The Photogblog

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Back with another quick post about my thoughts around trading my beloved Q for a new beginning in the Leica family. I had two Leica Q over the years and in a post on my website before it got hacked i heaped praise over the Leica Q. It is still to this date one of my favorite cameras ever , for many reasons.

The strange thing is i did not really have a good reason to trade it to begin with, but it was sort of the bridge over to the M system and i felt i finally wanted to give that a decent shot.

For a long while i was very much against buying into the Leica hype at all. I have been a avid Nikon user for many years and almost for as long as i have done photography more seriously.

Suddenly i was on the other side of those commenting about Leica on the forums etc, but instead of calling it overpriced and a luxury accessory i now at least understand and value those cameras and see them in a completely different light.

But it was the Leica Q that made me change my mind about Leica cameras and i instantly understood why its so beloved by so many photographers around the globe.

So over a few months i had a conversation with a man that wanted my Q-P and trade that for his Leica M4 with 4 lenses. I know i lost some money and some people would scoff at that deal, but my plan was to also search for a used Leica M of some sort and the have 4 lenses to start out with between the M4 and the new M body.

It meant i would finally be able to use Leica with some lenses at last and felt like a natural progression from the Q that many already told me would be the poison i your veins to get sold on Leica for the future. So that part proved to be true in the end i guess.

I finally decided to make the trade and walking home with the M4 and those lenses in my bag i had to ask myself quite a few times if i had done something stupid. I tried to rationalize and usually never try to regret a deal i have done and try to keep my head cool right after, knowing those feelings of questioning yourself and the deal always shower over you the first few weeks.

Its like a withdrawal from something you have enjoyed using for a long while and you always miss it, and that wa the case with my Q as well. But i spent a lot of time getting to know the M4, which also felt so much fun handling and starting to shoot with.

I always wanted a film Leica at some point, and the craftsmanship and handling of it is just stunning. Just like the Q it makes me want to pick it up to shoot with it all the time.

I also got to try the 4 lenses ( two Voigtländer lenses , a Minolta and a Nikon lens.) when i shot some images the coming weeks together with the kids. And they were all very nice, giving the images a very nice vintage look that i had hoped for.

I started the search for a digital M body and narrowed it down to an M9 with a changed sensor or the M240 that after selling off some old Nikon gear was inside my budget.

Finally i found a good deal on a used M240 with some other accessories that was included in the deal and i made the purchase.

The M240 had a nice patina and i really appreciated the worn look although it was in pretty good condition at the same time. Knowing myself a little worn Leica would make me baby it less being out shooting which was a good thing.

I set out right away shooting with both cameras and i started to slowly bit steady get to know them and also change my feelings that i had in beginning, regretting the deal i had made at first less and less for every outing.

Im not going too much into my thoughts on the cameras and will most likely make some sort of review on them when i had them for a year or so or at least feel i know them well enough to make a more experienced post about the subject.

Overall though i look forward to this new journey i am on, as well as shooting film again as i wrote in my last post. Hoping this will be a good year for us all as human beings but also that i get to collect a lot of fond memories using these beautiful cameras over the coming year.

I will share some more images from my time thus far.

Happy shooting, and over and out…

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Hi! So for my second blogpost i just wanted to adress something i mentioned in my first post about starting film photography again. I think i would have started shooting film again regardless of the Pendemic. Maybe just not this quick. It might have jumpstarted my old analog heart and make me want to jump into it a bit faster and wanting it a bit more after having more time to think about it.

The extra time also made me look around for used gear and spin more time on reviews for lenses and cameras than would i normally would have. I have made a lot of fun purchases over the year, and im now very happy with what i have acquired thus far. Also it made me appreciate landscape and nature photography on another level and going out with my Nikon FM3a and a Nikkor 20mm f3,5 loaded with Ektar made me want to spend more time developing that side of my photography even more so than before.

The area i live in is close to Stockholm here in Sweden but still has a lot of nature and countryside to explore and enjoy shooting in. While its pretty hard spotting any rare or exotic animals, there are a lot of common wildlife and beautiful forest areas and Nature parks that are restricted for more rare species of birds that are not too far from where i live. And i can actually go there by bike.

Yes i do not actually own a car, something that i probably unheard of for other photographers, but i take my bike or go by train/buss to areas too far to get to by bike. Its not the best for someone wanting to drag a lot of gear, i realize that! But i get by with my Bike for now and i love the outdoor experience and explore the areas around where i live on bike and being able to just park my bike anywhere to get to some more difficult places that would be harder to reach if you had a car.

Besides exploring the countryside i have also had a lot of time etsting my “new” gear on my poor kids. Shooting my 2 year old son Julius with my manual lenses on my FE2 or the FM3a has been a challenge albeit a fun one. Nothing can make you train your reaction time and learn how to focus than with a child that are never in one place more than a few seconds.

My patient daughter that are 11 now actually love photography herself and have been photographed since she was a baby, so a lot easier to get to shoot and actually plan a few shoots with.

One reason i bought a used Nikon F100 was besides using it again and it being one of my favorite analog bodies of the past, that i wanted to try some of my newer G lenses on it and see how they performed together.

So now after collecting some of the used cameras i was after and also building a pretty decent kit of lenses for them, i feel confident moving ahead with my Film photography, and i feel very motivated and inspired ina way i have not felt in a long while using my digital gear. Don’t get me wrong, i love shooting on all types of cameras and will still do a lot of work on the digital side of things, but currently with thePandemic going on, this leap back into analog photography seems to fit this phase of my life perfectly.

And i will try and update my blog with new shoots and test or reviews of the gear i use and love using.

