2013 was a crazy year in many ways. Apart from setting up a new business and founding NIKOLAIKIKI with everything involved, creating the website, developing the clothing collection, collaborating with Berlin fashion agency Common Works and cloth merchant Lebenskleidung, travelling to Turkey to document the organic and fairtrade production, promoting NIKOLAIKIKI in Germany and other countries, doing commissioned works like company portraits, weddings and shooting the Olympus OM-D, doing a dedicated 10 weeks trip only focussing on photography, I was taking a lot of photos in the first place.

 

I especially did a portrait project in Cambodia for a planned exhibition and accompaning book in spring 2014. A lot of the images below are from my autumn trip through the East. Of the 25.000 images I took in 2013 12.000 originated from the trip. I took three cameras with me, shooting mostly with a Canon 5D. My most used lens was a 50 1.2, followed by the 16-35 II. I used the 70-200 4 IS only for some landscape shots and almost never used my 35 1.4, I found the 50 much more useful on this trip. It's also my most used lens for weddings.

 

The following 100 images are my personal favorites from 2013. I didn't choose any of the calender images, because you know them already. I couldn't help to include the monk from Myanmar, though, I simply love it.

 

Check them out (I included personal notes for every image) ...

 

2013 started with celebrating New Year's with family and friends in Berlin

 

This is the old Kaufhaus Jandorf on the other side of our road looked through my Canon 50 1.2. I bought this lens especially for the autumn trip, but as I had to rent it every time for a wedding I thought it was the right time to invest in this beautiful optics.

 

I love to capture crazy patterns, this image is from Zurich airport

 

I love the North Sea, that's where I grew up. The above image is in the harbour of Hooksiel, this one is my mother with the cat Blacky on a friend's property in Friesland

 

Harbour Cologne

 

Depeche Mode venue at Kaufhaus Jahndorf, Room of a friend in Hamburg

 

Arendt at Bobby Reich at the Hamburg Alster

 

Building in London, with Henning in the dome of the Reichstag

 

Festival of Cultures in Berlin

 

These two are from a trip to Lago Maggiore with the Olympus OM-D

 

Berlin Street Art

 

I really like this one, it's a quality control of the GOTS production with Common Works and Lebenskleidung in Izmir, Turkey

 

I really loved the project Stadtlabor Weinbergspark against gentrification

 

I was shooting the Olympus OM-D in London, these guys are two of my best friends from New Zealand

 

A friend from Switzerland visited us in Berlin and we had this delicious olives in Mitte

 

A different perspective

 

I was invited to Biennale Arte in Venice this time, the above is an artwork with spices

 

Decayed sunflowers lit by a fire

 

I liked to attend this wedding as a friend

 

Party in late summer

 

Artwork from Art Basel

 

Audience at Mauerpark karaoke

 

Die Bäume at King Kong Klub Berlin

 

Crazy sky out of my window

 

SEA + AIR at Freifeld Festival, Oldenburg

 

Squirrel in Warsaw

 

Old men playing chess in Kiev

 

Kiev underground

 

Moscow is crazy, some musicians in the streets and impressive buildings in black & white

 

St. Basil

 

People in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, on a market and kids on a bench

 

The Kyrgyz were really cool and they liked to be photographed, as those women in a car. Women wear headscarfes when they are married.

 

Animal market, Karakol, Kyrgyzstan

 

Children on the way to school in Tasma, Kyrgyzstan

 

Three men on a carriage, love this

 

Our host mother in Tasma

 

Those kids were incredibly cute, we couldn't get the little one with the yellow sweater to smile :-)

 

Kyrgyz landscapes were pretty amazing

 

Approaching crazy Beijing

 

Beijing resident

 

Ancient cities in China

 

... and their residents, look at the ham right above!

 

Guards in a park, China

 

Cutest twins

 

Different ethnic people in Shanghai

 

Gorgeous Guilin, China

 

Crazy Hongkong, The Peak and bamboo scaffolding

 

In Singapore I liked Little India and the Muslim quarter

 

Man kicking a coconut, great

 

A mirror artwork at Singapore Biennale

 

Angkor is incredible, many people seem to find that as well

 

I have to thank my travel partner Carmen who shot a lot of images, too. The tropical flower above and our friend Chamroeun were shot by Carmen

 

My project in Cambodia involved a lot of handicapped people who lost arms or legs due to landmines

 

This is one of my favorites from Cambodia, it's a young woman with her son in a hospital

 

I interviewed an Apsara techer and photographed her students

 

Oops, tried grilled tarantulas for dinner in Phnom Penh

 

Soldiers on Cambodian National holiday

 

I tried to capture the Khmer smile, I'm confident I succeeded

 

I love this Khmer style, covering every part of the body

 

One of my most loved places in Thailand, secret

 

The most impressive pagoda in Myanmar, the Shwedagon in Yangon

 

The banana shop, Yangon

 

This is one of my favorite pictures from Myanmar, a woman in her kitchen on the countryside in central Myanmar

 

The Burmese are fun and you can see that

 

Incredible landscapes in Myanmar as well

 

My best action shot this year and the most beautiful woman 2013 in my mind

 

The Burmese go by bus and they are packed like sardine cans

 

Crazy trees in central Myanmar

 

We've been invited to a Burmese wedding on the countryside

 

July preparing dinner on the countryside

 

Monastery with monk in morning mist

 

Father and son on the way to the fields and woman with typical Burmese headscarf

 

Inle Lake

 

Young monks in the morning and people in Bagan, early evening

 

Mandalay hill after sunset

 

On my last day in Myanmar we were driving around with a motorbike, I took photos from the backseat, this snap of a melon vendor is one of my favorites

 

I flew back from Bangkok with a Boeing 787 via Stockholm and could capture the sunset over Sweden in this special shot

 

You don't need to travel far to see great sunsets, this is my favorite of 2013 in Wilhelmshaven, Germany

 

Last one is my personal favorite, a monk in Amarapura, Mandalay region, Myanmar (thanks, Neill, for telling me!)

 

Phew, this was 2013. I'm really looking forward to next year, I'm pretty sure it'll be awesome as well with lots of new things coming up.

 

All the best to all of you, a happy 2014 and thanks a lot for supporting NIKOLAIKIKI, I'm very happy to do what I do!

 

See you next year!

 

KIKI