Friday 26 April 2013

Jenga with Friends (aka. the pursuit of imperfection)

Today was a great day. I caught up with my soul sister Rach from down yonder then met up with my laughing buddy from the Tron, Kate.
Then we got together with our best friends, made sushi, played jenga, talked shit, and laughed until we couldn't breathe.

My strategy for getting back to the freedom of imperfection is to womp my camera onto aperture priority, and set it at 1.4 and only change my ISO. I don't want to be in control anymore, me and my camera are collaborating here, I'm letting him have his say and choose what he thinks is right. We make an ok team.


Tuesday 23 April 2013

getting my fucking soul back (aka. charlie helps to make the bed)

Wow really, last post was 22 May 2012. REALLY. Have I been lost for that long?

Today I went back to uni to talk to a class full of students about how my personal work has fed into my professional work. In preparation I went back through my archives, right back to my second year work from uni where I documented a few months of my life. I am shocked and amazed at the obvious and clear path I have taken since then. It is so blatantly an evolution of the same style. Why hadn't I realised this before?
Why didn't I notice too that this blog, and heck all of my client work too, was just a continuation of that same project? How did these things get by me? Why am I so surprised?

I 've been searching for my style, trying to define what I love about shooting, and its been here all along.

But its been a year. I haven't shot for myself in a year. A whole goddamn year.

My business is steaming along at a rate of knots. I'm improving and growing with every session. I'm making money, I'm busy. Its awesome. But I'm working my body, and my soul (most of all my soul) right into the ground. I've made a few mistakes in my short life, but this has got to be one of the biggest most crucial ones. Why did I stop taking photos for the hell of it? When did photography become work? How did I get to this point? I have so many questions!

Rachel talks about "camera therapy" a lot, but I'm only just starting to appreciate that that is exactly what I need too. Camera therapy.

I want to get back to the freedom of shooting for no reason. To free things up again. Fuck colour casts. Fuck noise. Fuck composition. Hell FUCK correct exposure! My first assignment had none of those things. Not a single image is sharp. I had no clue how to use my camera. But the images emote, they record, they describe and they have more feeling than anything I've created in the last year.

So, this blog as my witness, its time to get my soul back. My camera is coming with me wherever I go now. In fact I'm even going to take it on special outings with the sole purpose of capturing something new. I've been working so hard on perfecting my technique, and creating "professional photography". Now its time to unravel it all and get back to my true vision. I have no doubt that my client work will benefit from this. No doubt. My heart and my mind will probably chirp up a bit too.

Also, I learned a new word to describe myself with today.
Introvert.
I remember in french at school we had to do an introduction and one of the lines was "I am an extrovert/introvert" when it came my turn my teacher said in an "of course" tone "Anna est introvertie" - I was pretty put out, everyone else got to be extrovertie!
But today I read this article and I can't believe they know me so well! We've never met! I feel rather vindicated.

Well, my soul searching muscle is well and truly engaged, and long may it live. Here's what I shot today.
Charlie helped me make the bed (the fucking cutest!) Yeah it was dark as hell, yeah the lights pretty gross, yeah hes not in focus.

I DON'T CARE. I love him, I love his fur, I love these photos, I love that I picked up my camera and took them. I want to remember this.