Yeah, I took the plunge...

...and pre-ordered the Fujifilm X-T2. 

And used a 50% off for the battery grip, since I shoot a lot of portraits these days. Based on what I've been reading about people's experiences with the camera, it seems like it is undoubtedly better than the X-T1 which still is in most cases a great camera that I use for nearly everything these days. And the X-T1 won't get retired either, it'll be with me either as simply a backup or as a second body with another lens mounted for quick changes (probably the last).

Sure, it's not gonna be perfect, there are still flaws on it. I'm still annoyed about the 4K video for example. Just made it unnecessarily expensive. And just take a look at it. It's obviously a still camera for photographers, not a video camera for videographers. And there are other things as well that I'm not content with, but it's still gonna be better in several ways.

I have no idea of when it'll be arriving, officially in September, but who knows when it'll be here in Sweden. But it would be cool if it came in the beginning of September since I have a shoot with Sara Scarlet in September. Oh well, we'll see. I will get back on it when I've tried it out for a while.

LFCC

That stands for London Film and Comic Con, which I attended one and a half week ago. 

It was a pretty cool experience, since I've never been to one before, and there's an even bigger one apparently (Anna Quinn told me so) at the end of May, with more of everything, including cosplayers, so I guess I'll have to go for the last week of May next year instead of first week. 

 It was hard to get any decent shots of cosplayers, since there was crap backgrounds and other people everywhere, but here are a few shots anyways.  

London July/August 2016 Day 10

So, yesterday was my last full day in London for this visit. As usual it didn't turn out as planned (nothing never does). I had a run in the city, having a look at a couple of things in a few stores (didn't buy anything) and had some food. While I was about to get on the Piccadilly Line back to my hotel for a chill (and for resting my blistered feet), at Holborn, it started to rain. 

That rain kept on going for the rest of the afternoon and the whole evening, spoiling my plans of grabbing some shots of The Shard at its base (London Bridge Station) and some evening/night shots at the Isle of Dogs. At the same time, I could give my feet a rest and maybe I can walk the rest of the day while travelling back to Sweden. 

It's been a pretty good trip, not as productive as hoped for, since I didn't find myself getting any good street shots, but had three nice shoots with Beth, Chloe and Lauren. And it was nice to catch up a little with Anna Quinn again and also to meet Ben and the others while doing the street photographer meet up. 

So thanks London, see you soon.

 

London July/August 2016 Day 9

Yesterday I went to London Film and Comic Con, held at Olympia, London. 

Quite a lot of people, but heard that it had been packed on Saturday, so was glad that I went on Sunday instead. One of the reasons to go there was to have a look at what it was like, be able to shoot some cosplayers in costumes, and the other reason to go on Sunday was to catch up with Anna Quinn, the model I shot with in Copenhagen in the end of June. 

I met Anna and we chatted a little bit and she was dressed as HellBoy, and looked awesome. 

I saw quite a lot of cosplayers dressed up in different costumes, some that I recognised and some I didn't. And with quite a large difference in quality and time/money put into their costumes. it was fun though, but I was pretty tired after the visit. I will post some more photos here. Now here comes one of Anna/HellBoy. 

London July/August 2016 Day 8

Went on my last model shoot for this visit yesterday, with the lovely Lauren. 

This was the first time we shot together, but it went rather well and we might be able to do it again on my next visit which I don't know when it will be, maybe in the spring of 2017. 

Lauren is a nice and easy going person and I had a nice afternoon/evening and while two of our locations didn't work out pretty much because they were so overcrowded with people, it was still good. 

As with my other shoots, I'm gonna post process the shots while I'm back home, but here is one test shot though.

London July/August 2016 Day 7

Had an interesting model shoot with the lovely Chloe yesterday. It took us south of the Thames and to Nunhead Cemetery, one of the Magnificent Seven, cemeteries built in the 1830's-1840's. 

We were running a little bit late and when we got to Nunhead station, it started raining. Awesome. We didn't explore as much as we wanted both because of the weather even if it cleared up and stopped raining after a little while, but also that we were running a bit late. 

After that we went to the more multi cultural East London and to the wonderful part called Hackney. Hackney has been a bit gentrified as I've heard but while sitting on the overground train it looked kinda shit around the area and it hasn't got the best reputation. We were not shooting in the street, but at a rather nice hotel next to Hackney Central station. 

I got back my to hotel after midnight so it was a long day, but we got some nice shots. And here's a quick edit and preview of one of them.

London July/August 2016 Day 4-5-6

So been doing a little bit of this and little bit of that the last couple of days.. 

