Thermal Cameras And Net Art Surrealism: Daniel Sannwald's Fashion Photography

With aesthetics that are part Salvador Dali, a little Donnie Darko-turned-fashion-shoot, with a touch of Keith Haring’s vibrant geometry, Daniel Sannwald is a fashion photographer with a flair for integrating unique technologies into his work. From his computer-generated video for Delfina Delletrez to his Karlie Kloss shoots using thermal cameras and flip phones, Sannwald is a leader in the movement away from Instagram-fueled film nostalgia and towards a creative and colorful future for the photography world.

His work has appeared in various glossies like V Magazine, Vogue Homme Japan, Dazed and Confused, and others where he's brought  his visual art-driven approach to bear on the more standard magazine fashion shoot.

To find out some more about his style and background, we shot him some questions.

The Creators Project: Your work is a lot more experimental than much of contemporary fashion photography. When did you start integrating this into your work?
Daniel Sannwald: My father was an artist, so when I was really young I was already very close to the art world, and I think this put me in the direction of being interested in painting, in sculpture, in collages. He did a lot of work with videos, collages, paintings. So I’ve been born and raised next to someone who has been very busy with different mediums, so I think that kind of put a seed [and] influenced my work nowadays. And then I didn’t study photography, I studied visual arts with emphasis in photography and video—and back when I was studying I already explored different mediums and techniques. The day when I decided that I would like to continue as a fashion photographer, it was really important for me to always look at art. I always say I’m a fashion photographer who is looking at art and that reflects in the work I think.

Delfina Delletrez video

There is a large camp of photographers who have nostalgia for the darkroom, film, pre-digital age, etc. What do you think? Do you miss the pre-digital world, or do you embrace the change?
I’m completely embracing it, but I’m trained in the darkroom—in developing my own films, making the prints, color, and black and white. My really early work was always done by hand. Everything I’m doing now I tried to do in the dark room, used different acids, what bleach would do to the developing process and stuff like that. But nowadays, I’m really obsessed with the digital age. I’m always trying to find new mediums, new cameras, and new techniques to explore ways of capturing images.

Who are some other fashion photographers who inspire you?
I really love the work of Pierre Boucher, Mel Bles, Jamie Hawksworth—who shoots on film. I really love photographers who are still working with old mediums and achieve really amazing images. I love Tyrone LeBon. There are a couple. I really think the new generation is really exciting.

It’s good to hear a photographer say that. It is nice to hear photographers embracing the innovation you can get out of digital photography.
It’s also about time. After the recession everything became so safe. The big companies, people who are behind the image making, the consultant agencies, the art directors all played very, very safe. They were not open to new techniques, or new ways of photography, so I feel like now people are really hungry for finding new ways and seeing new images, and I think it is about time that the next generation is hitting it off.

i-D photoshoot

You recently did a shoot for i-D where you used a thermal camera, a flip phone, and a Hasselblad, can you tell us a bit about that? Where did the idea come from?
It is mostly very random. I get inspiration from many things. The thermal camera, for example, I watched a documentary about panthers, and they were filming partly with a thermal camera. So it would capture how the body heat would change when they get excited, when they were resting, when they were about to hunt. I thought it was really beautiful. Why not take the thermal camera on the fashion shoot and capture the heat of the model? The flip phone was quite spontaneous. I had a shoot in New York with Karlie Kloss, and my assistant had this old phone with him, and I was just like, oh my god can I try the camera? I did some shots and was like this is really beautiful. I’ve gotten quite obsessed with the flip phone, I’ve been shooting a lot with the flip phone now. A lot of photographers try to recreate something in post that looks like what the old flip phone does naturally. I was really excited to just be able to be like “click”, amazing! Doesn’t need much post.

You published a book awhile ago, how was the process of publishing and creating Pluto & Charon?
That was my early fashion work from the last 10 years, starting when some of the work I did when I was at university. Maybe 50 percent is done with analog cameras and with hand-cuttings, some have digital manipulations but very lo-fi.

Vogue Hommes Japan Louis Vuitton shoot. Images via. Courtesy of Rizon Parein

In an interview with the Ones2Watch you said that the shoot you were most proud of thus far was the Louis Vuitton/Vogue Hommes shoot in 2008. Tell us a bit about that shoot.
That was the first time that I worked with computer-generated images, so I worked together with a set designer called Gary Card and, almost like a cartoon, we were drawing every image out before we shot the images. Then [we] recreated all the set builds in CGI and placed the photography in the images so it almost looked like the model wearing the Louis Vuitton outfits was floating or living in a computer-generated space. So I was really excited about that because it was my first time doing this.

Parting words of wisdom for aspiring photographers?
It is really important to start seeing. People are always busy, especially now with the digital medium, thinking that the technique is really important. But it is really just important to start seeing, and the day people start seeing you’ve made it.

@megyoungblood