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The only thing missing in my photography kit, was a decent zoom lens to make wildlife photos and maybe shoot some close-up photos of artists at festivals. At first I was thinking of getting an 18-200mm lens, which would then replace the 18-55mm kit lens that came with my camera. After reading some reviews, and giving it some thought I dismissed that idea, because all the reviews mentioned that the image quality wasn't all-that, and well... I've gotten fond of the 18-55mm kit lens; it's extremely light, and it performs pretty good.

While browsing the web I noticed that the Canon EF 70-300mm f4-5.6 IS USM was on sale at a store in Barendrecht. I decided to read some reviews, and generally liked what I read and saw. Today, Xariana and myself were in the area anyway, and I decided to make a little detour and pick one up.

It's big, it's heavy and it makes my camera look badass; I love it Oh and more importantly, it makes some very, very nice pictures too! My kit is more-or-less complete now; Maybe I will get a nice macro lens someday, but that's more a long-term idea.

It was a boring day, and so Xariana and myself decided to go explore an abandoned monastery somewhere in the East of The Netherlands.

It was built in 1910 by German Jesuits who fled Germany as a consequence of the Kulturkampf. In 1937, the Jesuits handed the monastery over to a community of "white monks" that followed Charles Lavigerie, who later handed the monastery over to a group of Salesians of Don Bosco; who used the building as a seminary till 1971.

In 1974, the building was converted to a public art and exhibition center where amateur artists could explore, utilize and display their creativity. The center featured amongst others a planetarium and a large artificial cave system with an exhibition about evolution. The building was also used for various paranormal events and symposiums. In 1999, the building was abandoned.

In 2007, a company bought the monastery to convert it into a community center; a project that was started in 2009. The top floors of the building have been partially stripped, but the planetarium and cave-man exhibition are practically untouched.

Every year, the gardens of castle "de Haar" are home to the Elf Fantasy Fair. This annual 2-day cosplay event is the place to see -and be seen- for fans of all sorts of fantasy role-play. Daniel, my apprentice Bas, and myself decided to go check it out and make some nice photo's.

After a long day of shuffling through the gardens, my feet are killing me and my face has got some serious sunburn; but it was all worth it. I've seen a lot of hot babes with kick-ass costumes, and I can't wait for the next edition; which is in September.

One of the things on my wish list, was a fisheye lens. The main characteristic of a fisheye lens is that it has an extremely wide angled view. Some even go as far as an 180 ° angle. Because it has such a wide angle, you can put pretty much a whole room on a single photo if you position the camera on the right spot.

The second characteristic is that this extreme wide angle gives the image a spherical distortion. This spherical distortion gives portrait photo's a very funny effect, because the center of the image is magnified more than the sides. I really wanted one, but the only problem was that most of them are rather pricy.

While browsing a web shop stumbled upon a fisheye lens by an unknown brand that was almost half the price of similar lenses of the major brands. I got curious, but remained skeptical; after all the difference in price usually means compromises. After reading a few reviews and watching a lot of sample photo's I was convinced: this lens kicks ass! I'm talking about the Samyang 8mm fisheye lens, which is sold under many names. In certain European countries, including the Netherlands, Samyang lenses are sold under the brand name "Walimex".

So, what's the catch ? Well, it turns out there is no real catch. Optically this lens performs just as good, if not better, than some lenses that are twice as expensive. So why is this one so cheap ? The difference in price is in the way the lens operates. With most lenses, you can set the aperture size from within the camera. A tiny motor then makes the diaphragm either larger or smaller, and thus increasing or decreasing the aperture size. With this lens there is no tiny motor, and you can't set the aperture size in the camera. To make the diaphragm larger or smaller, you have to twist a ring on the base of the lens.

Aside from the manual diaphragm, this lens has no autofocus; it only has manual focus. This is no problem at all, because having a focus ring on a fisheye is rather useless anyway. Because of the extreme wide angle and spherical distortion, the depth of field is so amazingly large that no matter how you set the focus on the lens; pretty much everything will be sharp anyway. For example, if I set the focus on 30cm from the lens, then everything between 15cm and infinity will be in focus.

In short, by keeping this lens a fully manually operated lens, the manufacturer managed to cut the costs dramatically; making this lens extremely interesting for people that are looking to get a fisheye lens, but are not willing to sell their first-born child to get one. I totally love my new fisheye lens, and can't wait to get into the field and shoot some kick-ass photos.

Even before I bought my new camera, I already knew that sometime I would get a "Nifty Fifty" with a really big aperture for it. They allow you to make real nice photos with creative blur effects because the depth of field is very narrow. This makes these lenses very suitable for portrait photos. I just had to get one!

