Diese Szene an einem wunder­baren und gut versteckten, kleinen Wasser­fall verzau­berte mich. Die Kompo­si­tion des Bildes lebt von den geschwun­genen grünen Farne, die in die Bild­mitte zeigen, der Wasser­füh­rung und den Felsen, die im unteren Bereich des Bildes ein Dreieck hin zum Wasser­fall erzeugen. Obwohl dieser Flecken Natur mitten in Deutsch­lands liegt, so könnte sie doch genau so gut in einem Urwald oder einem anderen, dem Menschen unbe­kannten Planeten liegen. 

A water­fall in the middle of the Black Forest that I disco­vered by chance. It is some­what remote and hidden, but when you get close to it, you can hear the sound of the water falling down its gorge. The descent to the water­fall is a bit of an adven­ture. But it was worth it, because behind each rock you could discover another secret. A beau­tiful spot of almost untouched nature. 

On loca­tion, I was not enti­rely satis­fied with the condi­tions I found. The result of this photo, however, convinced me comple­tely at home in front of the computer. The beau­tiful green of the moss on the large rocks and the well-chosen expo­sure time for beau­tifully soft water with a light texture finally convinced me to show the picture to the public. 

| Top 32 Natur­foto des Sommers 2023 | Die Bekannt­heit dieses Wasser­falls bei Todtnau im Schwarz­wald macht es nicht gerade einfach, Bilder ohne Menschen von ihm aufzu­nehmen. Die Suche nach einer beson­deren Kompo­si­tion, ohne dass mir Touristen vor die Linse laufen würden, verschlug mich dann unter eine hölzerne Fußgän­ger­brücke, wo ich die Dynamik des herab­fal­lenden und flie­ßenden Wassers aber erfolg­reich in einem Bild fest­halten konnte. 

I took this beau­tiful scene at a stream in the Black Forest. The fern in the fore­ground, the stream and the rhodo­den­dron in the back­ground form a great work of art. 

This beau­tiful stream can be found on the way in the direc­tion of the Gerold­sauer waterfall. 

This beau­tiful section of the Triberg water­falls would be worth a visit on its own. The compo­si­tion is deli­bera­tely chosen so that the viewer’s gaze is guided up the river, to where the water flows out of the forest. 

This raging water­fall is another cascade of the Triberg water­falls. A large bridge leads over it, which was beau­tifully deco­rated with autumnal forest colors on the day the photo was taken. 

Germany’s highest water­falls exude a very special magic as soon as the leaves are colored in autumn. In this picture you can see the lower cascades of the water­falls of Triberg. 

Some pictures need no descrip­tion. Fallen orange leaves, moss-covered stones and trees, an idyllic stream and a magical atmo­sphere. That’s autumn in the Black Forest. 

The beau­tiful early autumn color of the leaves frame the Geroldsau water­fall in a romantic way. 

Espe­ci­ally on stressful days, some people long for peace and soli­tude to find a little peace within them­selves. The people of this house in the seclu­sion of the Black Forest certainly have enough of this peace and solitude. 

For this photo we already left in the middle of the night and arrived at still pitch dark night. After a short walk over 100 meters of alti­tude through the snowy forest, we arrived at this well-known view­point. With the naked eye, you could only see the lights of the Mummelsee Hotel in the distance, but with the camera I was able to take a wonderful picture. 

Ein Bild, dass für mich persön­lich, für eine dunkle Zeit meines Lebens steht. Aber gerade deshalb so eine enorme Aussa­ge­kraft hat. Nach der Diagnose der Krebs­er­kran­kung unserer damals nicht ganz zwei­jäh­rigen Tochter stellte man sich so viele Fragen. Unter anderem, warum konnten wir nicht früher sehen, dass in ihr ein Tumor heran­wächst? So wie dieser kleine Baum inmitten der großen Bäume des Waldes langsam, aber unbe­merkt heran­wächst. Die dunkle, mysti­sche Nebel­stim­mung vor Sonnen­auf­gang ist sinn­bild­lich für unsere unklaren Gedanken über eine unge­wisse Zukunft in dieser Zeit. 

