What's in yours?

The young, hip and trendy blogger Omana Bender, who dreams about becoming the next Hannah Montana, takes pictures of self and gets her dad to sponsor drunken pictures online, posted a brilliant blog earlier today. So brilliant in fact, that I wanted to bring her idea over to my blog readers and see how it inspires you.

So this blog is dedicated to you girlies out there that carry half your life in your bag, and you dudes out there comfortable enough to carry a man bag.

So Omana asked, what's in your bag? Then posted a couple of images as examples.

So inspired to dig around in my own bag and see what actually lives there, I took this photo:

I obviously have quite a geeky bag content, mixed with a touch of girlyness and sunglasses that fit my tiny head. What's in yours? Are you a girly girl, a geek like me with a whole bunch of electric toys, or have you got odd stuff living in there that I should be having as well?

I challenge you girlies and man bag owners to take a similar picture and share with the world! Feel free to post on my blog to show other visitors :)

And here's yours!

Sylvia

Ana

Nora

Martina & Sloane Square

Including images from a recent shoot I did. I wanted to capture some good commercial lifestyle scenarios inspired by some of the Next adverts. (Love those and that brunette model they tend to use).

Model Martina was great and had the perfect look, style and attitude to create the images I wanted (plus sunclasses is always cool). Hair & make-up was done by the lovely and talented Elbie Van Eeden who I've wanted to work with for quite a while.

Images was shot outside outside Sloane Square Tube Station. Yes... it's a glamorous life :P

I often get asked where I find my amazing locations, and most of the time the answer to this is that it's not at all an amazing location. It's a public space that you walk by every day and don't notice would be perfect for a specific type of image......

How to look good in images - Femelle Magazine

I signed up with Camera Press a little while ago, and am all of a sudden starting to see images appearing on websites. Nice! Who knows what I may have sold for print. I shall find out! It tends to take a little while before I'm informed, so thanks to lovely Twitter friends I was made aware of one of my images of Sara appearing on a new online magazine for young women in Norway called Femelle.no.

Click on the image below to see the article, which gives girls tips on how to pose for photos. It's in Norwegian, so for the none Norwegians you can just look at the pretty picture :)

I didn't actually realise how many partners Camera Press has around the globe! So lovely to see my image turning up in Norway. This has just inspired me to submit more stuff. Note to self: shoot lifestyle stuff.

I was having a look around their website, and I actually really like the site. Lots of great stuff for girls to read, pink stuff everywhere (girly rule number one of course) and I see links to a lot of great female bloggers that I follow daily. So girl power pretty much. Definitely recommend the site to Norwegian girls to check out once you're done admiring my lovely picture :P

They are also on Twitter for you addicts out there Femellemagasin

Video from a1 concerts December 2009

December 2009 was exciting times. I got my new Canon 5D camera. A1 was doing their 10 year celebration concerts in Oslo. It was almost Christmas. Oslo was covered in snow. Combining these was just like a little bit of heaven!

During the seven concerts the boys did in December I took a lot of pictures which you may have seen already. But I also used the film function on my camera to capture moments from the concerts. As I haven't shared this yet, thought I'd do so now.

So for those that was there, sit back and enjoy the memories. For those that missed it, catch a few glimpses of the moments of the boys that are a1.

The boys have just been touring in Norway and are in the next few months writing their album which will be released in Norway. I've heard a bit of a sneak peak of some of the tracks and it's sounding good! Hopefully I'll have the chance to photograph the boys some more this year :)

Photographer inspiration: Patrick Demarchelier

I've been away from my blog for a week and I kinda miss it. Been so busy editing and with shoots, which is a good thing! Plus I seem to have had a bit of a social marathon, which is also a good thing now that the sun has come out to say hello. How are you people enjoying this little moment called Spring?

Got some great images to show you as I go through my editing. In the meantime I am always inspired by other amazing photographer's work, so thought I'd do a post about another photographer who is definitely on my favorites list in the world of photography is Patrick Demarchelier. His editorials are amazing and always inspiring. I'll forgive him for being French.

PS. Someone called me their tiny friend yesterday. I'm not sure if that's cute or kinda insulting? Let's go with cute. Or funny.

PS again. Should one do a PS in a blog?

