BJØRN CHRISTIANSEN | Photographer

Right before Christmas last year I had a quite big project with Modelbureauet Modelbooking in Århus, Denmark, testing several new models at Yellow Cock Studio One of those models was Stephanie Schönhoff from Aalborg. Helping me out doing hair, make-up and styling was Anja Aarestrup Lund. Here are some shots of Stephanie form that day.

This is a photo from my last photo shoot in Denmark before Christmas. The model is Siri Nordheim Jensen from Modelbureauet Modelbooking. Helping me out with make-up and hair was Anja Aarestrup Lund. This particular shot of Siri was taken outside Yellow Cock Studio with a SB-900 mounted on top of the camera.

Datacolor Spyder3 Elite

As a Christmas gift from me to me, I bought a color calibrator for my screen. Hopefully my photos will come out better in the future. I ordered one unit from Netshop.no today, but I don’t think I will receive it before Christmas eve.

Nine models, two make-up artists, three intensive days in the facilities of Yellow Cock Studio has produced a lot of pictures. I have learned a lot, the models are guaranteed to have done weird things. This is a little collection of photos that were taken during the model testing for Modelbureauet Modelbooking. Sunday is my last day of testing here in Denmark before I go back to Norway to celebrate Christmas Holiday.

Today Tek.no and Akam.no reviewed one of my photos from the shoot I did with Rasmus Michelsen from Modelbureauet Modelbooking in October, 2011.

From Tek.no

Bjørn Christiansen er mannen bak (eller foran) portrettet over, og det er et portrett med skikkelig smell i. Det kunne så lett ha sklidd ut i klisjeer og svulstighet – posituren, blikket, det lave kamerastandpunktet, svart-hvitt, etc – men holder seg hele tiden på akkurat rett side av det, og dermed sitter det som et skudd. Signaturen forstyrrer dessverre en del – den er stor og lys og tiltrekker seg dermed blikket litt i overkant mye – men heldigvis ikke nok til å ødelegge bildet.

Here are the photo that have been reviewed:

Here are two portraits, one of Augustine Tino Asenjo and one of Mehdi Hassan. The portraits are taken in conjunction with model testing for Trend Models and is made ​​of Dora in Trondheim.

Tomorrow I have two male fashion photo shoots, this time for Modelbureauet Modelbooking. The test will take place in the studios of Yellow Cock Studio and stylist is Anja Aarestrup Lund from the agency. I am looking forward to work inside a studio again, it has been a while.

This is the fifth and last part from the series I shot with Jennifer Hansen, Modelbureauet Modelbooking in Århus. These shots are photographed in the corner of the daylight studio I rented at Christina Lykke’s Skyderiet.dk. and is lit with one flash aimed towards the roof. To get some contrast in the photo I had a big, black blanket which I have span between two light stands and positioned right behind me. Stylist on this shoot was Malene Micha Juhl. Working with both these fantastic people was fun and exciting.

Rasmus Michelsen, model testing for Modelbureauet Modelbooking in Århus. Clothes and manbag are supplied by [ei`kon]. The color of the wall behind the model gives the full image a warm and nice touch in contrast to his blue eyes and jeans. The style is a bit lumberjack meets hipster. Enjoy the rest of the photos I’ve shoot of Rasmus as well.

Part four from the series I shot on top of Aros in the “Your Rainbow Panorama Installation” of Stephanie Bäckström, Modelbureauet Modelbooking. Stylist on the shoot was Maria Släger Jensen.

Here are some more photos of Stephanie:

Here are two portraits of Jennifer Hansen from Modelbureauet Modelbooking in Århus. Styling is done by Malene Micha Juhl and the portraits are shot at Skyderiet.dk run by photographer Christina Lykke.

Here are two pictures from the test shots I did of Rasmus Michelsen from Modelbureauet ModelBooking in Aarhus. The pictures are taken in the old town on a fairly busy street corner. The sun was going down and our lights were about to disappear, but I managed to get some pictures of the last outfit we had planned. Suppliers of clothes for this male fashion photo shoot was the clothing store [ei`con] situated right next to the cathedral in Århus. If you are in town, check out their store.

