Maikel Boonstra

Afbeelding
Ervaringsverhaald-CVDS-Maikel-Boonstra
“This master's programme appealed to me because Computer Vision & Data Science has become so big in a short time”
Maikel Boonstra
Master Computer Vision & Data Science Student

After graduating as a maritime officer, Maikel Boonstra (25) decided it was time for a career switch. Although he'd enjoyed maritime school, he didn't want to spend all his time at sea. With his bachelor's degree in the hand, he was easily able to sign up for the Master's in Computer Vision & Data Science.

"I worked at a shipyard for two years after finishing my bachelor's, so that gave me time to consider a follow-up study. I knew it had to be something in mathematics or data engineering, as I had always been interested in mathematics and coding. I checked out the open days at NHL Stenden and ended up with this master. Computer vision & data science is a fairly new subject that's become big in a short time and that's exactly why it appealed to me. There's still so much to discover." 

"I got my coding and maths skills up to par before the master's started"  

Assignment for Province of Fryslân 

"The great thing about the master's is that you don't just learn through lectures and tests, but by working on existing problems, in large projects for real clients, putting everything you know into practice. You work with the researchers from the professorship, with other master's students ,and sometimes you also supervise minor students. For one of the projects, I investigated a method for detecting bicycle helmets in traffic using multiple cameras. It was an assignment for  the Province of Fryslân after they'd run a campaign subsidising the purchase of bicycle helmets. They wanted to find out if more people were now wearing helmets. We've now developed the software, all we need to do now is collect the results. We'll present our technology and wants to analyse whether people are wearing them more now. The software has been developed, so now we can collect the results - and we'll present our technology at the end of the year at the Technology & Innovation Conference."  

"A maritime degree is not the ideal background, so I knew it would be a tough year"  

Less than ideal background 

"A maritime degree is not the ideal background, so I knew it would be a tough year. I picked up coding as a hobby, and I'd already done a minor subject as Electro Technical Officer minor, where you learn programming to control systems and engines. But this master's required much more than that. So, I got my coding and maths skills up to par before the degree started. Even now during the master's, I spend quite a lot of time on it, because I still have to figure things out. from scratch. But that's what I'd expected and I think it's manageable." 

"The nice thing about the master's is that you learn by working on existing problems"  

Machine learning in maritime engineering 

"After the master's, I want to work as an AI engineer, preferably in computer vision. Ultimately, that suits me better than marine work. But machine learning is also used in maritime navigation, for example in port security, ship monitoring or for recognising rust in underwater images. It would be really nice if I could combine both studies." 

"The nice thing about the master's is that you learn by working on existing problems"