Perfecting
I remember those magic moments of photography when I didn’t think about the finished product but just focused on how much I wanted an image. The results were usually a surprise: lighting and composition were spot-on, it seemed as if the camera read my thoughts.
But the more I analyse the process of creating a photographic image, the less magical it feels. There’s so much to consider: light, framing, exposure especially. Things assumed to be automatic after a few years with a film camera that gave me no idea of what to expect. The camera is after all a mechanical tool, albeit extremely intelligent in these days.
It’s time to hold the reins tighter, exercise more control and use the camera and stop expecting random surprises. It’s time to make things happen, but improvement or unexpected results are welcome to occur despite extreme control.
Buttery
A former lemon butter jar filled with unorthodox plastic neon toothpicks.
Working in a photography studio has forced me to rethink the process of photography. A lot. In summary, a studio environment is very different to that of a hobbyist in the sense that the former is extremely fast-paced and things need to be done all the time: photos have to be post-processed, proofed, printed, proofed again, and sent to sub-contractors for framing/mounting. There is no chance to get it wrong, but fortunately digital photography has made it extremely easy to take hundreds of photos and choose the top ten percent. It’s extremely stressful most of the time, deadlines loom and expectations are high.
I had been intimidated by the more seasoned photographers, as they have built a good collection of work that represent perfect execution and an established train of thought leading up to execution. Working with such people should mean that I’m inspired to take more photographs, but no, such was my feeling of intimidation and ineptitude that I procrastinated greatly, choosing to post-process and manage job files all day long instead of spending half that time practising and executing what I’d watched and learnt, had been taught to do with much attention to detail.
It was the feeling of severely low self-confidence, that I would never take photographs like that because I’m too much of a perfectionist to even hop up the first rung of the ladder, choosing only to hold it steady for those who were halfway or even near the top. Practice makes perfect, and I really should practise lots because these are days without deadlines; when those days of project briefs and deadlines arrive I have to be, must be wholly prepared.
Here’s to more days of practice, especially after next week when my schedule clears up dramatically at the end of the semester. As said before, it’s been stressful trying to split my time between study and work, so hopefully the spirit of determination returns and brings something good soon.
The Heart or the Matter?
Who’s not going to watch Sex and the City: The Movie next week?
Was browsing fashion magazines in Borders earlier this morning for research—am trying to get a sense of the angles of artificial lighting on skin—and was amazed by the amount of retouched wrinkles, eyebags, eye colour, basically all photographs, including advertisements of wooden floorboards. The realisation hit me like a brick and I was stunned momentarily by all the fakery to which one needs a subscription, that the idea of being less than perfect is shameful and incredibly ugly.
I can’t wait to see what happens when SatC:TM screens to the general public: 1) Girls go ga-ga for those half-gloves and the huge hibiscus, big floppy hats appear on every street in town; 2) Sarah Jessica Parker, Michael Patrick King and everyone who made the phenomenon that is the TV series pump their fists in the air over a black-tie dinner, after having heard that tickets sold like crazy worldwide and cha-ching! they are now richer than ever, and plans for the next movie begin.
I’m playing the devil’s advocate here, though personally I love SatC and subscribe to its message of friendship, love and a good martini. How unfortunate that Kim Cattrall and SJP aren’t friends in real life, when they’ve played best friends on screen for so long; that in the later seasons the show became a commodity and promotion giant as much as the goods that were toted. I’ve watched the girls gallivant all around NYC frequently enough to recognise some streets even though I’ve never been there. How much longer are we content to believe what is given, even force-fed, to forget the realities of the movie industry, which crosses tracks multiple times with others such as beauty, fashion and celebrities to trump the layman and remind him/her of how terrible it is to be ordinary?
It’s all right to buy beauty products to treat your skin, or a new article of clothing that makes your figure sleeker; it’s perfectly fine to subscribe to the mantra of self-indulgence, just as long as one is always reminded of the reality of consumership, that the process of making the all-natural seaweed cream that goes on the face nightly can be more complex and distasteful than a two step process of harvesting seaweed and extracting its collagen goodness with a juice presser. It’s okay to fantasise and dream a little—I’m just urging a little more consciousness in the cycle of economics and tugging random kite strings back to earth.
Get the RSS feed