I've been working like a mad man for the past weeks, so my intention to update this blog every week went down the drain. There has been some personal work on location, but due to the moody summer up north I've been forced to do most of my commercial work in studio to be able to plan/book ahead.
Last weekend was spent on the island of Værøy in lovely Lofoten, shooting commercial images for a contractor. Due to the once again moody summer, one out of two days was spent waiting for the rain to clear, the next one was spent setting up everytime the sun came out, and rigging down in panic when the rain came back. But I got the images I needed, I will post them later.
By the way; after some conciderations I will continue to write this blog in english as I am trying to connect with international clients as well, so I hope the norwegians kan bare with me.
Usually I think the time is best spent promoting yourself when you are trying to start a new business, but I feel like talking about a colleague that deserves a lot of credit, Jens Haugen at Jens Haugen Photography. If there is a new path in norwegian photography, he is very often the first one to travel down it. And most of the time with great success.
You would presume that he then have been a assistant for one of the world leading photographers, have a masters degree in art, is in his 50's and lives part time in London, part time in Oslo. You could not be more wrong.
Jens Haugen have never gone through any formal photographic education, he resides in the small and sleepy town of Hamar near lake Mjøsa and is in his mid 30's. But he has something more important than all the other things; creativity, taste and tenacity. And a lot of it!
When I first saw this picture, I had absolutly no idea who Jens Haugen was. Never heard the name. Never heard about Tim Walker, LaChapelle or Albert Watson either for that matter. This was only 3,5 years ago, and I had just realized that there was actually people out there getting paid to do photography. Myself, I had only been doing the occational sunset picture with my film based Canon.
But when I saw that picture, I thought damn, someday I would sure like to be able to do something like that. I did not know how or when, but I realized that this is actually possible to do with an image. Eye catching creativity, hell yes!
So why do I feel the need to share? Well, I am hoping that Jens Haugen with all his creative commercial work can open your eyes, like he did with mine. You need to see beyond what you know from before to create something new, and this is something Jens Haugen does more often than anyone else I know in Norway.
To my knowledge I am the first and only commercial photographer north of Trondheim, so the potential is humongous. The counterweight is that the trends are stuck in early 90's, so there is a real struggle to dare people to think outside the box, and do creative work that stands out. Basicly, what the local newspapers have been churning out for the last 20 years is concidered the blueprint up north.
Please visit Jens Haugens homepage at www.jenshaugen.no and be inspired. See how creativity can bump you to the next nevel, and how his commercial work is part of what made him "Photographer of the year" three times in a row.
Commercial pictures should give YOU the attention amongst so many other commercials. So when people are opening their newspapers next month, who do you want to be? The one with the ad on the left getting everybodys attention, or the ad on the right that everybody skips past?
