Photography: Personal Work, Social Media, Marketing and Promos
Wowzahs! I havent posted in a long time! This year has been a strange year for a few reasons. I have encountered a number of injuries. Most recently I suffered a pretty sizable mountain bike crash. If you were to rank it 1-10, I would have scored a heavy 8. I took a risk and it did not pay off well. The reward was a face plant on a rock and some new battle scars. I looked like I had gone half a round with Mohmad Ali. I am taking a break from the downhill stuff, permanently. With my career and work on the major uprise, I would rather focus my energies on taking major risks with my business as opposed to doing things that will delay my work or put me on the bench.. "Put me in coach." Life: "No, you take the back seat and heal." Ain't nobody got time to waste healing..
This photo does not convey the severity of the injury.
I suffered a minor knee injury in February. It was a two part doozy. I was taking a yoga class and that was the major factor. However, when I was hiking the Pacific Northwest, a beautiful spot along the Oregon Coast, I twisted my leg while turing on a muddy corner and my knee didnt do what it was supposed to. That was a fun couple of weeks. NOT! A few weeks after the knee was better, I had a back injury put me out for almost a week. That came out of no where. What was mentioned was that due to the knee injury and compensating for that, my back was like, "hey, you, I'm going to quite out on your for a few weeks.." That was also not cool.
Growing up I always heard, from my mother, "If you want to play, you are going to pay." Well, this year I have played and I paid. This kind of risk, when you own a business and do not have a large staff to take over is challenging. When I was with the back injury, that was the worst of it. I had two full weeks of work and walking around, carrying lights, cameras, and shooting was very tough. I was not very happy to be in that condition. Like I said, I want to take bigger risks with my business, not so much my health. I am planning some awesome, fun, new marketing strategies that will be bringing me to new places. I am striving to shoot some new work and travel more. All the new marketing I am going to be implementing will be the foundation for this to come to fruition.
I firmly believe that I was born 20 years to late. I was just telling that to the guy who processes my film. Yes, I said film. I made a conscious decision a few weeks back. All personal work is going to be photographed using film. I have some pretty awesome film cameras. I just scored a vintage Yashica range finder. I have an awesome Nikon F4, a 35mm Canon from the 70's, an older twin lens reflex, not a Yashica or Rollie, but something fun and simple to play with.
Last week I was working on a marketing task and the light was splendid. Perfect golden hour light. I closed my macbook and grabbed a bag of film cameras and hit the road. I had no idea what I was going to shoot, but I knew where I wanted to go. I drove a half hour north of the studio and found some fields with views of mountains and some farms. I shot primarily with the Yashica, playing with the simplistic mechanisms that are so well engineered into this body.
I am not a hipster. I am a photographer. I am not shooting film to give people that aura that I am oh so cool, like a hipster. I am shooting film because I grew up with film. I worked in a few different 1 hour photo labs. I shot with film in school 1999-2001 and then again in college 2006-2009 and 2010-2012. If I was born 20 years earlier, most of my work would have been on film. Film is different than digital and I will explain below the images, shown below.
How many of you are guilty of taking a photo into Light Room and hitting a preset button? How many of you are also guilty of just allowing that preset to be the total result of the work? I know a lot of people rely heavily on presets and actions, (if you are using photoshop) as a means of making their photos look the way they do. The photographs above were photographed on 400 speed Fuji film. I scanned them in once I got the negatives from the lab. I spotted out all the dust that appeared during the scanning. I have not made a single local correction, exposure, brightness, or corrected the colors. I will not and do not want to. While I could nit pick the images, for example, the image with the trucks, I could go into photoshop, play with some levels, some curves, adding some darkness to the sky, but I don't want to. That is not important to the image. The image is paired with the photograph of the steering wheel shot through the window. The point of the photographs are about seeing, composing, using the mechanics of the camera in conjunction with film, and showing the work as part of a collection of images of what I see. The stories I tell through film are scripted through composition and light, not by the latest presets or actions.
I was explaining the cameras to a friend of mine. He is a few years younger than I am. He didnt understand a word of what I was saying because he, like so many other people, including most youth, will not have the benefit of learning from the use of film. In some ways I am keeping film alive, for me, by using these cameras and producing work with film. It is my way of honoring where photography has come from. It is my way of saying, this is what photography was and can still be, for those who know what to do and how to do it. There are still a lot of resources to learn film photography. There are new manufacturers producing film and keeping it thriving. There is a surge in people, them damn hipsters, buying vintage film cameras. Film is still going to be around for some time. Go play...
Behind the scenes in studio working with a dance company.
