Daydreaming and the excitement of the unknown.

Wow.... Been a  while since I've done this whole shebang. To be completely honest, I have been way too busy for my own good lately. I feel burnt out and unmotivated.

I go through this phase every Autumn. I have this cycle of being so amped during Spring and Summer that I shoot and shoot and grind myself down. Then I sit and scheme and plan and spend more time worrying about how to actually make things happen than getting anything done. I was planning to write a book on procrastination, but I think I'll start that next week. When Autumn and Winter come round I have run out of creativity and have no will or energy to even think about doing something interesting. I know it has something to do with the weather. The Norwegian weather kills me, I have no sense of belonging and am completely out of place in the snow. Today was the first snowfall in Trondheim. The initial excitement of waking up to a completely white city wore off as soon as I had to trundle up to the shop to buy coffee and rolls. Its not romantic. Its not cosy. It sucks. I remember last year or the year before I went through the same shit. I didn't pick up my camera for two months. I was worried in the beginning. Then I kind of grew to accept the fact that I cant squeeze creativity out of myself, at least not all the time.

 I walk past my camera everyday, mentally it feels we are like a couple with some intimacy issues. She wants my attention, wants to be held and have her buttons pushed. I greet her as I get out of bed on my way to the kitchen. I make some coffee and sit in the deepish nook of my window sill that is my favourite "drift off and zone out" place. I smoke a cigarette and watch the world scuttle past down below. I steal a glimpse at her poking here head out of the shelf. I think about how good things are when we are together. We make things together, we compose, manipulate and create together. I know what she is capable of, I know how to take care of her, and recognise her in my hands every time. She makes some mistakes some times, but I forgive her, she is not perfect, but neither am I. Some times I blame her for my mistakes too. I could be better at taking responsibility for this. She sits there staring at me on some days, pleading to be taken out into the world and shown things she has never seen before.

I have been shooting a bunch of personal projects lately, some of them you will see and some f them you won't. The ones that you will see are great and something I am really proud of. They might not have great meaning to you as the viewer, but for me, the personal effort, sentiment and value is enormous. My head is in a thousand places now. So many things to finish, so many to get started, so many to follow up. I can only do so much at one time. This whole vibe of not shooting and being idle is ok for now. I have accepted that there now only a few weeks left for me to start getting things done. I have committed myself to the process of making some of these happen. Commitment is such a massive thing for me at the moment. I have been so scared to challenge myself and do things out of my usual way, experimenting, playing, testing, making mistakes. A while ago I had to remind myself why I started doing all of this..... Why was that again? Recognition? No. Fame? No. Money? No. To be talented at something? No. Fun? Yes. Photography can be a mental burden, a leech on one's soul when the inspiration runs out, a financial gamble, an art, a rewarding pastime, and a form of art. For me its the reward and the process of making something beautiful come to life. Capturing a moment that can be shared with everyone.

Winter here is a fuck up. Unless you have some winter fashion idea that will probably be cheesy as fuck no matter which angle you look at it. Actually, I do have some cool ideas for shooting outdoor stuff in the snow, but my word, how I can not be bothered to haul all the gear out into the snow and stand there and freeze. Hopefully when I get round to doing these, they won't be cheesy as fuck. Hopefully. So apart from the freezing temps, the shitty light, the misery of just living in Trondheim in Winter, there is actually nothing for me here in this time of year. In fact anywhere north of Morocco is fairly superfluous this time of year.

I hold my hope in one thing that is just around the corner. One thing that will fill my heart and my sun deprived skin with warmth. One place that always make my heart beat to a rhythm I can dig. Home. Cape Town. Oh yes. It has been way too long my old friend. Sun, beach, shorts, lazy evenings, my car, my family, my dog, food, moms cakes, dad's shit jokes, friends. Ill take it all right now. The best part of all of it is the time, 10 weeks!!! Half of which will probably go into shooting and building up my book so that I can show some spring/summer fashion when I get home in February. Its going to be great. I also have this bucket list of shots to get. Some of the big ones will start falling off the list soon. This one thing is pretty much the only thing that is keeping me from putting the toaster in the bath right now.

At the moment I have some other things going on here, making my new home feel like home is coming along pretty well. Tying up the last of the offshore jobs for 2012 is also on the cards. A short trip down to my favourite coastal town in South-Western Norway is also a possibility. And then I'm gone. Will try put up some things whilst I'm working through my mountain of shit. In the mean time here are some of the things, and people I have been shooting with my iPhone. For those of you that are on Instagram, you can follow me @twoshoesphoto. Much love as always for all of you out there following my blog. Take it easy. N.

