New Site + Workshop announced

I'm seriously SO HAPPY to share some great news with you - my new portfolio is up. After what feels like two years or more of wanting to update my website, I finally managed to get it up. I went with Squarespace in the end (yes, I'd recommend them!), and am working on integrating the blog into the new site soon as well. For now there are still a few things to change, but I decided to just go live with it now.

Also, there's a complete new workshop coming up in July - it will be a two day workshop focusing on teaching you all the photography basics from scratch in a way that's easy to understand. I want you to be able to get to know your camera and improve your photos even if you're a beginner. I'll also teach you how to create great images that work well on social media, and that can get you the most out of your online marketing. Images play such an important role in marketing, and especially with so many blogs around you want to stand out through the content you create and the photos you put up on your blog. They represent your brand after all.
The two days will be filled with fun, meeting new people, and creating amazing content for your blog or website that you can use straight away.
If you want to find out more head over to the site and book your spot. I'd love to meet you, and teach you everything I know.

Invitation to Exhibition

Some of you might already know - as part of finishing my course, we’re having an exhibition at the beginning of June, our final show. If you’re in London I hope you can make it - I’d love to see you there!
Below are the details:

Private View: Thursday 5th June 2014, 6-9 pm

Exhibition open: 2nd – 7th June 2014, 10am - 5pm (except for 7th June 10am - 4pm and late night opening on 3rd June)

Location: London College of Communication, Elephant & Castle, London, SE1 6SB

You can see a sneak preview of our work right here.
There will also be other courses exhibiting during the same time, e.g. BA Photography.

The Photo Brunch Shoreditch / 03

Last Saturday I held my third Photo Brunch in Shoreditch - it was awesome again. I could repeat myself and tell you about how great it is to take photos with a group of like-minded people, but I already mentioned that here and here. So instead I’ll talk a bit about the weather and brunch - it was such a nice day (can you see how sunny it was in the pictures?). We had brunch at Dishoom again, since the food is so good and I really love the atmosphere there. Definitely go if you can - do book a table though, as it gets very busy.
I also really enjoyed teaching and seeing everyone pick up new skills. Seriously, everyone did so well - it was great to see Candi and Alistair, Imo, Yvonne, and Crystal starting to understand their cameras and getting their head around exposure. Even just seeing them having fun was fun!
I also met Crystal for the second time after having a one-on-one session with her a couple of weeks ago. It was lovely getting to know her a bit better!
And being in Shoreditch was a great experience as usual, I feel like I've never really noticed how many different areas there are within Shoreditch alone - we moved from lovely, quiet streets into the more arty and busy area around Brick Lane, and ended up somewhere that made you feel like you were back in old London a few decades ago.

By the way, I’m handing in my business plan today. I’m applying for funding for the Photo Brunch, so I can grow the business and offer more value to you in a few different ways. I’m excited to share more with you on this soon.

I’ve set up the next Photo Brunch for 18 May - it’s a Sunday because I want to take you to Notting Hill (and a Saturday around there would be way too busy to teach). You can book your place right here if you want to take your photography to the next level and get some pretty pictures. I hope you’ll join. :)

What have you been up to over the weekend?

VSCO Grid

Just a quick post today to share with you my newly created profile on VSCO Grid. I made a selection of some of my favourite photos taken on my phone, so you might have seen these pictures on Instagram before.
I love using grid type platforms, such as Instagram, Pinterest, and VSCO Grid - apart from being able to find so much inspiration and seeing everyone’s talent, it’s such a great way to craft a portfolio. I think making a tight selection, choosing only your best photos, and combining them in a way that works well, really helps to develop a sense of colour, composition, and layout in general. Something that’s really important when it comes to creating an actual portfolio - I’ll talk about that soon in more detail, when I’ll launch my new portfolio.
Have you got a profile on VSCO Grid? I’d love to take a look!