On day 5 I was supposed to have done a model shoot, but unfortunately my model had to cancel since she was covered in heat rashes. Did not look very nice, judging from the photos of her body that she sent me and I hope you'll get better soon. 

Yesterday I did do a model shoot with the lovely Beth Smith in Epping Forest. Very nice place and model and I had a good time  and will post process the photos when I'm back in Sweden. Here's just a test I did. 

And today I'm off to do another model shoot. 

London July/August 2016 Day 3

Third day in a really hot London.

Been to the Barbican Estate once before and it's really cool and I had to go there and have a second look.

After sweating for a few hours, stopping by at a steakhouse for a healthy pile of tasty meat, I got back to my hotel in the late afternoon, had a shower to cool off and thought that I should stretch out on the bed in the cool air of the A/C before going out to shoot some cityscapes in the blue hour. Big mistake. I fell asleep and missed all of that. Awesome...

London July/August 2016 Day 2

Yesterday I went on my first photography meet up with some local street photographers. We went for the interesting Shoreditch and Brick Lane area. Unfortunately it was a bit too crowded and I found it hard getting anything interesting at all and while back at my hotel looking at the shots, nearly all of them went in the bin since they were pure garbage. 

Though it was a nice experience and the social part was great, I think I prefer doing the actual street photography on my own. But I met some nice people and had some good conversations during the photo walk and when we were done with it, we ended up for a couple of hours at a pub called Hamilton Hall just outside of Liverpool Street station, for some more conversations and refreshments. 

I'd do another meet up with this group if I get the opportunity again while being in London (and having a free schedule), because it was nice meeting some new people with the same interest, and the actual photography bit is not really the main feature.

London July/August 2016 Day 1

Just a little update.

I arrived in a really hot London yesterday afternoon. After a nice shower and some chill-out time in the wonders of human engineering (A/C in my hotel room) I went to Piccadilly Circus, had some awesome food at Jamie Oliver's Diner and walked around in SoHo and around Piccadilly Circus before going back to the hotel for the night. 

On the schedule for today is a meet up with some local street photographers in Shoreditch/Brick Lane for some street shooting. And after that, we'll see. :) I just hope the temperature will fall a bit...

Btw, this guy was shouting like a lunatic, with his "Repent ye" sign. The religious ones are weird.

Analytics

This is interesting. 

Squarespace has got a built in tool called Analytics, it's also an app for my iPhone and iPad (there's probably one for Android too), that gives me statistics of how many search hits, visits and what content that is mostly watched/read. 

For quite a while, my blog post about The Angry Photographer has been the most popular thing and still is and up until a week ago things like my review of the Fujinon XF 90mm f/2 R LM WR has been on and off in second place together with my Seascapes or Portraits. But now, my new category Nudes has taken second place of most visited/watched content. 

I'm not surprised. 

Naked women are interesting. Naked women are beautiful. Most women in general are beautiful, naked or not. I'm new to this and I've only shot two women nude (sure I've maybe shot some intimate stuff with girlfriends, not intended for the public, lol) and they're both beautiful, so yeah, I'm not surprised that it's a popular content of my website. 

And that's cool. I'm not shooting nudes, well I'm not doing any type of photography (nudes are not my main thing) for anyone else than myself OR the one I'm shooting, BUT if other people find it interesting, beautiful, not so beautiful or whatever, that's cool. If not, I wouldn't even have this website and I wouldn't post any photographs here. 

And when it comes to nude photography, again it's not my main thing, but I like it and I do want to shoot more. And no, it's not for perving on beautiful naked women, it's for the art and photography perspective. And I know, I'm not the best photographer, but I'm very serious about this and I want to always get better.
And I think I've written about this before, but I like the contrasts between nature's shapes and colours and the female form and skin tones. Or for the contrasts between abandoned structures and the female form and skin tones. I have quite a few ideas, and I'd like to experiment with different techniques. Am I the only one? Definitely not, lots of others do this, but I want to do it myself, my way. Do I have a certain style yet? No, I don't think so, since I've just started doing this, but hopefully I can develop one with time. The hardest bit is to find models and good locations to shoot, but hopefully I can expand this part of my photography much further.

Canon EOS 5D MkIII w/ Lensbaby Composer Pro + Lensbaby Pinhole/Zoneplate optics

Thoughts about the new Fujifilm X-T2

So the successor to Fujifilm's X-T1 was officially announced on the 7th of July, and here are some thoughts about some of the specs.