A scene from a wintry forest. There was dense fog on the spot, because the clouds hung so low in this forest that it always seemed to be raining, then again only misty mois­ture surrounded us. Before sunrise in the twilight, deep in such a large, dark forest, surrounded by silence and quiet bird­song, you expe­ri­ence moments again and again that you can’t explain. That’s how I came up with the title of this photo­graph: Meta­phy­sical Twilight. I also pondered a lot that morning about things I could not explain. 

In forest photo­graphy, you have to look for compo­si­tions with an open eye and a steady step. A few centi­me­tres to the left, right, up or down can change a scene greatly. In this shot it becomes parti­cu­larly clear. Just a few centi­me­tres to the side and it would have been a comple­tely diffe­rent image of a single tree. When I disco­vered the trees almost perfectly lined up, however, I wanted to photo­graph them so that they continued into the depths of the forest like a kind of echo of the fore­most trunk. 

It is always a plea­sure to walk into a spring forest where the wild garlic blos­soms are in full swing. The spicy smell, the fresh green colors of the leaves and the chir­ping of the birds in the early morning always put me in a kind of “short vaca­tion” every time I visit. On this morning after a down­pour the night before, I was parti­cu­larly lucky, as a light misty haze in the forest made the atmo­sphere seem even more enchanted. 

The bloo­ming wild­flower carpet of this wood­land is crossed by a fallen tree trunk and its bran­ches. The light mist in the forest gives the image a special aesthetics. 

On this spring morning, condi­tions were not neces­s­a­rily the best one would wish for photo­gra­phing wild garlic in bloom. But the mist outside the forest gates and a brief moment of pier­cing sunlight provided inco­ming, wonderfully difuss light that lite­rally made this scene glow. Luckily, I was there at the time and was able to capture this wonderful shot on my sensor. 

Even though the carpet of wild garlic in this section of forest on a small hill was not parti­cu­larly dense, the morning atmo­sphere was beau­tiful. The sun still managed to shine through the leaf canopy that morning, a few weeks later, this was already too dense. 

A forest scene, as if from a fairy tale. Those who still have some child­like imagi­na­tion will reco­g­nise the face in the trunk of the tree and possibly ask them­selves, who is or who was that? An old witch who was defeated by a glorious hero and is now banished in this tree trunk? Fittingly for the scene, I was able to catch the right light some time after sunrise to give this scene the neces­sary dreamy glow. 

Die letzten Tage waren ziem­lich stür­misch. Bei solchen Wind­ge­schwin­dig­keiten und da viele Bäume noch belaubt waren, erwischt es schon hin und wieder einen Baum, dessen Stamm die Belas­tung nicht mehr aushält, oder gar entwur­zelt wird. Dieses Exem­plar liegt hing viel­leicht schon länger in den Seilen, aber dennoch passte er zu der Wetter­lage und zur Bild­kom­po­si­tion. Ich habe eine etwas längere Belich­tungs­zeit gewählt, als bewusstes Stil­mittel, um den Wind in den verschwom­menen Blät­tern sichtbar zu machen. Mal etwas anderes, als immer alles pin-scharf zu machen. 

Wenige Minuten nach dem Sonnen­auf­gang verwan­deln die ersten Sonnen­strahlen des Tages den dunklen Wald in einen magi­schen licht­durch­flu­teten Ort, der alle seine gespens­ti­schen Züge verliert. 

This bird’s eye view of an autumn wood­land shows the diver­sity of our wonderful native forests and the beauty of our natural world. 

Germany’s forests are parti­cu­larly beau­tiful to look at in autumn, as the mixed forests change color in diffe­rent facets. Paired with evening soft side light, great shots of these autumn forests are created. 

A beau­tiful scene of nature showing some wonderful facets of our breath­ta­king world. The forests in the early Hersbt, the clouds on the horizon, illu­mi­nated by the setting evening sun, the rising moon and in the middle this bare tree, which is synony­mous with the tran­si­ence of all crea­tures here on earth. 

Im Früh­jahr kommt Farbe ins Spiel. Ein Grund dafür sind die Raps­felder in der Umge­bung meines Heimat­dorfes. Wunder­schöne Kontraste entstehen zwischen ihnen und dem klaren blauen Himmel. Das ergibt immer wieder schöne Bilder. In dieser Aufnahme nutzte ich einen etwas erhöhten Standort, um den bereits leicht blühenden Baum etwas intimer mitten im Raps­feld zu fotografieren. 

