Portraiture is HARD! Mostly, I say its hard because I have always like to take photos of things I find interesting as my way to record and catalog things in my life. I think most of this comes from uncomfortableness in front of the camera and so when I was tasked to take a series of portraits for this project, it was definitely going to be a learning experience. Here are the results.
– J
Stranger Cosplayers
For my 2 portraits of strangers, I thought it would be a great idea to take them at New York Comic Con. I have been continuously attending since 2010 and I felt like if there ever was a place to take images without the fear of being told no, it would be this place; I mean people dress up because they want to be seen! What I discovered though was that it was not as easy as I thought it would be. Although people don’t mind being photographed, the photos need to happen fast because you are one out of a dozen of lenses trying to capture the moment at the same time. This means that you get over exposure from people’s flash going off, or people photo bombing you image or the subject changing pose to give someone else the shot. Needles to say, I managed to get these images but I didn’t get to take as many as I could. The availability of willing subjects was there but the logistics were tough. Now I understand why people do full out photoshoots outside the Javits Center and not inside.
Lego Spiderman Tipping. 2018
Daft Disco. 2018
Sir Russel and the Hard to Focus Photos
Sir Russel the Chinchilla is back! I have always wanted to take amazing images of him but he is a little finicky when it comes to staying still and so I choose him as my series of 3 photos of someone I know. My first attempts at taking photos of him were difficult; between his lack of consideration and constantly having to move around and the terrible lighting in my kitchen where he gets his weekly exercise getting this images was hard. What I leaned from this was that I had to let him do Russel. I can’t direct him or pose him, and so I had to stay still and keep focused on him until I felt like he would do something and then take the shot. I once read that if you see the perfect shot through the camera you missed the perfect shot (or something like that). Well this was the perfect example of this. I just had to be patient and try to predict the best moments so that I could capture them.
Get my good side. 2018
Hurry! 2018.
Wat’ you looking at?! 2018.
Self-Portraits? (Uh -oh!)
And lastly, the dreaded self-portraits (three of them to make matters worse T.T ). I had the most difficulty with these, more than any of the other ones (and I just complained how much of a pain those were!) However, I decided that I would take this as an opportunity to express how I look at myself through the things I do and enjoy. The lack of color in some of these is because in my research, there is so much we have yet to discover that I have to look at everything with a gray lens, for nothing is as clear as differentiating black or white. This series of photographs also allowed me to see how much bioanth (biological anthropology) has shaped my life and how I enjoy what I am doing, which is good because I still have a long road ahead of me towards getting my Ph.D.
Another Day in the Trenches. 2018
My first skull. 2018.
“nosce te ipsum.” 2018.