A blog about photography

In the first week of September, myself and 4 other photographers had the brilliant idea to photograph some German hills (mountains according one of us…), arches, castles and ruins. What we didn’t anticipated was the lack of sleep we would get while executing this brilliant idea.

In the weeks leading up to the trip, I had chosen myself to find all the photo spots we would visit during sunrises and sunsets. The others accepted my fate rather quickly. It almost seemed like they didn’t care where we were going, as long as we went out. One of us went so far to say yes to every crazy idea I had, where to photograph, how to get there and where to park the car. The other sighed, stayed in the car and waited patiently until we were back. I had warned them about this and they still agreed to let me do al the planning. I know, crazy right?!

The first evening / night

After we left around 11am on the first day, we arrived in southern Germany just in time to get some food ready and leave for sunset. And with just in time, we saw the sun set behind the mountains just when we arrived on our location. Talk about luck right?!

The first image I have shot with the telelens to make sure sun was rather large in the frame and that it was connected with the mountains in the foreground. The second image I have shot just a couple of minutes later and was also the last shot of the day where the sun would be in the frame. Talk about luck. If we had run into traffic on the way to Germany or if had dinner just a minute slower, I wouldn’t be able to make this photos.

The second day, sunrise shoot

After shooting deep into the night, just a couple of hours ago, the alarm went of and we were on our way to the same location, but to shoot sunrise. On the way there, we drove through a lot of fog and it was hard not to stop and take some photos. I absolutely love to photograph some fog, but we had bigger plans as this was the premier morning to shoot some fog in between the hills and trees down in the valley. We found our location from the night before and we had some amazing views. These are some shots I was able to take that morning.

Second day, sunset shoot

This time, we had a nice and relaxed dinner compared to the first night. We decided to go for a schnitzel dinner as this mandatory in Germany. They even knew we were Dutch by just asking for mayonaise (which we didn’t get btw, the audacity!). This evening we went to an ruin in the middle of one of the woods in the area. The difference with this one, compared to the other forests, was that it was all the way up. Only climbing until you literal walk against the ruin walls. Of course, we also stayed long into the night and one of the photographers shot one of the best drone footage you’ll ever see (until the next morning, but more on that later, keep reading!). Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to take any image that’s worth to see the light of day, but don’t worry, I have redeemed myself the next morning. My god, that light was fantastic.

Third day, sunrise shoot

ISO64, F13, 1/100th Z7ii + 70-200/2.8S at 105mm — ISO64, F13, 1/100th
Z7ii + 70-200/2.8S at 105mm

To be honest, I could just post a dozen photos of this morning and you would know everything you need to know, but that would make for a boring read isn’t it?

This morning we crossed the boarder into the neighboring country (I purposely don’t tell you where this is, as the location of this place is fragile and there isn’t a real footpath to it). This morning we were just with 4 photographers as one of us stayed back and needed to get some sleep after getting just a couple of hours of sleep each night. In retrospect, this was also a lot safer, because the platform we stayed was just big enough for the four of us. We had a complete tripod penetration on both sides going on as this place was just that small!

The morning started with a bit of search to the start of the trail. We have driven past it at least 3 times in the pitch black. When we finally found the start of the trail, we had to almost literally clime to the top as the slope was close to 45 degrees! After the first 10minutes it got a bit better, but we still had to clime for the next 30minutes and we almost walked past it! As there is no real footpath down to the arch, we had to improvise a bit while walking (almost falling) down to the platform. When we finally had found our spot, we waited for a spectacular sunrise, but that never happened… UNTIL, the sun rose above the hills around us and we were able to use the sun in our frames. This is one of the frames I have shot during the 5 minutes this was possible.

Now you have seen two photos. As you see in the photo above, the mist in the valley is getting some light on it. But we, didn’t saw that at first. So when we were talking about the shots we got so far, I walked out to the arch to see what’s more to see from this vantage point. When I saw light rays coming through the trees in the valley below, I ran back (for a whopping 2 meters!) , changed lenses and got shooting.

Below you’ll find a selection of photos I have shot after the above.

