A client turned friend. The sweetest of girls. With an unbelievable voice. Meet Keisha. A talented musician who was given the butterfly wings to change people’s lives with just a beat.
Posts Tagged ‘fun’
One for Thursday … – Niki Strbian Valokuvaus
February 25, 2010Valentine’s day in the botanic garden – Niki Strbian Valokuvaus
February 16, 2010All shades of green. Sunshine. Glasshouse. Kaisaniemi botanic garden on Valentine’s Sunday … PART 1.
Finns don’t regard love affairs stable enough to dedicate them a day in their calendar. As my father says: “Women come and go but basketball stays.” 
Surely Finns do not have a dedicated day in the calendar to basketball either, despite the important fact that it’s my Dad’s lifetime hobby. If there was a holiday dedicated to sports in Finland, it would most likely be, you guessed it, to ice-hockey. Perhaps even skating. And maybe sailing. And maybemaybe to sauna (which counts as both sports and a cultural event here, didn’t you know??).
But we are talking about Valentine’s day. On February the 14th Finns choose to show their affection to friends. Because friendship truly lasts a lifetime. And because it’s quite enough to show affection once a year when government permits.
I decided to celebrate the day by spending the entire day with my best friend/assistent/colleague/muse in the botanic garden, shooting a marathon of minisessions for my friends. Here the first sneak peek from Sunday. These two are quite fresh among my friends, yet I feel I have known them for a decade. At least. You two clowns, who are so in love: Come over soon to eat some halusky with us, we run out of the special cheese usually really quickly 
Enjoy, hope you will like it!
When editing the photos, I had the “Isn’t she lovely, daa, daa, da…” tune stuck in my head. I wonder why…
Let me introduce you, in case you don’t know why the heck the next photo features a lamp. This, ladies and gentlemen, is the famous Double Bubble lamp designed by Eero Aarnio. I challenged everyone to bring something special to the minisession and A+A came up with this. This is HERS not HIS. I am happy they didn’t go with HIS. The BMX bicycle could have been a bit difficult in the glasshouse…
The secret meaning is of course that the big bubble represents the boss of the family. Hmm…?
Looking into the future. Is it bright? Enough?
xoxo
Snow, snow, snow queen – Niki Strbian Valokuvaus
February 4, 2010Having fun with friends. In -16. Wind. Both of my kids. Cranky. Imagine the shoot:
click click click click
back to the car – unfreezing hands
click click click
back to the car – hot tea
click click
back to the car – cannot start the engine, cannot turn the key
click
back to the car – kids crying, me fainting from the cold, leaving and driving home
and … we almost kissed a truck who skid when the driver went too fast through a curve. But we got home safe.
You were awesome as always! thank you
How is your handwriting? – Niki Strbian Valokuvaus
January 28, 2010Pour me a drop of truth. It doesn’t have to be a whole glass. How is your handwriting? Getting worse with every email and Word document you write? With every letter you don’t write? I just finished reading a thick, thick book of correspondence between two Czech actors and humanists, Jan Werich and Jiri Voskovec, also known as V+W. And the great amount of letters that crossed Atlantic (since one of them lived in communistic Czechoslovakia and the other in the US) made me wonder… Would it be different for them if Internet was existing? Would they use the actual paper and pen so much? How many letters to my friends have I written lately… gosh, none, I don’t even have time to write emails. I don’t fancy that my friends store and back up my emails, but I think, I hope, they do keep the occasional letter I write – while my hand is in a great pain from such weird thing I want it to do. My handwriting got really bad over the years and it was not good to start with either…. I had a flash of geniality yesterday and found this www.fontgarden.com. Lifesaver! Before your handwriting gets real illegible, get it recorded in 010010111000. Or just download any of the cool free fonts they already have and pretend it’s yours. You can choose among big names’ handwriting – fancy a Franz Kafka? Marilyn Monroe? And while you are at it, enjoy the quotes. Some of them are real gems. Here my choice for the day:
And that’s why we don’t have any TV 
Oh and while my lil ones cannot write yet, they can do this. Show me that with your mouse, ha!
