Eddie Horstman

With their wide range of paper Ilford has given me wonderful opportunities for transforming my creations from digital into an analogue form. ILFORD Galerie Smooth Pearl Prestige is one of my favorite paper types because of its beautiful colour gradations and amazing pearl glow.

Eddie Horstman was born in 1969 in The Hague, the Netherlands. He currently lives in Zoetermeer.

Eddie graduated from the graphic design school of Rotterdam and took several additional courses to educate himself on a variety of professional graphical applications.

In addition to his extended graphical insight, he is also known for his interest and knowledge in the area of hardware and software applications. Eddie enjoys sharing this knowledge with others by publishing articles on a regular basis. Among others he published reviews on products of Apple, Epson, Wacom and Adobe. These suppliers have grown to appreciate his articles and have become quite interested in having their products tested and reviewed.

From a young age, Eddie became interested in photography and graphical design. Old commercial brochures, photographs and album art inspired his love for graphics. Cars were also a significant contributing factor to Eddie’s enthusiasm. The unique design and characteristic lines of some old car designs were especially fascinating to him. Later he expanded his area of interest towards old buildings and city views.

Eventually this all resulted in Eddie picking up the camera to start taking pictures for himself. It is no surprise that old-timers (which he normally photographs in the street) and capturing old locations in cities, have become his favourite themes.

“It is just remarkable how many beautiful old-timers can still be spotted in traffic and parked in the streets nowadays, but you really need to pay attention to it. To be able to transform the picture into a High Dynamic Range image later I have a standard practice to use the bracket function while photographing old-timers.”

Nostalgia is a recurring theme in his work, perhaps even one of its main stylistic features. He searches for topics or situations that reflect timelessness or visualize a bridge to the past. These elements are then enlarged or highlighted. It is for this reason that it often seems as if time has stood still in his work.

“I am fascinated by things that remain as time goes on. Especially in my photos of cityscapes I want to give the impression that the picture was taken in the mid-twentieth century. So modern elements will not be easily found in my pictures. ”

The work of Eddie Horstman is not only characterized through its themes, but also by the finish of the end product, to which he devotes a lot of attention. Not only the mastery of the techniques but also his creative insight are reflected in his work.

“Composition, sharpness, colours and the small details are decisive in my work; I can therefore long delve into the picture to realize exactly what I have in mind. I do not use a studio so I am not able to retake the picture if this would be preferable. Therefore, I take pictures from multiple positions and angles if possible and I always use a tripod. To achieve the desired end result I rely on my technical tools. For me that’s Photoshop and my Wacom tablet. ”

A common technique used by Eddie in making his pictures is the High Dynamic Range (or HDR). With this technique it is possible to get maximum results even with poor lighting conditions. The technique also provides increased photo detailing. Through his years of experience with HDR, he has become a real expert in this area.

A Fine Art Print provides a much different impression as a digital image. Also in this area he puts a lot of time and effort in working on getting the best results. For printing his work he uses ILFORD photo paper.

In recent years the work of Eddie Horstman has not gone unnoticed. Broader audiences increasingly recognize his work and some of his works have been published.