Now & Then

A while ago Hanna invited me to play along in a fun series called Now & Then - it's basically a way to get to know each other better online, and to share some fun facts about what life was like back then. I loved reading Hanna's answers, so here are mine...

Now (2014, age 23) & Then (2006-2008, age 16-18):

READ

NOW: Harry Potter, The $100 Start-up, Contagious, Branding Yourself, Isabel Allende, Rafik Schami

THEN: Harry Potter, Carlos Ruiz Zafon

WATCH

NOW: Alice in Wonderland, Harry Potter, Peter Pan, New Girl, Forrest Gump, The Help, Breakfast at Tiffany's
THEN: Pretty Woman, Harry Potter, Desperate Housewives, Grey’s Anatomy, Sex and the City

LISTEN

NOW: Lorde, Adele, The XX, Lana del Rey, Chase & Status, Lykke Li, Two Door Cinema Club, Macklemore, Marina & the Diamonds, Phoenix, Lianna La Havas
THEN: Kanye West, Chase & Status, System of a Down, Lil Wayne, T.I.

ATTITUDE

NOW: seize the day, simplify life, ambitious, pro-active
THEN: ambitious, believing, big dreams, have to look good

DREAMS

NOW: run a branding business, travel, live a simple life
THEN: work as a photojournalist (preferably for National Geographic), change the world

LEISURE

NOW: yoga, running, eating & drinking tea, baking, painting, church, learning/reading/taking courses

THEN: running, painting, dancing

I'd love to read Carrie's, Ana's and Marta's Now's & Then's - I hope you're up for it :)

Food Photography

Last week I had the chance of being on set of a food photography shoot for the Sunday Times Magazine. It was wonderful! Such a great insight into food photography, and everything that’s going on behind the scenes.
I’ve done some food photography (see here and here - and read some tips here) myself, but in contrast to the Sunday Times shoot, I did everything on my own - from planning and preparing to cooking/baking, to styling, to photographing, to editing, and finally eating.
I can tell you, doing all that yourself can be very stressful, especially when you’re making something delicious that you just want to get your teeth into. Being patient and taking the time to photograph your food can be hard. And you don’t want to rush the process either, as you want to ensure you’ve got some good shots.

I’ve learnt a few new things on set the other day, e.g. that being picky is a good thing when it comes to photographing food. Don’t just settle for a shot that looks great at first sight, but take a closer look, especially if there’s a ‘repeating element’ in the photo (such as rice, chips, lettuce, …). Those things can easily create ‘gaps’ in between each other, leaving black holes. Go back and rearrange single parts, e.g. move a piece of lettuce slightly to create a homogenous image.

Relating to what I said before, it can really help to have a team of people working with you. Don’t feel like you have to do it all yourself. Of course you can, and it can be tempting to feel in control of everything, but it is so much easier to share tasks. If you want to focus on photography, work with someone who does a good job in the kitchen, and consider another person to help you out with props and styling.
Having a team of people on set also helps to judge the photographs and to get helpful feedback.
I’ve worked with my mum a few times before, she made most of the food, which let me focus my energy on styling and photographing. Just find people who are just as passionate about food as you are, and that you work well with.

That’s another thing - you have to really love food to work in food photography. Otherwise it can get really boring very soon. It’s still life after all, and in a way it’s all very similar.
I do love food a lot, so I really enjoyed being on set of a professional food shoot for a whole day. But even though I love food, I felt tired at the end of the day, and had definitely had enough of food for the day. I might not have actually eaten that much throughout the day, but being able to snack on so many different things all the time over the day really makes you feel like you’ve stuffed yourself.
But if you do love food enough, you’ll find that the next day you’re up for more food all over again ;)

This is a rather general post on food photography, and I’d love to share more specific advice with you. Is there anything that interests you in particular regarding food photography?

