The Enchanted Rhododendron Forest

Albert Dros
5 hours ago
3 min read

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.

Another thing worth mentioning is the sunstar of the Mavic 4. Honestly, it is quite impressive in these photos. The sunstar looks beautiful in all of them, even at more open apertures like f/2.8.

To switch things up in between I used my Sony A1II with 100mm f/2.8 Macro to photograph the atmosphere from up close. The opening flowers from the sunlight, and the bees (there were so many) flying around!

Of course, I also shot some video:

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.

Gear used:

- DJI Mavic 4 Pro for all the wide angle drone shots

- Sony A1 II with the Sony 100mm f/2.8 Macro GM for the close ups

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