Timbuktu

Yeah, that was the supermegafamous celebrity that I shot a couple of weeks back. It´s for the magazine Spirit, I think it is supposed to be out on the streets right about now so then I guess I can publish it.
He was such a nice guy, very humble and positive, even though the pictures were taken a sunday morning. It is for a column that´s always in the magazine so I had no choice about background etc. But I think he looks quite cool indeed.




The shoot for next week is coming together now, all the models are booked and locations have been found. Will be shooting monday and tuesday, as always I´m quite nervous but I hope and think it will have a happy ending.

I´m considering buying a car.

Entourage

The new must-see series has just started on norwegian television, but the first two seasons are available on DVD. I truly recommend it. It´s about Vince, a prettyboy doing sudden success in Hollywood, and his mates that joins the ride. The show is based upon the life Mark Wahlberg lived when he broke the moviescene. Even though there are loads of highlights in the Entourage it´s the role Jeremy Piven plays as the mad agent Ari Gold that truly takes it over the top. The ingredients are sexy women, cool cars, crazy workaholics and four totally different dudes hanging out with way to much money to spend. It´s a show that gives us insight to a life lots of guys dream of and even though it´s quite shallow it also reveals that money and success ain´t everything. Isn´t it? Hmmm.

More work

Well, got a new job on friday. It´s rather big so in addition to the three jobs that needs to be retouched I have a bit too much work to get done this week. But I´ll never complain about too much work, I love it. I love feeling a bit stressed out because the feeling I get once I´ve finished each job is fantastic. Will probably shoot the pictures thursday and friday, and have to find/get permission to shoot in five different locations including an airport, a hospital and the university. Five models need to be booked and stuff to be included in the shots need to be found. But they pay me good money to get this done so I have to and really want to do a great job.

Train Station

Reeeeeed

My new portfolio arrived from the great city London yesterdat. It´s red, dark red. I really like it, will be using it for my fashion/beauty pictures. Hopefully a red book will give me even more jobs then a black book would.
Got a call about a new job today, will be attending a meeting tomorrow about it. Don´t know what it is but hopefully it´s nice and that they wanna give it to me. Finished a retouching job today and will finish my own pictures tomorrow.

Heia Espen

A good year?

Shot the last photos of the campaign yesterday and it all went great. Very pleased with the result and both the client and ad.agency seems satisfied and that feels great.
Also got three new retouchjobs and will be documenting a commercial stunt taking place friday and sunday. It has really been a superb month, I went into this year rather nervous about the future but now most of the dark clouds has drifted away. The future actually looks rather bright.
I´m also beeing considered for another rather large job, I just hope that they have faith in me even though I do not have the experience that many others do. Not the greatest blogger as of lately but that will change.
Can´t wait to post this job I just did, but since it won´t be published until the start of march I guess I have to wait.

The Test

Tomorrow is the first of hopefully many tests that will show if I can suceed as a commercial photographer. I´m nervous as hell but still pretty confident, have put lots of hours into the preproduction of this shoot. All the snow that has come was not part of the plan but unfortunately I´m not God so I guess it just have to be included in the pictures.

Good night and good luck to myself.

Stressed out !!!

Way to many things to think about at the moment. This job is killing me, so much production. Within a couple of days I´ve had to find a superb apartment, a familyfriendly car, 6 models from 25-70 years old, lots of props, a couple of other locations and some other stuff. Will be shooting monday and tuesday and I have to create something good. Jeezeeez.

Up in all this I assisted the photographer Guri Dahl today, shooting the people running this country. Will be assisting her next thursday as well and then we´ll shoot the prime minister. That´s cool.

This is the view from his office by the way.

Yeah

The whining really paid off. Got assigned to a rather big commercial shoot this past friday. I will be shooting the pictures monday and tuesday next week but have a lot to take care of before that so I will be busy the entire two next weeks with this job. And if I manage to keep my expenses down it´s a pretty well paid job as well.

I have also got a retouching job, will be finishing all the pictures taken by Knut Bry for a book about apples.

We´re going out to dinner today with some friends of ours, Eirik and Stine. Mother India is the place as always.

By the way, if you´re between 65-70 years old and still looking good I got a job for you, bring your misses and you can make a couple of thousand in a heartbeat.

Crazed fans

Both shoots went rather well. And both have been retouched and sent to the clients.

(And now it´s time for some whining!)
I sent out 20 letters for about one and a half weeks ago, containing new pictures I have taken along with a short handwritten letter. Only heard from two of the recipients. Guess it´s a long and hard way to the top in this business, actually it´s a f***ing struggle just to get the ends to meet sometimes. And at the same time all these guys in their midforties are taking the same pictures they took 10 years ago and making great money of it. Damn it.

