About

Hi! I am Martijn Smeets, a Dutch photographer living in Helsinki, Finland, with my partner Lieske and our amazing Alaskan husky Ala.

Thank you for visiting this little place where I share the images, experiences and stories that have stayed with me over the years. But first, let me tell you a little about myself, my life and the background to my photography.

Go North!

As a photographer and adventurer, I have always been inspired by the scale and pure beauty of the Arctic and Nordic regions. It’s a world that lends itself to adventure and exploration. Many of my images were taken during such adventures in the North, whether sailing or on a dog-sledding expedition. Over the years, my focus on the North became so pronounced that it turned into a personal mantra: Go North!

Photography and the outdoors

I’ve always been drawn to landscapes and weather. Many of my childhood memories are linked to nature and the outdoors. On family holidays, I could happily spend hours watching the landscape pass by through the car window. I’m still the one pointing out things along the way, even if my travel companions don’t always share my enthusiasm.

Photography fits naturally into that curiosity. People occasionally joke that I only see nature through a lens, but I feel it actually makes me notice more. I’m looking at the wider landscape, then at small details, colors or something happening in the distance. Thinking about what might make a photograph keeps me interested in all those different things, even when I’ve left the camera at home.

My commissioned photography mostly involves weddings and portraits, whereas my personal work focuses mainly on nature, travel and documentary photography. I enjoy the technical and creative challenges of working with studio lighting, finding a composition that works or finding a way to tell a story through a series of photographs. Throughout all my work behind the camera, outdoor photography has been the most consistent part. It increasingly overlaps with the way I like to spend my time: hiking, canoeing, bikepacking and venturing out on longer expeditions. Whatever the discipline or subject, I prefer a documentary approach: working with what’s there rather than scripting individual images or entire series.

I tend to get the most satisfaction from photographs that have taken some effort to make. That might involve carrying a camera for several days through the wilderness, preparing for a demanding trip or figuring out a complicated lighting setup. I enjoy working through those challenges and eventually getting to a result I’m happy with. In that regard, I value the process of making photographs much more than showcasing the end result.

Showcasing the experience

One of the most meaningful comments I’ve ever received came around 2003, after I published some forest photographs on my first, very basic website. A friend told me that when he looked at them, he could smell the forest. This comment gave me the confidence and drive to keep creating and find my own style. It made me realize how much a photograph could convey. That’s something I continue to look for in my work. I’d like people to get a sense of what it was like to be there, whether that’s the atmosphere of a landscape or the experience of taking part in an expedition.

This was quite different from what first interested me about photography. As a child, I was fascinated by the mechanics of my father’s old Yashica. I would play with the camera without film in it, trying to understand the shutter, the diaphragm and how light traveled through a lens to reach the film. The creative side developed later. 

Photographing a rusty car wreck in a canal in Fréjus is one early memory of enjoying the search for angles and color combinations. Neither those pictures nor the forest photographs would be highlights of my portfolio now, but they were important in getting me interested in what I could do with a camera.

Today, I use editing to bring an image closer to how a place appeared and felt to me. Framing, viewpoint and shutter speed already influence how a scene is shown, and I see editing as part of that process. I try to keep it restrained, using Lightroom to work on color, contrast and atmosphere. I don’t replace skies or create composite scenes. What was there gives me plenty to work with.

Journeys and stories

Although I enjoy crafting individual images, I often find myself thinking in series. Once I have a few photographs of a place or experience, I start looking for what could add to them. Exploring different perspectives or aspects of a subject deepens the story and adds to my own experience of working on it.

The series I made at the Fagradalsfjall volcano in Iceland in 2021 is a good example. Traveling during COVID was complicated, especially as we were also moving to Latvia at the time. After several days in quarantine, I spent a week repeatedly returning to the volcano. Having that time to explore different perspectives made the resulting series much more satisfying than a short visit would have been.

In recent years, dog sledding has become a surprisingly big part of my photography. My first expedition with Bardu Huskylodge (Ursa Minor Adventures) was their Dividal expedition in 2020. I enjoyed it so much that I kept returning year after year. Documenting these expeditions also became a particular passion, and suddenly I found myself in the niche of ‘dog-sledding photography’.

Running to the Sea, the book about the 25-day expedition from Bardu Huskylodge to Vardø in 2024, is the photographic work I’m most proud of so far. It brings together a demanding adventure, months of preparation and a very personal photographic account.

Books, and a little about life

If you’ve made it this far, thank you for taking the time to read rather than just scroll past. The pace at which we consume information online is something I struggle with, both personally and when sharing my photography. As mentioned earlier, I enjoy the process of creating photographs. Sharing my work, however, comes less naturally. I get frustrated with meme-culture, the repetition on social media and how quickly images (or anything, really) are consumed. I’d like my photography to receive attention, of course, but I’m reluctant to adapt it to that pace. That’s why I’m a little bit on and off platforms like Instagram, and why some finished photographs remain in my archive for quite a while before anyone sees them.

I particularly enjoy bringing a series together in a book. Selecting the images and working toward a finished result is a large part of the pleasure for me. A book also gives someone the chance to sit down and spend time with the photographs, without any distractions. It’s a welcome contrast to the online world.

Photography is my part-time business alongside consultancy work in business transformation and enterprise architecture at Bvolve. I enjoy having different interests in life and wouldn’t be particularly happy focusing on just one. Sport has always been important too, first as a competitive swimmer at national level in the Netherlands and now mainly as a road and gravel cyclist for the Stanga Racing team in Finland.

Rotterdam remains our home in the Netherlands. Lieske’s work for the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs took us to Riga from 2021 to 2024, followed by Helsinki. Living in Helsinki gives us plenty of opportunities to explore the North together with Ala, whom we adopted from Bardu Huskylodge. We often travel in Oscar, the Mercedes Sprinter I converted to accommodate our outdoor plans, bikes and photography equipment.

You’ll find some of those journeys here, in photographs, books and stories. Thanks for taking the time to have a look around. It really means a lot.

All the best,
Martijn

Go North!