I love reading other peoples experiences using gear and how the shoot and just want to somehow contribute to other photographers and give my side of the story and maybe inspire someone else getting the same gear or shoot the same way and getting inspired in the same way i did at first. Also id love to hear your thoughts or suggestions on things i say or write about here, or just some fun banter about the gear or pictures, anything goes, but keep it civil.

This month i have acquired a few new cameras that i will explore these coming weeks, and i will posts some more pictures coming from them and detail my experiences using those cameras, one of them being the Rollie 35 TE.

But will get back as soon as i get my first roll back from the lab( if i indeed succeeded in get the focus or exposure right on any of the frames lol) and tell you more about that….

But for now, Over and out….

Leaving you with som departing shots using different film and cameras and lenses from the recent months…

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So this will be my first post in this new beginning. As my old blogg was hacked i will try and see to that this one hopefully will stay alive for a bit longer. I am a photographer based in Sweden Stockholm, and i will focus on my experiences and journey as a photographer, some posts will be about shooting, some about gear ( yes we all love gear talk!) but also just my views on things regarding photography and about other photographers and photography around the world.

My passion is photography in all forms, i started out shooting mostly with a photojournalistic angle as i studied at a school with that sort of influence. And i stil to this day shoot with a storytelling mind, trying to create stories even in my portrait work, but that decisive moment as MR bresson talked so passionately about is what makes me excited as a photographer. When the time and space come together and create an image being unique and impossible to recreate ( at least not exactly the same).

When i started doing more serious photography and went to study photography i shot mostly in monochrome and with Tri-x. I learned to develop and print myself in the darkroom at the school and basically lived there trying to create something of interest. The truth is i had a lot of passion and ideas but was pretty much a novice when it came to the technical side of gear and how to use light and get the correct exposure etc.

My first “real” camera was a Canon Eos 1 o got from my mother, sure i had several other point and shoot and also a Dynax SLR before that one.

But i remember wanting that professional feel and i could not afford it myself. I also got a Sigma 24-70 as i could not afford the Nikon 24-70( or canons equivalent at that time) which was pretty much my dream lens to get in the future.

I shot my first sort of professional work except the occasional portrait for a friend or family , at a martial arts event in Stockholm. It was for a DVD cover portraying the winner of that Martial arts gala. I used the Canon Eos 1 and even at that point in time the camera was sort of antiquated, and the loud noise of my shutter echoed through the arena at points the event where it was supposed to be a quiet moment between the cheering and the punches and kicks.

Some of the celebrities in the front row i remember vividly getting a bit annoyed when i rapid fired some shots away. There was one guy in particular , a Swedish famous photographer that told me to step aside and let the “real photographers” do their job instead…

No it was not a glamorous first job, but i learned a ton and i had fun doing it even if it was stressful at times.

Fast forward a couple of years, changing cameras and learning more along the way, i started shooting Nikon instead and never left. To this day i love the ergonomics of Nikon houses and also the tones and color coming out of them.

The last film body i owned was a Nikon F100 that was also at that time sort of a dream camera for me. Which was a bit of a nuisance as Digital photography was looming in the near future and i got a hold of a camera i really liked and did not want to part with.

I started shooting more and more portraiture and got lenses like the Nikon 85 f1,8 and kept learning how to pose and use light to its advantage in my photography , i also started dabbling with Speedlights for simple setups etc.

The digital age was over us, and a couple of years after that i left my beloved F100 behind for a few digital cameras that at the time were decent and ok but by todays standard was nothing to write home about.

The last trip i took my F100 was to Thailand and at the same time i brought the Lumix LX3, a nice little point and shoot that had almost developed a cult following for its IQ and feel.

The milestone came with the Nikon D700 for me. It was the first professional camera that made me feel i could leave my film days behind( ironically enough i never did in the end….but i will talk more about that in the future ), and that camera would become one of my most loved cameras and that i produced some of my best pictures with.

I also started working a bit more doing portrait work and other type of photography i had not felt comfortable doing in the past.

At last i also was able to get the dream lens, the 24-70 and some other lenses that had been unobtainable for me i the past.

I was at a time where i felt more comfortable as a photographer and with the gear i had. I think it was somewhere around here that i learned and adopted my style as a photographer pretty much. And from there just continued to hone those skills and refine that style of photography.

Don’t get me wrong, i always feel i have lots to learn, and will always be very fast to criticize myself and my images, but at least i started to like some of the stuff i produced and got more work because of it.

To make a long story short, over the years i have used a lot of different gear, everything from Nikon, canon, Fuji and Leica. In this blog i will review some of the gear i really liked using, even some gear i do not own any longer but have used for a long while and that i think would be great for others to get my thoughts on. Those reviews will not be a technical review with numbers and specs, but rather my own thoughts and what i liked and did not like about it, but will mostly only talk about gear that i am passionate about.

I still shoot a little bit of everything, and do my own projects as well as work from time to time. I wouldn’t label myself as a portrait photographer, but i guess if its one genre i shoot mostly that or documentary photography.

Quite recently i got back into film photography again( surprise surprise! ), and i will get into that as well i the coming blog posts, about fil stocks and about the cameras that i like shooting with and why. I hope people reading will chime in and discuss! I love talking photography and speak about it with likeminded people. So that is my wish and hopes for this blog.

I know this is a weird time we live in, not only regarding the Pandemic, but just in general. I wont go into that, but the uncertainty of where we are heading as human beings but also just in photography. Do we have DSLRs i the near future on the market ? Does film going to exist? Will photography only be considered something we do on our phones?

Who knows. But as an art i hope it will remain, and that documenting our surroundings will always be important to teach and pass something on to the coming generations.

Stay safe and keep shooting!

/over and out…

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