ICM art for your desktop

If you are looking for a cool wallpaper for your desktop, iPad or iPhone, head over to makaikemaui.com, where Shane Robinson offers a number of his amazing intentional camera movement images as free downloads. It was actually Shane's work that inspired me to start experimenting with ICM photography. The above image, titled "Cruising #3", is one of my personal favorites.

Lines

I've been experimenting with a more graphical, minimalist type of intentional camera movement photography lately. These are some of the first results. They were made by photographing a Litepanel MicroPro, a small LED panel that is normally used for lighting video shoots. It's composed of lots of tiny LED lights, that form very points of light, even at a relatively low power setting. Because of that, it's very easy to create high contrasts and make the background go completely black. The only difficulty is that it's very obvious if they're out of focus, because in that case you won't get nice crisp lines. Some more images after the link...

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A new take on time lapse

It's always interesting to see what happens when two creative minds collaborate. Motion & sound designer Woob and time lapse photographer Samuel Cockedey took the genre of the time lapse film to a whole new level. The edgy soundtrack, creative processing of the footage and the timing all work together to create something very unusual and intrigueing. When it comes to music I often find a remix of a track more interesting than the original, beceause there's this extra layer of depth that comes from the creative input of the remixer. The same thing goes for this video as well. Great work guys, and I'm looking forward to seeing more of this kind of collaboration on Vimeo.

Lightscapes at Masters in Motion

If you're attending the Masters in Motion conference in Austin you might spot some of my lightscapes images on the screen. The conference brings together directors/DPs like Vincent Laforet, Philip Bloom and Tom Guilmette, who will share their knowlegde and let aspiring filmmakers get their hands on cool toys like the Phantom Flex and Red Epic.

A1

I've already posted some hints and teasers here before and today I finally finished my short film inspired by the Audi A1. I decided once again to go for a contrasty black & white look, with some red accents. The film burn effect that you see in some shots was actually created by overlaying some intentional camera movement photos of the rear light of the car. I thought it would be more interesting to experiment a little instead of using some ready-made effect.

The soundtrack is "Meanwhile Back in the Jungle" by Massiv in Mensch (available on iTunes).

Altered landscapes

I shot this near Oostvoorne, looking out over a large protected nature area. The interesting thing is that in the distance (click on the image to enlarge) you can see the industrial landscape of the Rotterdam harbour. It makes for a interesting and subtle contrast, one which you will only notice on closer inspection. I like it when you can explore an image and there's more to it than meets the eye at first glance.

Another little preview

Here's another little preview from the same project as last post. As you can tell I'm trying to merge two distinct looks: one contrasty black & white look, and another with some intense color accents. Stay tuned for more...

Lightscapes - a different take

I thought I'd start sharing some more behind-the-scenes and work-in-progress stuff on the blog, since that's what I usually like reading on other blogs. It's great to see the end result, but even more fun to get a glimpse of how it all comes together.

On that note, above is a still from a video project I'm currently working on. It's a different take on my Lightscapes work, where I try to create interesting effect using long exposures. The difference is that usually I do this by moving the camera around (it's not called Intentional Camera Movement photography for northing), but in this case I move the light around while the camera stands still. The reflection of the moving light source, in this case a LitePanel Micro Pro, creates an interesting sense of motion. Will share more as the project progresses. Stay tuned...

Sharing the experience

A few days ago we lauched HDtravel, a new online magazine that features our favourite travel experiences in large photos and high definition videos. The idea is to present the stories with a personal touch and to create an uncluttered experience in order to create visual and emotional impact.

Designing the interface

One of the most important considerations when designing the interface was that it shouldn’t get in the way of the experience. The flow of the story shouldn’t be interrupted by the user having to click on images to see larger versions. Nor should users be distracted by other information on the page. Ideally, I wanted the interface to have an app-like experience, focussing on one thing at a time. This would also make it intuitive to use on iPads and other mobile devices.

I came up with a clean layout that displays large images and video in a continuous horizontal row across the screen. In theory it would have been possible to have each photo or video fill the whole browser window, but that would create too much of a slideshow feel. When looking at one piece of the story, I wanted the next and previous pieces to be partially visible in order to create context and visual flow.

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Lost in the woods - a photo adventure

In an attempt to come up with some new and interesting photo locations I thought it would be nice to go shoot something in our local park. So I packed up my trusty Nikon D200 along with a zoom and a fisheye lens and headed off to the park with Brit. Once arrived, we only had to walk a short distance before we saw this really cool tree that had fallen over, probably in a recent storm. This would make for the perfect backdrop for what I had in mind. I had Brit pretend that she had gone for a run in the woods and had gotten slightly lost. For added drama, we mounted an SB900 flash to a nearby tree using a Gorillapod. The above shot is the one I like most. It took quite a number of tries to get it right, since I had to hold the camera high over my head and couldn't see what I was capturing.

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