For the past month I haven’t been too interested in photography. Actually, I haven’t been too interested in much anything besides skateboarding. Then two weeks ago I blew my knee and ankle (skateboarding) and since that I’ve spent most of my time watching skateboarding videos in the internet and standing on my board in our living room, listening to the trucks squeak.

I picked up skateboarding last summer for the first time since junior high. I, of course, suck at it too, but this time around it doesn’t matter. I don’t have to take pressure from not learning any tricks and so on. Skating is my happy place where I don’t have to think about school or work or… well, you know, photoshop and lenses.

That’s why I haven’t been too eager to mix the two and start taking photos of skating – not until now, I figure. Skateboarding is amazingly visual sport (and yea, it sure as hell is sport even if you can do it with your jeans on) but even so, I’m more interested in portraying the culture around it rather than the act itself.

These photos were taken three weeks ago at Syyssessarit, an event to close down the season here in Tampere. I only had my camera with me because maybe I was a bit shamed to skate before all the pros so I settled with the next best thing, hah. They’re not the best skateboarding photos but I guess they’re not meant to be either.

P.S.

Jarkko’s last post was our 100th post!! That’s gnarly, as skateboarders say (according to my Thrashers). I’m psyched, as they also say.

Posted by Konsta
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These photos of Sauli Niinistö were never used so I might as well post them here. I feel that taking photos of seasoned top politicians is kind of tricky since they know the game. They know what kind of image they want to project and they know how to deliver it. So it was with Sauli. We did the interview at his home (which actually was a surprise that he invited us there) but he was very precise where the photos should be taken. The interview and the shooting was to be done outside, there was no chance that we were going to go in. But when we started there was a moment of chaos and I did miss one potentially interesting photo. This happened: Sauli and his wife Jenni have a French bulldog named Lennu. Kind of comical looking fella, I think. At the very beginning of interview Lennu shoots out from nowhere and rushes the presidential candidate. He his trying to grab the dog while this drooling rocket of energy feverishly climbs on top of Niinistö who at the same moment is shouting “no photos!” This didn’t really matter because I had tele lens and I was standing maybe two meters from him so I missed the moment. Why I hated that I wasn’t able get the photo? Because something unexpected and uncontrolled happened.
Anyway, I don’t know if it transcends to the viewer as a great image but I was pleased with the shot where he is standing his arm stretched out. This is because it was the only moment when he seemed to be somewhat absent and not conscious about being photographed.

Posted by Jarkko
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Some reportage stuff from last summer. This one is from Åland. The topic was basically about the traditions and the present of this special area. The writer and I tried to think about the stereotypes related to finnish Archipelago – you know, stuff in tourist brochures- and then compare that ideological landscape to concepts that we percieved as “reality”. This was done by finding people with different kind of stories: workers from Thailand, footballers from US, local rockers and so on. So it was also a sort of “outsiders looking in”  angle to the identity of Åland. The story itself turned out to be ok but in the photos this method resulted as a very scattered outcome. The result wasn’t a catastrophe but I’ve should have had balls to take more focused visual approach. But you’ll live and learn. Hopefully. These images are mostly the same ones used in the paper.  The story was published in Helsingin Sanomat.

EDIT: One photo added.

Posted by Jarkko
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Last week I went to take some photos of a new work by Charles Sandison. He is an artist based in Tampere and the winner of Ars Fennica 2010. His latest piece is presented in Hämeenlinna Art Museum and it is something that you should check out. I was familiar with some of his work before but the scale of this was just pretty overwhelming. 26 projectors making constantly changing patterns and shapes, all based on his C++ coding. And what I understood the projectors are not screening individually, they all are projecting the same piece. So it is not a static video projection but a kind of living form of code or scripture filling this big space. Back in the days the exhibition room used to be an old granary and the whole idea for the work stemmed from this notion. Sandison scanned some old granary accountbooks from this era and by some strange way turned them into coding. Anyway, the work is a visual blast.

Posted by Jarkko
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