Swedish Championship in Portrait Photography 2016

During the weekend 10-11 September 2016 in Stockholm the Swedish Championship in portrait photography took place. I competed with 6 photos of which 5 got to the top 3 or received an honorary mention.

I am very happy with the result, especially since I am a commercial photographer, focused on destinations and adventures, now competing in a different field of photography. And I am even more happy that my favorite portrait photographer in Sweden, John Hagby, won the 1st price in the Portrait category. Hats off to you John.

Here are the photos I competed with.

Category: Commercial – 3rd place

portratt-sm-portrait-championship-3rd-place-commercial

Neverstore is a Swedish punk rock band formed in 2000 in Skövde. 2007 and 2008 they won “Best Swedish Act” on MTV Europe Music Awards.

The first guitar that Jacob, the lead singer and guitarist, tried to play he borrowed from his neighbour on Orrelyckevägen in Hjo. And that neighbour is me.

A few years later I am their official tour photographer, sleeping in a crappy tour bus with these great guys and their team around Scandinavia. Crazy fun times =)

This is from a photo shoot for their album cover and promotion photos we did in 2015.

Big thanks to Zsuzsa and Siri for all the help and Kungsgatan 13 in Skövde for being able to use their kickass tattoo studio.

This photo also came in 2nd place in the Moscow international Foto Awards 2016 under the category “Advertising, Music”. The winner was a photo of U2 and the 3rd place winner was a photo of Taylor Swift. So my friends in Neverstore is in good company I would say.

Category: Couples – 3rd place

The photo is taken at J Bar L Ranch, www.jbarl.com, in Montana, USA. We had been out riding all day and saw another group of cowboys making camp. They were doing a real old style adventure, riding with authentic gear over several states. I was in a hurry to get home before it was completely dark, so I asked if I could take a photo of the man and his horse. I didn’t realise it at the time, but the quick snapshot taken in really bad light sure was something extra.

A year after this trip I won the Travel Photographer Awards with a series of photos from J Bar L Ranch. I am pretty sure this guy gave me the first place.

A funny side note is that because of the publicity in the contest, I also got into contact with a woman who know this guy and his horse. Dick is a legendary horse trainer and runs the famous Pieper Ranch in Oklahoma. www.pieperranch.com

So say hi to Dick the cowboy and Dottie his kickass horse.