PS. iPhone 5 camera? OMG!!! I want one soooooo bad. (Just had to drop that in there!)

Sad looking dogs always have the most personality.

Skate session with the boys. Rock, paper, scissors for who goes first.

I made dinner for 9, one of my most impressive feats to date.

Give some, Get some! Got invited to dinner with my girls. Thank you!!!

Collected the key to my new crib. So proud, so stoked, so much spaaaaace!

Went IKEA shopping with the rarest Pokemon from Bergen. Swedish meatballs are a given.

Went shopping for furniture with Linsa, acquired this bad boy Transformer of a coffee table in jet black.  Its now in feed me stuff mode.

And now in: "Oh hi! Im a sneaky coffee table" mode.

The boys testing out the PS3 and the stereo that is waaaaaay too big for my own good. Noise complaints are expected shortly.

Made a biltong pizza. OMG! Words cannot describe the stoke.

Norwegian poetry. Makes me restless!

Bought a bad ass little floor sucker! His name is Darth Vader.

Fast wireless internet courtesy of Apple. This thing is the business!

Breast cancer awareness. I showed and am still showing my support.

Tooooo many potatoes.... Amazing home cooked food ala TwoShoes.

First snow today. Tooooo soon.

An apology, kinda.

Oh my, oh my. Where are we now? Monday evening. Hope ya'll had a good weekend? Mine was pretty chilled. Work, eat, party, sleep, repeat. Love the routine of being away on a work tour, hate the mundanity of it all though. Whats on the agenda tonight then? Ah, yes. Its coming to me now…

You may have noticed that a few posts ago I took the liberty of having a jab at my ex. This I am indeed guilty of, and now I feel like an asshole. Most probably because I am one. First of all, lets sort this out. I am very much sorry about that. I do in no way regret the condescending slander I hurled through the vast chambers of interspace. I believe in conviction, if I say something, and even more, if you read it here, chances are I stand behind it 100%. What I have come to realise though, that I put myself in a position of being a hypocrite and unprofessional. Here I am on my pedestal of up and coming photographer dishing out advice on how to be professional and deal with this and that and rapping on about how you should be so aware of your reputation and how you deal with your client/subjects, then in the same breath having a go at someone through my showcase to the world? Yeah. I did that. I have these moment's of insanity that tend to bite me somewhere down the line. Im down the line now.

I guess the realisation came when my mom sent me a message asking if I was in Trondheim or in jail for deformation of character. For those of you that don't know my mom or my relationship with her, i'll break it down like this: If I received a complaint in the mail from the cops about a lawsuit involving deformation of character, I would chuck it in the trash and roll a cigarette. If my mom sent me a message lie the one I received from her, I would write a blog posts apologising to all my readers for being a toss. Although I show no remorse to the person all my slagging off was aimed at, I do apologise to all of you that have supported me over the last almost a year. My gratitude is unmeasurable, and from now on, I'll keep my hateful comments towards certain members of the public in a non-return addressed envelope. Except for Jacob Zuma, you my friend can go fuck yourself. Yes. Actually, whilst we're at it, whoever stole my BMX at my 16th birthday party, you can go fuck yourself too. Ok, Im done.

I guess what it comes down too is calibre and karma. For me, I didn't just have a shot at someone over my space that I use to show off my work as a a photographer, I shot myself in the foot, kinda. I guess I feel like a jackass for going on about all that professionalism shit and then taking out my anger on my blog. Im bigger than that and a better person than that. Its also the energy you give off though. Karma is a bitch for sure, imagine if you lent someone money out of the kindness of your heart, and waited for months for them to pay you back, and they went and bought a house instead? Kinda says something about who you are if you cruise with the attitude of just taking and not giving anything. It all comes around in the end, I just need to get my conscious clear and keep truckin'. I want to be recognised as a not just a good photographer, but a great photographer, an epic photographer. I hardly imagine Joe McNally or Zack Arias having a shot at their respective partners over there blog. That shit is weak. Grow up Nic. I know that I'm a good dude, and regardless of whether some people deserve to have their genitals spontaneously explode to prevent them from passing their genes on to any future generations appreciate/tolerate me. If I don't have anything positive to say from now on, I'll post it on Facebook. haha. Once again, Im sorry to all my readers for acting a fool. And sorry Mum for being a tit.