I am on Instagram as @jeffreybphotography I have been using IG for a few years now and have posted, as of today 2567 photos. For a while it was anything goes. Now, this account, is soly for my business. I share work, current mostly, behind the scenes, and humors moments on sets. I share what I am seeing at sets, my equipment, and the life of a photographer. I am getting a fair amount of little red hearts. I have yet to land a big shoot because of IG or connecting with someone on IG that leads to a great shoot. I am struggling to get to that point. I know that a lot of it has to do with where I am located most days. The work that I want to shoot is not in my region. I am relying on my other marketing efforts to lead to that. While my IG is a major component of my branding and identity as a photographer, it is taking a little bit more time than I would like. That is fine. I see it as a challenge and will not only increase the followers, fans, but increase the potential to use it as a means to score big shoots. You dont need to be a social marketing guru to use the app, but you need to be posting the right content and directing it towards the right audience, both in terms of fans and followers, but also towards the people that will see it and want to work with you. That is what I am working on, aside from shooting film, and creating new marketing strategies to implement.
Until the next post, stay cool my friends.
Peace, love, and buckets. On set with a dance company.
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Follow me on Instagram and get a glimpse into the behind scenes of my shoots as well as content that I post on the daily. @jeffreybphotography or clicking the image below.
Here is a recent portrait of two dancers, sisters, that I photographed in the studio. I will be doing a blog post about this shoot shortly.
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Commercial Photography: Fashion & Studio
Whoa, time flies! I just looked at the last post I made, November 28th, seems like 2 days ago, but was a few weeks back. The lack of blog posting has been due to a huge volume of work I had after our return from Europe. Since mid-September I have been having a blast shooting, editing, acquiring new clients, and working on a super awesome promo that should be going out in the next few days.
As you can see by the date of this post, it is a Sunday, a handful of days away from Christmas, and I am in the studio writing the first blog post from here in what seems like years. I was in for a good portion of the day working on some light renovations. My studio has always been a revolving set. I have shot portraits, head shots, groups, families, still life, teen, youth, children, babies, and fashion. From 2009 till about 2014 I had been that studio that did a bit of everything, weddings, head shots, families, and commercial work. While running a business that was all over the place I was trying to focus on my portrait/fashion commercial work all the while producing bodies of work for exhibition. 2009-2012 was spent co-managing the studio with my former business partner. From late 2012 till now I have been on my own. There were some highly successful days, long days, fun days, productive days! As I have branched out on my own I realized what I love most is the commercial work. Fashion, portraits, interior and exterior, and travel photography are my focuses. I have reduced the interest in exhibiting my work for the time being as I begin to focus on taking a portion of what I have shot over the last several years and license it for stock usage.
Within the last month I licensed 22 images to a national chain restaurant, The 99. The photographs will be printed and put on display by the creative buyer. I am excited to see the work when it is finally hung. I have begun working with some stock agencies and have a portion of work that is going to be marketed stock usage. During the last few hours I spent resetting, cleaning, and doing light renovations in the studio I found a few bodies of work that were exhibited. It brought back the memories of the last few years. The collections represent ideas that I went out and produced, exhibited, and sold work from. As I look forward to the new year and the new promo that is about to go out, I am reinvigorated and ready to advance my career to the places it has been leading to.
Once the promos have shipped I am going to be doing a post about them. I have spent the last 4-6 weeks working on a print promo, researching some creative ideas and coming up with something that is going to make some creative directors, art directors, etc pretty happy. The cover of the promo has a photo from the following shoot that I did with Alyssa, a model that I really enjoy working with. Alyssa is a actor, dancer, and model. When I work with Alyssa I know what I am going to get and she has something unique that I am pleased to put into my portfolio.
For this shoot we did a bit of dance and fashion. We did 4 looks with minor stylized changes. I asked for this shoot as a location test. There was an opportunity to shoot in a space I have always wanted to shoot in and I requested Alyssa to join me in the space.
I am so anxious to post the promo, but again, not till they are out in the mail! I will also be posting some shots of the studio once everything is hanging, in place, and all the renovations are complete. One of my largest clients has requested the use of the studio moving forward for portrait work, so I am anxious to get some new backdrops in place as well as expand some of the ideas I have had for the last two years.
I hope your Sunday was as productive as mine was!
Dance Photography: New Work
During October and November I worked closely with the owner/choreographer of Eclipse Dance Co to photograph her dancers for a show that opened at the end of November. This project was a bit different than previous dance shoots. Our objective was to shoot for prints that would be exhibited during the show. Each image would feature a specific pose and be suspended within the dance space. The show did not open on a stage, rather a unique event space that exists within a former mill. The title of the show was "Still Moving." It fused the still images within the actual dance. The pieces were site specific, relying on the structural elements of the space to build a stage. The goal was for the audience to navigate around the space while the dancers moved through the space. It was a different take on observing dance.
