News

Spring bloomers

Photos

A small series of landscape and macro images of the beautiful spring bloomers in our nature; wood anemones in Bertembos, wild garlic in Bois de Laurensart, rapeseed in Kaggevinne and some orchids in Sint-Pieters-Rode.

Northern lights at Maiden's Tower

Photos

A historic geomagnetic storm resulted in a magical night with a stunning aurora borealis that was even very visible in our country Belgium. I visited my favorite spot at the Maiden’s Tower in my hometown of Scherpenheuvel-Zichem. With two camera I was able to take a lot of photos and make a time-lapse of the stunning northern lights.

Kenya

Photos

Photos from our 10-day safari trip to Kenya. We started our trip with the lakes in the Rift Valley and visited Lake Naivasha, Soysambu on Lake Elementaita and Nakuru National Park. Then we stayed for 5 nights at the foot of Mount Kenya. We made a intensive day hike to an altitude of 3770m on Mount Kenya, we went on a foot safari and did game drives in the beautiful parks of Solio and Ol Pejeta. We were able to spot about 100 bird species and 25 mammal species, including many white rhinos and some black rhinos.

Bearded readlings

Photos

The bearded reedling can only be found in reed fields, they are quite social and are usually seen in groups of up to several dozen birds. The adult male has characteristic black 'moustache'.

Glowing mushrooms

Photos

When I went out in the evening in the forests of Averbode I discovered some beautiful glowing mushrooms; an ingenious trick from mother nature, gnomes who leave their lights on or just a creative photographer, ...;-)

Kingfishers

Photos

Some of my best images from recent years of one of the most beautiful birds in our country; the kingfisher. The common kingfisher is a fish-eater with a bright blue orange plumage of about 16cm long. Males are distinguished by their pitch-black lower mandible while females have a dark red spot.

Scotland

Photos

Photos from our fascinating and fun trip to Scotland. We stayed in the Glencoe region for 5 days and explored the beautiful Glencoe valley, the viaduct in Glenfinnan, Urquhart Castle at Loch Ness, the beautiful castle of Inveraray and some castle ruins such as Castle Stalker and Kilchurn Castle. Then we went to the Cairngorms National Park where I was able to photograph an osprey, we visited the herd of semi-wild reindeer and we went dolphin spotting in Moray Firth. Finally, we stayed on the coast with the beautiful nature reserve of St Abbs and the wonderful Farne Islands with tens of thousands of seabirds.

Hageland Expres

Publication

On May 13, 2023, a lovely article appeared on the website Hageland Expres with an interview about my second series of night photos of the Hageland. Here I briefly explain how I go about choosing locations and lighting them with lamps and flashes.

Hageland by night

Photos

After my first photoseries in 2018 this is a second series of photos of well-known and lesser-known monuments in the Hageland region (Scherpenheuvel-Zichem, Diest, Holsbeek, Tielt-Winge, Aarschot, ...) that I have photographed in recent years during the blue hour or at night. Often there was a beautiful starry sky, a full moon or the comet NEOWISE passed by. I usually use multiple lights and flashes to illuminate the subject and create some atmosphere.

Norway

Photos

At the end of September 2022, I travelled to the north of Norway with some photo friends for a week; to the beautiful island of Senja and the region around the mountain Otertinden. Autumn was at its peak and the fall colors were phenomenal. Furthermore, I was very lucky to observe fantastic northern lights three nights in a row and to take some very nice images. Here are my best images from a week of landscape photography in the far north.

Butterflies

Photos

Some images of the many butterflies in our garden in Scherpenheuvel. For a few years now I have been busy planting more diverse shrubs and flowers in our garden in the hope of attracting more wildlife and insects. Last summer the results were spectacular because we saw many colorful butterflies.

Little owls

Photos

In the spring I was able to photograph little owls several times. They were not shy and I was therefore able to make a lot of varied images. The little owl is one of the smallest owls (21 to 27cm) in the Lowlands. The little owl is mainly nocturnal and can be found in a wide range of habitats including farmland, woodland, heathland, ...

Italy

Photos

In April 2022 I traveled to Italy with my family. We stayed in Grinzane Cavour for a week near the beautiful castle. We explored the beautiful Langhe region in Piemont with vineyards, hills, picturesque villages and many castles. Afterwards we went to Cinque Terre; 5 wonderful villages on the rugged Ligurian coast and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. On foot and by train we explored the 5 villages and by boat we also went to Portovenere.