Fresh face Sophie Edenhoeg creates discussion with this editorial

I absolutely LOVE this editorial. But fashion is all about taste, and when I saw these images at the Fashion Gone Rogue blog all the discussions going on about these images caught my attention. At first I was simply captivated by the images and the very beautiful model newcomer Sophie Edenhoeg, photographed by Henrik Adamsen. Male model Christopher Sylvest. I then discovered some people had a lot of opinions around it.

I wanted to continue discussions I saw at Fashion Gone Rogue to see what my blog readers thought. Is this a good editorial? Is it suggesting under age sex? And if it is, is this an issue or all ok cause it's fashion?

Would be very interested to hear your thoughts on this one.

More Blog recommendations

In January I posted my Top 10 Favorite blogs to share with you guys. Since then I've discovered so many great blogs that here is a second list of 10 more blogs I'm following!

Click the titles to view the blogs.

Fashion Gone Rogue

I am totally addicted to this blog and must read it daily! It keeps me updated on all the latest and greatest shoots in my favorite fashion mags, so I know what the top photographers are doing out there, who's hot in the modeling world, and can follow image and style trends. Simply a must follow for any photographer out there. Blogger is also on Twitter.

She is Frank

Fashion photographer blog. I like her style, images and sense of humour. She's also on Twitter.

Divine Bunny

Artsy, fartsy and fabulous fashion blog with cool images to follow. Loving this blog more and more as I get addicted to it.

Lindsay Adler Photography

Lindsay has been on a roll with helpful and interesting blogs for photographers. This is quickly becoming a must read blog for me. I like it when people share things I can actually use. On Twitter as well of course.

Birdy & Me

Great for fashion and photography inspiration!

Igor + Andre

Simply a wonderful blog. I LOVE the illustrations with a passion, and think I'd like to live in Danny's mind for a day, cause it seems so full of wonderful inspirational stuff. One of those people who I happily call an artist. Still waiting for his reply to my email, but I'm guessing he's got a backlog to work through. Crossing fingers it will be any day now :). Also on Twitter.

Bottle Bell Photography

Love the feel of her images! She has that feminine, artsy touch to what she does and is wonderfully creative. Very inspirational. On Twitter.

Mori Girl

I've always wanted to go to Japan! This blog gives me a chance to be there in spirit, through the words and images. I still don't know what a Mori girl actually is, but the images are inspiring.

RVDS Photography

Good friend and fellow photographer RVDS Photography (aka Ruan). I always like to follow work of my photographer friends, as they keep me just as inspired as any big fashion magazine out there. I especially love Ruan's studio and beauty work. He's on Twitter too you'll be pleased to know.

Omana Bender

This is one for you Norwegian's out there. I recently came across this blog, and it makes me laugh. She's another one of those teenage Norwegian bloggers, but with a twist. She's the only one to make me laugh, plus she posts nice images to go with what she's writing about. I've just discovered this blog, so want to see how it grows on me.

Lost angels

Finally finished editing my images from my classic editorial at The Lost Angel. I edited so many, so will share some of the black & whites with you in this blog and post a few colour ones later on. For this shoot I was originally inspired by that classic Chanel vibe, and at the same time I wanted to bring in a bit of a modern edginess to it. So going for a black and white approach with less contrast than I normally do I thought suited this scenario well.

I was on the roll that day with amazing photographic direction..... "lean on the thingy", "a bit more that way" (pointing un-understandibly) and "be broken". Luckily Emily and Lucy were good at understanding what I wanted.

To read more about the shoot and watch the behind the scenes video check out my previous blog post.

The team:

Model: Emily Andrews (Nevs Models)

Model: Lucy Jaques (Nevs Models)

Styling: Annie Faryia

Hair & Make-up: Gabriella Ciullo

Assisting: Jason Goddard

Photography: Cecilie Harris

Location: The Lost Angel

Fashion Photographers on Twitter

I've been thinking lately that Twitter would be a great place to follow the work of fashion photographers I look up to (the Vogue and such published kind). However, it seems a bit of an effort to find them. Perhaps they haven't entered the world of tweeting yet. But they should! Would be a great way to keep inspired and follow their work more closely.

I just looked through the April issue of Vogue and googled all the photographer I could find, and still not much luck.

So the list I have so far is rather short, but as I find more will add to it. And feel free to let me know if you find anyone else. Have a feeling this might have to be a bit of a team effort.

