Stars & Storms

Isla Kalayo - Fire Island

Fire dancer Kevin Jay Rama of Isla Kalayo (Fire Island) at Guyam island, Siargao Philippines. After shooting the Milky Way at Guyam island and taking some photos of Jay (fire dancer) at Viento del Mar, I want to improve my shot of both. Finally I came up with the idea to combine them and thus take Jay to Guyam.

Guyam Light Painting

Light-painting HNY on a deserted island with fireworks! I bought a hundred light sticks earlier this year to shoot them tied to surfers at a full (super)moon night here in Siargao, Philippines. We tried, but it didn’t come together. Left with most lights, I decided to go my favourite location here, the deserted Guyam island near Siargao island. Earlier this year I took a fire dancer there and shot him under the Milky Way, I always wanted to try out something different, this seemed perfect, and now finally I was even able to buy fireworks! With a few friends and friends of friends we headed to the island, on a hopefully rainless night. My idea was for everyone to create their own light-rope using different colours, then have them paint/dance/move/swing in front of the island and shooting whatever we came up with. Along the way we came up with the idea to light-paint ‘Happy New Year! Guyam’. The firework fountain shots turned out really hard as I had no experience and only had 6 tries of a few seconds. They weren’t very spectacular either and one didn’t even work. At least they were of some decoration to the Happy New Year shot. The image is a composition as you might imagine :) The trees are composed of a few shots where I had my friends lighting up the trees with a flashlight and walking around between the trees with a camera flash, lightning up the trees from various angles. The sky was a separate shot, as was the shooting star. Each firework is a separate shot and the light-painting shot is different. ‘Happy New Year! Guyam’ we took in 4 different shots. Shot with a D750 + 14-24/f2.8. After some RAW editing I added the images to my file in Photoshop, used the lighten transparency and masked out the subject. There’s even a bit of a Milky Way in there!

Dedon Island

Scene from the Dedon 'Between Dusk & Dawn' time lapse movie shot at & for Dedon Island resort, Siargao, Philippines. Shot & edited by Martien Janssen

Milky Way at Siargao

The Milky Way shot at the Dedon Island resort in Siargao, Philippines. I shot this image during one of my time lapses at the resort. After a few of my Milky Way time lapses went viral on Facebook, I went to Dedon and offered them to create a full movie of the resort, shooting sunset to sunrise and the Milky Way using their resort and fantastic furniture as a foreground. Look for my Dedon time lapse movie to see the stunning result.

Indonesia: Mt Bromo

View at Bromo Tengger Semeru National Park, Java, Indonesia. Of all volcanos in Indonesia, the country with most in the world, Mt Bromo is the most popular and scenic. The active volcano rumbles and blows smoke almost non stop. Surrounded by other dormant volcanos and with Java's highest, highly activ volcano' Mt Semeru' in the background, this location is a nature photographer's delight. To me this location was at the top of my bucketlist and I spend a month shooting it day and night to capture footage for a few photo and time lapse projects. The weather conditions made it very hard to find the right conditions for my footage, but in between all clowds and rainshowers I witnessed and captured some of the most stunning scenes I've ever seen.

Indonesia: Mt Bromo

View at Bromo Tengger Semeru National Park, Java, Indonesia. Of all volcanos in Indonesia, the country with most in the world, Mt Bromo is the most popular and scenic. The active volcano rumbles and blows smoke almost non stop. Surrounded by other dormant volcanos and with Java's highest, highly activ volcano' Mt Semeru' in the background, this location is a nature photographer's delight. To me this location was at the top of my bucketlist and I spend a month shooting it day and night to capture footage for a few photo and time lapse projects. The weather conditions made it very hard to find the right conditions for my footage, but in between all clowds and rainshowers I witnessed and captured some of the most stunning scenes I've ever seen.

Indonesia: Mt Bromo

View at Bromo Tengger Semeru National Park, Java, Indonesia. Of all volcanos in Indonesia, the country with most in the world, Mt Bromo is the most popular and scenic. The active volcano rumbles and blows smoke almost non stop. Surrounded by other dormant volcanos and with Java's highest, highly activ volcano' Mt Semeru' in the background, this location is a nature photographer's delight. To me this location was at the top of my bucketlist and I spend a month shooting it day and night to capture footage for a few photo and time lapse projects. The weather conditions made it very hard to find the right conditions for my footage, but in between all clowds and rainshowers I witnessed and captured some of the most stunning scenes I've ever seen.