Gradu hat photos – Niki Strbian Valokuvaus
November 6, 2009Now this is how an yo-lakki picture is supposed to look. Mother Nature knows that if you like your rose and forced grin stuff, you can get it to your heart’s content elsewhere. But should you want something more contemporary, look no further!
Oh and of course you recognize Wia and Lucas, the giggling couple that caught my eye on Aleksanterinkatu during our photoclub’s outing. For obvious reasons (like the fact that they are absolutely fantastic and natural in front of the camera, clearly in love, stylish, defined, fun, sexy and I can go on and on!), I couldn’t have let them escape more photography exercise with Niki. This time we had a liiiiiittle more than half a minute to snap some pics. You like them? I am drooling over this gorgeous couple. Aren’t you?
Thank you guys, you are absolute rockstars!
I am listening to Christmas carols (yep, already now) and am in the mood to give some gifts to my faithful fans who also like to photograph on their own! So here is the deal…
The prize:
The winner will receive a complimentary portrait session with me and a CD with high resolution images (value of 800€). Further details about the session can be obtained from my website. The session must take place before March 1st and must take place in Helsinki Metropolitan Area or before June 1st in Prague, Czech republic.
The contest:
- enjoy a little photoshoot with a child or children that is/are really close to you, you may also use a recent photo
- send ONE favourite photo to my email niki@nikistrbian.com, the photos will be posted in a special album on my Facebook fan page
- if you are not yet a fan, become a fan of Niki Strbian Photography on Facebook
- send people (family, friends, colleagues, ex-classmates) to become fans of Niki Strbian Photography and to vote for their favorite photo (which would be yours, of course)
The winner will be announced on Friday 4th of December based on the total number of votes entered for each image. Votes are counted as individual comments under each photo. Clicking the Like link doesn’t count as a vote. Voting people must be fans of my fan page, votes from people who are not fans won’t be counted.
And inevitably the rules:
- entries must be submitted latest on Wednesday, the 18th of November
- one entry per person
- voting will continue since November 19th till December the 3rd, the winner will be announced on Friday, the 4th of December
- one vote per person
- comments under a photo count as votes, clicking the Like link doesn’t count as a vote
- you may vote for your own image, but are you really that desperate?
- submitted images must be of child/ren under 18 years of age
- photos taken by professional photographers won’t be accepted
Are you ready to play?
Remembering Italy – Niki Strbian Valokuvaus
October 25, 2009Some time back I promised you few pics from our great family vacation in Italy. It was gorgeous and I must thank my great husband for organizing, well, pretty much the whole thing. It was the best holiday I have had in a long time. Even with the occassional holiday cloud and thousands of medusas taking over our bay. And since we had one set of grandparents with us, we also had a rare and valued opportunity to go out in the evening. And that’s just what we did.
Oh, we didn’t go anywhere far, just in case our little angles wake up and would want us, but being in the historical center of a small Italian town dating back to 15th century, we had a plenty of choices. Walked few minutes down a steep hill and we hit the first bar. A terrace, in fact. It was about 22:30. A waitress asked if we were going to eat. No. So sorry, she replied, the terrace is open exclusively for dining until 23:30, then we could come for a drink. Or we could sit on the wall (surrounding the terrace) on a fluffy pillow, have a drink and enjoy watching the passers-by. And that’s just what we did.
Gaia was a bar-tender in this place. I liked the little devils in her eyes since the first moment I saw her and I knew I had to photograph her. And guess what? That’s just what we did
The Fun Theory – what made me smile today – Niki Strbian Valokuvaus
October 20, 2009Sometimes all you need to make your day shine is a little melody For more check out the Thefuntheory.com
[youtube 2lXh2n0aPyw]
I found this thanx to Lawrence Chan of Tofurious. Thanx
Share it, go on, make some else smile.