Rune Kolvik / Blog

On the winter solstice I received a package. It was the first copy of my book. I had ordered two copies so that I could proof the colours before I ordered more books. I figured it was better to pay shipping twice, and not risk wasting money on ten copies with bad colours. Immediately upon arrival, beeing very pleased with the quality, I placed a second order.

I brought the book with me everywhere I went and showed it to people I met. They all liked the product, and they all liked the photos. Their favorites differed, but they all enjoyed it in general. The book is for sale in the blurb web-shop.

Have a look at the preview below and order your copy if you want to.

Læretiden | Rune E. Kolvik by Rune E. Kolvik | Make Your Own Book

Now that I have finished my first book, I am ready to start work on the second. This will be a book containing photos taken with “low quality” cameras. A book very much inspired by Chase Jarvis’ book “the best camera is the one that’s with you”. The photos are from my mobile phone camera and my holga 120 camera. In this book I want to celebrate the content of the photos, rather then the technical quality.

I had planned to write some posts here on the blog while working on the book. To document the prosess. That didn’t happen. The book is finished tho. I finished it just now. The work is done. It feels a bit weird. But most of all, it feels good. Now I have to figure out how many to order, and then wait for them to arrive in the mail. I can’t wait to see the printed book. I hope the prints won’t differ too much from what I saw on my screen. Much, and actually most, of the work on the book was done at Brukbar. With a refreshing drink in my glass and surrounded by people. Somehow I found that environment much easier to concentrate in then to sit and work at home.

I learned a lot about making a book throughout the process. Things that I wouldn’t have thought about had I not changed my mind about the layout and design several times. And I bring this knowledge with me when I start anew with my second book tomorrow. I will write about that in a new post.

For a long time now, I have wanted to create my own photo book. I have had a lot of ideas for projects I could easily turn into books, but most are quite long term and will be large investments. The other day I had a chat with some people at my favourite café/bar Brukbar about my creative funk. When I went home that night a question started to form. Do I have material in my archive that I could turn into a book?

I thought about it for a while and then it occurred to me that most of my images are from when I was an apprentice. So the idea then turned into creating a book with my work as an apprentice. Hopefully the book will show a novice photographer growing into an ok one. The hope is that the creative process of this bookmaking will spark the creative parts of my brain and start working on more of these book projects. Then maybe the ok photographer could become a good photographer.

As I am typing out these words I am thinking about a second book I could do from my pictures from my smartphone, but that’s for later.

Fist things first.

Lately I have been thinking about buying a Samsung galaxy tab. Mostly to read my rss feeds, catch up on my Flickr contacts,  and general surfing of the internet. But I am not sure it is worth the investment. After a bit of research I have found that the number of apps available for Android tabs is still quite low. All Android apps can run on tabs, but are not designed for the larger screen, and all design elements will be scaled up. As a result everything will be stretched.

Seeing as I will mostly use the tab for internet surfing this will not be a major issue. A bigger issue is the keyboard. With the larger area and larger “buttons” I am concerned that I will have to stretch my thumbs way to much, as I have a tendency to use my right thumb more than the left. I probably will have no problems adapting though.

The investment is an issue. Considering I have a smartphone that does all the tasks I want the tab to do, and that I have a laptop that does all the tasks with more power. The only thing the tab offers are large screen and a small total size.

What to do?

After I left my job a few weeks ago, I have been spending a lot of time at my favorite bar/café Brukbar. I am here as I type. I love the atmosphere here. The music they play varies a lot. Right now; Bob Marley. Yesterday; Patti Smith. I mostly read my rss reader, magazines or a book. Not very social, but very satisfying. I really ought to take some pictures here and post in a future post. As I plan to spend much more time here, and some time doing documentary photography.

After a few weeks of vacation, I am getting a bit bored with having so much free time and need to occupy myself in some sort of way. I was hoping to shoot a lot now that I have all this time off, but something is holding me back. I really want to shoot. I just don’t. Really annoying. Ohh yeah.. And I need to get a new job.

