“The Veluwe” (behind the scenes)

“The Veluwe” (behind the scenes)

I am Rick Kloekke, a professional photographer from the Netherlands and I just published my newest personal work ‘The Veluwe’. In this article I talk about the film, the gear I used and show you some behind the scenes.

Search for beauty close to your home!

Sometimes it can be hard to see the beauty of the area where you live, because you simply see it every day. It realy is worth it to focus on shooting at a particular area close to your home. You will probably find some stunning compositions and get more appreciation for these areas. I did this at ‘The Veluwe’, a nature reserve in The Netherlands.

The Veluwe

The Veluwe is a nature reserve in the middle of The Netherlands and has some really diverse landscapes. You can find heather fields, sand plains, beautiful forests and even (small) hills! The Veluwe is often recognised as ‘De Hoge Veluwe’, but The Veluwe is much bigger than that. My goal was to show the landscapes found here during beautiful conditions and especially focus on the less known and visited areas.

Equipment of The Veluwe

The ‘main ingredient’

As beautiful as the Veluwe is I am not very often shooting without fog here. Without fog the scenes can be very busy which doesn’t work very well. So as a ‘main ingredient’ for my shots I used fog. It makes the scenes less busy and it is easier to give some focus to particular parts of the landscape. The fog also gives the scene a beautiful atmosphere and simply makes everything look even more beautiful!

Must have shots

There were a few must have shots I wanted in my film with each different challanges. From very early wake up calls to preventing condensation on lenses during a shot.

Blooming heather and fog

The Veluwe is known for it’s blooming heather. When the heather is blooming the whole landscape turns purple. The goal was to get some shots of the blooming heather during sunrise with low hanging fog. This meant waking up at around 3:30 or 4:00 to get on time on location. Despite the early wake up calls it realy was worth it to get in these places during the most beauitful conditions and nobody around!

Blooming heather and fog

Thunderstorm

We don’t have thuderstorms very often in The Netherlands, so it was a challange to shoot a nice cloud structure at the Veluwe. I made it one of the must have shots in this film. After some failed ‘chases’ I finally managed to get a shot of a nice incoming thunderstorm and on top of that it was blooming heather season!

Thunderstorm at the Veluwe

Lightbeams in the forest

One of the most rewarding shots are the ones with lightbeams in it. The Veluwe has some beautiful beech forests which are perfect for shots with lightbeams. One particular morning I was super lucky. There was a lot of moisture in the air and when the sun peaked through the forest the magic started. The lightbeams stayed very strong for a long period of time, which is rare. Most of the time the lightbeams get less intense quickly when the sun is getting more powerful. This morning I witnessed the best and strongest lightbeams I have seen so far!

Lightbeams at the Veluwe

Gear used for this film

There was one tiny piece of gear that was essential for getting the shots needed: a lens heater. Without the lens heater the lenses (or filters) would get condensation on them with sunrises or night shots. An essential piece of gear for a timelapse photographer!

Dew Heater on lens

I used two different bodies from Sony. The A7RIII and the A7III with various lenses from Sony and Zeiss with filters from NISI. For the motion control I used the Kessler Stealth Slider with second shooter and pan & tilt head.

Many thanks to Rick Kloekke…

…for sharing his story here on Time Lapse Magazine. Go check out his website TimelapseView.nl!

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