a little piece of norway

i know, i know. it's been ages since my last post. or - to be more precise - close to three months (!) anyway. i apologize. seriously.

i have to be honest. the last weeks have been really hardcore. illness in my close family has really turned my days upside down and i haven't had the time nor inspiration to do much dedicated shooting. then there's work. w-o-r-k. i have, however, started shooting a lot of 35mm analog photography to document my day to day life. i will cover this in a separate post. i'm trying to get some scanning done, but it takes time. time, you say? ah yes...that precious & elusive substance more valuable than solid gold in my honest opinion. gimme gimme gimme.

role play

but back to the task at hand. photography. my passion. i actually had an hour to kill (believe it or not) the other day and went downtown to buy some more coffee. i brought my camera with me, as i try to do every day. this particular day the weather was exceptional - especially for norway, all things considered. there were a lot of people out and about and i thought i'd hang around there for a few minutes in the middle of downtown oslo at a place called 'egertorget' - i was out getting coffee anyway. egertorget is right smack in the middle of the city and also, conveniently in the middle of the city's broadway of sorts - karl johans gate. if you look in one direction you'll see the kings palace and if you look in the other you'll (after walking a bit) see the old train-station-come-shopping-mall.

what's cool about egertorget is that all kinds of people pass through there, hang out there, shop there, perform there...where there's people there's action...and opportunities for some photography. especially street photography.

band on the run

now - shooting street photography in oslo, or in norway for that matter, is kind of tricky. yeah - the kids don't mind as much but my generation and older - they see a camera, they run and hide. seriously. they act like you're holding a gun to their head threatning to shoot their loved ones. not kidding (wish i was).

so the trick is - bring your stealthy camera setup, act as normally as possible, be nice, don't act like you're james bond on a super secret mission and just hang out. let the pictures present themselves to you.

where the wild things are

i'm no expert at shooting street photography, but i'm learning and i'm loving every step of the way. i've been watching people like chris weeks and of course legends like henri cartier bresson and really connecting with the concept of trying to capture moments. those fleeting moments that happen and disappear...and believe me - they happen all the time and they disappear as fast as they happen. you really have to focus - at least i have to pull myself together ;) - in order to anticipate the moments and be ready to capture them without being spotted or intrude upon what's going on. i get spotted sometimes, though, for sure. i'm not all stealth yet...working on it, working on it. shooting from 'the hip' as they say is a lot tougher than it looks. basically, shooting from the hip means you're not holding the camera up to your eye, you measure the distance to your subject(s) using the rangefinder on the lens, dial in the settings on your camera manually (yes, manually) and then work within the preset zone you've chosen for shooting in. having a leica - analog (yay) or digital (yay but $$$) are ace for this thing. you can also use a zeiss icon or a voigtländer bessa. they do the trick although their not built like a leica nor do they inspire you like a leica. ;) yes. i'm biased.

fresh air

i hope you enjoy these images and please tell me if any of them is more pleasing to your eyes than others...maybe you'd even like to tell me why you might find them pleasing? interaction, my friends. interaction. ;) oh and the LIKE-button? press it, baby, press it...share the love with your friends.

timeless

staring at the suntrippin'

blanksthis last image has me conflicted for several reasons. first of all - i feel images of homeless people are a bit 'cheap'. as a group they're 'easy targets' and it's important not to take advantage of the position these human beings find themselves in. then there's how we as an audience react to photographs of homeless people. they often make us feel a certain way and it's almost always got nothing to do with the photograph but the condition of the person in the picture. again, i'm conflicted as to posting this image. still - the look he gave me really stuck with me. this image moves me because it almost felt as though he surrendered to the camera. that's the only way i can describe the feeling this image gives me. if you see this guy - make sure you take care of him. give him a few bucks for food and drinks. he's been roaming the streets of oslo for as far back as i can remember. this is a really tough guy, but his eyes no longer have the spark they used to have.

may the force be with you - always.

-morgan-