or more of them might just end up in the Antwerp by Night project. I’ll keep you informed of this when I have made the final decission. Comments might of course guide my decission ;-) Enjoy!

Antwerp in March ... Revisited

Antwerp in March

2009-03-03T21:47:00.001+01:00

As I promised, mainly myself, in my last post, this weekend I picked up my camera and went for a walk in Antwerp. My focus was on the north-side of the city. A place that not that many people visit, since it’s not the most touristy part of town. The walk ended up taking 2 and a half hours and I came back home with more than 130 photos.

Of course, I didn’t post all of them, but a nice selection of the photos can be found on the here. I must admit that I post-processed a lot more than I normally do, but I hope it only improved the shots. But since I didn’t post the originals, you’ll have to take my word for it ;-)

So March started of very well, and I hope that from now on, the inspiration is back. I’m going to continue to go out for walks, not only in Antwerp, but in the greater Antwerp area. So I hope I will be posting a lot more photos from now on. See you soon.

Antwerp in March

Spa Weekend

2009-02-26T09:00:00.001+01:00

In my latest post I promised to upload some of the photos from our weekend in Spa (and surrounding area). So now, the photos are online and you can see them here.

Like I said before, not my best work, but I tried to enhance them a little and the ten photos online are the ones that I found of some worth. So take a look at them and like always, feel free to comment on them.

The Coo Waterfalls

The winter slump

2009-02-25T08:51:00.001+01:00

As you, as an avid reader, might have noticed, there hasn’t been much activity on my photowebsite lately. The main reason for this is my enormous case of the winter slump. I have no inspiration and therefore hardly pick up my camera lately.
The past weekend should have broken that spell. My girlfriend and I went to Spa (not A spa, but Spa, Belgium, where the water comes from) for a nice relaxing weekend. Included was at least one winter hike in the woods and so, a great opportunity to take out the camera.

Well I did take out the camera and started shooting the entire weekend. In the woods, as well as in the town. My hopes were up and I started to get inspired again. That was until I took a look at the results yesterday. If I may say so myself, a load of crap. There were maybe one or two decent pictures. The rest of them looked completely uninspired and rushed. Let’s just say that this wasn’t very good for moral. Just to show you and especially to remind myself, I will post some of these photos later this week on the website.

So were do I go from here? I have to get out of this slump and for my own good, as soon as possible. Luckily, the photos can only start getting better, so that’s a start. I know I just have to get out there with the camera. Not shooting away vigorously, but just walking around getting some inspiration and then, most importantly, taking the time to make the shot. So, starting this weekend, that’s what I will do as much as possible. I might even get some extra shots for the “Antwerp by night” project. Who knows. I just know this stupid, humid, Belgian winter, and all that it entails, has to end.

Erwin Olaf at Fotomuseum Antwerpen

2009-02-09T20:27:00.001+01:00

Last Saturday, a new exhibition called “Eye Candy 1984-2009” started in Antwerp’s Photography museum. The featured artist is the well-known but quite controversial Dutch photographer Erwin Olaf. If you don’t know the guy, check out his website.

Since Erwin Olaf thinks of himself as an artist, the object of his work is to make you think. All good art makes it’s spectators think about what it is they are looking at, how it makes them feel and maybe most importantly, if they like it or not. As an artist, his photographs do not include pictures of reality. He tries however to put his own vision into a photograph, his own dreams, feelings and thoughts. And I can only tell you one thing, … not all of the thoughts or feelings portraiyed are fluffy happy thoughts. There are quite a lot of dark and confronting photographs there.

All this is not to say that I didn’t like the exhibition. I liked it a lot as a whole. There was more than one photograph that I didn’t like, but if the purpose of his work is to make you think, mission accomplished. To my own surprise, I stumbled upon some personal boundaries of taste. By which I mean that there were some pictures that at first I couldn’t agree with, that in my opinion were “over the top”. This surprised me because normally I’m quite open minded when it comes to most expressions of art, but here I was confronted with a little known side of myself. Calling it my “conservative” self would be a little harsh, because if I was conservative, a lot more of the pictures would have shocked me. But it was a side that can think of a piece of art as on the edge of tastelessness. Now don’t go thinking the work is “shocking” in todays standards. There is nothing there that you haven’t seen anywhere else, but still it raises the question whether to call it art. Well, the fact that it made me think about it all means to me that it is and I even appreciate those photographs for it a lot. So coming out of the exhibition, I liked the pictures I liked and appreciated the ones I didn’t. I don’t think a bigger complement can be given when it comes to art.