Update on current projects

So, a while ago I told you I was working on a project documenting creative business owners as part of my final major project. Well, I started working on it (the pictures in this post are from a cafe I photographed in relation to the idea), then for whatever reason got a bit bored and lost interest in it, just not feeling the passion anymore. SoI started brainstorming new ideas, and put this specific project aside for now.
I just wanted to tell you, since some of you have been really helpful in coming up with ideas, suggesting businesses, and putting me in touch with people. Thank you! I really appreciate your help!
Now I’m focusing on a couple of different projects (and got a third one in mind which I’m not quite ready to talk about yet):
1. Documenting a farm in Iceland
2. Documenting a circus

Both projects have taken a while to come together, but everything is going really well now and I’m making progress. So I’m really looking forward to sharing more with you on those soonish.

While I’m at it, I might as well let you know that I’ve been very inspired by fashion related and more abstract photography & art recently, so I’m hoping to get some personal projects in this direction going at the same time. If you’re up for some modeling, or are working as a stylist or hair and makeup artist, please get in touch.

Liebster Award

Laura from Little Travel Bee nominated me for the Liebster Award, so this post will be a bit more personal - keep reading if you want to get to know me better.
Thank you so much for nominating me, Laura!

The Liebster Award is a blogger award, it is a way for bloggers to promote some of their favourite bloggers (with under 200 followers). When you receive a nomination you can pass it on to your favourite bloggers. 'Liebster' is German for beloved, dearest or favourite.

So the rules are:
1. Thank the person who nominated you and link back to their blog.
2. Answer the 10 questions given to you by the nominator.
3. Nominate other bloggers for the award that have fewer than 200 followers.
4. Create 10 questions (or less) for your nominees to answer.
5. Let the nominees know that they have been nominated by going to their blog and notifying them.

Here are Laura’s questions and my answers:

1. Why did you decide to start your blog?
I’ve actually had 3 other blogs before starting this one - initially I started blogging just because I wanted to gather some inspiration, and because I had been reading inspirational blogs for a while and wanted to do what those people were doing.
Once I set up my photography portfolio I wanted a blog to go with it, partly to build credibility and also to have an online presence so that I could build relationships.

2. What has been the best piece of advice you have been given about blogging?
I listened to a podcast with Jeff Goins the other day, and he pointed out that it’s important to keep doing your best work and be persistent.
There’s always another mountain to climb, and when you think you’ve finally reached your goal you can still go way higher - so you have to love the work you do and you need to be able to continue to do it. You’ll only find your right audience if you create work from a place of deep passion.

3. If you could travel anywhere in the world, money no object, where would you go?
Ha, almost anywhere would be cool. Who doesn’t want to travel the world? There are four places on my ‘travel wishlist’ at the moment: Iceland (will share a bit more about my plans regarding this soon), Bhutan, the States, and Morocco. I’ve actually been thinking about trading my photography skills, like this guy, so we’ll see where everything goes :)

4. What has been your favourite holiday/trip?

Spending 7 months in New Zealand and Australia was awesome. I loved travelling on my own and meeting new people along the way, feeling free and independent, and having to manage to survive on my own pretty much (although my parents did support me, and I’m very grateful for that!). It was a great time to explore, work random jobs, such as kiwi fruit thinning (picking the ‘bad fruits’ at an early stage so the ‘good’ ones could grow better), blueberry picking (was probably the worst paid job I ever had, but my friends made it a lot of fun and the blueberries tasted amazing), and working at the cookie shop (pretty cool and yummy as well). Now I actually regret not staying longer. But, well, I was homesick.

5. If you could only eat one type of cuisine ever again what would it be?
I was just thinking of something kind of ‘neutral’, and Italian came to my mind. As much as I love all types of food, I probably couldn’t eat Indian a few days in a row. So Italian seems to be the answer to this one, pretending all the carbs didn’t exist ;) (And it should include pancakes and waffles, too).