Again, these are thoughts about what I’ve read about the X-T2. I'm not an official X-photographer so I haven't been able to test it. In a way this camera is a bit exciting, in another it’s kinda meh, but still it’s the most exciting news this year from Fujifilm, since the X-PRO2 was and still is a totally uninteresting camera for me. 

So, let's go. 

  • 24,3 MP X-Trans CMOS III sensor. This is good and no surprise. It's supposed to be quite a bit improved, not only does it have 50% more pixels, but dynamic range is supposed to be even better.

  • X Processor Pro which handles operation, that will fasten things up and make it feel quicker. And with a new autofocus system with up to 325 autofocus points and about 40% of the imaging area has phase detection points. This leads to 8 fps with mechanical and 14 fps with electronic shutter in normal mode and 11 fps with mechanical shutter in boost mode with the new battery grip. Also pretty good news, but I’ll see if it’s actually any good when the camera actually is on the market. Don't know how useful that 14 fps with an electronic shutter, since I guess it's meant for moving targets and I don't know if they have worked around the rolling shutter problem with moving targets. I guess it'll get noticed when people are able to buy it.

  • They put that little joystick the came on the X-PRO2 on it as well. Not a surprise either, but it's good and will probably make moving and selecting autofocus point easier and faster. Something that I've been missing from my Canon DSLRs

  • New EVF, 2.36 million dot OLED, with a refresh rate of 60 fps in normal mode and 100 fps in boost mode. This is also really nice and will make the already excellent EVF even better. 

  • ISO, well I have to see it for myself. It’s supposed to be improved since the ISO capabilities of the X-T1 left a lot to wish for, but maybe it’s better now. 

  • Flash capabilities is supposed to have been improved and that’s good. Not sure how much though. High Speed Sync for example? Don't think it has it.

  • It’s a little bit bigger than the X-T1. Is that good or bad? Both I guess. It depends. Since I’m currently shooting mostly portraits I’ll buy the battery grip as well because of the extra shutter button and other controls. The availability to use more than onebattery (3 at the same time) is also good, though it’ll make it heavier. 

So, that's mostly pretty good things, and there are more specs, but read about them somewhere else, these were things that I felt like commenting on and these are positive things. Now to one major disappointment. 

  • 4K video? WTF Fujifilm!?! Why? If people wants to shoot video, buy a fucking video camera! This was rather disappointing, but still I’m not surprised. But it sucks. Fujifilm should have ditched video capabilities all together and just concentrated on making this an even better still camera, (since there are still things that needed to be improved on this release), not a fucking camcorder! A big minus in my book. 4K video just made it a lot more expensive. It's about 50% more expensive than the X-T1 was/is. That's a major raise in price. Yes, I can afford anyways, but still, others might be struggling. 

But still I'm gonna buy this camera. Of course I am. But I’m gonna try and keep it cool until the problems that all first batches of cameras have, are gone. I’m not even sure when it will be available in stores...

ADOBE

I've been writing about some problems with Adobe Creative Cloud app and Lightroom before. 

Today I thought I should try and remove the app, and re-install it. That fucked everything up. I tried to use Creative Cloud uninstaller and then also Adobe's Cleaner Tool and remove everything. Did not work that well and while trying to install the Creative Cloud app it did not work at all. 

The positive thing was actually Adobe's customer support. I used their chat and a nice guy took control over my iMac (as I've read other people been forced to). Never a good feeling getting someone else to control your computer, but it worked out very well, both Lightroom and Photoshop are up and running again and it's all good. 

The thing is that I'm still running OS X 10.10.5 Yosemite, and the latest version of the Creative Cloud app only supports OS X 10.11 El Capitan, which it doesn't say or warn you about and since the app automatically tries to update itself = fail. My MacBook Pro came with El Capitan installed and it works flawlessly with with Lightroom/Photoshop. But I haven't upgraded to El Capitan on my iMac, since I also do music on this computer and both my DAW and my audio interface has only recently been totally fine with El Capitan, when it comes to compatabillity and bugs and shit. But I guess that I have to, since it's probably gonna be problems down the road with Adobe, but this time I'm really impressed by their customer support. Hats off. 

NSFW and some stuff that has happened lately

I'm thinking about separating my portraits and the nude stuff that I have shot and that I am going to shoot in the future.

On Thursday the 23rd I went to Copenhagen to shoot U.K. model Anna Quinn and she was amazing. A super pro model, crazy beautiful and such a sweetheart. I had a great time, and I think she had one too and we had some nice conversations while walking around Christianshavn and shooting. It was awesome and I hope I can catch up with her in London in a few weeks, since we talked about doing that. Her photos are already in my portrait section. Hopefully I'll be able to shoot with Anna again when I return to London not this, but next time in May 2017.