Maybe you have seen this first photo on my portfolio. Here is the story behind. Model is Stephanie Bäckström from Modelbureauet Modelbooking in Århus, styling, hair and make-up was done by Maria Scläger Jensen and the location was Your Rainbow Panorama by Olafur Eliasson, on the top of the art museum in Århus, Aros. Since we started off quite early we hadn’t been bothered by that many people visiting Aros, but suddenly a man appeared in my frame, I waited until he had the same posture as my model, Stephanie, who didn’t know why I waited so long before I shot the picture. A some kind of art by accident. This picture is shot in the green part of the panorama. My experience with shooting in these light conditions were that I had be really care full not to use my LCD-display on the back of my camera to review the exposure, first of all because the light in the room were colored by the windows, second it was impossible to see anything on the screen. To get the right exposure in color filtered lighting environment, trust your light meeter.

This is part three of model test I had with Jennifer Hansen, Modelbureauet ModelBooking. Stylist of the photo shoot was Malene Micha Juhl, who did a fabulous job of preparing Jennifer for the different pictures. This part of the photo shoot is inspired by fashion photographer Richard Avedon and his airy jump-images, which is perhaps inspired by Henri Cartier Bresson’s picture in which a man jumping over a puddle. A good illustration of the theory behind “the decisive moment”. My thought behind this was that I had my shots of Jennifer posing static and now I wanted some movement. Her skirt was kind of wavy and letting her hair down enhanced the movement.
The technique I did to get these images the most sharp, in spite of a great movement was to lower the ambient light in the studio. Since this was a daglysstudio was a little difficult to cover the windows, but all the lights were turned off and setting the light of the flash was turned off. The camera was set to continuous focus, or AI Servo on Canon, an aperture of f/14 and a shutter speed of 1/200 second at ISO200. The reason that the aperture is set so low is to eliminate most of the ambient light and only let the flash freeze the picture. All three images are captured with just a flash.

Third part of model testing with my Rasmus Michelsen Aarhus. Rasmus is represented by model agency Modelbureauet ModelBooking. Clothing and styling was done at [ei´kon], a fashion store for both men and women. Anonymous, black jeans, a white t-shirt, blazer, black, high boots and a murse is what gives this model a rocky touch.
What is a murse? Well, I just learned that that was the slang for male bags or purses. It is supposed to be a masculine way to carry around papers, laptops and other electronic devices, you’ll be the judge of that. A murse is also refereed to as a male nurse, fag bag or a man-bag.
The location of this shoot was over and under the bridge down town Århus, Åboulevarden and Skt. Clemens Bro. On the first picture where Rasmus is walking across the bridge, the light hit the surrounding building and helped out lighting the scene. The second and third picture is more film noir feel more than the classical commercial fashion. The second picture is shot on the walkway right beneath the first picture, and the third is shot in the staircase right next to Restaurant & Cocktail Bar Copenhagen. This part of the series should in theory give a little more sense of motion rather than the two previous sections.

The second part from the photo shoot with Stephanie Bäckström from Modelbureauet Model Booking in Aarhus. Location is still “Your Rainbow Panorama” by Olafur Eliasson on the roof of the art museum Aros. Styling, hair and make-up is done by Maria Schläger Jensen.

This is my part two from the fashion photo shoot I had with Jennifer Hansen, Modelbureauet Modelbooking in Århus. Styling, hair and make-up was done by Malene Micha Juhl. For these particular photos we wanted a cheeky, careless feel, a bit Kate Moss, heroin chic.

Orbis Ring Flash

Today I received my Orbis Ring Flash-gadget converting any speed lights into a ring flash. I haven’t had time to test it out yet, but I am planning two photo shoots this weekend. The difference between the Orbis Ring Flash and the more known Ray-Flash is that the ring it self is lit from beneath instead of forcing the light through a maze of mirrors before lighting the actual ray. Fredrik Kihle is a photographer who introduced me to the Orbis Ring Flash. Head over to his website and check out his projects with ring flash photo.