photoblog golden hours

The summer weather has been very changing the past few weeks, at the moment it is very warm here again and the last summer evenings of this year are sunny and golden.

In a very short amount of time I did a couple of photoshoots and I really would love to share my favorite ones with you. 

Some of the pictures absolutely make me feel as if these moments are too beautiful to be true!

This week I also went through the forest to reach the blooming heather which is only growing in this month and the next, but that will be for another blog.

Here now the photo's I took during the few lovely golden sunsets this week.

During one of the shoots there were so many mosquitoes unfotunately! So we had to leave the fields a little bit soon (I still have so many bites though still.. But oh well, everything for a good picture right?)

Ps. You can now book photo sessions now via my new website! + view my portfolio there. 

Have a lovely week!

Sasja

photoblog countryside picnic

Jolien, a friend of mine, who I met in highschool, is one of the happiest people I have ever met in my entire life. I love taking pictures of her because she's always very open and comfortable when I'm shooting pictures  and that is perfect for a photographer.

We had a lovely picnic under the shadow of a big tree, on one of the typical dikes you can find on the Dutch countryside. 

sadly I found out I got a really bad sunburn, I didn't recognize the sun shining so much because the wind was blowing very hard which made it seem very cool outside. 

I was glad I could take some pictures of her under the shadow of the tree and Jolien also took a few pictures with me on it.

I hope you will enjoy them.

Have a lovely day,

Sasja

visiting France

I went to France last week. It was only for one day (two days if you include all the driving 8 hours so that makes 16 back and forth), but it was really worth it. 

As some of you may know I design crochet patterns for the French company Fonty, a wool company who produce and sell 100 percent sustainable and natural yarns. 

We visisted their factory to see how all the yarn is made. 

The last time I went to France was twelve years ago, in the summer of 2007. I was really enjoying the views, the golden sunlight, the white cows resting in the warm sun, the hills, the meadows and the serene silence. 

My favorite thing were probably the quiet French villages and the lovely architecture, I would so much love to live in a French house!

We also ate in a France restaurant for lunch (ouch, we didn't know it was a daily menu and not a la carte so we almost got meat on our plates before we told the waitress that we actually don't eat meat... we got something else luckily hihi). And oh my... no one ever told me that it's normal to eat a four course lunch in France. But apparently it is ha, so that's what we got. A lot of food, I can tell.

A really nice thing I noticed is, that the villages are very quiet and there aren't many people walking outside. But still there are a few shops or restaurants in every village (which is unusual here), and surprisingly every restaurant or shop has it's customers, even in the evening hours. 

Now I will show you a few of the many pictures I took in France. We went to Rougnat by the way.

next to our hotel. can you see the waterwell? I love those.

a lovely little house with so so many flowers! we stopped the car to take a picture of  this...
then the lady of the house came outside to see what we were doing hihi. she said
bonjour though and she smiled so she didn't mind. 

the treehouse, the laundry...

beautiful French landscapes

Have a lovely week ahead,

Sasja

trying out astrophotography

A couple of years ago, on 28 september 2015, there was a lunar eclipse visible here in the Netherlands, so I set my alarm around 3 or 4 in the morning and went outside. Back then I didn't use a tripod nor the manual settings of my system camera. Eventually the pictures turned out very hazy, there was movement visible and I couldn't really even see the red moon. I was very dissapointed and a little upset because it didn't work out while I knew that it must have been possible tot take clear pictures of this special moment. In the end I went to bed again that morning, without any pictures of the lunar eclipse.

After this happened I wouldn't expect it to succeed again, let alone taking good pictures of the starry sky.

But - it happened, and I'm glad it all worked out! On friday night I set an alarm on 1.30 in the morning to take pictures of the stars. But, before I forget to mention this, I spend a couple of hours before that night to research which settings to use to take pictures of a starry sky.

I found out that I absolutely needed to use a tripod (which I have, luckily). I also needed a bright nightsky without any clouds, and when I checked the weather forecast on my phone I saw that it would be bright on friday night. And you also need a camera where you can manually edit the settings (which is most likely always a DSLR or a system camera).

About the settings: there is never one standard setting I can give you for a certain situation, because every situation, especially in nature, is always differnt. Sometimes there's more light than other times, but it also depends on the quality of your camera.

My sister suggested to go outside together, so we did, on friday night on 1.30. I was very tired but it was worth it all!

I know the pictures are probably not as sharp or perfect as you can see in magazines or on photography websites, but I consider myself a beginner still so I'm happy with these results.

I'm already checking the weather forecast on my phone everyday again to see if there will be a bright night sky soon (the days are very bright and hot at the moment, around 35 degrees, a heat wave), but the nights are somehow a little cloudy. So hopefully the stars will be shining soon again for us.

