NIGHT PHOTOGRAPHY by Patrick van Dijk

from RPS - Benelux Chapter eJournal - Volume 18 Spring 2020

by Royal Photographic Society

BORIS VON BRAUCHITSCH ‘9’ André Bergmans

The RPS Benelux Chapter INTERVIEW by Armando Jongejan FRPS

Patrick van Dijk

For a while I have ‘followed’ photographer Patrick van Dijk His night shots are really special

A good reason to ask him some questions

40 PASSION: NIGHT PHOTOGRAPHY | PATRICK VAN DIJK & WORKSHOP Interview by Armando Jongejan FRPS and photos by Patrick van Dijk

As most of us do, I use Facebook and sometimes you come across something special. For a while I have ‘followed’ photographer Patrick van Dijk from Rotterdam. His night shots are really special, not only because of his technical proficiency, but also the subject matter is different. It was a good reason to ask him some questions:

What about you and your photography? My passion with photography started around 3 years ago. I'm a sailor by profession and I saw a lot of great frames when I was underway to Germany. First I shot with my mobile phone but soon after that I bought myself a Panasonic Lumix G6 and started with "real" photography. Soon I changed the Lumix for my first Nikon D3400 and I fell in love with Night photography.

Night photography, but this is different, why a harbour? This was also the time I changed my job to work at the Port of Rotterdam on a towboat and because of that job I get to visit a lot of great places in the Port and so I started shooting the Harbour vibes. I needed a better camera and lens because the D3400 with Tokina 12-24/f4 did not shoot in a way I feel good about so very soon I bought my Nikon D7100 with Sigma Art 18-35/f1.8 lens. This is my current set up and I still love everything about it. The f1.8 is a great benefit when you need it and Sigma gives the shots a signature of itself. I love to shoot between f1.8 and f6.3 . For me, this gives a lot of light to play with. People recognize my shots especially because of how I edit the night shots and, of course because of the Harbour vibes.

Your photos looks more or less the same in quality, how do you do this? I edit in Lightroom and always work with the same workflow, which means keeping the temperature around 3000K to keep the blue tones. Highlights I always set between -60 to -100 and shadows +60 to +100 giving a bit of a HDR vibe. The new Texture tool in Lightroom is also one of my favourites to play with in my edits. There is always a bit of noise in night shots, so I use noise reduction to clear it up. When exporting my shots for social media upload I always use 2048px long side to keep the quality as good as possible for social media standards.

We organize a workshop. How can you join? Since one year Patrick started with workshops in night photography. The workshops are visited by people from all over the Netherlands and from Belgium. We want to organise a workshop night photography with Patrick for our Benelux Chapter on Friday 18 th September 2020 in Rotterdam (if it is raining there is an alternative location). Minimum of participants 5 and maximum 10. The costs are Euro 20 pp and payment is in advance. Do you want to join? Please contact ASAP André Bergmans. If we have enough confirmed and paid registrations you find more details in the Summer edition of our eJournal.

You can find more information about Patrick onInstagram: @fackphotos or onFacebook: @fack_photography