why this might be the beginning of the end…

of the Cemetery Girls project. or at least another rung on the ladder of my internal analysis about whether i need to continue this work or not. so three of my last 5 models have pulled this rabbit out of their hats and imposed this restriction on what they will allow me to do with my photographs. namely, that they do not want their photographs displayed on Flickr. that’s right. there are 3 models in my portfolio that many/most of you have never even seen, and may never see. unless you were to sit down next to me and i were to show you their photos on my computer. this irks me greatly.

at first, nice guy that i am, i said, “yeah, sure, ok…” when they sprung the caveat on me.

“but why?”

“oh, i don’t (always) like the way i look in photographs”

and what i should have said was, “then why the hell are we doing this? why are you wasting my time with your fickleness when there are 5 other models that i could be working with right now instead of you that LOVE to see themselves in photographs and would literally die for an opportunity to work with an artist.” well, i’ll tell you, that is what i’m going to say from now on! i’ll say it nicely though. i’m just kinda pissed off right now.

here is what happens inside my head when i create these images. i find a prospective model. we talk. they look at my work. they decide if it is something they feel inspired to participate in. we meet. we walk around a cemetery for a few hours and i casually take photographs of them while we talk about stuff. we go home. i upload all of the photos from the shoot into a private album on the internet so they can see the work they did. (i don’t know of any other photographer that does this. the main reason i do this is to allow them to say, “oh god i look horrible in that photo! please don’t let anyone see it!” and i will cooperate. this has actually never occurred before these recent 3 though. seriously. out of the 90+ models i have photographed no one has ever said “i don’t like that photograph. please do not use it.”) but the reason i have been so kind in allowing my models see their proof shots is because we do “trade” work. they trade their time for my time. i am not paying them for their services.

then i begin the real art of my work. i use software to manipulate (edit) the colors of my photographs. this is when i feel like a real artist because it is almost like painting, what i do. i know, i know, it’s not painting and it’s not really art. it’s faux art and a monkey could learn to do it, but for an uneducated man in these modern times, it passes for art and i get into a bit of an altered state of mind when i tinker with the colors and hues. i listen to my music and i get very focused and forget about the rest of the world. sometimes i’ll look into one of my photographs and really feel transported to another place, my mood will change, i’ll stare closely at one little section of the image and wonder deeply about an engraving on a tombstone, or think, “hmmm, what IS that inside those shadows…?” or i wonder exactly what it is she was feeling or thinking right at that moment… it’s a reverie, my editing. and i don’t rush through it. it’s a contemplation. it’s a wonderful thing because i don’t have an employer. i don’t have deadlines. i could decide tomorrow to pack a suitcase and catch the Amtrak to Omaha, leaving all my unfinished photographs behind (and yes, there are literally 1,000s of photos waiting for my attention) and no one would be able to stop me.

when i finish editing a photograph, i put it in the “finished box”; Flickr. sort of like the “In” & “Out” boxes you see in old movies in offices. work comes into the “In” box, you do the paper work, then put it into the “Out” box when it’s finished. and it goes to the boss for review. that is almost exactly what this procedure feels like to me. but it’s not. i used to play the Flickr game for points. and by that i mean i used to really use Flickr for it’s social network powers. i made friends with people, i commented regularly on their new photographs, i shared my photographs in specialized groups so that they would get more attention, if someone commented on a photograph of mine i would thank them and be sure to comment on two of their photographs in return, etc, etc… i don’t do this anymore. i don’t have the time or the energy. Flickr is too big and there are too many people and too many photographs. i have some really good, old friends on there who’s portfolios i have not looked at in months (if not over a year). it’s just tooooo big. it’s a pity really because Flickr was genuinely instrumental in helping me become the photographer i am today. BUT, my routine is still to save my photographs there. oh, and there are other reasons too. Blurb, for instance. when i am ready to make a new Blurb book, i can directly feed my photos from Flickr into the Blurb editing software. the two are directly linked. this means that i don’t have to do manual downloading and storing of my photos on my local computers. this is a BIG plus. another thing that’s good about Flickr is that people out in the world “mine” Flickr for images to use in official publications. that is how i got my photographs of Adrian Belew published in Guitar Player Magazine. their editors found my photographs.

sooo, it’s a practice built into my dna, to edit my photographs and save them to Flickr. i don’t tag my photos. i don’t send them out to groups on Flickr so that other people who do searches can find my photos. (some photographers are starved for viewers and will put dozens of tags on a single photograph so that the odds of being found in a search are increased. i don’t do this. laziness is part of the equation, but privacy is too. my photographs belong to me and the person in the photograph. basically. if you stroll through my photostream you’ll see that typically my photos have been viewed less than 10 times each. that is something that would depress most Flickrites, and it used to depress me, but now i wear it as a badge of honor.

