Category Archives: Gear

Fairytale from Denmark

Denmark is famous as the land of fairy tales and castles – so when top Danish photographer Henrik Sørensen was asked to do the campaign shoot for the new Hasselblad H5D-40 he decided to mastermind a shoot with a difference and do a twisted take on Denmark as a fairytale country. Underwater.

From Henrik Sorensen’s YouTube Channel:

“He ended up with this submerged, slightly decadent fairy, floating gracefully in the 18th century palace setting.”

“With top of the league underwater model Kristina Korsholm, the beautiful costumes from Trash Couture, a huge backdrop of Ledreborg castle, and the best crew in town, all was in place for a great shoot when Henrik dived into the pool.”

“Watch the film and see one of the best underwater crews create these stunning and contemporary images, fine art or fashion? – entirely up to you.”

What a concept and result! Can’t really complain anymore about having to drag out a background, reflector and a light stand or two now can you?

Thanks to John Joe Joyce for pointing me to this one.

Monster Lens seen in St. Peter’s Square

A lens with a long reach can be a really useful tool when you can’t get near your subject or you’re looking to compress the view. Vieing for the first close up shot of a newly elected Pope from St. Peter’s Square would be an ideal occasion to use such a lens but what would be a suitable focal length for such a job? 200mm, 300mm, 600mm? Maybe with an extender or teleconverter to really get close?

One photographer, Dylan Martinez of Reuters, doing this exact job last week considered the same issue and brought along a Zoom-Nikkor 1200-1700mm f/5.6-8P IF-ED!

nikon1200-1700

At 16Kg and a maximum diameter × maximum length of 237 mm × 888 mm with a closest focusing distance of 10m, this beast looked more like a military weapon than a camera lens when it was set up in St. Peter’s Square on 13/3/13. Italian newspaper, La Stampa, ran a few photos of the photographer at work here and you can see his results on the Reuters blog.

The lens was initially designed and was first used in 1990, to shoot baseball at the Koshien Stadium, Japan. The Nikon website has all the details here.