6. Which country/city do you think is best for shopping?
London.

7. Which photograph that you have taken are you most proud of?
I love the photo I took of Lady Gaga during my first year at uni. It was at the ITV Studios, and it felt very Paparazzi-like. But I’m still really proud of it, and it always gets people’s attention when I mention it.

8. What is the best hotel you have ever stayed in/visited?
I haven’t stayed in many hotels yet, the last few times I travelled we always stayed at AirBnB apartments. Our Rome Apartment was lovely, very arty, and Rome was great as well!

9.When you go on holiday what do you always have to bring with you?
Just the basics really. No particular item. Clothes, shoes, basic cosmetics, … Maybe lip balm would be ‘the one thing I definitely have to bring’. Did I forget anything really important? I’d love to hear everyone’s answer to this one (feel free to share in the comments).

10. What are your travel plans for 2014?
As I said above, definitely Iceland - and then we’ll see how much money I’ve got left ;)

So, here are my nominations:

Siobhan
Hanna
Giulia
Jo
Kate
Charlotte

And these are my questions for you:

1. What are you really really good at?
2. Where do you see yourself in 50 years?
3. What is your biggest problem/challenge when it comes to blogging?
4. What do you value the most in life? (There’s a cool trick to figure out your true core values: imagine you’re being sent to an island, and you can pick 5 people to go with you - assuming your family and close friends are already there. Who would you chose? And why? What is it that makes you want them to be there? These are your core values.)
5. What do you feel is your true identity? I.e. what do you think you’re really supposed to do in life, what is your dream/true talent?
6. If you were a character from a movie or a different world (e.g. from Space), who or what would you be, and what would your story be?
7. What did you do and play as a child?
8. What does a normal day in your life look like?

Really looking forward to reading all your answers - I hope you’re up for it! :)

P.S. You've got till Sunday to enter the Giveaway, if you want the chance to win a one-on-one Skype session with me, or come along to the Photo Brunch:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Space Party

I’m on work placement at the Sunday Times Magazine for the next couple of weeks, so I prepared some posts which I’ve been meaning to get out there for a while. Today I’ve got some photos to show you from our New Year’s Eve Space Party.
It was so much fun, especially going crazy on the 'dance floor'. I also loved preparing and getting everything ready, really focusing on the details. Luckily Louis wanted it to be just as perfect as me, bought a whole roll of fabric from the market to put up in our living room, borrowed a smoke machine, got a laser, more lights, loads of drinks, and created the playlist (you can listen to part of it here).
I created a secret Pinterest board for inspiration, wrote invitations (sadly don’t have any pictures of them), made lots of food, and was obsessed with my outfit and ‘character’ and coming up with a name and story around it.
I even downloaded the Google Sky Map app (which is pretty cool!), which helped me to come up with my name - Vindemiatrix from planet Alphekka ;) Louis was called Unukalhai (forgot the planet's name).

P.S. Of course we had a lot more people show up than the ones in the photos - but you know, I like things to look good, so these ones are definitely the most spacey looking ones ;)

PPS. Have you entered the giveaway yet?

Behind the Scenes / 03

Just wanted to give you a little update today on what I’ve been up to lately.

I recently started back at uni for my final year. So far things are going well, and I’m quite excited about finishing soon, and getting out ‘into the real world’. At the same time I know it will be sad to leave. I realise that this is the best time to experiment and to work out what I want to do, where I want to take my photography business,… While I want to work now and put myself out there, I don’t have the pressure of having to make a living quite yet (although that would be nice of course). I can play around with photography, try different things, work on different projects, figure it all out, and if something fails it won’t hurt too much. Feels a bit like freedom. ;)

Then again I take things seriously, and constantly push myself to improve, and work on my skills. A few days ago we had a guest lecturer come in and speak to us about the business of photography - including topics like taxes, pricing, contracts, etc. Probably one of the best (meaning most helpful) guest lectures we’ve had. Of course not the most interesting thing you want to think about, but certainly important, and SO useful to have someone tell you all about it, and being able to ask questions.
This is actually really relevant for me right now, since I started taking on freelance work recently.
I’ve been doing more work for Appear Here (click here for some previous examples), some of which you can see above and below.