Indonesia: Mt Bromo

View at Bromo Tengger Semeru National Park, Java, Indonesia. Of all volcanos in Indonesia, the country with most in the world, Mt Bromo is the most popular and scenic. The active volcano rumbles and blows smoke almost non stop. Surrounded by other dormant volcanos and with Java's highest, highly activ volcano' Mt Semeru' in the background, this location is a nature photographer's delight. To me this location was at the top of my bucketlist and I spend a month shooting it day and night to capture footage for a few photo and time lapse projects. The weather conditions made it very hard to find the right conditions for my footage, but in between all clowds and rainshowers I witnessed and captured some of the most stunning scenes I've ever seen.

Indonesia: Mt Bromo

View at Bromo Tengger Semeru National Park, Java, Indonesia. Of all volcanos in Indonesia, the country with most in the world, Mt Bromo is the most popular and scenic. The active volcano rumbles and blows smoke almost non stop. Surrounded by other dormant volcanos and with Java's highest, highly activ volcano' Mt Semeru' in the background, this location is a nature photographer's delight. To me this location was at the top of my bucketlist and I spend a month shooting it day and night to capture footage for a few photo and time lapse projects. The weather conditions made it very hard to find the right conditions for my footage, but in between all clowds and rainshowers I witnessed and captured some of the most stunning scenes I've ever seen.

El Nido

El Nido, Palawan, Philippines. Palawan is named worlds most beautiful island for the second year in a row, largely thanks to the beautiful scenery of the islands and beaches at El Nido. You can't leave Palawan without doing any of the trips at El Nido. The locations are divided in 4 different tours, A B C & D, but you can do combination tours and, even better, organise your own private tour. This way you'll be able to avoid the large crowds and choose where to go and how long to stay. Your island hopping tour will be much more enjoyable that way. I organised a private tour for our group of 3 and found a couple to join us. We left earlier and stayed till after sunset, paying only a few bucks more and we had the best possible day. I couldn't get enough of the gorgeous island scenery and its beautiful rock formations. There's lagoons and beaches to visit, spots for snorkeling and swimming, the boat staff will cook you an incredible lunch.

Milky Way at Guyam Island

Milky Way above Guyam island. Panorama image of the Milky Way. It's quite tricky to shoot a good panorama in the dark without having a panoramic tripod head. The camera shows if you have it straight or not, but it's far from perfect, sometimes it's still very slanted. And if they're too slanted, you'll have a hard time stitching all of it.

Milky Way at Guyam Island

Milky Way above Guyam island. I've been to Guyam a few times to shoot the Milky when moonlight was minimal, spending the night there, shooting from sunset to sunrise. Each time I've been shooting this exact same shot, trying to improve it. I always thought it was a pity the trees were so completely dark. I tried lighting up the island here with my flashlight, combining several photos get the right effect. I could have used different exposures before, but I've always been time lapsing the whole thing, so I couldn't. This time I offered my time lapse to get the better shot and get some photos instead time lapses.

Milky Way at the Cloud 9 Boardwalk

Milky Way above the Cloud 9 boardwalk in Siargao, Philippines. Siargao is the country's surfing capital, Cloud 9 is the famous icon, this is where the big waves and surfing competitions are held. So busy during the day, so quiet during the night, except for the occassional local or tourist that comes to have a look at night. I've spend a lot of hours here at night, sitting on my sarong, listening to music, drinking Tanduay Ice or whatever, munching on candies, enjoying the view, hoping the weather stays nice, waiting and waiting for the time lapse to finish and finally go to bed.

Bagan, Myanmar

Bagan, Myanmar

Bagan, Myanmar

Bagan, Myanmar

Bagan, Myanmar

Bagan, Myanmar

Bagan, Myanmar

Bagan, Myanmar

Bagan, Myanmar

Bagan, Myanmar

Than Sadet beach at Koh Phangan, Thailand.

Than Sadet beach at Koh Phangan, Thailand.