New version TscExcelExport

Component

A new version of the TscExcelExport component that supports the latest Embarcadero Delphi/RAD Studio 11 version This Delphi VCL component is an advanced, powerful but easy to use component which enables you to export all records of a dataset from Delphi to Microsoft Excel. Version 4.42 offers support for all Delphi and all Excel versions.

Austria

Photos

A small selection of photos from our family holiday in Austria's beautiful Schladming-Dachstein region. We stayed in the picturesque village of Hallstatt, made many walks in the beautiful mountains in the Schladming-Dachstein region, visited the impressive castle of Hohenwerfen and had a nice meeting with cute alpine marmots.

Jumping squirrels

Photos

A small series of images of jumping squirrels. It wasn't that easy to get these action shots, but they do show the incredible power of these cute animals to even jump up to 6m.

Extreme close-ups of insects

Photos

This year I focused on micro photography, the superlative of macro photography. I develop my own automated macro rail with which I can make 30 to 60 images in steps of 100 to 300 microns (thousandth of a millimeter) and then merge them. This way I can make razor-sharp images of insects that want to sit still for a few minutes. Obviously, the latter is not and technically it is always quite a challenge. These are my best images of extreme close-ups of insects.

Nocturnal animals in our garden

Photos

The wildcam in our garden often registers all kinds of mammals at night, such as stone martens, hedgehogs and various types of mice. It seemed to me an exciting challenge to make some beautiful images of these nocturnal animals with my Nikon cameras. Not an easy task, however. With a laser trigger and a few flashes, with all kinds of setups and after many attempts, I managed to make a few but varied images of the stone marten and hedgehog.

Wild boars

Photos

This summer I went three times to the Belgian Ardennes to an observation hut on the Plateau des Tailles to photograph wild animals. I was able to take a varied series of images of the wild boars. A small group of young pigs often showed up before sunset. The big family with heavy boars and sows and also young squeakers only came at dusk or when it was already dark.

ROB tv

Publication

At the end of July 2020, the peak time was to see Comet NEOWISE with its luminous tail in the starry sky. I then went to the Maagdentoren in our city Scherpenheuvel-Zichem to take some pictures. I tried to illuminate the tower in different ways with a pocket and LED lamp. Now we will have to wait 6,800 years until we can observe the comet again. A day later my images were shown during the news on the regional television station ROB tv.

Vlaanderen Vakantieland

Publication

In June 2020, Vlaanderen Vakantieland (Flemish Tourist organisation) launched a campaign to promote tourism in Flanders again with the title 'We missed you' and the hashtag #welcomeback. They used a series of beautiful images, including one of me from the castle of Horst

Slovenia

Photos

A small selection of photos of our family vacation through the beautiful Slovenia. First we visited Salzburg in Austria . Afterwards we drove to the south of Slovenia and visited the karst formations of Rakov Škocjan and Lake Cerknica. I was able to photograph wild bears there. After this we went to the Adriatic coast with the impressive caves of Postojna and Škocjan, the castle of Predjama and the picturesque coastal town of Piran. Finally we went to the Julian Alps with the Triglav NP and the beautiful lakes of Bled and Bohinj, Velika Planina and we also visited the capital Ljubliana.

Sunrise at the heathlands

Photos

The end of August is always a good time for landscape photographers. In the morning there is often atmospheric fog and the heather is in full bloom in our regions. This is a small selection of photos of sunrises on the flowering heathlands. A few photos are made this year in the beautiful nature reserve the Teut in Zonhoven. The other images are from past years in Gerhagen (Tessenderlo), Veerle heide(Veerle-Laakdal), Averbode heide (Scherpenheuvel), 's Hertogenheide (Aarschot) and Blekerheide (Lommel).

Viajes National Geographic

Publication

In July 2019, a nice article about Madagascar was published in the Viajes (Travel) magazine of National Geographic in Spain that included a photo of mine. I took this photo of a ring-tailed lemur with a baby on her back in 2014 in Isalo National Park in southern Madagascar.

Ethiopia

Photos

Photos of our short trip to Ethiopia. First we travelled through the Rift Valley and we enjoyed the thousands of flamingos and endangered hartebeests. Than we travelled to the Bale Mountains. There we could spot the mountain nyala and the Menelik bushbuck and at the Sanetti Plateau at an altitude of 3000 to 4000 meters we could observe Africa's most endangered carnivore; the Ethiopian wolf. Then we descended to the subtropical Harenna forest. In Debre Zeit I photographed many colorful birds and we visited the Jemme River Gorge to watch the gelada baboons.

National Geographic finalist

Photo contest

My photo of the Saint Joseph chapel in Sint-Pieters-Rode in the snow was one of the finalists of the prestigious National Geographic photo contest 2018 in October 2018.

