I must admit, in the aftermath of the incredibly time and energy consuming adventure of creating my own instructional DVD, I got a bit burned out. I loved making it and I’m very proud of the result but it was a huuuuuuge job, certainly combined with my personal situation. It’s not that I had enough of teaching but I felt I needed to focus on my photography again. It’s a great feeling to teach other photographers but I started feeling like I was the only one that didn’t progress as a photographer.

It wasn’t deliberate but for a while, I just had to put my blog, workshops and LIME in the fridge and focus on my own work again. I spent a lot of time studying the work of people that I admire, re-evaluate my own work, meet creative people outside my own little network and did a lot of thinking about the direction I want to go.

You know how important it is to me to master as much techniques as possible but these are just tools to allow you to tell a story or convey an emotion. And I just found that even though my technique is better than ever, I wasn’t very happy with my pictures anymore. So I went back to the roots, keeping it simple, shooting for fun, focusing on feeling rather than detail in the shadows and perfectly level horizons. And I found it back … the amateur photographer in me.

With the changes in my personal life, things have changed pretty dramatically for my financial and business situation too. I’m not ashamed to admit that a visit to my accountant earlier this week wasn’t very motivating. And I would like to thank everyone who bought Motivational Light, because you gave me that little bit of breathing space to dedicate some time to rediscovering my own creativity.
To make things work out, I really need to grow my business faster than what would normally be possible but I believe I can do it thanks to finding myself as a creative photographer again.

I know I need to be more business minded. And I know that I need to make some decisions that I don’t really want to. But I’m still very positive that I can work things out. Last week, with the help of many great friends, I spent the whole time testing out ideas and concepts for a new big project that I will launch in September. I strongly believe that it is going to be a way to be creative and economically viable at the same time. All the images in this post were taken during that creative test week.

The test week was really the the result of all my self rediscovery activities. I’m charged with creative energy and feel like shooting every day again. I feel I’m ready to teach and blog again and all of that is thanks to my friends, family and my kids who have supported me through these difficult times.

I’ll be taking some time off to enjoy the kids but after that I’ll be back at full force! Promise

A couple of weeks ago the kind people of Calumet let me play with the Hasselblad H4D. It wasn’t a real scientific test. Tom and Pieter were trying out some lighting gear and I just snapped away some pics with the Hassy while we acted ridiculous as usual.

We did this just outside the room where Mike Larson was giving one of his great seminars organized by Calumet and Sunbounce. We even borrowed his beautiful model for an hour or so.

So what about the H4D then? First of all, this wasn’t any kind of scientific test. I basically just snapped away some pictures like it was a compact camera and that’s probably not what it was intended for. (Although a friend of mine said he saw a tourist with an H4D in Venice.)

Let’s start with the bad news: ergonomics, build quality and handling sucks big time. And I mean really big time, my 450D feels a lot more professional. The H4D looks and feels like it’s made of the same plastic as my first DSLR, the 300D (aka the digital rebel). It’s very slow in writing pics to the card (not even 1 pic/second). I do understand that these are very large files but then the camera should have a larger buffer / more processing power. The autofocus is slow and simply doesn’t work at all if the subject is backlit. The menus seem to be designed in the 90’s. The LCD-screen is plain rubbish. If Canon would fit such a bad screen on an entry level DSLR, the forums would be filled with complaints. I could not tell anything about the pictures when watching them on the lcd.

Is there anything good to say about the H4D? Well, it has something that my 5D mkII nor my 1D-bodies have … a pop-up flash. Yes, that’s right, a pop-up flash.

But wait, there’s more: Once you download the huge files to your computer, you finally discover what Hasselblad has been famous for during decades: SUPER QUALITY. The resolution is just mind blowing. If I zoom a picture to 100% in Lightroom on my rather recent Macbook Pro, I can go and make myself a coffee while it’s rendering. To some this resolution is essential for their work but most of us can easily get by with a Canon or Nikon. To me, the biggest advantage of the Hasselblad files is the depth. The gradients are way smoother than any digital camera I’ve ever seen.

Since I met him for the first time, I’ve been wanting to take a portrait of Waldemar. You may not know him, but he’s the one that drives the van on the European Sunbounce workshop tours. He’s also the one that bends the ultra strong German steel in the Sun-Movers. He looks like a very tough guy (and I’m sure he is when needed) but he’s also a very generous man. And he’s the owner of a face that just screams to be taken a portrait of.

These were shot outside in the middle of the day. I underexposed the ambient so it didn’t play any role in the picture. We lit this with just one beautydish overhead.

I know the H4D is not supposed to be a replacement for a 5D mkII. It’s probably expected to be used tethered to a computer, in a controlled environment. But still, for that price I would have expected a decent construction, good lcd and excellent ergonomics. I wouldn’t even mind if they would have to drop the pop-up flash for that. If you need the resolution and/or the depth it’s probably still worth the hefty price tag and I’m not sure if the other digital medium format solutions are any better.