Third day, sunset shoot

After getting those amazing conditions, and personally, very nice photos, I had a high for the rest van de day and we were going to another ruin to photograph the sunset and the stars. This was a short hike, but a hard one as it was literally straight up a mountain. No switch backs, just going straight up. Our calf’s were burning after 25 minutes of going up.

The ruin itself was just amazing. When we were exploring the ruin, we noticed that there were people on highest platform of the ruin. Of course, it was the platform that we were planning on staying for the rest of the night. Luckily for us, they left after just 30 minutes of us being there. They did leave with the famous words “You’re Dutch right?! We just took some sweet mushrooms from The Hague”. Thanks for letting us know sweet stranger. That’s just what we needed to know :).

Anyway, the evening / setting sun went rather quickly an we got some nice photos out of it. The ruins where quite large, so in the beginning nobody was in each other shots and the light painting we did, didn’t ruin each other shots. But of course, after just 30 to 45 minutes of shooting, we all sat right next to each other shooting more or less the same frame. Now, I can hear you think “but that’s boring, everybody has the same photo”. Well, yes, that’s what it looks like, but in the end, we didn’t. Some of us were zooming in more than the other and of course, the post production for all of us is completely different. So we took the same photo, but we ended up with completely different photos. And I think, that’s the beauty of photography right? No photo would be ever the same as the next one despite standing next to each other.

First we shoot some sunset photo:

Because I marked the shots that I took above, I knew exactly where to my tripod to get the exact same composition to get the night shots. This was easy for the shot looking down as there was only one position possible to position my tripod without falling of into the valley 100m below me.

For the other one, it was a bit harder, but I was successful. What I did was, I had placed some rocks around the tripod legs and took my tripod away very carefully to not touch or kick over the marks I had made.

The last day. We could finally sleep.

On this day, we decided to skip to morning session and sleep. This was a rather nice idea as everyone was tired and needed that sleep badly. But the only reason that we chose to do so, was because we wanted to photograph another castle way into the night and we needed to drive for about 3.5h to get there (and close to 4hours back home). It was the rational thing to do (and the safest).

As this was the last day of our trip, we started packing. I figured, this is going to take forever as we had 3 ladies with us, but to my surprise, we were al rather quick with packing our stuff and had everything in the car within the our.

We hadn’t even reached the end of the driveway of the hotel, one of us (you know who you are) stated “I just need to go to a McDonalds, I want to know what they have compared to us”. And to be honest, we all wanted to know and go the big yellow M in the sky.

But, we had both chosen the correct one and the wrong one. The food was good and quick, but before we could order (or even enter the building), an employee told us we needed to fill in some app to register our presence in there store. Sounds easy right? Well, it wasn’t. I speak basic German. The employee spoke even less English. It’s hard to get your point across on what we need to do with just using your hand and feet when you need us to install an app on your phone and go through all the different steps of that app. We did it in the end, well 4 of us did and that was enough for him. After having lunch, we went on our way again. Next stop, Heidelberg. After a quick stop and tour throughout the city, we went on our way to the last stop of the trip: Burg Eltz.

For who doesn’t know this place, it’s a fairy type castle in the middle of a valley with hills surrounding it. The only downside to it, is that’s is a super touristy spot. So, in the beginning we had to fight a bit people in our frames, but when the light get to it’s best, the toursits had left and we had the place for our selfs. For around 15minutes as other photographers joined us.

During this evening, I have shot many different photos which are shown below. Enjoy!

At the end of this night, we drove home. It was a long drive, but we were all very happy with all the photos we were able to get and even to learn something new.

Our drone pilot has made an great video about the trip! Put it on full screen and just enjoy!

The photographers (or just as crazy as me for joining me on this crazy adventure)
Matthijs Bettman: https://www.instagram.com/bettmanphotography/
Niels Boer: https://www.instagram.com/photographybyboer/
Marieke Urlings: https://www.instagram.com/mu.fotografie/
Chayenne van Zetten: https://www.instagram.com/chaysfotografie/
Monique van der Vlist: https://www.instagram.com/moniquevandervlist_fotografie_/

Photos: @bettmanphotography
Video: @chaysfotografie

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5 photographers, 1 trip. Chaos ensured