Last night I was meeting up with my dear friend Irene. While waiting for her I visit my favorite café/bar Brukbar. I bought a cup of coffee, and sat there thinking about what I had written in the post ponderings about things to come. About my need to shoot pictures. I have a project in mind for it. I have called it “fifty on the five” because it will all be done with my 50mm 1.4 on the 5D. Pictures of/from my everyday life. I will also take time off to reflect over the images I make. To think about what I did, and why I did so. These thoughts will be written in my black moleskine journal. This will help me take better pictures. It will make me practice my handwriting and writing skills.

Sitting there writing in my journal I felt very centered. I actually felt a bit like a writer. I felt that I am moving in the right direction. And in small steps. I have a lot of goals set out for myself. I just have to face the fact that it is going to be a lot of hard work, and that it’s going to take time. But I am on my way. While taking a brief break from the journal, sipping my coffee, I posted this to twitter:

“Feeling content with knowing that I have some turbulent times ahead. I’m ready for it. #bringiton”

When I had finished my coffee I got a text from Irene that she was on her way, so I walked to our rendezvous point. We ate some dinner and talked for a while about the goings on of our lives. We tend to talk a lot, and time usually flies. When they started turning off the lights in the room, we took the hint and made our way home. It was midnight after all, and I had work the following morning.

Before the room got to dark I took a picture of Irene:

Irene for "Fifty on the five"

I got out of bed bright and early and made my way to the rendezvous point, where i met up with Cecile Sørgård. She had graciously offered to drive to this years Nordic Light International festival of photography.

I had been waiting for this day for several months, and after last years festival where I saw Marc Ribaud and Elliot Erwitt, I had high expectations for this years line-up. The names I was most looking forward to was Erwin Olaf and Albert Watson.

We picked up our third travel companion Lena Katrin Bye Mikkola, and we were off. The 4 hour drive seemed like only an hour with good conversation and a bit of catching up on the goings on of our lives.

Upon arrival in Kristiansund we checked in to the hotel, and started our day of planned gallery visits. We saw lots of exhibitions in a few hours. (Albert watson, Vee Speers, Ervin Olaf, Helene Fjell, Student work from some of the Norwegian photo schools, and local camera clubs. We saw the awarded photographs from the annual competition in the National association for professional photographers (Norges Fotograf Forbund, NFF). All nice work, but the best by far was Erwin Olaf’s large, beautifully mounted magnificent prints.

The planned lecture by Erwin Olaf was sadly cancelled, but he promised to come back next year. So there is something to look forward to already.

A bit bummed out by the news about the cancellation we had some time off to relax and have some dinner. We ate a beautiful meal at Kaikanten Brasseri. All the tables was reserved but the manager made room for us. Thank you sir.

After a nice dinner it was time to go see the award ceremony for the NFF yearly competition, and to find out who had won the “photographer of the year” title. After a lot of prices had been awarded we had arrived at the crescendo of the day. The NFF photographer of the year was…  Jens Haugen.

We had a few drinks in the hotel bar and got into bed early to be well rested for the next day of lectures.

So.. I went to London, and I went to Nordic light. Those trips in a way rejuvenated me creatively. They made me think. Where am I, and where am I going. And specifically what am I to do with my photography.

The last few years I have hardly touched my cameras.That is, I think,  mainly due to my job. Working at the lab with the pictures of other photographers have in a way drained me creatively. Seeing the same pictures over and over again, thousands of them, have made me look at the pictures in a kind of assembly line like way. You don’t really look at the product but you notice when there is something not right about it.

I can remember a time when all I wanted to do was to make pictures. A time when I was eager to try new things. When I tried it all. I want that back. I did a lot of horrible pictures, of course, but I also did some good ones. But at least I made my own pictures.

I have a lot of things I’d like to do photographically in the future. I have a few long term art projects in mind that could very easily turn into exhibitions and books. But in the near future I need to hone my skills. I need to work the technical aspect of photography back into my blood. I need to make it second nature. I need to work on my communication skills to easily convey my wants to models. I need to work on artificial lighting. I need to work on creative editing. I need to practise it all.

