Last week Adrienne and me went on a diving vacation in El Gouna, Egypt. Together with Thorsten we organized a week of diving with the ‘Dive Connection’. I took my Canon G11 along under water, where I made some videos. It will still take some time to edit them. For now I have uploaded the pictures I have taken during the trip. Since a break from diving of 24 hours is required we couldn’t dive on the last day. Therefore we went on a ‘desert safari’ which included trips through the desert on a quad bike, a camel and a sand buggy. Even though it was a bit touristy, we still had a lot of fun.

About a week ago Adrienne and me and colleagues from my previous job went to the Efteling. I took some shots with my new camera and post processed them with Silver Efex 2 which I purchased last week. It is great software to convert your images into black and white. The amount of options it has to change your images is amazing. I believe that you can download a trial of the software and test it for a number of days. I can definitely recommend it.

This Friday and Saturday a colleague of Adrienne was involved in the filming of a two minute video sequence somehow related to his work as research scientist. He invited Adrienne and me to have a look. It was interesting to be there. Big cranes were holding up huge spot lights, a NYPD police car was brought in together with two English speaking actresses and the street was filled with crew members.

I had to sell a lot of other camera gear to buy it. But it is well worth it…

Expect some pictures made with this beauty from now on.

Doel is a deserted town in Belgium near Antwerp. Apart from some die hard protesters, most of the inhabitants of Doel have left the town over the years after the government made plans to demolish the village to make place for the expansion of the harbor of Antwerp. This has resulted in an eerie ghost town, which, when walking through its streets, gives you a kind of weird post apocalyptic feeling.
I went there together with Hans take some pictures.

At the end of last year I joined a photography club in Eindhoven called Lichtstad ’51. This year they are celebrating their 60th anniversary and they decided to organize an outing in Amsterdam. Since Adrienne was still in Hong Kong I brought my friend Evgeniya along.
The organized activities were a boat ride through the canals in Amsterdam followed by a lunch, a visit to a photography museum, a guided tour through the east part of Amsterdam and a cooking workshop.
A couple of things went wrong, however. The bus driver ran a scooter off the road on the way to Amsterdam. Lunch wasn’t arranged so one of the organizers ordered, what turned out far too many sandwiches. Three people commented on Evgeniya’s pregnancy, even though she isn’t carrying a baby (guess that her shirt went in the trash when she got home).
But all in all it was a fun day. We had a great time.

Last Friday Neda invited me to take some pictures of her and her friends. Four models, all eager to have their pictures taken and only a short time to make them… Luckily I had a great assistant helping me out. I have selected four pictures that for me capture the character of the models.

Not a day goes by without Discovery Channel airing at least three survival shows. Enthused by these shows, Arjen started planning a ‘survival’ excursion to Sweden. In preparation we both attended a course last year, where we learned to make a fire and to build a shelter.
This year, however, it was going to be the real thing. Me, Arjen and his brother-in-law Johan, set out for a week of outdoor camping near Kloten in Sweden.
Click on ‘read more’ to read the rest of the story and to see the pictures I took.

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I have compiled a set of 28 interesting snapshots I took during our trips to Hong Kong and Malaysia. Click on the ‘read more’ link to have a look at them.

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After the hot and humid jungle, we went to Cameron Highlands. The lower temperature and humidity were a great relief after the hot and humid jungle of Taman Negara. The Cameron Highlands are the home of the large BOH (best of highlands) tea plantations, and some fascinating nature. We had went on some amazing guided tours through the tea plantation, the mossy forest and as if that was not yet enough, we also went on a strenuous guided night walk until 1 o’ clock at night.