Author: Kevin Du Toit

My SA peeps, there is a lot I’d like to say about my interview with Werner but I want this young dynamic persona to tell you himself about his passion and how Mr. Lamprecht gets his motivation.  Werner is much like a filmmaker where his still pictures are telling a story and he truly seems to have captured the art of photography.  So let’s begin.

KDT: Werner, please give us a quick synopsis/back story of who Werner Lamprecht, is and how it seems you’ve been shooting pictures for ever right:

WL: I’m 21 going on 22, I’ve been skating and taking photos for 9 going on 10 years. I love what I do and won’t stop for anything! Skateboarding has shaped my life and I’ll always be thankful for that!

KDT: Your pictures could easily be any pro photographer, what got you into shooting photos?

WL: I’ve always had an interest in photography. I do however believe that my interest in skate photography came after opening my first Blunt Magazine back in like 2000! Guys like Barry Tuck, Pablo Ponzone and Brett Thompsett really had the best pictures out there and really inspired me!

KDT: What got you into skating?

WL: This might sound weird, but I think I was meant to skate! Thanks to my dad I got my first board at age four. I still have a VHS tape of me standing on and pushing my fish tail board down a Kempton Park hill at age four!

Thanks to two of my very old friends, Eduard Malan and Thys Lötter, I popped my first ollie at our leaders camp at the end of 1999 on one of their boards which they brought along. Since then it has never stopped!

KDT: Yeah, skating is something you either have or you don’t.  Would you give a brief walk through your work flow?

WL: I don’t really have a proper flow going at the moment because I work a 8 to 5 job from Monday to Friday and then I usually do my skating and photo shoots on weekends. If someone needs to get pictures taken, they’ll call me and I’ll organize a shoot on the weekend.

KDT: Werner, are you a self taught photographer or did you have a mentor that showed you the ropes?

WL: Well, my dad’s always been into photography. I think I just inherited his skill. I got my first “point and shoot” camera at age 12 and shot anything I could. If it looked good, I shot it! I kept on shooting pics with that camera until like age 17 when I got my first introduction to an SLR camera. I received a Pentax K1000 film SLR camera from Deon Fourie’s mom as a gift after she had seen some of my pics. I taught myself all about focus points, aperture and shutter speeds with that camera.

KDT: What does it take to be a good skateboard photographer?

WL: To me there are a couple of things that will make you a good skate photographer.

1 – make sure you have a good angle! The better your angle, the better your photo.

2 – make sure you have good lighting available. If you are shooting in the day, make sure you shoot with the sun behind you and if at night, make sure you have sufficient lighting set up.

3 – make sure to take the picture at the correct moment. Rather wait an extra 2 or 3 milliseconds when taking pics of flip tricks just to make sure you get the best shot. It always looks good to see the actual pop involved in a trick.

4 – make sure to take the picture from such an angle that you can see the rider’s face. No one likes looking at a photo where you don’t know who it is. You also get some funny facial expression from time to time!

5 – make sure your focus is correct. To be completely sure you have perfect focus, maybe ask the person you are shooting to stand in the position he will be when popping a trick. That way you can get correct focus with the lens.

6 – one should really have a feel for the trick that’s being done. Knowing what the rider is doing will assist in getting that perfect moment of the trick being done.

6 – having a good quality camera and lens also helps! haha

KDT:  NICE!  Awesome advice.  Who are some of your heroes outside of skating?

WL: My Mom! She has been through a lot throughout her life and she has really taught me about being persistent and enduring when life gets you down! For that I am very thankful!

KDT: When was the defining moment when you knew that it was time to go digital instead of film, or was it a gradual transition?

WL: I’d say it was the day that I bought my Digital SLR camera. After I took my first pics with that camera I knew that things would change for the better. In a way I would say that it was something that came gradually as I had perfected my techniques with the film SLR camera, so going over to digital just made it so much easier to get the perfect shots.

KDT: There are times when everyone is telling me that a picture is good, but I am not satisfied with it. How do you know that a photo is really good?

WL: For this question I am quoting a close friend, Alwyn Van Niekerk. He has told me that a picture can be called a really good picture when it has the effect of making the viewer look at it over and over and over again.

KDT: Good one Alwyn Van Niekerk. You have many creative outlets… which do you get the greatest satisfaction from?