So my recommandation is, go and have a look at it. Form your own opinion about it, think about it and look at every aspect of it. It opened my eyes a little more, and I hope it can do the same for you. Whether it works for you or not, it’s a very good exhibition none the less.

Information:
Exhibition “Eye Candy 1984-2009” by Erwin Olaf
February 7th, 2009 until June 7th, 2009
Fotomuseum Antwerpen
more information here.

Two new albums added to the site

2009-01-27T21:16:00.001+01:00

I just added two new albums to the site.

The first are a bunch of testshots for my new lens, the Canon EF L 100-400mm IS. I tried to take some different shots to test the far and near ends of the lens, but also the colours and a “speed” shot, since I will be using the lens for shooting car races this summer.

The second album is an album that I have been willing to add for some time now. A lot of shots I shoot don’t belong to a specific album and therefore are normally not put on the site. With the miscellaneous album I want to change this and give those “random” shots a place on the site.

Check out the albums here:

The testshots album

The miscellaneous album

Hope you enjoy them!!

Whether or not I would join a photoclub?

2009-01-26T16:37:00.001+01:00

For a while now I have been thinking about joining a local photoclub. And yet, I still haven’t joined one. It’s not that are no options, because in my area there are quite a few photoclubs. So why haven’t I yet? Well, first off, I’m not a very social a person, but on the other hand, I love talking about photography and looking, sharing and discussing photographs. So the answer to the question must lie a little deeper. So I started thinking about it and I think I found the answer. Actually answers, because in my own opinion, there are two.

The social photographer

The first reason is called “the social photographer”. The fact that you go out in a group to shoot something. For me this sounds like a contradiction in terms. For me, photography is a very personal thing. It’s about how I see the world and the subjects I want to shoot. And wether you like it or not, when in group, it’s very hard to be personal. A couple of weeks ago I say a photoclub walking around in Antwerp. All of a sudden I realized that I would never want to be a part of that. Walking around with about 10 other people to take photographs. The reason being that there are a few characteristics of a group that I can’t combine with my personal views on photography. First is the fact that in a group there are always people you like and respect, as well as people you would never hang out with if you didn’t happen to belong to the same group. I would love to go out shooting with the first type of person, not so much with the second type though. Second thing about a group is that wether you want it or not, there is always going to be a feeling of competition. Especially if the group consists mainly of men. And in my opinion, competition is not really healthy for photography since it destroys objectivity. So being a social photographer wouldn’t work for me.

The right way

The second reason for me is the thing that also keeps me of most of the photography forums. Because when you enter a group of photographers, there are always some characters who have to tell you “the right way” to shoot something. And yes, I know you should try to keep your subject away from the exact center of the photo, I know the 1/3-2/3 rules for shooting landscapes, etc. But you know, some of the most interesting shots are the ones who break with the rules. Before you start thinking, “oh he just can’t handle critique”, this is not true. I love it when somebody comments on my photographs and proposes a new way of looking at a subject, or a new technique to shoot something. I will always try it out. But this is very different than comments like “your subject can’t be in the center of the photo”, or “your horizon is way to high or low”. And whether you sign up for a forum or sign up for a photoclub, there are always these kind of people. And to be honest, I don’t want to spend my spare time listening to people like that, let alone go on a photoshoot with them.

The alternative

I think the best alternative is not to join a photoclub, but just go out with your friends and bring your cameras. If you think of a place you want to go and take some pictures, invite someone along (if you feel like it of course). This way, you can still share the moment with others, they can take pictures too if they want, but you don’t get that “this saturday we have to go shooting with the club” nonsense. The best (amatuer) photography is done spontaniously, when you feel like it and thus enjoy it most. When you start to plan when you have to go out shooting, you’re inevitably going to be disappointed or disencouraged sometimes. So my advice is, go out when you want, invite one or two people, and share and discuss with people that you know and whos opinions you trust and respect.

Again, this is my opinion. I know there are a lot of people in photography clubs and loving every second of it. That’s great for you, really! And eventhough sometimes I wish I could be one of you, you won’t see me joining a club in the near future. So do your thing and most of all … enjoy!