I’m also going to be working on my dissertation and final major project soon. More excited about the practical work than my dissertation of course. It will be great taking some time to explore a subject, photographing a lot, meeting new people, and getting into a story in depth. Sounds perfect, but it will be a lot of hard work, challenging myself, taking in feedback and putting to use all I’ve learnt so far. Exciting times to come!

So, there you have it - a bit of my personal and work life up to date.
What have you been up to lately? Feel free to comment, or send me a link!

P.S. I feel like these pictures bring back spring. I’ve got so many more that I took in Notting Hill, so I might just have to do a picture post very soon dedicated to showing you more prettiness. :)

Behind the Scenes of The Sartorialist

I came across this video about Scott Schuman (the guy behind The Sartorialist) the other week, and wanted to share it. I thought it was really interesting - both the interview and being able to basically go along with him on one of his tours through the city.

Almost seems too perfect - just being able to go up to people, tell them your blog name, and have them totally agree straight away to having their photo taken ;)

I love documentary videos/interviews like this one. They really inspire me - this one made me think about where I’m going with my career, where I want to be, and gave me some new ideas. 

Here’s another one by the way (where he mentions August Sander. Yay - he’s one of my biggest and longest inspirations, too! ;) )

If you know any other interesting videos let me know! Could be about anything really (I love anything from the creative industries to business to psychology) - maybe there’s something on TED I haven’t heard about yet that inspired you? Or it might not be a video, but just a written interview. Anything, please share. :) And let me know what you think of this one - what do you take away from it?

Behind the Scenes / 03

Productivity

I want to share something a bit more personal today - I find it really hard to find my own voice when writing blog posts, and always ask myself whether this is how I really talk. If you know me in person you might be able to tell - please let me know what you think. ;) So my goal is to write in a more personal way.

Maybe it’s the fact that the internet seems like such a huge and wide open space, where anyone can access anything. And while the great thing about it is that you can connect with so many people that you would otherwise probably not get to know, it can also be intimidating opening up to ‘strangers’. But then again, isn’t that part of blogging?
I personally enjoy getting to know other bloggers better, which usually happens when someone shares something personal and opens up (and by that I don’t mean sharing their life’s story and secrets).

So, let’s try today - I’ll tell you a bit about my day-to-day life.
Most of my days are pretty relaxed, at least while I’m not going to uni (which is the case at the moment).
I used to just get up whenever I felt like it, unless something was on (usually around 8 when my boyfriend gets up to go to work), then went for a run, showered, had some breakfast, spent some time on Pinterest and checking mails etc. while drinking my tea and enjoying my rather long breakfast. So then by the time I had finished breakfast it was probably around noon. Sounds pretty relaxing, but a bit crazy, too. You have to know though, that breakfast/brunch is my favourite meal of the day, and we always enjoyed (and still do) a long brunch on the weekends back home.

Over time I realised that I didn’t really make the most of my time, and should put it to better use. It can feel pretty frustrating not being productive. I was never bored, but somehow the days just went by, and I didn’t feel like I got much ‘actual’ work done.
So I knew that I should be more active, and tried out different things to structure my day and get things done - like setting time slots, or putting the most important tasks at the top of the to-do list, or using Wunderlist. But none of my efforts really succeeded.

A while ago I came across Zenhabits - a blog focused on simplicity, living in the moment and being present, getting things done, health and fitness, and focusing on the important. It’s a great blog, and uncopyrighted by the way (a concept I’m really impressed by!) - you should stop by and take some time to read some of the articles, there are some great ones in the archives!