WL: It is mostly my photography. I get the best satisfaction out of seeing someone looking at one of my pictures and giving positive feedback and comments.

KDT: What is your fav camera body right now?

WL: I actually don’t have any other cameras than my Pentax K1000 and my Canon 350d. So the obviously choice would be the digital 350d. If I had the choice to choose a camera right now I’d have to say the Nikon D3X. That is one beast of a camera!

KDT: Which one item of equipment would you say is the most important to you?

WL: The obvious choice would be my camera. My cell phone is also in there as well as my PC and iPod.

KDT: What is Werner Lamprecht doing to pay bills now?

WL: I have been working as a hardware sales consultant at Sahara Computers since I finished school. I basically sell computers during the week as a full time job. I also recently started reselling Slip Skateboards. It’s a venture by two of my friends coming out of Kyalami to help the South African scene out with good quality product at a fraction of the price that one would expect to find in the shops. It’s just started off recently but the brand is doing good.

KDT: Would you say that South Africa is now the forefront of skateboarding?

WL: I wouldn’t say forefront, but we are definitely getting there! The skate scene in our country has really progressed tremendously over the last 10 years and it can only get better from here on onwards.

KDT: Who do you feel are some of the most under rated skateboarders out there right now?

WL: Locally – Both the Van Staden Brothers, Joubert and Jansen! These dudes are serious about skating and they really know how to put stuff down! Both have good style, good approaches and big bags of consistent tricks! They really make me want to skate more and better! I’d also say Charl “Skippy” Steyn! This dude is so technical it’s not even funny! Some people will go out trying to pull off hammers or complex technical tricks. Charl will go out and combine those two elements to provide seriously sick technical hammers!

Internationally – A kid called Nick Mullins. Do yourself a favor and go and search him on Youtube. This kid has sick style and big tricks. It is quite sad, but he is currently in the hospital with a viral infection and unable to skate.

KDT: Glad to see you are advocate of Nick Mullins. What is the ONE lasting impression you want to leave in your photos?

WL: I’d love to capture the essence of the era we are currently in when it comes to the skating and the skaters out there at the moment. I want people to look at my pics one day and say “Damn, look at what was being done back then”.

KDT: That is kind of why I wanted to interview you.  You have that universal appeal when you capture an image.  It’s all about getting it right at the moment of making an impact when catching that magic shot.  Are you going to do galleries of your work?

WL: I’d like to do an exhibition of my work someday. Right now I don’t think it’s the right time to do something like that though. I’d rather wait another couple of years and build up a proper reputation for myself. That way an exhibition will make a bit more sence.

KDT: If anyone was to ask you how to capture that moment with your lense, what advice do you have for them?

WL: I’d say that they will have to go back to the “What does it take to be a good skateboard photographer?” question! Haha.

Here are some quick questions we got out of Werner and wanted to share with you:

Last Trip You Were On – I went on a trip to Mpumalanga about a month ago. It wasn’t for skating though. Strictly business!
Place To Visit – 1^st Cape Town and 2^nd Centurion!
Hobby besides Skating – Fishing, Photography, Music.
Drink – Double Southern Comfort with single lime and lemonade.
Band/Artist – for chilling out: JACK JOHNSON! , Matt Costa, The Killers, Interpol, Coldplay and then the Hip-Hop: Jay-Z, Notorious B.I.G., Busta Rhymes, The Game, Obie Trice and the list goes on!
Competition – Good!
Last Time You Were Stoked – Every time I go skate!
Last CD You Bought – Jay-Z’s American Gangster

Time To Wake Up - 5:00 AM
Breakfast – Wimpy?
Last Person You Were With - My Mom
Magazine - Blunt (RIP) , Session , Thrasher  and Transworld.
Website – www.theberrics.com
Last Thing You Read – an e-mail.
Car – I drive a Citi Golf , I’d like a Golf 5 GTI.
Animal - Cat
Last Time You Were Mad - Today at work!
Last New Trick You Learned – I got two new tricks. On Flat I’ve learned Pop Shuvit Underflips and on a ledge I’ve learned Fs 50-50 540 Bigspins out.

Quotes – “skateboarding is ideas put into action, if you can think of something you can pretty much do it on a skateboard” Marc Johnson

Movie – Pursuit of Happiness, The Hangover, American Gangster, The Number 23.