Digging through my old files I found some B/W photos I took during a massive street riot in Nairobi. I was on a 6-month trip to Kenya during my time at University and for me as a student studying International Politics but not really knowing what I was going to do with my life, these pictures actually became very important to me. The way I took these pictures, the fun I had while taking the pictures, the fact that I was in the middle of a dangerous situation (police and army were firing with live ammunition, the protesters were using slingshots and Molotov cocktails) and pushing my limits and the fact that Reuters and AP were considering printing my shots made me see for the first time that this might be something I could be doing in my life.  I got a camera from my dad when I was 14/15 years old and photography was always a very serious hobby for me. But not for a second did I consider doing it for a living. The proper thing to do, was to do well in high school, get into a good university to study and then to make something out of your life. Being a photographer wasn’t part of that equation. That experience of documenting the riots in Nairobi didn’t make me drop everything right then and there, it took me another two years or so, after finishing University, to pursue photography, but to this day the memory of that experience keeps me going. The day itself unfolded totally spontaneously and later got me into big trouble. My study group was on a lay-over in Nairobi for a few days and our hotel happened to be next to the Nairobi University. The Kenyan government had shut down the University, just days before the final exams were supposed to take place and demanded that the students pay tuition. That meant that all the students who were going to finish their final year, couldn’t. It meant they were going to loose a whole year of studies. It meant all the students had to pay tuition to continue their education and in a country like Kenya all but the wealthiest people were able to afford that. The students took the the streets, trashed the downtown area, destroyed shops, blocked all the main roads, set fire to everything they could and shut down the city. The government sent in special army and police units and they tried to crack down with full force. And all of this started as I was walking back to our hotel after I had dropped off some film to be developed at a nearby shop. All I had with me was my old Olympus OM-1 camera with a 50mm lens, half a roll of film in the camera and a spare roll of film in my pocket. As I came around a corner I literally got swept up by a stampeding horde of army and police troops who were driving the students down the street. Being the only white guy around but with an SLR camera in my hand they assumed I belonged to the press. One army guy said to watch out for Molotov cocktails and I don’t know what I was thinking, because I took his advice and ducked but obviously didn’t listen the the voice of reason telling me that maybe I shouldn’t even be in a place where fire bombs were being thrown in my direction. In somewhat of a quiet moment I had a look around and noticed I wasn’t the only white guy with a camera. Off in the distance, out of the line of fire, there were some real photographers with some real telephoto lenses. They had listened to their voice of reason and stuck to their 300mm lenses. I didn’t have that luxury. With a 50mm lens you have to get pretty close to get the details you want so I stayed close. At one point the army troops were retreating and four soldiers came running past me carrying a wounded soldier by his limbs. Probably hit by a rock from a slingshot just under the brim of his helmet, blood was gushing from his head and I couldn’t even recognize his face. Without realizing what I had just seen up close I managed to get a shot of the scene. Then in one of the next charges (they went back and forth up the street) I stayed behind and switched over to the student side. There I was the only white guy and was greeted with open arms. I was also the only “journalist” and all these students came up to me…

wanting to tell their story so I could tell the world. To summon their courage they were drinking heavily and smoking dope and other stuff and the level of aggression was pretty scary. Things then got serious because the army started shooting with live ammunition and tear gas. Running away, I got hit by a tear gas canister that exploded next to me and I thought I was gonna die and go blind from the stuff. Tears and snot ran down my face, I couldn’t see anything until some people came running up with bottles of water to wash the gas off our faces. At that point I had had enough, my second roll of film was used up and there really wasn’t any point in hanging out any longer. As I beat my retreat one of the real press photographers ran up to me and asked who I worked for and when I told him nobody he gave me his card with an address and asked me to come to the Reuters office the next day if the shots turned out well. Tired, scared and pretty damn proud of myself I made my way back to the hotel. I had the films developed the next day and to be honest there were hardly any good shots. I was using a manual focus, manually metered camera so the majority of the shots were out of focus or badly exposed. The people at Reuters wanted the shot of the wounded soldier, even said it would run in the big newspapers, but…it was too underexposed to be saved! That was my first taste of  battle photography and I am still pretty surprised with myself at how calm I stayed during all that madness. Granted, these riots were nothing like Afghanistan or the Kosovo but there were some hairy situations, it was dangerous, but for some reason I stayed calm and cool. I am also surprised how much of a kick it was. I remember really having fun, being in my element and thinking I could do this more often. But, life turns out differently than you plan or foresee it though and that is good. Now I am a single dad raising a son and I have responsibilities. I can’t run around the war zones of the world, I don’t want to either. Just knowing that I could is enough for me, knowing that I did once (on a small scale) reminds me that I can handle almost anything that might come along the way in the future.

