When I moved to Canada from Europe I had no idea what to expect. Ok, I didn’t expect people with blue faces. Later I learned that they do get blue faces, usually in the second half of February. It was a few years ago I was introduced to shooting birds, with my camera. Again I didn’t know what to expect. While Europe is pretty rich in birds, I had never had any interest in them. After all, the cities I lived in were hardly a place where you can find birds. Unless you’re looking for pigeons or house sparrows.

Here in Canada I got the first real view of birds that didn’t look like sparrows (or did, but with a twist). The white ones were a real treat to shoot. The first one I saw was in the Zoo. It didn’t look too miserable, it just looked out of place.

Read more: The white ones

Some people have asked me, “How do you always come back with so many great pictures from your trips?” Well, not all trips are always successful. I can remember a “hunt” for Snowy Owls where all I got was a white plastic bag from far away. No owls to be spotted. Sometimes I come back with a lot of pictures, only to see later that only a very small portion of those pictures are meeting my criteria.

After all, you can’t force nature to do what you need for that perfect picture. Some subjects are more willing than others, but in general… not so much. So here is a collection of

Read more: Hunting outtakes

Last weekend I decided to go off the grid with a friend. We had been scouting the area already a few times, always coming up with new ideas and plans for returning there once more.

So this time we decided to take off from Winnipeg around 5am. Not my usual time for getting up, that’s for sure. After driving for about two and a half hours we arrived near the area we wanted to visit.

Read more: A day in the wilderness

Fall is upon us. When I started writing this post, there was still a lot of colour to be seen everywhere. By now, that colour seems gone.

A few years ago I moved to Canada for a bunch of different reasons. A nice extra benefit was the seasons that are really present here. In Europe I enjoyed all the seasons, but in Holland, winter is not really a season, it’s more a wet period between autumn and spring. With a chance of a few snowflakes, but those are not guaranteed.

Read more: Fall, already

One of the most common elements on earth. One of the more fragile ones too. Way too many places now have water that is no longer of a usable quality for wild and/or domesticated beings, humans included. But as you can imagine, this blog handles only the beauty of the views of water, not the quality over which I have no influence.

And no, I do not pollute water knowingly. The above picture was taken by my friend who stayed on the shore while I drove over the winter road to Matheson Island last winter.

Read more: Water in Manitoba

There are different ways to greet the sun when it rises in the morning. Some prefer it with a shot of rum, others by doing yoga. I prefer the shot, with my camera. The important thing is to arrive at an interesting, lonely spot, way before the sun even thinks about rising above the horizon.

The horizon is easy to find, out in the open. If you have a large body of water at your disposal it will be even easier. By the way, you don’t have an excuse for a crooked horizon this time.

Read more: Sun salutation

Many times I hear from professional photographers that you have to have some kind of symmetry in your pictures. Why? "Well, it is better” is the answer. To what is better or not in my pictures I have no answer. I am not an art photographer, although some of my pictures hang on people’s walls. I try to record what I see and what moves me somehow.

I believe that if I don’t have a story or some mood for a picture, the picture will usually not see the light of day outside my Lightroom catalogue. Believe me, I have lots of pictures in there. But sometimes, just sometimes, the picture is good enough to be shown for one reason or another. Often it is to illustrate a story, not so often it is the picture that induces the mood.

Read more: Mood and symmetry