That means taking my trusty 5D with me at all times, but more importantly using it every day. I was considering going old school and shooting polaroid on my medium format Mamiya RZ67, but there is no way i am going to carry that with me everywhere I go. Also there is no light meter on it. I could use my handy Sekonic light meter, but I get all this in the 5D. Built in light meter. Manual exposures. Instant feedback. And it is not as large and heavy.

Updates to come. 

It was time for my first trip to the capital of England. Maybe even Great Britain – The United kingdom. Maybe even Europe. I had wanted to visit this city for a long time and now was my chance. I couldn’t have asked for a better companion and guide in this large city. Isabelle Uller had lived there for a number of years, and gave me an introduction that suited me well.

I had said before we went there that I had little to no interest for seeing the usual tourist sites, like The Big ben, Westminster abbey, The London eye, and so on. I wanted to experience the city as best I could in the 3 days we had there.

The trip was paid for by Studio G, as a reward for a pleasant result the prior year. And if it was not for this fact, London would still be on my list of places to visit. It is now transferred to the list of places to revisit – accompanied by Paris.

My first impression of London overwhelmed me a bit. At first i thought it was the size of everything, but i later realized it was more the number of small things. The quantity of the city. I think i was overwhelmed by a need to take everything in. It was only after realizing this and accepting the impossibility of the task that i could relax and enjoy what I was experiencing.

The first day we walked along Oxford street and browsed some very large stores. We passed through Regent Street on our way to Soho. I liked Soho for it’s smaller size. I liked the narrow streets. Later we gave a visit to The National portrait gallery. A lot of large old paintings of old royalties. Not exactly our cup of tea, so we found our way to the basement and saw a small exhibition of photographs by Mary McCarthy. I had bought her book some time ago, so I really enjoyed seeing her prints on the walls of The National portrait gallery. Following the visit to the gallery we had a few pints of lager at a pub, before we went to our reservation at a Chinese restaurant in Soho, Plum Valley. This restaurant gave us what was to be the best meal, by far, of the trip. For starters de ate a very delicious duck, chicken and prawn dumplings, fried squid, and some vegetarian dishes i sadly have forgotten. For the main course I ate Mongolian beef with fried noodles and some rice. I think this even qualifies as my best meal EVER.    

The second day we did some more shopping in Oxford street, and checked out Covent Garden. Boy do they have shoe stores in Covent Garden. I don’t think two hands have enough fingers to count them all. A bit later we met up with the rest of the gang to have dinner at a restaurant I have sadly forgotten the name of. Or maybe the restaurant is glad, because I didn’t like the food there. It was ok. I ate it all. But I had expected more from a restaurant with such a fancy menu. Oh well. They can’t all have the best food I guess. Isabelle and I ate quickly, because we had other plans. We were going to a metal pub in Soho, to meet some old friends of her. On our way there Isabelle assured me that she knew where it was. After walking up and down the street two or tree times, we tried the next street, and there it was. Bröderna Olssons Garlic and Shots. What a lovely little place. Judging by the name i would have thought the smell of garlic would be more prominent. But I couldn’t really smell any garlic. Luckily we didn’t make use of the elaborate shot menu. 101 different shots can very quickly spell disaster. And what a colourful pallet of friends. A writer, a rock/metal photographer, a touring band merchandise salesperson, a brain surgeon. We talked for a few hours and had a few beers then we took the tube back to the hotel.

Third and final day Isabelle and I travelled to Camden to shop a little at the markets. She found a lovely dress and a handbag, and i found a leather jacket. We also gave a visit to the fascinating store Cyberdog. Blacklight and raving music. I guess we were in a raver’s heaven. Back to the hotel to grab our luggage and off to the airport.

There is a very funny story to be told about the long drive to the airport, but out of respect for a certain person, I will keep it to myself.   …for now.