Here is a little piece of news (source) about a recent campaign I shot:

Rodenstock recently launched a kids glasses collection which squarely meets the requirements of the little ones. The bright and colourful kids glasses are striking in their modern design, are highly flexible to withstand maximum wear and tear and offer optimal wearing comfort.

The diverse range of kid’s frames speak to the target audience of kids aged five to twelve and show what kids glasses by Rodenstock stand for.

The international campaign will be used by all Rodenstock partners worldwide. The newly created PoS materials such as posters, ceiling danglers and tent cards will be featured throughout the optician shops. At the same time, end-user mailings will significantly boost traffic and interest. The campaign was launched at the beginning of March at the Mido trade fair in Milan. Mido is the leading fair for the optical industry in Europe.

Die Resultate vom schwierigen Reportage Shooting im BMW Werk in Muenchen sind jetzt im aktuellem BMW Impulse Magazin zu sehen. Das war der komplizierte Job (zum Blogeintrag) mit der schwierigen Lichtsituation, einer fiesen Kombination aus Tageslicht, Tungsten-, Halogen- und sonst noch was für Lampen, insgesamt aber sehr dunkel. Da hat sich der große ISO Umfang (die Lichtempfindlichkeit) von der Canon wirklich bewährt und dafür gesorgt, dass auch bei den schwierigen Bedingungen und ohne Stativ, gute Bilder entstanden sind.

A few weeks ago I got to leave the studio for a short but fun assignment for the BMW client magazine “Impulse”. I documented a guided tour of the BMW production facilities in Munich. Visitors and people who are buying a new BMW get an in-depth tour of the plant and it was my job to show a group of people enjoying the tour. So armed with safety glasses and an external flash that I had to hold in one hand, the camera in the other, I had two hours to pull this thing off, “Strobist”-style. The conditions were not nice, tungsten, fluorescent and some other weird gas lights in dimly lit environments and hardly any space to move… Thank the Gods for nice new high ISO settings, at 2500 ISO I still got some very cool shots. BMW and the ad agency are happy and in a few weeks the pictures will be in the magazine!

The Double Dose //  “Double Trouble” ist ein DJ-Projekt von zwei Jungs, Freunde von mir,  die beide zwar richtige Jobs haben, die aber die Musik trotzdem nicht aus dem Kopf kriegen. Sie arbeiten gerade an ihrer, nennen wir es Mal “Medienpräsenz” und aus Spaß und Lust habe ich Falk und Laurin gestern geholfen und PR-Fotos für sie geschossen. Genau wie ihre Musik Teamarbeit ist, geht es mir beim fotografieren auch um die Alchemie die zustande kommt wenn man verschiedene Leute in einen Raum steckt, einen losen Plan hat und dann experimentiert und sieht was dabei rauskommt. Jedes Mal andere Zutaten, jedes Mal ein anderer Mix und gestern war wieder ein perfektes Beispiel dafür wie gute Ideen einfach spontan entstehen können. Am Nachmittag, kurz vor dem Shooting kam mir die Idee das Logo der beiden Jungs, ein “D” und ein”T”, dreidimensional und groß in den Raum zu stellen. Also haben wir kurzerhand gebastelt und 1,2om große Buchstaben fabriziert. Währenddessen kam mir die Idee wie ich die Fotos machen wollte und mit etwas Improvisation und Luca’s Hilfe (mein Sohn) kann sich das Freestyle Ergebniss sehen lassen!