Hageland by night

Photos

A series of photographs of famous and less well-known monuments in the Hageland region (Scherpenheuvel, Diest, Bekkevoort, Holsbeek, Tielt-Winge) photographed during the blue hour or later at night. Often there was a beautiful starry sky and usually I use several lamps to illuminate the subject.

WildlifePhoto

Photo contest

In the international WildlifePhoto contest 2017 (organized by the famous wildlife photographer Will Burrard-Lucas) two of my photos were shortlisted and finally my photo of Altai Mountains was selected as runner-up (2nd or 3th place). Even my photo of the sunrise at the heathland in Lommel was highly commended. Both photos will be displayed on a large outdoor screen in New York in March 2018.

WWF - Photo book

Publication

The newest WWF book 'Beeldverhalen' is available in the bookstores since this week and offers you the most amazing and unique photographs from nature. Every year the World Wildlife Fund organizes a photo competition together with Frans Lanting. Out of the 13,000 photos submitted, the 170 best were selected. Three of my photographs are also published in this book.

Nature in Limburg

Photo contest

In November 2017 I was invited to the opening of the photo salon of photo club Renovat in Sint-Truiden and the proclamation of the photo contest 'Nature in Limburg'. It turned out that I won the first prize of this contest with my photo of the Blekerheide in Lommel. Thanks Limburg province and photo club Renovat for the great price!

Nature Photographer of the Year

Photo contest

In November 2017 my photo of a “Funny sifaka” was one of the finalists and finally highly commended (top 5) in the category Comedy in the international photo contest Nature Photographer of the Year 2017. The photos of the finalists were exposed during the Nature Talks Photo Festival in Ede (Netherlands) on November 11th and 12th. Afterwards these images will be exposed in several museums, public places and companies.

National Geographic block calendar

Publication

The new National Geographic block calendar for 2018 has been released. The National Geographic editors gave a photo assignment each month and asked the enthusiastic Flemish and Dutch photographers to submit their images and 365 images have been selected for the calendar. The result is a versatile palette of beautiful images, from places around the world, special people and impressive natural phenomena. I am very pleased that 7 of my photos were selected.

AA Traveller magazine

Publication

In the June issue of the South African AA Traveler magazine one of my photos was published. For the cover photo of the 'hiking heaven's edge' article, they used my picture of a sunset in the Simien Mountains. The article tells about the breathtaking and unique landscapes in the Simien Mountains in Ethiopia and the rare gelada baboons that live there.

First price Joker photo contest

Photo contest

The Belgian travel agency Joker organizes a photo contest every year. A lot of beautiful travel photos were submitted at the end of 2016. A public prize was awarded and the jury selected 7 of the most stunning photos. I received the first price with my photograph of a chameleon catching an insect in Madagascar.

Customized tasks in VSTS builds

Article

The Microsoft Visual Studio Team Services (VSTS) have a totally new way of creating build definitions. There are many available tasks right out of the box. In this article I will cover some techniques how to customize the build process. I will show you how to implement PowerShell scripts and work with environment variables and arguments, how to load custom C# .NET assemblies and how to create extensions and upload them to VSTS.

India south

Photos

Photos of our journey through south India. We began our a journey with a houseboat trip on the tropical backwaters of Kerala. Afterwards we went to the Western Ghats mountains with beautiful and rolling tea plantations and the 'hill stations'. We spotted the endangered and rare lion-tailed macaque monkeys and around 120 species of birds. We also went three days on safari in Kabini and we saw lots of monkeys, deer, elephants, crocodiles, flying foxes and a tigress. Then we visited the palaces in Mysore and the beautifully refined temples in Halebidu en Belur. We also visited the wonderful site of Hampi with beautiful temples and palaces. We ended our trip on the beach in Goa at the Indian Ocean.

Madagascar

Photos

Photos of our journey through the fascinating Madagascar. Very special on the ‘Red Island’ are the unique endemic animals such as lemurs, sifakas, chameleons, geckos, lizards, frogs, birds, ... Moreover there are varied landscapes such as dense rainforests, dry forests, savanna, huge baobab trees, tropical beaches with palm trees, rice terraces, unique rock formations and canyons ... The country has many colorful people and everywhere you can still see traditional ox carts, old cycle and pulled rickshaws, dugout canoes, ...

Belgian newspaper Nieuwsblad

Publication

On October 2nd the Belgian newspaper 'Het Nieuwsblad' published a nice article in the paper and digital edition about my seven photos that have been published in the block calendar of National Geographic 2016.