And I am starting to see the light in the tunnel when it comes to editing shots from last weekend. I shot with a Copenhagen based model called Diviana. Also a super awesome model and I think the least shy person I have ever met. We shot in Jægersborg Dyrehave in Klampenborg, just outside of Copenhagen, Denmark on Saturday the 25th. It was a really nice shoot, and Diviana is also really good at what she's doing, beautiful and such a nice person as well. And she was walking around completely naked most of the time and seemed super relaxed about it, which made me feel relaxed as well since I'm not very used to shoot nudes yet, but it was awesome. But it resulted in an crazy amount of photos and I've been working on them every night after work this passed week and all day today and I'll probably have half a day tomorrow as well before I'm done. And we've already talked about shooting together again, and I have a few ideas of expanding what we've already shot and also on some other stuff.

But based on the amount of nude shots I got from this shoot and since I plan on posting quite a few of them, and also since I've got a few nudes from before has made me think that I should separate them into a gallery of their own. 

So, maybe tomorrow night or early in next week, I'll be posting these new nude shots in a completely new gallery, probably just named NSFW.

Model shoots, regular work, and some nudes...

Yes I know, I'm really bad at updating sometimes. But regular boring life and work comes in the way of doing photography sometimes. But I've done a couple of model shoots since last blog update. 

I'm up to my third with the bubbly, lovely Susan and a new one with gorgeous Hanna, which included a few nudes which was fun (but damn those mosquitos). Photos from these three shoots are in my portraits section. 

And tomorrow I'm going to Copenhagen and I'm going to do a shoot with a U.K. model named Anna Quinn, which is going to be fun. And I'm going back to Denmark on Saturday to do a mostly nude shoot with a model called Diviana, which is also going to be fun. 

These will probably be up in my portraits section by the end of the weekend.

New model shoot

Had the pleasure of meeting a nice, bubbly and gorgeous woman this Sunday by the name of Susan. We met for a "fika" (as we say in Sweden, which pretty much means a cup of coffee), chatted for a while and then had a test shoot in the small city of Helsingborg. 

Susan hadn't been photographed "seriously" before, but I find her to be very natural, fun and easy to work with even if she wasn't experienced as a model. I think it went really well and I'm definitely gonna shoot with her again, next time with more of a theme of some sort. 

For now, I've put some shots in my portraits section. 

London May 2016 Pt. 1

So I haven't posted any shots from London until now (except for model shots in my portraits section). As I've mentioned earlier I wasn't super inspired which is weird in a way, since this is my favourite city. But it might be because I had a cold and was annoyingly tired a lot of the time in between my model shoots.

Anyhow, I'll start with a few black and white shots of the city. Nothing new, nothing revolutionary, no new viewpoints really or anything, but oh well, that's the way it is sometimes. All shot with the Fujifilm X-T1 and Fujinon XF 14mm f/2.8 R combination, except for one, with the Fujinon XF 56mm f/1.2 R instead.

Thoughts about nude photography

I should actually call this post "Thoughts about nude photography and a few words of appreciation for my friend and muse". 
Nude photography is something I haven't been thinking about much earlier on in my "photography career" (LOL), though I have been thinking about it more for the last few months. Haha, no, not obssessively, but still something that I've been thinking more of since photography is a passion of mine and I think about it all the time and of different ways of doing it and expanding it.

It kinda started when the subject popped up while out with my beautiful friend and model Hanna, some months ago. Since I haven't been doing that much portrait photography at all earlier, except for a few times now and then I haven't really been giving it that much of a thought at all, mainly because I never thought I was really gonna get into shooting portraits and models. But after I started shooting on a regular basis with Hanna, I've been thinking about it more. In general she has been a real boost for my confidence as a photographer and I've learnt a lot together with her. And while I find it awesome fun to shoot with others (and once again, a lot of the confidence to reach out and really start looking for others to shoot with, has been given to me by and while working with Hanna) the projects and ideas that we have come up with together and yet have to try out and complete, are really special to me. And I have to say that I consider her being my creative "soulmate" and muse who inspires me the most. And no, I haven't told her all of this.

Anyways, when it comes to nude photography, you can find so many GWC (a term I heard from Lucifera who I shot with in London) Guy With Camera, someone who has a camera as an excuse to be in a room for example, with a (more or less) naked woman. And that makes it harder I guess for others who are genuinely interested in doing photography for the reason of doing photography and to try to create beautiful images in the process, to be taken seriously. And there are also other real assholes posing as photographers out there. Sexually abusive and just plain disgusting ones. Which also makes it harder at least to some degree to find "partners in crime" to work with, since I'd think that many female models are suspicious, which they rightfully should be.