Fortunately, these lenses are also really cheap. There are no fancy zooming mechanisms in them, which means that they are really simple and therefore cheap. Another plus is that because there is no quality loss due to the zooming mechanisms, these so-called "prime lenses" produce extremely sharp pictures. I can't wait to make some photos with my new baby

Deep in the forests of Propsteierwald, Germany lays an abandoned camp of the Belgian Army. Since it is only a 10 minute drive from Daniel’s house, we decided to go check it out.

Next on our list was the abandoned train station of Montzen, Belgium. It still amazes me how little graffiti can be found on the place. One would assume that an open train station would attract many vandals and youths, but the place is relatively unharmed.

Personally I’d love to re-visit the sites when the weather has improved a bit. I’m sure that the buildings of Camp Astrid look even cooler with the forest in its full glory.

With my spanking new camera, it became a bit of a nuisance to walk around with my old tripod, since it had no quick release plate. This meant that I would either have to keep the camera on the tripod all the time, or screw and unscrew the camera each time I want to move. It was time to get an upgrade.

A bit of searching, reading reviews and checking out tripods at photography stores later I decided to buy a Velbon Ultra Luxi M. It's a cute little tripod that is easy to carry around. It weighs just a little over 1 kilogram and folded up it's only 35 centimeters in length. Yet if you fully extend the 5 sections of its legs, and slide up the center column, it comes up to a very respectable height of about 155 centimeters.

Another cool feature is that you can split the center column in half, and fold the legs really wide, so you can get very close to the ground with your camera, while retaining full stability. It's a very thin and light tripod, yet it can easily hold 2.5 kilograms of weight without losing stability.

Driving to work on the highway can be a serious drag, everybody knows that. To reduce the boredom and save on the fuel consumption of my car, I always drive to work through the countryside. There's more stuff to see, and occasionally you notice something cool.

A few weeks ago I suddenly noticed a collapsed roof through the branches of the trees. Normally it would have been impossible to see, with all the leaves in the way; but now that most trees are bald, the roof was only just visible. My curiosity was triggered, and I decided to check it out today. What I found was a pair of abandoned and partially decayed cottages that were squeezed between the trees on the edge of the forest surrounding the Loonse & Drunense Duinen.

Unfortunately, I forgot my tripod in the car, so I will be going back again sometime in the near future to make some more pictures.

As you may have noticed, I’ve been taking pictures of abandoned and decaying pictures. While I’ve been exploring these buildings for quite some years, I never took photos of my adventures in the past; with exception of this photo. A few months back I suddenly decided to start taking some photos; at first with my cell phone, later with my Canon PowerShot A620.

On its own the PowerShot A620 is a fine camera, and it has served me well for nearly 5 years. But traveling through moist and dark buildings, I started to notice the limitations of a “point and shoot” camera; even though the PowerShot has plenty of options for custom settings. And since I started to like taking pictures more and more, I decided to start looking for an upgrade.

I had already decided that I wanted to get a “Digital single-lens reflex” camera; more widely known as “DSLR”. After reading a lot of reviews and comparing models, I had found my new camera: the Canon EOS 450D.

The EOS 450D has a very nice 12.2 megapixel resolution, which is more than enough to produce high quality images. The lens that was included with the kit is not –the- best lens, but it does its job quite well. I will probably get a better lens at some point in the future, but for now this lens will do just fine. The camera has a 9-point autofocus system that works remarkably fast. Where the PowerShot took about 1 second to focus, the EOS 450D does it in maybe 0.1 second. I’ve got a bunch of memory cards lying about that I can use with the camera. On a 4 GB card I can store 658 photos in JPG format or 177 in RAW format.

I’ve ordered some accessories from DealExtreme, which should arrive in a week or two. I’ve ordered a nice camera bag, some lens cleaning products and some useful thingies like a water level that you can slide onto the camera and a lens-hood.

It might take some fiddling and practicing before I will have mastered this beast, but I’ve read a lot of tutorials, watched a truckload of how-to videos, and I’ve got quite some experience with photography already; so it won’t be long before I’ll be able to produce some kick-ass pictures The results will, of course, be available in the photos section of this website. I can’t wait to get outside and play

It was Saturday, the weather was kind of "meh", so it was time for some Urbexing. On this particular Saturday, Daniel and I visited the abandoned factory of the Royal United Leather complex in Oisterwijk, The Netherlands. The constant dripping of water on concrete gave a very soothing atmosphere; but the presence of some pigeons that were constantly making noises, and the barking of a dog nearby made it quite spooky as well.

Unfortunately, we couldn't visit the entire compound, because there is also a motorbike rental company that uses part of the building; and we didn't feel like getting arrested for burglary.