Conclusion: The H4D is certainly “haute cuisine” when it comes to image quality, too bad you have to consume it with a plastic fork on a cardboard plate. But still, I wouldn’t hesitate to rent one, if I need the image quality.

My buddies at California Sunbounce are organizing 6 days of workshops with Greg Gorman and Mike Larson in Zingst, Germany from 1-6 June. I’ve done some workshops together with Mike and he certainly inspired me in many ways. I’m looking into changing my schedule so I can drive to Zingst to attend at least one day of workshops. If anyone would be interested to join me / drive with me, let me know.

For those who haven’t seen Mike in action yet, I can tell you that this guy really knows how to motivate people to make better pictures, improve your business and balance it out with a personal life. I highly recommend his workshops for every professional photographer, not only wedding photographers.

Here’s a video they did last year with Mike:

View on YouTube

I’ve been a big fan of Greg Gorman since I first discovered his work. His celebrity portraits are simply stunning. But this workshop is about his second passion: fine art nude photography.

Here’s a link to a video about a similar workshop he gave. NSFW unless you have a very liberal boss I guess.

If you are anyway close to Zingst or have the time to travel, I think you won’t regret following these workshops. More info here.

Almost forgot … I was going to post some scans from the past every now and then.

1996, Luxembourg – Echternach

This is my cousin Jef and he used to be my partner in crime in many of my teenage adventures. Our friendship really took off on family parties when we were kids. While the adults and the little kids were eating pancakes indoors we went for a walk in the streets around my grandparents’ house to discover that if you kicked the poles of the street lights hard enough, they went out for a couple of minutes. The challenge was to get the whole street into darkness before the first lamp went back on.

During school holidays I always stayed over at his place for a couple of days and he with me. We spent most of our time playing games on the Commodore C64 (remember Kung Fu Master, Hero and Frogger), watching ninja movies and making shurikens out of Mercedes badges. We learned to play campfire guitar together. There must be some tapes of our famous concerts, but I won’t torture you with it. We even started doing some photography at the same time.

For a couple of years our families went camping together for a couple of days each August. Jef and I explored the forests around Dinant on our own and after a few years we got permission to go out on a two day trip. That was only the start of many outdoor trips. We both discovered mountain biking and combined our love for camping in the wild (illegal in Belgium) with the adrenalin rush of the bike during countless trips to the south of Belgium.

This picture must have been taken during one of the last trips we did together, maybe even the last. After that we still went biking pretty often but only for one day. Now we both have our own busy lives. When we see each other on a family reunion, we don’t go kicking streetlights anymore but we always plan to go biking again … one day.

As you know I’m very much in favor of photographers getting together and sharing their knowledge over a few beers. But don’t just stick to the beers and shooting for fun. One of the best ways to learn something is to join other photographers on real assignments. And if you’re there you might as well assist too.

Pieter dropped by for a coffee and a chat because he had to shoot one of his famous L-style Sessions in my neighborhood. We meet pretty often but I’ve only seen him at work a few times. Since I’ve had nothing to do and needed some fresh air anyway, I just invited myself to trail along on his shoot. I operated the Sunbounce a couple of times but I also had some time to fire off a couple of shots of Pieter at work with the Leica M4-2, I borrowed from Wilhelm.

Although I know Pieter’s style pretty well, it was still very interesting to see how he gets those pictures. The other thing that’s always interesting is to see how other photographers interact with their clients. You can’t just copy someone else but there are always a couple of things that are worth trying out to incorporate in your own style.

So what did I learn? No big secrets but the way Pieter directs and poses his subjects is phenomenal. I also really like how he frees his mind and back by working mainly with one camera, one lens and natural light. That might give him less technical options but also lets him work fast and concentrate on the subject.

Assisting fellow photographers benefits both the photographer and the assistant. The assistant learns something and the photographer has an extra pair of hands available. And if he’s lucky he’ll get some very flattering behind-the-scenes pictures when the assistant takes out his Hasselblad and concentrates on the photographer’s best part.

I’m certainly going to assist more in the future. What about you, do you ever assist? What did you learn?

Can I fall in love? Considering my previous post, a title like this could make you think this blog post is about women. Well it’s not but if the newspapers can use misleading headlines, so can I. This is about lenses, the Canon 24-70mm f/2.8L USM in particular. I’ve had it for a couple of years (it’s actually my second one as the first got stolen 13 days after I bought it) and it’s always been my least favorite lens.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s a great lens: well built, the perfect all-round focal length (on full frame), it’s fast and accurate. It’s good at almost anything … but great at nothing. It just isn’t as edgy, extreme or special than any of my other lenses.

Come to think of it, it’s not that different from falling in love with a woman. You just don’t fall in love with a girl because she’s moderately interesting, slightly intelligent, not ugly and reasonable in everything. You fall in love because you get a kick out of Nobel prize winners or because she makes you laugh every minute (or just because she has the perfect boobs).

But in the end you might be probably better of with that first girl who can be trusted every time. I got a similar feeling with the 24-70. That lens has been my must-have/go-to lens when I need to play it safe. But to see if I can fall in love with it, I’m going to use it more often for a while during those times where I don’t have to play it safe and would normally choose another lens. Yesterday I took it with me on a long Geocaching walk with the kids and some friends.