But I've been thinking about it and I've been discussing on and off with Hanna about the subject of nude photography the last few months, and it's been quite interesting since I've learned even more about myself and of what I really want to do and what I definitely don't want to do when it comes to nude photography. 

I don't want to take glamour styled shots. I really dislike that type of shots. And I don't want to shoot (as we say in Sweden) "Slitz-bilder", think FHM Magazine styled photos, I really dislike them too and they are basically glamour styled shots. Many of these type of photos are with models that are photoshopped into oblivion and I really hate that.
And I don't want to shoot anything that could in any way be seen as pornographic. Fetish stuff I'm not sure about. Some of the clothes that are usually used can look really cool but I don't really want to take erotic type of shots either, so I don't think it's for me. Boudoir styled photos does appeal to me, since it's mostly implied nude and if really nude, it's usually done quite tastefully and often used with shallow DOF, which I am a very huge fan of using. 
And I don't want to shoot "open leg" (I was even unaware of that term until I joined this model/photography networking site called PurplePort a few weeks ago) photos, just because seriously? I have to say this, I am not prude in any way and nothing really shocks me when it comes to sex, and I don't hate porn. Am I a huge fan, not really, but porn is there for a reason and it's a huge market (and for example has been pushing internet technology forward which helps us all). It's got its up and downsides for people involved in it and I understand the type of photos and obviously movies involved in this. I don't believe that people are continuously used in that industry, it probably happens, yes, but I also think that many people in that industry is in it because well, they like sex, they might be exhibitionists and they like the way in which they can make a living out of it and I have no problem with that. And in porn, I can understand the "open leg" shots, with the more or less close ups of vaginas for example, since it's porn and it is what it is, jerk off material.
But do I want to see it in regular (what ever that is?) photography? No I don't. And I'm a dude and I love vaginas, and I think they are absolutely beautiful but do I want to take "open leg" close ups of vaginas and post them for all the world to see? No. Fuck no! 

So with this, am I saying I would never take a photo that might show a vagina in some way? No, definitely not that either. It could look absolutely beautiful if it's done in the right way. I love women's bodies and it's a part of it. And it might be just seeing a small hint of it being there and then nothing more maybe, it's so hard to tell, I think you have to "feel" as when you're actually doing the shoot I guess, if or not what to include (as long as everyone is in on it being either way). And I love the idea of implied nudes, where you might see a lot of skin (or not so much), but not really "everything". And I like the idea of when you see some and then leave the rest for your imagination. And I don't want to take any nudes just to show someone off just for the sake of nudity, because I don't want to objectify someone. I want to do nudes for specific ideas, for when it can look absolutely stunning (I love the combination of skin tones and greens, like moss and grass in forests for example, it might be romanticised but I really like it), as can it do while being in black and white, but basically, nudes for when it can render beautiful photographs. And as long as the one I'm shooting with is comfortable with it, which is the most important thing. And which goes for who ever it is in the future that I have in front of my camera in what ever situation it is. It is supposed to be fun, and not be weird.

And I tried doing a little bit of half nude yesterday and it didn't feel weird, which before I was afraid that it would. But no, it was just fun and I think it rendered some really awesome photos (which can be found in my portraits section). 

So I feel blessed (I hate that word since I'm so far from religious anyone can be, but for lack of a better English word) to have someone that I know, trust and feel comfortable being around and being able to explore this type of photography together with, and who I'm pretty sure feel the same way about doing this together with me. So thank you, you are truly a real treasure. 

Portrait updates

No updates on this blog for more than a week. 

Well, I've been sick since I came back from London. And I've been editing a lot of photos for my models and yesterday I was out shooting with Hanna. 

My London trip I can sum up with this. It was great in some ways and a bit of a let down in others. I shot three very different, but all very professional and super nice women which was a great experience. Some of it came out really good I believe, some of it didn't turn out as well as I hoped, mostly because of myself. But still, it was great and I had a great time meeting, shooting and talking with these three women. 

Then my street photography, well, I didn't feel that inspired when I was actually there. It's weird, since it's an awesome place to shoot, but still. I have started to go through these photos and I will start posting them here in my blog (maybe a couple in my cityscapes) within a couple of days, I believe. 

So if you haven't, head over to my Portraits section and have a look. First many photos from my shoot yesterday with Hanna and then my three models from London. Enjoy.