Ohne solche freie, selbst dirigierte und unbezahlte Projekte die ich nur zum Spaß, zum lernen und zum experimentieren mache, würde ich kommerziell gar nicht arbeiten können. Das merke ich immer wieder. Bei solchen Projekten kann man kreativ sein, sich weiter entwickeln und die Art von Arbeit machen die man (idealerweise) auch irgendwann Mal für Kunden machen kann. Im harten Arbeitsalltag geht der Spaß manchmal flöten, aber jeder Fotograf/Kreativer sollte sich die Zeit nehmen um eigenen Projekte aus Spaß zu machen, nur so vergisst man nicht warum man den Job eigentlich macht.

Before I sit on my rear end and do nothing I’ll try to set up a photo shoot, so on Friday morning Lauren, my styling/stylish side-kick and I pulled some strings and organized a cool swimwear shoot for the next day. We were fortunate enough to have Lucia Kopacikova from Major Models (Milan) infront of the lens. Lucia models for clients such as Cosmopolitan and Triumph and it was great having a talented model to work with – in fashion the model makes or breaks a photo. I managed to talk Philip Lawrenz into doing the hair and make-up for the shoot and without having seen the model or my ideas Philip pulled off 6 great hair styles and did beautiful make-up. The results will be up in a few days and a short making-of video will follow soon!

SHADES of GREY // Mit Teilen us den aktuellen Männerkollektionen von Hugo, Y-3 und Helmut Lang,  zusammengestellt von Christain Brach @ Loox Agency, haben wir vorletzte Woche eine coole Männer Modestrecke produziert. Das Grooming wurde vom Meister der Haare, Stefano D’Attilia gezaubert und vor der Kamera stand Martin O. (PS Models), frisch aus Milan und für kurze Zeit in München. Die All-Star Männermannschaft wurde noch von meinem Assistenten Julius und meiner Wenigkeit ergänzt und entstanden ist eine schöne Schwarz/Weiß Strecke. Eine kleine Vorschau gibt es hier zu sehen, die fertigen Bilder werden in den nächsten Tagen im Portfolio zu sehen sein.

Ab 16 Uhr heute Nachmittag sind wir On Air! Heute gibts also die Fortsetzung vom Web 2.0 Experiment das ich letzten Oktober angefangen hab live vom Studio aus ein Shooting zu übertragen. Beim letzten Live Stream haben knapp 100 Leute zugeschaut, weltweit! Kanada, Japan, Polen, USA und via Facebook kamen die Kommentare rein, die Leute haben uns Posing-Vorschläge gegeben und uns angefeuert. Ich bin gespannt was diesmal dabei rauskommt…

Ab 16 Uhr werden die letzten Vorbereitungen zu sehen sein, mein Assistent und ich werden vermutlich noch dabei sein das Licht einzustellen und dann wird es losgehen. Um 17 Uhr werden wir uns alle Mal kurz vorstellen 8 bis 10 Outfits wollen wir schießen, es könnte also eine längere Angelegenheit werden. Auf Facebook und Twitter werde ich die Updates posten und hoffentlich bekommen wir dieses Mal noch mehr Feedback!

I love my JOB! // Drei neue Modestrecken in nur zwei Tagen, das war das Ergebniss der letzen Woche und es hat Spaß gemacht, sehr viel Spaß. Viel kreatives Spinnen, spontane Improvisationen und gegenseitige Inspiration, so wie es mir gefällt. Hier ein kleiner Vorgeschmack… Aus Samstag wurde ein 12-Stunden Tag mit 15 verschiedenen Lichtaufbauten, aufwendigen Frisuren und verschiedenen sehr kalten und unheimlichen Locations. Ganz cool und locker und immer mit einem Grinsen im Gesicht von unserem Model Kasia (c/o Louisa Models) ertragen. Das Styling hat wieder die talentierte Lauren DeYoung gemacht und hat dabei zum Teil auch Stücke aus ihrer eigenen Kollektion verwendet, die coolen Frisuren und das Make-Up hat Tinka Luptakova (c/o Louisa Artists) gezaubert. Am selben Tag habe ich auch noch ein Testshooting mit Ariana gemacht, einer Freundin von meinem Assistenten Julius. Sie stand noch nie richtig vor der Kamera und konzentriert sich vernünftigerweise auf ihre Schule aber überraschte uns dann alle damit wie locker und auf Anhieb gut sie es vor der Kamera machte. Das Resultat: einfach auf dem Thumbnails clicken…