back to the drama. so when these recent models told me “no displaying photos publicly”, i verbally agreed to the demand and then tried to actually do it. i edited their photos and saved them privately to Flickr. which means they are virtually invisible. only someone that i send a personal invitation to can see the photos. for some reason this was very difficult for me to do. it’s like sitting in a dark room, all alone, and creating a masterpiece of art but then not having anyone to show it to. like working at the college darkroom on a Saturday. you go there for some privacy to work on a special project because during the week there are just too many people in the darkroom and you get splashed with chemicals and there is always a line at the print dryer. and you think, “ah, peace and quiet.” but you come out of the dark room with a really splendid photograph and want to show someone to see what they think and there is no one there. no one at all. this is really what Flickr is like anyway. you could save work in Flickr for ages and literally never get feedback from anyone. it’s a really strange world that is moving evermore towards isolation. MY PROBLEM with not being able to save my edits to the big wall where everyone pins their final works up is that i feel like i’m in that empty dark room. why even bother creating a piece of art if NO ONE is ever going to get to see it? maybe NO ONE WILL ever see it anyway, but at least i get to put it on the wall where there is a chance that someone will see it.

does this make sense?

it has made my process feel like a cap has been plugged on my oil spill and all of my creative unction is being clogged up inside of me. i need the flow. i need the doors open at the entrance and the exit of my dark room. this does make some sort of sense, to somebody, right? and right now, the main consternation that i’m feeling is from the woman in the last shoot that i did. her photographs are AMAZINGLY creative. absolutely some of the most genius work i’ve ever done with anyone yet she has told me that i cannot freely display the images that i want to in Flickr. she looked at the proofs i shared with her and sent me a numbered list of the images she was happy with and said that i was free to display them anywhere i wanted. but i had not even edited them yet. nor had i edited any other photos yet, either. she has totally made a judgment call on the raw images with no allowance for what i can do with them with my editing skills.

it’s funny but i had issues with this model months ago too. before we ever shot. i knew there was something peculiar about her relationship with other photographers she had worked with and that it was strange that she only showed a select few photographs of her on the internet; i.e. at model mayhem or elsewhere. and i called her out on it and told her that i felt she was being secretive towards me and that she had some weird, higher expectation of my skills/abilities that i felt i could not satisfy.

and now i’m going into a bit of a tailspin mentally about this whole shoot. she wrote to me this morning and said “all i want is 4 or 5 nice photos that i can keep for myself”. and i told her that is not how i work. i don’t spend 3-5 hours with a model taking 1,500 –2,000 photographs just so that you can have 4 or 5 pretty pictures for your collection. my style is about documenting the span of hours that we spend together showing you in myriad moods and emotions and poses. i want the viewer to be washed over in waves of variety of images of you… not just a snap shot here, a snap shot there… 

OHHH, so if she will not agree to let me do my work, my way i think i’m going to have a crazy-man reaction and do something drastic like delete all of her photographs. pretend the shoot never even happened. i’ve never felt this upset by someone before, but it would be a really great experience too. to do something so irrational. it would be like Van Gogh cutting off his ear in a way, wouldn’t it? or am i mixing up my metaphors? i wish i could show you just one of her photographs. she was sooo incredible. so i dunno. light a candle. say a prayer. her name is Grace. we need your help to save this art.

how this is going to affect the future of my project? i am going to write up a new model release form in which i clearly state that final edits of photographs will displayed on Flickr and that at my discretion your photographs may be published in book format. and i will give the model release form to the model prior to our meeting for them to study. if they disagree, i don’t care how beautiful they are, i will not allow myself to enter into this mental torture again.

lots of developments going on. i got a pep talk from my Muslim friend tonight about fasting for Ramadan. i think i may need to refrain from doing all photo shoots during the period of the fast because the fast is very, very intense. by Islamic rule, NOTHING goes down your throat during daylight hours. no food. no liquid. this is a fast for 30 freaking days that is going to cause dramatic bodily changes. i strongly suspect that i am not healthy enough to endure the rigors of it. so really, i may need to make my own concessions and break the rules by drinking during the day. i think i could possibly manage the not eating part. and once the sun sets, you can eat as much as you want until the sun rises again. wtf, right? :)

~om shanti~