At this sunset in winter the sun set without evening red. This was due to a band of clouds behind the horizon that blocked the light rays of the sun that should have colored the clouds over Malsch. Normally such a sunset red appears 15–20 minutes after sunset, but in this case the colo­ring was before sunset. Since I was in time on the spot, I could still catch this scene. The setting sun over the Upper Rhine Plain. Due to the haze in the atmo­sphere, it turned into a red fire­ball and so did the clouds, which is actually not a typical evening red, but still resulted in a beau­tiful scenery. 

A beau­tiful sunrise above the thin layer of fog. The sun peeks through the large bran­ches of a lone tree in the middle of a young field. Another shot that shows how beau­tiful our nature is. Even boring areas can create an epic moment in magical light. 

This photo could not have been planned, but when I was on my way to a spot that I wanted to photo­graph that morning, this image compo­si­tion lite­rally jumped into my eye. The condi­tions were ideal. The golden-colored clouds, the fog, the just-rising sun. Perfect how the diagonal formed by the illu­mi­nated clouds and the forest in the back­ground mirror and balance the image hori­zon­tally. The fog helped to sepa­rate the tree as a subject from the background. 

Towards the end of the winter 20/21 showed us in Kraichgau once again from its best side, with bright blue skies and suns­hine from morning to night, with free­zing cold but at least also with some snow, which has remained for several days. The combi­na­tion fit well to be able to take beau­tiful pictures of winter here at home. 

No sooner had autumn passed than the first frost arrived. An inver­sion weather condi­tion brought us fog in the nights during the first cold winter nights of the late year. Hoar­frost formed on the remai­ning leaves and bran­ches of the trees. In addi­tion, there was a little snow in some areas. This resulted in a beau­tiful wintry mood in nature, which I could record here on a beau­tiful morning at the edge of the forest. 

Inte­res­ting scenes resulted from a drop in tempe­ra­ture further below zero and nocturnal fog. This clash caused hoar­frost to form on the forests of my home­land. Deep into the woods, bran­ches, twigs and remai­ning leaves were covered by white frost. Beau­tiful winter land­scapes that had not seen a single snowflake. 

Bei der Aufnahme dieser Szene während Frost und Nebel kam mir sofort der Titel in den Sinn. Der große Baum im Vorder­grund wirkte auf mich, wie ein Vater der seine beiden Kinder, die beiden Bäume im Hinter­grund, ermahnt. 

A scene that you probably just walk past 99% of the time. But if you are looking for some­thing special in the bare winter forest, this young tree, elegantly dancing around the big trees, can catch your eye. That’s how it caught my eye and I was able to bring it into a beau­tiful compo­si­tion with a long focal length. The back­light and the prevai­ling fog in the forest natu­rally help this motif. It was exactly the weather condi­tion it needed. 

On this winter morning in February, there was dense fog espe­ci­ally in the some­what higher forests of my home region. So I set off to a place where I had been before in summer. There, in a larger clea­ring, I knew there were some inte­res­ting trees with a little more distance, which should help in finding a compo­si­tion for the picture. This tree with its peeling bark caught my eye imme­dia­tely. It was to become the eye-catcher in my picture. 

On my home hill stands this silver birch, which I hadn’t really noticed before. On this foggy morning, however, illu­mi­nated by the light of the sun, which came only hesi­tantly through the fog cover, it seemed to have a special charm. 

That morning I was walking along the path when I spotted this tree in the mist. Looking for a suitable compo­si­tion of the image, I disco­vered the traces of a tractor in the field. The lines lead into the picture towards the tree in the fog. 

They could hardly be more diffe­rent. And even in the low morning sun that gradu­ally fights its way through the fog cover, the autumnal foliage is illu­mi­nated in diffe­rent ways, which led to this special shot. 

When sun meets fog haze special light moods are created. If the sun’s rays are inter­rupted by trees, as in this picture, they suddenly become visible. 