Racing Season is coming!!

2009-01-21T20:20:00.001+01:00

The 2009 racing season in Belgium starts in april and I have to admit that I’m very much looking forward to it this year. The reason why is fairly simple. Last year I started shooting a lot more car races and I must say, I liked it a lot. It’s some sort of bug that I caught and can’t seem to get rid off.

I liked racing a lot without a camera too, so it didn’t come out of nowhere. But combining my love of racing with my love of photography was a big hit. It’s very hard to describe why I like it so much, but let’s just say it’s always a challenge. For instance, getting a great panning shot of a GT car at 1/80th of a second is not going to work every time, not even if you are a pro, but once you get one the thrill is huge. Even moreso than other branches of photography, shooting panning shots at a racing track requires a lot of practice. So when you nail one, it’s a bit of a triumph over yourself.

Now the 2009 racing season. I have made up a calendar of events that are on in Belgium and in some cases Holland or Germany. I think between april and october there are about 20 weekends with an event worth mentioning, so getting to all of them is going to be nearly impossible. That’s why my goal is not getting to as many as possible, but getting as much variety in the races as possible. That means shooting as many different types of races as I can. My goal this year is to get at least one FIA GT, one Belgian GT, one BTCS, one Le Mans Series, one WTCC and one DSC race on “film”. I would also very much like to add one DTM race and possibly a smaller type rally. You might notice that there is no Formula 1 race in the list, that’s because those races are rediculously expensive and very restrictive when it comes to photography. If they test in Spa like they did in 2007, I’ll try to be there, but I’m not going to the race (unless someone can get me in with a press badge, anyone?).

The equipment for shooting these races has changed a bit for me over the winter months. I acquired some things that hopefully will help me make even better race shots. The main changes in the “race” equipment are a sturdy monopod and a great telezoom lens. Until now I have shot races without help of a tri- or monopod, but with the new lens, a Canon EF 100-400mm L, it’s going to be necessary. Not only does it cover a lot more distance than my lenses now, it also weighs quite a bit more.

I’m going to try out the equipment in the next few weeks and you can rest assured, I will post some of the testshots on the website. That will give me a fair bit of time to adjust to the lens and the monopod, and in the meantime, make the wait for the start of the racing season a little more bearable. Finally, if you would like to join me on one the racing events, for photography reasons or just out of curiosity, just let me know. It’s always nice to have some company.

To Photoshop or not to Photoshop … is that the question??

2009-01-20T10:35:00.001+01:00

Everybody who has every read a forum or a blog about photography will have probably come across this question. There are a lot of photographers who say post-production is just a part of photographing, others say that as little post-production as possible should be used. Of course, it’s easy nowadays. Before digital photography, post-production meant you had to have integrate knowledge about developing film, enlargers, etc. Now, in the digital age, post-production is all about software like photoshop. And let’s just say it’s quite a bit more accessible for everybody.

Now comes the part were I, wether you like it or not, am going to tell you my view on the subject. And keep in mind, it’s just MY view. Attach as much value to it as you want.

First of, I don’t think this is a question. Not considering post-production would be wrong, whether you are a amateur or a pro. However, and this is a big “however”, if you are an amateur, keep it to an absolute minimum. If you a pro, do whatever the hell you want, because you problably know a lot better than I do, what post-production is and how it fits into your workflow. But for the amateur it’s a different thing. In my own experience, post-production can help you to save an otherwise lost shot. The result might still be great and you can still be proud of the photo. But I can’t tell you how much happier and proud I am when that “perfect” shot comes straight out of the camera.

I have seen raw shots that were almost black, turned into pretty good photos using photoshop and other tools, but is that what it’s all about? Sure, it can happen that you get this one-in-a-lifetime shot, that for some reason doesn’t quite cut it. By all means, run that through photoshop to save the shot. But don’t count on photoshop to make good photographs. First try to make the shot yourself. Keep at it until it finally works. You’ll see that the resulting photograph might be exactly the same as the photoshop one, but you’ll be a thousand times more proud that you can actually shoot that. For instance, there are tools that can produce a beautiful sunset out of a mediocre sunset photograph. Great! I propose you take the time to make a decent sunset shot. Even if the colours are not as vibrent as the one you produced with the tool, I would still like the shot I made myself a hundred times more, and I’m almost sure that most amateurs feel the same way.

