Wednesday 10 November 2010

THIS is FILM - NY first

NY city - first roll.

Has I continue shooting, everyday -  it becomes a natural thing,a part of my everyday routine.
The camera and film is always inside my bag, wherever I go - they go, like the keys, the money, the mobile. The camera has become a common everyday object for me.

As I shoot for 6 months now on film only -  first realizations start to appear -  I reflect upon:

The Angle and the quality of photo
90 degrees Angles -  I notice I shoot frequently 90 degrees / perpendicular vertical and straight to the object. This type of Angela seerms to freeze time strongly in the picture, or to reinforce that time stopping quality.
No matter what the subject may be, it also seems to create a instant and powerfull relationship between the object and the viewer.
So the angle is a make or break of the shoot: it can make the shot powerful or banal, evocative or meaningless, it can pull the viewer to engage with the subject or not.
The choice of angle is CRUCIAL, to achieve photography rather them a snapshoot.

Distance between photographer and subject
2) There seems to be a optimum distance between the photographer and the subject -  especially in portraits ( people, animals, objects) - too little distance and the shoot seems to become banal/comom or to big distance and we loose the  intimate sense of the portrait ( it becomes snapshot only). I seem to naturally understand that optimum distance to which I know where to place myself in relation to the subject - many of my portraits seem to achieve this -  but not all the time. I need to pay attention and to swicth from intuitive mode to technical mode.

The personal eye
Many people and more and more people come to me complementing me for my photos. They presume I am a successful, professional photographer. I love you photos, you take great photos, you have a great eye for photography.
Because I am still a mainly intuitive photographer, I dont honestly understand these compliments.
But them, someone said to me, they would have never seen a relationship between a plastic spoon and a gum, or a part of birds wings lost in the autumn leafs on the streets grounds.
Its the eye, my eye choices that makes my photography mine and one else's. Its the eye, the choice of the subject, the angle and the final choice to when shoot the click that makes these mine.

And I keep on being told I have a very good eye. I agree with it -  its natural to me, but more than that,  photography has become a important personal journey,where I record and reflect upon my unique, individual choices at a certain moment.

When I walk around with my camera, it is as if I have a third eye with me - who is always alert, who is always looking ( for beauty, for meaning, for understanding, for confirmation) -  and when It finds it -  it just screams inside my mind : LOOK , and them my eyes follow, mechanically I take my camera from inside my bag and I shoot.

And now some shots - NY firsts  (first roll and where my eyes landed)

Plastic Spoon and blue gum
( from ONGOING project : Rubbish and Stories)

Feet up
(Williamsburg -  Brooklyn)

Morning view from Cave Room

Dead Food smiles
( from ONGOING project : Rubbish and Stories)

Apple Holocaust
(New Jersey)

Pham's gaze
(New Jersey)

Straightforward
(New Jersey)

Helpful waitress
(New Jersey)

Brooklyn Diet
(Simple cafe - Williamsburgh/ Brooklyn)

One dog waits outside at night
(Grand Street - Brooklyn)

Cave next -  my room

Zoey waits dowstairs

Zoeys intention -  male curiosity

Zoey -  portrait 

Zoey -  2x shots

unexpected face 
(outside LEICA gallery NY)