Anyway, one of the posts I recently read suggested saying ‘no’ to one thing each day (could be anything), and creating a new to-do list every day listing the three ‘most important things’ to get done for that day. Then at the bottom of the list go the ‘small things’ that don’t actually take up that much time, and shouldn’t get in the way of achieving your three main goals. Then set aside a specific amount of time to get things done - e.g. tell yourself you’ll work on ‘task x’ for 1,5 hours. Get it done during that time. You probably will if you focus.

So far this concept seems to work. I’ve found that giving myself a set amount of time really helps, as well as only focusing on three main things each day to not get overwhelmed, and not get frustrated if I won’t manage to get ALL of the stuff done that’s on my general to-do list.
It’s also been helpful to remember that small things shouldn’t take up as much space and time on my to-do list (and in my head) as some of the big tasks.

I hope this post came across as open and personal - and I hope you can relate and take something away for yourself.

How do you manage to get things done? Any ‘secret’ tips you have?

P.S. The work space above isn't mine by the way.

Behind the Scenes / 02

Today I want to talk about business. I feel like every since I met my boyfriend I started getting interested in business and in the whole start-up world.
I learnt from him over time, started reading blogs like Problogger, and got interested in anything business related - whether this might have been a blog post I read, an article in a magazine, a book, or an e-course I did.

I recently finished reading Rework, which talks a lot about the way we work. I love how the book is structured - it has a fast, straightforward pace (most chapters are 1-3 pages long). The authors are really direct with the points they’re making, and make you think twice about what you’re doing, and whether you should be doing it in a different way. Like Seth Godin is saying ‘they've demonstrated that the regular way isn't necessarily the right way’.

A few points I took away:
- ‘Inspiration is a time machine.’ It won’t wait for you. If you’re feeling inspired NOW you’ve got to do the work NOW. No matter whether it’s 2pm or 2 am. It’s perishable.

- ‘Learning from mistakes is overrated.’ What you learn from mistakes is what you should NOT do again. You still don’t know what you should do. Instead building on successes means you’re building on something that you know did work.

- If you stopped doing what you do, would people notice? Are you building ‘just another me-too product’ or are you ‘making a dent in the universe’?

- ‘No time is no excuse. If you want something bad enough you will make the time, regardless of your other obligations.’ If you can’t find the time to do it, maybe you’re not passionate enough about it.

- When you’re starting something new there will always be different options, like ‘what you want to do, could do, have to do’. Start with what you ‘have to do’ to build a foundation. The foundation is what you can’t remove in order to keep going, everything else depends on it.

There are a hundred more points that I could talk about, but if you’re feeling a bit entrepreneur-ish at all you should read for yourself.

Behind the Scenes / 01

I always love getting to know bloggers a bit more, and hearing about what they do outside of work, or learning about things they do which you usually don’t get to see on the blog.
So, I thought I’d give you an insight into my life. This won’t necessarily be super interesting, it’s just something to give you a little glance into my life - which can be boring and ugly, just as it can be nice and beautiful. The point is that as bloggers we intend to share the pretty and positive things of life - no matter whether we’re sharing some big fact or something more personal, I believe that even ordinary things can be presented in a lovely way, without being pretentious.

You’ve probably seen pictures of this magazine before. That was when it only existed in virtual form. Now I got it printed, which makes me so happy. It was great actually holding it in my hands, and being able to flick through it. I got three copies for now - printing the first one last week really put me out of my comfort zone. I had absolutely no knowledge about the printing and binding process, and felt like a complete noob at times. But the people at uni were nice and helped me out, and when I went back a few days ago to get the other two copies done I already felt more confident with what I was doing.

It’s so exciting being involved in printing your own magazine. Actually being able to ‘use my hands’ makes me really happy. I think I miss the manual/’getting my hands dirty-work’ sometimes, since working as a photographer (in the digital age) means a lot of work in front of the screen. 

Anyway, I got my magazine and I’m happy.

On another note: I'm guest posting over on Hanna's blog today as part of a regular column called ' appreciate it'. You can find last week's post here.