Because the weather forecast was far from great, I used my bulletproof vintage 1Ds mkII. In combination with the 24-70 that’s a heavy beast to lug around for a long walk during which you need to operate a hand held GPS and a bunch of kids. But I don’t regret it as I’m pretty happy with the souvenirs I was able to make of this great day. I’ll keep committing myself to using the 24-70 more often for some time and I’ll report in later.

It’s been quiet on my blog. It happened before and it will happen again. Usually this happens just because of a very busy time. But the last months it was not just the heavy workload that kept me from blogging, I went through a very dark time in my personal life. After 10 years of marriage my wife decided to move out. I never saw it coming and it was a very hard kick in the face for someone for whom family is the most important thing in life. I won’t pretend that I understand it all and I don’t feel the need to blog the parts that I do understand.

I just know that I have no choice but to move on and start a new chapter of my life. I’m in the clear with myself and I just try to make the best of it. I have the kids every other week and I miss them like crazy when they are not with me. But I can still be the father that I always wanted to be. After my wife moved out, I decided to take the kids on a trip to the coast to get our minds of the big changes and show them that I’ll always be there for them.

We had such an amazing time and all enjoyed every second of it. Even though it was pretty cold, it was dry and the sun was out most of the time. We also had a lot of good conversations on how we have to go from here both emotionally and practically. I’m so proud of the way the kids handle this. Off-course they feel lost sometimes but they don’t hesitate to talk to me. They also understand my situation really well and help me out so well.

Lately I found myself again. And that’s thanks to the incredible amount of help and support I received from my family and friends. I feel very lucky that I can count on so many great people.

My main concern is being a good dad but to do that I need to figure out how to sort out the many practical and financial challenges I’m facing. I really want to keep the house and the studio but that won’t be easy. I’m going to have to refocus on some parts of my business to increase my income substantially. Some things are still a bit vague but every day my plans take more form. You’ll discover them over the next months and I hope I can count on your patience and support.

I’m so excited, after six months of blood, sweat and tears my Motivational Light DVD is finally available.
Check out the official trailer that Pieter made.

View on YouTube

For more info and purchasing, please visit www.motivationallight.com

We drove ourselves to exhaustion to get it finished but that’s easily forgotten when I look at the end result. The goal was to make a 90 minute instructional DVD, but we ended up with two and a half hours of video about learning how to light. We also tried to squeeze in as much small practical hints and tips as possible. On top of that, there’s an hour of video about how I post processed a number of pictures I shot for the DVD. And then we still have a long section about gear that we just couldn’t fit into the DVD. We’ll release those videos and some more unused footage soon as free online bonus material.

I’m very curious about your reviews, comments and reactions, so please let me know what you think in the comments.
We also would be very thankful if you would help us to spread the news about Motivational Light.

The wait is almost over … we are almost there. If we don’t encounter any unexpected setbacks my lighting DVD should be available by the end of this month. I’ve been thinking, writing, studying, testing and investigating the content of this DVD ever since I got the idea to do a DVD a few years ago. I’ve been analyzing what information photographers really need to bring their lighting to a whole new level. And I’ve been working very hard to find the best form of getting that information and vision across.

And even then, it took Pieter and me many months of hard work to plan, shoot and edit all this together. Right now we are editing like crazy to get the final details right. I’m extremely happy and proud about the way it all comes together in the editing booth. So I’m very excited that it will be available really soon now.

Here’s another sneak peek that will give you an idea of what we got out of our first days of recording.

View on YouTube

We are flooded with questions about the DVD, so let me give you some answers:

- The DVD is in English (or at least my interpretation of English).

- We are still editing but the final result will run somewhere between two and three hours. The biggest part is about lighting but there will be also some sections on gear and postprocessing. We also tried to squeeze in as much small practical tips as possible.

- We’ll offer the DVD as a download. That way you can access your purchase immediately and we avoid having to ask a higher price to cover costs like handling, disks, packaging, shipping, taxes, … We also shot everything in High Definiton and with the download you can enjoy the full quality. For those who want to have a physical disc, we’ll offer a slightly more expensive download + double DVD version. So as long as you have an internet account and a credit card, you can buy it anywhere in the world.

- We still need to finalize some last calculations but the final price for the download version of the DVD will be around 125 EUR / 175 USD

- We are honored that so many of you want to preorder but since you can have immediate access to the download, there’s no need to preorder.

If you have any more questions about the DVD, I’ll be happy to answer them in the comments.

Walking around at a congress for professional photographers with a 25 Euro plastic toy camera, provokes some strange looks sometimes. I only had time to shoot one roll of Kodak Portra 160NC film (medium format). Looking at the very particular look the Holga gives these pictures, I should have shot a lot more frames. It’s not that these are great pictures, but I still like them.

The first picture was shot from my hotel room balcony and all the others were shot during a 15-minute walk.