Of course, this is only my view on the subject, but ask yourself this question. If you spend twice as much time post-producing your photographs than actually shooting them, shouldn’t you be into graphic design, instead of photography? I know there are notable exceptions, especially amateurs who have a certain artistic vision will use post-production to make their photographs comply with that vision. But the rest of you, try making the shot you want with a camera instead of with photoshop!

Antwerp by Night – So it begins!!

2009-01-16T21:20:00.001+01:00

Today sees the launch of a new part on the SmugMug site. The Antwerp by Night project, that I started in december 2008, is getting serious. Although most of the photos were on the site already in the Previews album, the new gallery shows the selected photos of the project. They include a title and a short comment, to make you see my side of the photo.

So please, check out the website and the “Antwerp by Night” section and comment your little hearts out. I can learn from every comment and it will hopefully make the photos still to come a lot better in every way.

See you all on the site!!

Photographic New Year’s reso… goals

2009-01-15T12:09:00.001+01:00

I think New Year’s reolutions are something to avoid making. Why? Because these are the first “promises” you break in a new year. It’s nice to set goals for the new year, but I can help but notice that whatever goal was set as a “resolution”, is probably never to become reality. I don’t know why this is, although it might have something to do with the fact that whatever people call a “New Year’s reolution” is something they would like, but are not that committed to. The things they are committed to are called goals, are not named at all. That’s why this year, I’m going to set some photographic goals. Things I’m going to work on throughout the year 2009.

Ongoing Project

Last year I started the project “Antwerpen by night”. Initially, this was a project for the month of december. And although the project was going fine, I still feel that I could do more with it. That’s why I’m not closing this project, but leave it open for the rest of the year. In 2009, I’m going to photograph Antwerp by night as much as I can, showing facets of Antwerp at night throughout the year. So expect lots more night photographs. I will also dedicate a seperate portion of the site to this project.

Other Projects

Throughout the year, there will probably be some other projects that I’ll be starting. I don’t have anything specific in mind yet, but I will keep you informed through this medium. At least on of the project will have something to do with landscape photography, maybe even wildlife. More later in the year.

Racing

One of the big things for me on the photography front, will be car races. There are about 20 events I can choose from this summer in Belgium, Holland and Germany. So photographing at least 5 or 6 of them is not impossible. I’ll try to shoot at least one Belgian GT race, one BTCS race, one WTCC race, one FIA GT race and one Le Mans Series race. That makes 5 already, so prepare yourself for a lot of motorsport photographs this summer.

Events

As ever, 2009 will also be filled with one-day events that I will try to shoot. I’m thinking of parties, trips abroad, weekend trips, etc. These are not really a goal, but it’s worth mentioning since they will constitute quite a percentage of all the photographic work I’ll be doing.

Fun

Last, but certainly not least, 2009 is about the fun in photography. I set goals to learn and to develop my skills. But in the end all the goals I set, are things I really want to do, want to shoot. So the only thing that could make me abandone my goals foor this year, is the fact that it’s no longer fun for me. Luckily, I doubt that’s going to happen.

Opening of the new Blog year

2009-01-14T12:24:00.001+01:00

We'’re alredy two weeks in the new year, so it’s about time I opened the new Blog year 2009.

I open the year by starting a new blog to accompany my new website at http://ronnygabriels.smugmug.com. It have been a nice digital couple of months for me with the new website that I hope will take my photography to a more serious level. In this new blog you will be able to follow all the updates that I post on the website, together with other remarks, thoughts and questions about photography.

Since I am only a starting hobbyist, I will not be posting any tutorials or reviews of hard- and software. I leave that stuff to the professionals who problably know a million times more than myself on those subjects. What I will be posting are my photographic “adventures”, tips I might pick up along the way and most of all questions I, as a beginner, ask myself about photography. With that last category I know I risk making a bit of a fool of myself, but I think it’s very important to ask questions about stuff you’re not sure about. Even when some pro might have a clear-cut way of doing certain things, it’s important to ask “why?”. Once you figure out for yourself why a certain way of working really works, you will have learned a lot more than when you would have just followed like a lemming.

So I hope you will enjoy the blog, participate a little to answer some of my questions and maybe even share some experiences.

For now, see you later. If you want to see some of my photos, check out the website http://ronnygabriels.smugmug.com.

Ronny