Interview: Felicia Püschl

Felicia Püschl: I took a photography class as a teenager, and I fell in love pretty much instantly. I continued to study photography and started out as a freelance photographer at age 20.

Sinical Magazine: Who are some photographers that inspired your work when you first started?

Felicia Püschl: Joel Peter Witkin comes to mind, he is a absolute genius who really have the guts to do his work as he wants to, even though it isn’t always appreciated by the public. The second one is Floria Sigismondi, who is a very talented photographer as well as a director. She directed quite a few music videos that had a huge impact on me long before I knew anything about photography. When I discovered that she was responsible for so many of my strongest impressions growing up I just couldn’t believe it.

Model: Julia Magnusson Pivén, Makeup - Alexandra Larsson

Sinical Magazine: What type of camera equipment do you use?

Felicia Püschl: I have a Canon 5D mkII and a few different lenses with focal lengths that varies between 14mm and 85mm.

Sinical Magazine: What type of lenses and focal length do you prefer for portrait work?

Felicia Püschl: I love my 85mm f.1.4 Sigma for portraits.

Model: Eleine.

Sinical Magazine: When creating a composition what is your main focus?

Felicia Püschl: That depends on the purpose of the picture. I can choose a more chaotic, harmonious or symmetrical composition depending what emotions I want the viewer to have. So I guess you could say that the emotion of the picture is my main focus.

Sinical Magazine: How much planning goes into a shoot?

Felicia Püschl: It varies, I tend to plan my own projects forever and ever, fabricating props and searching for the right location and so on. With clients I try to plan ahead as much as I can without being overly annoying. But of course, some of my best pictures are from totally unplanned, spontaneous shoots.

Model: Le Siss

Sinical Magazine: Do you work with continuous lighting or flash lighting?

Felicia Püschl: Both, I choose what kind of lighting to use depending on what works for the shoot in question.

Sinical Magazine: What are some lighting set ups you like?

Felicia Püschl: I usually prefer fairly simplistic set ups, one main light source and maybe a backlight. I use my beautydish with grid very frequently.

Model: Sandra Morin Vikström, Makeup - Jannike Reinholdsson

Sinical Magazine: Do you have any pet peeves when it comes to models or other photographers?

Felicia Püschl: I can’t stand photographers who think that owning the most expensive equipment or memorizing the specifications for every single lens or camera on the market is what makes you a good photographer.

Sinical Magazine: What is the most interesting that’s happened during one of your photo shoots?

Felicia Püschl: As a teenager I often used my family as models and I put them through some pretty cruel experiments. I did for example force my dad to get up at five in the morning, put on a suit, drive to the ocean and sit in the water fully clothed, because I wanted to shoot him in the morning mist. I also chopped onions and smeared them in my sisters eyes because she couldn’t cry on demand for another picture.

However, my favorite story is when I wanted to make it rain from inside an umbrella. I was early spring and still very cold outside, but i didn’t stop me. I duct taped a garden hose to my sisters back (she had the fortune of being the model), witch was going to spray water into the umbrella from behind and make it look like it was raining. She was also going to have a cat in a leash because I thought that it was a fun detail. The water came on, the cat freaked out and my sister turned purple because of the freezing water within seconds. It wasn’t a very successful shoot to say the least.

Model: Clara Vallmark, Makeup - Marinela Vilceanu

Sinical Magazine: Do you have one tip that you would recommend to any aspiring photographer?

Felicia Püschl: I think that the most important thing for any artist is to find their own expression, and the only way to do that is to keep practicing, experimenting and try new things. It isn’t something you can force, it just has to come naturally. For every time you succeed there is a hundred failures. And get inspiration from other artists, not just photographers, it can be any type of art that gets the imagination going. The hard truth is that if you don’t have anything unique to offer with your work, no one will notice you.