Speaking of which! Facebook! What a joy! I love it! What a rad tool! Ok, I'll stop with the abbreviated sentences now… But really, the power of the internet has once again amazed me. Having liberated my Facebook account from that person I shall no longer mention in polite conversation, I got with it and started making right. This coupled together with Instagram has just rocked my world. Where have you been Instagram? I have become somewhat dependant on that your little speech bubble with a heart silhouette though. I can't believe I was hating on these life changing software gizmo's of so long. Words can actually not convey my appreciation for these two gadgets. Admittedly though, I think I crossed the line today. I was always against food photo's. The point being that food is there for one reason, to be eaten. Why the hell do I want to look at pictures of burgers, cupcakes and all the other shit everyone else is eating? I want to taste these delicious things, not pixel peep at them. Today was a big step though. I took a photo of a bunch of yoghurts on my daily shopping excursion. Yoghurts? Really? Have I turned into a Instahipster overnight? Blogging? Facebook? Instagram? Pictures of yoghurts? (admittedly they were very cute, they had little cartoon penguins in all different colours on them.) I stood there in the shop shocked, stunned and utterly flabbergasted at what I had become… This was all followed by two people immediately liking my new uploaded yogart. (haha, see what I did there.) The whole situation de-escalated fairly quickly, I ended up buying six yoghurts and some other crap for those of you wondering. Iceland pictures coming soon!!! WOOHOO!!! Going to be siiiiiiiick! Have a good night ya'll. N

PS. You can find me on Instagram under the handle: twoshoesphoto

Damn you yoghurt, damn you Instagram.

SATURDAY!!!

Good Afternoon all, hope you guys had a good Friday night? I did! I connected with a fashion designer  in the UK, who is doing some very cool stuff. Basic, simple and beautiful. Also she is one of my best friends sisters. So I'm very excited to get some more fashion stuff going... Watch this space. In the mean  time though, you can also watch their space at:

                                                      www.rokadesign.com

or their blog at :                      www.rokafashion.blogspot.com

Now then, hopefully now the female percentage of readers here is satisfied with something shiny to look at instead of listen to me ramble. Here is some more news though, Im making a relatively conscious effort at the whole social media, network thing. I decided to reclaim and liberate my Facebook account from the harlot of a girlfriend that had control over it. Was great to find out though that since we split, she changed her status to single, or emotionally incapable, or just plain fucking deranged, but didn't bother to change mine. I only figured that out a few days ago. Its been like 3months since we broke up. What bothers me about this is that the potential amount of passer by's that could have possibly been Mrs Schwerdtfeger is well, realistically not that high considering I only have like 60 friends, but still existent. To make up for the unforeseen catastrophe and somewhat humorous attempt at cock blocking me, from today there will be a period of reconciliation. What this means to you is that if you were a single girl, that was turned away by the false pretence of me being monogamous during the said time frame, you can now make up for lost time. Im single, virile and disease free now, and have been for the last 3 months. You know what to do.

Back to Facebook, yes I'm on there. Find me, my general rule for being friends is that you should not be someone I want to strangle in real life. I'm on Instagram too now! Im using it for what it is, and trying to expand and get my work seen by as many people as possible. Twitter is next, but that will wait for a bit. Im getting used to the whole mish mash of this Facebook, Blogger, Instagram stuff first. You can find me on Facebook as: Nic Schwerdtfeger and on Instagram as: twoshoesphoto.
Uploading DSLR pictures to Instagram? Showing pictures that are post-processed in Lr or Ps on Instagram? What you guys think? Does it beat the purpose of Instagram as the platform it is? Or is it cool? Leave a comment.

Now for some pictures. All shot on iPhone, all fixed in Lr, except for the last one, you'll see why. Oh... I almost forgot. Here's a video that I have fallen in love with. Its Norwegian artist that one of my girlfriends introduced me to, Susanne Sundfør. Check it out, reminds me a bit of LARK! Have a rad Saturday everyone! Caio, N.

Pictures:

Plenty of time spent on trains over that weekend.

The cool part of Groningen, the city.

Acting like a horse?

Hulle kan mos langarm dans daar in die oorsee.

Two Shoes gets new shoes! Myself and my cuz rocking it.

Best fun you can have with a lawn mower engine.

I WON!

Kokomo Beach Club, sounds like a place outta Vice City or a Travolta movie? It is! The DJ booth is a frikkin' boat!

Most beautiful sunset Ive seen in 6 months, lasted for an hour. Straight out of camera. No PP.