In der Farben­lehre steht die Farbe gelb für Opti­mismus. Diese wunder­schöne Aufnahme zeigt die Spitzen einiger Bäume eines Waldes, der hinter einer wunder­schönen Inver­sion liegt. Das warme Seiten­licht der gerade aufge­henden Sonne verleiht dem Bild diese wunder­schöne warme Farbe und machen es zu einem schönen Mini­ma­lis­ti­schen Motiv. 

| Top 100 Natur­foto des Sommers 2023 | Dieses wunder­schöne Licht an einem Weizen­feld in der Nähe meiner Heimat konnte ich im Hoch­sommer an einem schönen Sommer­abend genießen. Das abend­liche, kontrast­arme Seiten­licht ließ das Feld im Vorder­grund wunderbar weich erscheinen. Das Motiv, der einsame Baum auf dem Feld, ist da fast schon Beiwerk. 

| Top 16 Natur­foto des herbstes 2022 | Die Karl­s­tal­schlucht in Rhein­land-Pfalz ist bei Wande­rern ein immer wieder beliebtes Ausflugs­ziel. Im Herbst lässt der Wald das Tal in wunder­schönen Herbst­farben leuchten. Vielen ist das Motiv des Pavil­lons in Mitten des Tals bekannt, aber auch einige Strom­schnellen des Bachs bieten sich an, als kleine Wasser­fälle foto­gra­fiert zu werden. 

In this photo I was able to capture a dreamy, beau­tiful light mood in the early morning in the Pala­ti­nate Forest in late summer. The bloo­ming erica plants, the rocks and the sun star of the morning sun toge­ther with the pine trees form a beau­tiful photo. 

Nach einigen Jahren war ich mal wieder in der Mehlinger Heide und habe wunder­bare Bedin­gungen vorge­funden. Vor Sonnen­auf­gang ein leichtes Morgenrot, dazu leichte Nebel­schleier und nach Sonnen­auf­gang eine Explo­sion des Lichtes. Ich habe in kürzester Zeit viele Aufnahmen gemacht, diese gefiel mir ganz besonders. 

The Mehlinger Heide is not quite as well known as its larger rela­tives, such as the Lüne­burg Heath, but even here great morning moods can be captured. Like on this day, when the sun and the misty haze was just right. 

It was quite special to see how the rising sun formed an extre­mely strong red glow in the fog of the heath as it rose above the horizon directly behind the fir tree. Secondly, the red glow became stronger when it was suddenly no longer visible. A moment that had to be caught. 

Another picture of my favo­rite trees in the heath. Looking at this picture with a little distance, I must say, the early rising, the hour journey and the wait in the cool summer night for the ideal condi­tions was worth it after all. A truly magical moment that we were able to experience. 

When photo­gra­phing on the heath in the morning, timing and condi­tions matter. The light gets brighter by the minute, the fog is in constant motion. It’s a matter of fixing the compo­si­tion as quickly as possible and waiting for the right moment. 

During the day, the heath land­scape looks more like a green desert. For a few weeks in summer, however, the peren­nials bloom and espe­ci­ally in the morning hours, when a veil of mist forms over the meadows, there can some­times be magical moments. 

This heath land­scape was a mili­tary trai­ning area a few years ago. Under the heavy equip­ment from the mili­tary, nature suffered parti­cu­larly. Years after the “decom­mis­sio­ning” nature rises with a beau­tiful heath land­scape, from which even the one or other young tree grows out in the meantime. 

Aufstehen um 4:30 im Sommer. Eine Stunde Auto­fahrt. 20 min laufen zum Spot. 40 min lang Motive und Bild­kom­po­si­tionen auspro­bieren und warten auf den Sonnen­auf­gang. Hat es sich gelohnt? Ich finde ja und ich würde es immer wieder tun. 

Auf der Suche nach einigen inter­es­santen Land­stri­chen für ein paar Land­schafts­auf­nahmen stoß ich an einem Stra­ßen­rand an Sardi­niens West­küste auf ein kleines Pini­en­wäld­chen. Schon bei der lang­samen Vorbei­fahrt fielen mir 2–3 Ideen, bzw. Kompo­si­tionen ins Auge. Am nächsten Morgen, machte ich mich noch vor Sonnen­auf­gang auf den Weg, um hier einige Aufnahmen zu machen. Eine meiner liebsten Aufnahmen ist diese hier, in der sich die Strahlen der Sonne doppelt an einem Baum brachen und gleich zwei Sonnen­sterne erzeugten.