Freezing cold

Yesterday I wanted to catch some freezing mood in the picture. First, I just thought to take some ordinary shots and afterwards play with the whitebalance to get blueish feeling, but then Jenni came up with an idea of putting some white lip balm to her lips, spraying some water on her face and wearing her swim cap.





I used two flashes - one to light the background wall (1/4 power) and the other with reflecting umbrella on camera left.



I always shoot RAW files or RAW+JPEG so I can better adjust the lighting and white balance afterwards is I have to. In these shots the normal daylight WB was about 5200k, so I tweaked the WB to around 3500k to get this blueish freezing mood.

Self-portrait

I didn´t had anything special to do yesterday, so I decided to do some "studio" shooting in my living room or actually in front of the living room wall. A couple of days ago I received remote slave, which I had ordered from the internet before. I recommend Deal Extreme if you want to buy some cheap gadgets from the internet. They have all kinds of stuff on sale and the best thing is that they are offering FREE SHIPPING for all the purchases to all over the world! I think thats quite amazing.

So, I wanted to test my new remote slave and utilize also my second Vivitar 285hv speedlight. I was home alone so I had to do also the modeling side of the photosession. I adjusted the camera to tripod and triggered the camera with my remote control.

Strobist info: Vivitar 285hv speedlight (full power) camera left with reflecting umbrella. Another Vivitar 285hv (1/4 power) behind, left side of the model lightning the wall.

Toned in Photoshop.

20th Terwahölkkä and marathon 24.5.2008 in Oulu, Finland

Yesterday I was out and shooting in 20th Terwahölkkä and marathon here in Oulu. The races (marathon 42.2km, 1/2 marathon 21.1km and 1/4 marathon 10.34km) started from near by hotel Eden. The weather was sunny, but not too warm, so I think it was ideal for the runners.

My girlfriend bought me new camerabag - Lowepro fastpack 350 for a graduation present. I packed my camera gear in the backpack and was ready for shooting. During 3 hours time I started shooting at noon from the hotel Eden area and rode with my bicycle along the marathon route and shot over 200 frames. Here are some shots:




First runners (Marathon and 1/4 marathon) started their journey at 12:00.





























These and more pictures from this event you can find here.



All in all it was a very nice day for shooting, people were happy and energetic and I was more than happy with my new backpack. It was so easy and fast to use thanks to side-entry compartments.

Lapland girl

A couple months ago I was practising studio-photography at my friends small studio. My girlfriend was modeling me and we decided to go with lapland girl theme. She got this nice furry hat (I don´t know is that was a real fur or not) that she has gotten from her parents when she was younger. I took a series of shots and here are some the pictures:



I used 2 Elinchrome studioflashes. One camera right and the other camera left very near camera. I am quite happy to this shot, although there is not much contrast in light.



Here is the other one with more shadows on her face.

Sisu - Finnish strong tasting candy celebrates it's 80 years anniversary

Famous (for Finns at least) Finnish strong tasting candy - Sisu, celebrates it's 80 years anniversary this year. I am a big fan of Sisu, so I was delighted to see on the other day, that Sisu has produced a Sysi Sisu branded candy to celebrate this 80th anniversary. Sisu, as a Finnish term means roughly translated (according to Wikipedia) as strength of will, determination, perseverance, and acting rationally in the face of adversity. The equivalent in English is "to have guts". I wanted to give my share to the celebration, so I bought a packet of Sysi Sisu candy and photgraphed it in my Do-It-Yourself light-tent. Here is the result below.

Some photos from Oulu

Last week I was cycling around Oulu with my Canon IXUS 860 IS pocket camera with me. I took some photos from Market Square and Ainola-Park.

People enjoying sunset at Market Square. On the right there is Oulu City Theatre.

People sitting along the pier and having some refreshments.

Old sailing boat attached to pier near market square.

Watery view from Ainola-park.

Canon - The Assignment

My submission to the competition

Link to the competition. You can vote your favorite photographs and the judge will choose the finalists from the most popular entries

Child photography session

I think child photography is one of the toughest shooting sessions possible. I was aware of this when I was asked to shoot some 1-year photos of our friends child - Iida. I was very happy to say yes, because I wanted and needed more practical experience about shooting sessions with "real" clients. I don't know if child photography is the best place to start, but it was fun! I took this session as a learning experience and tried to give my 100% effort to get best pictures possible. I have to admit, that this was my first time to take some photos that somebody has asked me to do, so it gave me also some positive pressure.

I got my 2 Vivitar 285HV speedlights about 2-3 weeks ago, so I didn't had too much experience with them. I had with me only one working receiver to my Cactus 2Vs transmitter, so I had to work with only one flash. I would have liked to play with 2 speedlight, but sometimes you just have to work with the gear you have. Other stuff I had with me was one Manfrotto 001b Nano stand to hold the speedlight and attached to was also reflecting silvery umbrella. I had also with me large 5 in 1 reflector panel to fill the shadow areas. My girlfriend was with me there and she was assisting me, holding the reflector panel etc.

The model's mom was also a great help to me to guiding and playing with Iida, and trying to get her attention. We took the photos inside the family house and because the weather was so great and sunny, we went also backyard to get some shots. There was bright sunlight out there, so we had to use diffusive panel in some shots to soften the sharp edged shadows.













Iida was a great model through the whole shooting session, which lasted about 2-3 hours. She was so energetic, moving and running all the time, so sometimes it was a tough job for me to try get some decent shots.

All in all it was a nice and fun experience and gave me more confidence to do also child photography. And the most important - the parents were very happy to the photos.

More photos from this session you can look here

Euro MayDay 2008 demonstration in Helsinki

I was lucky ( as a photographer) to bump in to a demonstaration on my way to hotel after shooting some photos about capping the statue of Havis Amanda. Actually I didn't know then what was the demonstration about, but afterwards I found out that it was the Euro MayDay 2008 demonstration. Here are some video footage from the You Tube. I was lucky to get some pictures about the police force, who were waiting the demonstrators to come to Erottaja district, where they turned to Southern-Esplanade street. Here´s the photos..

Police vans bringing the police force to Erottaja district.


Demonstrators in Mannerheim street.

Police blocking the demonstrators way to Erottaja.


Demonstrators neat swedish theatre

Police troops ready

The finnish Vappu girl approaching police


Demonstrators at Mannerheim street.



Demonstrators at Mannerheim street.


Demonstrators heading to Southern-Esplanade street. More pictures fro the demonstrations you can find here

I promised you some pictures from Vappu celebration, so here we come. I was a couple of days in Helsinki and enjoyd the nice sunny weather and the carnival feeling of spring and Vappu. Here are some photos from Helsinki..

Police is patrolling in the Park Esplanade.



The students occupying the stairs of the cathedral.

The students occupying the stairs of the cathedral.
Students walking in the Cathedral Square.

People (and the Alien) in Market Square.

People sitting on the stage in Park Esplanade.

Vappu celebrations in Market Square

The students occupying the stairs of the Cathedral

The students occupying the stairs of the cathedral.
Havis Amanda (now 100 years old) has been capped..

The Cappers

The Cappers

Faces in the crowd


Happy swimmers.

I you are interested, you can find more my Vappu pictures Here