Bryan Adams

David Bailey

Karl Lagerfeld

Michael David Adams

Nick Knight (SHOWstudio)

Nigel Barker

Terry Richardson

I know, we can still count them on one hand. We must find more to add! I've tweeted Vogue UK, Nigel Barker and Jay Manuel to ask for recommendations, but they may not have time to answer a humble photographer like me. Worth a go though right, as sometimes Twitter seems to be a funny place full of surprises.

Have a fab day lovely peeps.

Gatecrashing Ruan's shoot with Simon

What do I do for fun you say? If I'm not hard at work myself I gatecrash my friends shoots!

I recently gatecrashed my friend Ruan's shoot (aka RVDS Photography) with Simon Jennings from D1. Those of you who are regular readers of my blog or follow my work will know that I have done two shoots with Simon before. He's my little muse, and an awesome model. Rebecca Fletcher did hair and make-up for the day.

Anyways. Ruan is a fab photographer, and let me hang for the day and play around with my still quite new 5D camera. Made such a difference to move from my 40D. I wanted to use the video function more, so thought I'd capture a behind the scenes video of the shoot. The quality of the video on the 5D is amazing, so was fun to play around with it and put together this little video.

I let Ruan play with my 5D during the shoot, which at that point he looked like he was experiencing Christmas and birthday at the same time. I admire Ruan's work a lot, so feel free to check out his website to see more of his stuff. Also including some of his images from the shoot in the video and this blog. In addition I have begged him to do a guest blog spot on my blog, so crossing fingers he'll get around to that in not to long :)

Behind the scenes video from my shoot with Emily & Lucy

Must tell you about my most recent shoot which I'm editing at the moment.

The story starts like this..... model calls half an hour before shoot is due to say she is in hospital and can't make shoot. Make-up artist is already just two minutes away from mine. Make-up artist and myself are disappointed and head to the my fave bar The Lost Angel on Battersea Park Road to drink our disappointment away. We opt for the "to die for"-raspberry Mojitos. Inspiration strikes and we come up with fab plans for another shoot. I make some calls and three days later we have fab team plus fab location to shoot at. Disappointment turns into one of my fave shoots ever!

I'm definitely one to try to turn any bad situation into a positive, so that's what I tried to do here. I wanted to shoot a classic and beautiful style scenario inspired by a Chanel vibe, and at the same time have a cool edge to the images. Having the fabulous models Emily Andrews and Lucy Jaques from Nevs, they had just the looks I had in mind. In addition I had Gabriella Ciullo to do hair and make-up, Annie Faryia to help with styling and Jason Goddard to assist on the day. One of those things must be said that a good team has such a big impact on the end result. Wonderful work from all involved on the day.

Also must say a special thanks to the lovely people at The Lost Angel who let us shoot at their wonderful location. You guys totally rock and I'll definitely continue to be back from those raspberry mojitos. Yum!

Jason and Gabriella captured some behind the scenes footage during the shoot with my Flip cam, so before I've got more pictures to share with you here's a video to enjoy in the meantime.

It's all about bunnies.......

It's Easter weekend! Which basically means four days off work for many of us to spend on relaxing, eating chocolate, shopping, catching up on sky plus recordings, catching up with friends and generally doing as little as possible. At least this is my intent. I'm also fitting in some picture and video editing that I need to catch up on. This is what Easter means to me this year. I would have spent it with family if it wasn't for the fact they are in another country.

I have already started eating my Easter egg, which I was given by a very generous and kind friend. I promised I wouldn't touch it till Sunday. It was just too tempting. It is a Thonton's egg. You know how delicious their chocolate is. It's practically not my fault.

So I've seen Easter bunny related stuff around the shops, and am in quite an Easter mood as I've planned a weekend to catch up with friends. Nice. Wanted to wish you all a happy Easter, and in a true photography/fashion manner dedicate this post to Easter the fashion way. Including some inspirational images (obviously not mine) - some showcasing some fabulous Louis Vuitton and Marc Jacobs bunny ears.













Happy Easter and chocolate eating :)

Sneak peak from my Emily & Lucy shoot

Quick blog with a sneak peak from a recent shoot with Emily & Lucy from Nevs. Will have more images and a behind the scenes video to share very soon. And will tell you know a bit more about the wonderful people involved in this shoot, the superb location (which you can't see in this image) we shot at and the fun of the day.

I shot a whole series of the girls, both together and on their own, so will have plenty to share with you. In the meantime it's Easter time! The Easter weekend has hardly started and I've already been given an Easter egg. Nice!