Sessions has been up and running in some form since the summer 2001. The first site was built in a couple of hours in order to show clubbing photos to a few friends and really wasn’t all that usable or well designed. To be quite honest the photos were awful too. Back then I didn’t really have too much of a clue how photos should be taken in poor lighting conditions (etc.), but I was enthuastiac. Carrying a camera with me all around was something I was already used to and as I fell in love with the finnish techno/rave/club/party scene (or whatever you want to call it) I felt an urge to start documenting it.

My quest for ”the perfect photo” (of which I’ve propably told most people I know about) begun. I started by photographing party people and by trying to capture their emotions on film. Seeing people looking so satisfied and happy moved me in the way that nothing else did (and it still does). These moments of total satisfaction and happiness were the ones that I aimed to publish here at Sessions. [Editorial remark: Nowadays, altho Jouni has retired from the 'business' - he sometimes still visits events with his camera and captures those prefect moments for you to see].

Sessions (the first site) became a bit more popular than I ever intended and as I was never really happy with it I decided to design a new site. A bit more thought was put into designing Sessions 1.1, but it was still a pretty basic static website. Well, at least the directory structure was designed well enough to keep the updating routines fairly easy...

For a long time I took photos with Canon EOS500 (with 28-80mm / F3.5 [Editorial remark: Yes, a kinofilm camera]) but was never really happy with the results. I also experimented a bit with some early FujiFilm and Sony digital cameras but the image quality they produced didn’t satisfy me either. When Sony published their F707-model I knew I had found myself a new camera and so I bought myself one of them on the spring 2002. Many of the early photos I took with it are of pretty poor quality, but I think I got some fairly decent images out of it. After 2½ years of shooting with F707 I decided it was time to get myself a new camera (because even though F707 really is a nice camera in many ways it also has many limitations); Canon EOS300D. It's was a really nice piece of equipment and it took some time to master it well in poor lightning conditions. Well, as they say; "practise makes perfect." [Editorial remark: Nowadays Jouni shoots with Canon EOS 40D]

Sessions 1.1 was a nominee for ”website of the year” in the finnish club awards two years in a row (2002 & 2003) and had ~2000 photos by the time I decided it was time to let it go and build yet another version. SESSIONS2 (it’s written in capital letters just because the logo is) was something I desiged in my mind for quite a while, but didn’t really have the skills to build it on my own. That’s where my schoolmate Carl came into the picture and wrote the features and the structure – Massive respect and lots of thanks!

Sessions (poor choice of a name to begin with, damn it!) began as a one man's project, but grew to be too much for me to handle. In 2004 SESSIONS2-crew consists of me, Carl, the man behind the code and Anne, my assistant photographer (which was also my girlfriend for over 2 years). Also a couple of other persons showed some activity towards SESSIONS2 by contributing various content to the new site. We continued developing the site together and hoped that you and the other visitors liked what they’re getting. [Editorial remark: Obviously they did :)]

Yours,
Jouni Väänänen, Founder Of SESSIONS2



How it all continued; The later history

A Lot has happend during these 8 years of existance. SESSIONS2-website was selected as the Website of the year in Finnish Club Awards 2005, a nominee for the title 4 years in a row before that (site versions 1, 1.1 & 2). SESSIONS2 crew has also varied during the years. Jounis personal assistants have changed couple of times and some of the 'not so active members' have just vanished somewhere. For Pacifique 2006 and Laserpoints 2006 & 2007 Jouni built up a team of event photographers using his own team and adding couple of assistant photographers as reinforcements to match the crowing needs of event promoters and the scale of the events. As more suitable event photographers have "appeared on the market" they were approached (and eventually signed) until S2 had a team that could operate as it's own.

Jounis first addition was Tuomas Lairila, announced in the late 2005. At this point the SESSIONS2 started to cover more events than it used to. The view in event photos expanded - now there were two different photographers with a different style documenting club events. The third photographer was Karo Holmberg in the early 2006. Karo, unlike Jouni & Tuomas, lives at the eastern parts of Finland photographing almost every major event in that direction. His photographing style also differes from Jouni and Tuomas. Third addition, the fourth S2 event photographer, was Joni Rolig just 4½ months after Karo.

As a christmas present 2007, Jouni announced withdrawing from the club event photographing "business" and leaving the site to the rest of the group. Karo Holmberg was nominated as a new Site Manager and Jouni took his well deserved title as the Founder of SESSIONS2. Another big change was 57% growth in photo size, from 600x400 to 750x500 pixels.

In the year 2008 two previous assistant photographers and one new photographers were signed in SESSIONS2 -team: Mikko Bäck, Tuula Ylikorpi and Jukka Aro. Laserpoint 2008 was the first event, where the massive team worked together for the first time.

Altho SESSIONS2-members photograph mainly in Finland, we have also covered few events & clubs abroad, f.ex Ibiza, Japan & Netherlands.



How things are today?

At this moment SESSIONS2 is the biggest club event photographing team in Finland keeping up the quality and the ability to cover and produce different kind of photo-related content, like photostands for clubbers, clubbing photo exhibitions or just plain event photography to the most demanding club events that Finnish club scene can offer.

Altogether Finnish club scene is not just about the massive mega partys - it's also about the smaller local events which are made with love towards electronic music - which are made for the clubbers who love to dance or just listen the music. These are the events we document and that is what we achieve with a team that works seamlessly together as well as they perform as a single event photographers. SESSIONS2 is not anymore a site for Jounis event photos, but a home to a seven exceptional event photographers.



Feedback is always welcome!

Yours,
Karo Holmberg & the rest of the crew