sometimes getting to the beach isn´t so easy

me, myself and marta

Some self portraits here in loja and some shots of marta as well. Coming along quite well today.

me, myself and I

Some self portraits here in loja.

results

So Luis turned out to be able to model pretty well. I´ve done basic retouching. Here´s some contact sheets.

luis_model

I´m getting ready for a fashion shoot tommorow. I saw this great light in the model´s place and just had to grab a shot with the amazing background and ambient light. Luis is half sweedish and half spanish and has serious personal style. I cancelled the stylist, for real. His wardrobe reads like a sartorialist post. Its all bohemian, but with just enough class to ground it in something.



And then I found this at his house



I suggested a zorro themed shoot, but even though models are skinny, apparently it doesn´t fit anymore.

And in the taxi on the way to his house a cd started to reflect some interesting light on his neck...

here´s a couple of ideas for black and white toning I´ve been messing with. Not so sure about the whole series having this tone...That´ll have to wait till I get a bit further into the project.

najeeb

these are the shots of najeeb from today. He´s the bass player for capture the flag here in Madrid, but is classically trained in cello.

rec v2...in color

rock_ continues

So this is luis or "rec overflow". Victim 2 of the series about madrid musicians.
I like this whole contact sheet thing. It´s not the final presentation, just a way for me to compare-contrast...

“Here’s the dilemma and the strength of photography. It’s the easiest medium in which to be competent. But, it’s the hardest medium in which to have personal vision that is readily identifiable.”

-chuck close

I think this is very true. I learned how to use a camera in about 15 minutes at age 12 to take photos of a basketball game for the yearbook. A 2 month stint as an assistant showed me how to light with strobes at 23. Years later, I´m still struggling to find my readily identifiable personal vision. I´m taking a master´s level documentary photography course from Fosi Vegue via blank paper. Just having time to talk and work through a personal project, look at other people´s work and also look at some of the greats will hopefully help. It´s been a long time since I was last in school.

Fosi challenged me last week to rethink letting go of my black and white vision. I´m really good at seeing effective light for black and white images. I guess I feel this pressure to shoot color because it´s what what people are looking for these days. But then there´s people like Trent Parke, who´s done some of the most interesting black and white documentary work I´ve seen in a long time. He´s trying out color and it doesn´t really work for me. Color is hard, and many times unnecessary.

My main hangup with using black and white is that I used to shoot black and white because it was free in school via the newspaper, and had to send out via mail my rolls of color and lacked a decent scanner. Once I got my hands on a digital camera that all changed.



So these portraits are my adventure back into black and white. The point of the work is to shoot musicians, producers, djs, etc not doing music but being human beings. Shooting your subjects nude can help you get to the essence of them. Sometimes just taking their guitar, turntables, or Macpro away can be just as disarming helping to get to the person behind the music. We´ll see how this works out.

rock_via issuu