It's so incredibly warm at the moment... this afternoon I'll be going for a lovely swim again (already went twice this week hihi).

Here I will share the pictures I took, feel free to ask more about the way it was all done.

For all of these pictures I used a shutterspeed of 5 seconds and an ISo of 800.
I used my 50mm analog Olympus lens on my Canon 600D with f2/8

I hope you will enjoy the warm summer days (and the cold winter days for the people from the other side of the world...)

Sasja

a new camera and a thunderstorm

As I am writing this post the rain is pouring and the thunderstorm is roaring. A few times a minute I can see the lightning through my window, lighting up my bedroom. And the street is full of water. 
It’s June - the temperatures are warm but  are usually saying goodbye with a thunderstorm as their final waves. I’m not worrying about it though, as it will be warm weather soon again in the weekend. And beside that, I love thunderstorms.

I’m not here to write about the weather though, but about my new treasure, my new camera. I just love it so much. In fact, I ordered it last thursday and when the postman didn’t show up the next day it was really working on my nerves since I can be very impatient sometimes, especially when waiting for something I really want to have so badly. I got it on saturday though so I’ve got nothing to complain about...
I ordered the Canon 600d DSLR camera. I never used a DSLR before - all pictures I ever posted on my instagram were taken with my System compact camera, the Canon sx40hs. And although I’m thankful I could use it for all these years, I really felt the urge to get myself a new one after four years. My old camera didn’t give my the results I exactly wanted to have which led to frustration and the feeling of a missing link. I absolutely wanted a camera that could switch lenses and my old camera doesn't have that possibility.
If I’m honest I had no idea where to start looking for when I researched buying a DSLR because there are so many types of them..! So I decided to read a FAQ of one of my favorite photographers, Gingerlillytea, and found out what camera she uses, and decided to get myself the same camera as hers because I was sure that one could take good photographs. As long as I would be as creative as she is though. Yes, I know it’s not a very professional research but I can be very impulsive sometimes and often follow my first impression instead of analyzing it over and over again (which is absolutely not giving me a positive outcome sometimes!)
But in this case it was positive and I’m glad I ordered the camera I wanted to get in the first place.

I decided to use two old analog Olympus lenses that were getting dusty somewhere under by bed, and give them a new life. I’m using an adapter to attach the analog lenses (a 50mm and a 70-210mm) to my camera. The negative side about this (I think?) is because the autofocus doesn’t work because of the adapter. But at the other hand it’s probably good because it forces me to use the manual functions which will make me practice it more automatically instead of switching over to the auto function.

The 50mm lens is so beautiful... It has a lovely depth of field and bokeh as well. I especially want to use it for portraits mostly. Sometimes it’s a little hard getting the focus right in some situations though, especially when I use the 1.8F opening. I know I can also use a smaller diafragma but I’m not so sure which shutter speed to use in combination with that diafragma. To make a long story short: I have to practice a lot. I can't tell so much about the 70-210mm lens because I only took a few pictures with this lens. The 50mm is my favorite so far because it's a very lightweighting lens as well.
Personally I think that the most difficult thing to think about while shooting manually with your DSLR is actually picking the right shutter speed. If you have much knowledge about picking the right shutterspeed or any other advice, please contact me because I would love to learn all of these things.
I will share some pictures with you here, pictures I took with my new camera, mostly with the 50mm 1.8 olympus lens. As you can see some of them (the sheep picture for example) aren't 100 percent sharp on the focusing point but I'm a beginner with this gear.., so it's alright I suppose.

Thank you for taking the time to read and I wish you all a lovely day,

Sasja

our trip to Siegen, Germany

In the nineteen years that I exist I visited a few countries - Belgium, France, Spain and a few days ago I also went to Germany. I had never been there before so it was a whole new experience to me although we only stayed there in our hotel for one day. I noticed that I saw literally no person riding a bike there, which is very strange to us Dutch people - as Dutch cities are crowded with cyclists.
For the ones who might wonder... My sister and I went there for a concert, not for a holiday. So enjoying the surroundings behind my car window was really a bonus to me. And the other bonus was coincidentally running into my favorite singer Alex Pappas from the band before the show... by the shopping center in Siegen. And talking to him for ten minutes.

We actually didn't go into the woods and over the hills because sadly there was no time left for that. But in our 4 hour drive to Siegen I actually got a few chances to take some pictures of the surroundings which I would love to share.

Oh, I forgot to mention that I was still very young when I visited France and Spain. Still a small child. recently I told a friend of mine that I am really dreaming of going to the France countryside someday, and this particular dream seems to come true very soon in July or August. Hopefully I will be able to take some lovely pictures there as well.

Now I will show the moments I captures on our way to Siegen. It's so special to see the landscapes change as you are driving through different countries!

have a lovely day,

Sasja