And again.
Once again, I’m behind on my posting. Or maybe I will be soon, if I put this off much longer. I’ve had a number of pretty great shoots lately, great for different reasons, which I should be all sorts of excited to share. The problem is that I wedge these photographic endeavors into a busy and slightly obsessive music schedule, and I often run out of energy to actually post about it all.
First up is a shoot I did a while ago with a fashion photographer, Suguru Konishi. It was a very pleasant shoot, and I awaited the results with a fair amount of anticipation. When I got them, however, I was sent into a brief and very silly bit of panic. When I posted two of the three images on my ModelMayhem page, it suddenly hit me that both images have the exact same arm position. And then, I kept seeing the same arm pop up all over my portfolio. Too much sameness! I ended up switching out one of the images for another. Here are all three images, which I’m quite pleased with:
It’s a tough thing, sometimes, to not use an image that you really like because you know that it just doesn’t add the right stuff to your portfolio. The bottom two images are my favorite, but in the context of the rest of my portfolio, they are just too similar. Of course, switching out the middle image for the top one doesn’t really diminish the quality in this case; the are both images I’m happy with. But I’m definitely more attached to the middle one.
All this has made me think more about how I pose. I’ve started to feel like my well of poses is starting to run a little dry. Part of that is due to the fact that photographers will often ask for redundant poses, but most of it has more to do with a bit of a disassociation I’ve been feeling lately with my own body. Time to return to my yoga practice and to reconnect with myself, I think.
Wonderful images. I like the light and shadows on the second one best. Yeah, as a photographer sometimes I find myself cribbing from my past work, especially posing. And I tend to become fairly attached to images I’ve shot, usually because I know the model as a friend, and the images spark memories of a good time together shooting. But I only have so much space in my portfolio, especially on MM, and what I like personally may not be the best thing to represent myself to a wider audience, so it becomes a tough job culling images.
Justin Bonaparte said this on November 2, 2011 at 1.30 pm |
The problem is that, coming from a marketing perspective, redundancy in a portfolio shows a lack of a model’s versatility. I don’t want photographers looking at my work and thinking I can only handle one pose. Since I’m returning to working as a semi-professional model, rather than a hobbyist one, that now matters. I wouldn’t care so much otherwise.
immateria said this on November 2, 2011 at 11.27 pm |