But I´m the only one with my own official fanclub, yeah. Two new fans, the superb but mad photographer Knut Bry and my good friend, the always superbly-dressed hunk, Marius.





Tip Of The Day
You have to go and see the movie Shortbus. It´s way more than upclose and personal sex-scenes and singing the national anthem in your homeboy´s ass. I loved it at least, and so did my girl. And so should you.

Shortbus

I´m pleased with yesterdays shoot, it all went well and even though my shirt was slightly too large for him it looked perfect. Will post the pictures at the end of the month.
Will be shooting two pictures tomorrow for Vice Magazine, gotta thank Mona for that one. Thanks Mona.
On wednesday I´ll shoot some images of a cabin about half and hour outside Oslo for Hyttemagasinet.

Ordered a new portfolio book today, it´s identical with my last one except that this one is made of Red Leather. Hopefully it will look superb, it´s for my fashion/beauty pictures.

Heading to the movies later on to see Shortbus. Check out the trailer below.

Good Weekend

This have been a really good weekend. Started out friday night when Trine and myself visited some friends of mine, playing Risk and drinking wine. Saturday I played a basketball match which we won 97-60 and later that evening I made a fantastic pizza after my moms recipe, it´s not quite as good as moms yet but I will get there.
And today I´ve been shooting this rather famous swedish artist. I bet you´re wondering who but that I won´t tell until the pictures are published.
Now it´s time for Grandiosa, Coke Zero and The Untouchables on DVD.

Should I Stay Or Should I Go

Had two very good meetings today, and with my rollercoaster selfesteem it is very nice to hear qualified people give me good feedback. I tend to ask myself..............



.............. and find something else to do. Always wanted to be a teacher.

2007

Well, that was it for 2006. It´s only a couple of days into the new year now and I´ve just started working again. I have big hopes for this year careerwise. Scheduled a couple of meetings tomorrow and I´ll be shooting someone famous this weekend. I really look forward to it and I hope he is a nice guy. Maybe if I´m lucky I´ll get a shot of him with my Heia Espen shirt on as well.

I always thought that naked women would gather lots of comments both pros and cons but obviously not. Maybe those pictures I posted earlier just suck ass so noone would even bother to look at them. I try again with some nudity, my apologies to all of you feminists and naked-women-haters out there. Anyway I can guarantee that there won´t be much more nudity in the future, I just had to try it out. I´m a bit above mediocre happy with both these and the earlier ones. A bit boring maybe. Better luck next time I suppose.

Top 15

Aiaiai, headache from last night.
But what better way to cure it then with egg and bacon for breakfast, a couple of episodes of The Sopranos and listening to some quality music. By the way, bought a re-issue of Can - Ege Bamyasi on green vinyl the other day, what a gem.
Anyway, as a self-proclaimed musiclover I feel obliged to give you my favourite records from this past year and so here it goes.

Espen´s Official Top 15 Records of 2006

1. Tv On The Radio - Return To The Cookie Mountain
2. Band Of Horses - Everything All The Time
3. The Knife - Silent Shout
4. Tapes´n Tapes - The Loon
5. The Decemberists - Crane Wife
6. Belle And Sebastian - The Life Pursuit
7. The Pipettes - We Are The Pipettes
8. The Kooks - Inside In Inside Out
9. Arctic Monkeys - Whatever People Say That´s What I´m Not
10. Bonny `Prince` Billy - The Letting Go
11. Grizzly Bear - Yellow House
12. Cold War Kids - Robbers & Cowards
13. Broken Social Scene - Broken Social Scene
14. Razorlight - Razorlight
15. The Hold Steady - Boys And Girls In America

Mr. Nielsen

It´s about 5 am and I´m quite drunk but that doesn´t stop me from writing a post. The reason that I´m writing is this; me and trine are walking home from tonights party and suddenly it starts to rain like hell, we seek shelter underneath some roof at Vår Frelses Gravlund. And before we even get there we are joined by two other people, one of them being a hero of mine; Mr. Christopher Nielsen, the artist, the creator of both Slipp Jimmy Fri and To Trøtte Typer. Even though he was most interested in discussing groupsex and aliens with my girlfriend we had quite a few interesting discussions. He is weird. That´s what I found out, but also fascinating, and even though he seemed quite interested in Trine I love the fact that I spent about 30 minutes with Mr. Nielsen, in the rain, at a graveyard, four hours past midnight at new years eve.

Happy New Year everyone.

Piz & Løve.