The Enchanted Rhododendron Forest

A place just 15 minutes by car from my home. I have been coming here for many years, but this year I decided to try something different. Because these plants grow so tall, I had the idea of going up just a little higher with my drone to find new perspectives. I started with a practice session in decent light and managed to find some nice compositions, but most importantly, I got a good feel for how close I could get to the flowers and scouted out different angles.

A couple of days later the light was simply excellent, so I tried again. Going up a bit higher opened up so many new possibilities with the light. I could frame exactly against the sun while it was just barely catching the edges of the trees. The result was beautiful light rays bursting through the forest, with a sea of rhododendrons in the foreground.

For some shots I had to switch off all the sensors to get even a little closer to the trees and the flowers themselves. With very careful flying, I managed to make all of these compositions. On a few of them I narrowed the aperture to f/8 and chose a slightly higher ISO to keep a good shutter speed, since the flowers would move a little in the wind from the drone. Also, some shots required taking a panorama or focus stacking. 

All of these shots were taken very early in the morning, between 5 and 6 AM. No one else was around in the forest. I felt a little bad for disturbing such a beautiful, peaceful morning with the sound of my drone, but luckily it was just me.

See the full series below. All photos were shot over a period of two weeks in the late spring of 2026.