I really enjoyed the close relationship the dancers had with the audience. The audience became a part of the show with their interaction. At times the dancers swept their ways through observers. It was different, far more different than most dance performances that I have been too. It was refreshing to be a part of something so creative.
You might not always have an assistant, so do the next best thing, set the lights using whatever talent is available.
In terms of the portraits of the dancers, they were photographed at the dance studio. Over the course of 4 shoots we were able to capture the ideal images of the dancers, the ideal poses, that would fit within the show. Working from a mood board that the owner of the dance co put together, we were able to use her studio space during their rehearsals to capture the images.
We've photographed dancers on roof tops, parks, other landscapes, but this images is one of my favorites because of the relationships between the two. Compositionally I adore the poses.
In the 4 shoots that we had there was only one major technical issue that arose. How do we film the dancers from above? There was a request to film one of the pieces from above. The film was to be shown while dancers performed the piece. It was going to be a dramatic and incredible forced perspective on the piece. The first shoot we were unable to mount the camera in the right manner. Working with my 5d, I tried a few set ups of mounting the camera above the dancers. WIth no luck I had to abandon the entire process that I sculpted. There was one idea that I had that would incorporate a raised pole that went up and down for one of the dance classes. If I could lift the horizontal pole high enough, mount a camera looking down, all would be good. The next challenge, how do I mount onto a 6"+ pole? It took some serious out of the box thinking. In the end I used my Gopro Hero 3+ mounted with a U shaped bracket and a magnet. I had to do some serious research to figure out of a magnet would work. Why? Welp, simple. Magnets F*** things up. Magnets and electronics don't always work. Don't believe me, go grab your computer and a strong magnet and see what might happen. Once mounted, lifted, I ran the Gopro via my iPad and worked closely with the owner of the studio to ensure the dancers were in the right position. After several takes we nailed it, the dancers nailed it, the project came to a wrap.
The following photos were a part of the show.
The following gallery are a few highlights from the performance on opening night.
Dance Photography: In Studio
Last weekend I shot some dance in the studio. The moment Sarah arrived I stressed that I did not want to see anything technically perfect. There is a time and place for perfection, this shoot was not one of those moments. One of the most important things for a dancer is to be just that, perfect, well nearly perfect. The pose, the movement, the right position within the dance, etc. Perfection or nearly perfect can make or break a performance. With this shoot, I wanted to convey a sense of portraiture, a sense of fashion, throw in some personality and lights, and we have a shoot. I like shooting dance, like I do fashion. The more I shoot, the happier I am.
The following set of photos are an homage, kind of an inspiration to Edgar Degas. Degas is known for his paintings, be he also made photographs of dancers. His work is both beautiful and iconic. I have had the luxury of seeing some Dagas paintings in real life. Yup. I stood right there looking at his brush strokes. Breath taking, for sure....
Dance Photography: Shooting for an ad
Three weeks ago my friend came into the studio. Our agenda, make photographs of her for an ad for an upcoming Dance Festival. I decided that I wanted to shoot the ad in film. I loaded my Nikon F4 and after reviewing each pose she was offering, I made photographs. Working with film in a digital studio posed a serious challenge. How was I to process the film?
While I have all the parts of an analog darkroom, I did not have anything set up to process the 4 rolls of Tri-X 400 I had just shot on. I was incredibly excited to have the film processed and knew that it was going to be a few days before I could see the film. I was leaving to go away for the weekend, my friend, portrait below, was also going away for the weekend. He allowed me to drop the film off at his private, in home darkroom, and promised me I would have the film back within a few days. I took his word and set out for the weekend away. The anxiety was painful, as this shoot was one of the first in a very long time that had me so excited. It was unlike the shoots I do for clients, which always have me smiling and happily content, because it was the first time in a very long time that I worked with film. I knew what I was going to get. Great images with some grain. Something I was looking forward to.
The moment I saw the film, I knew I achieved what I was looking for. I got the results I wanted and I couldn't be any happier. It took me a few days to scan the film. Roughly 12 hrs of scanning for high resolution. But in the end, I have a set images that are just incredible and capture my friends talent. Currently these images are in an exhibition along with three other photographers. The below photograph is of my friend on the night of the exhibition, followed by a shot from the exhibition.
Instead of framing my photographs, I installed partitions and hung the prints via clips and finishing nails. The un-framed prints take on their own personality being a part of a set of walls that sit in the middle of the room. I am very pleased with how the exhibition looks.