Archive for October, 2009

  • 10/27

    Authorship Part 1: Family and Pumpkin Patches

     

    “Photography is either a window or a mirror. You either take pictures to learn about yourself or to learn about the world around you.” -David Alan Harvey, Magnum Photographer

     

    David couldn’t stress the idea of authorship enough in the loft workshop I did with him last year. To be honest, I didn’t quite appreciate just how important it was at the time. Which is funny, because the idea of authorship not only transformed the way I see photography, but it’s something that I emphasize heavily in my own workshops. Authorship is about putting yourself into your pictures. Bringing a perspective that’s your own, and finding that thing that really matters to you. We all start out shooting by looking at the work of others and trying to copy it – using a look or composition or technique that someone else did. The trick is moving past the inspiration of others and finding our own.

    Every person has the potential to bring something that is uniquely theirs to each picture. A set of experiences and a way of reacting to the world that only they do. It permeates every decision we make. Some react to visuals, while others react to actions. Some look for wit and others look for solemnity. Everyone finds something a little different. It’s about opening yourself up to those reactions without anchoring yourself to the images that inspire you.

    There are any number of things that help. But, I think, at the heart of it, it’s finding something personal. Something you care about, want to be around, and are interested in. For many, family is a great place to start. I took these pictures over the weekend, when we went looking for a pumpkin for Evan. It was his first time, and though he picked out a pumpkin, I think he liked riding on the wagon much more than picking the pumpkins. Katya describes it better than I do on her children’s photography blog for 5 West Kids. What, I really enjoyed was the tractor ride around the farm. Apparently, it’s called a hayride. Even though I think of myself as a city guy, I have to confess that sitting on the hay with my family as the sun came down and that guy playing his banjo – it really worked for me. It was a great day. Well, until I ran into traffic on the LIE heading into the city. That part kind of sucked.

    So! More on authorship and weddings to come. Also, be on the lookout for my Point and Shoot Workshop! This one’s a fun one – it goes over the basics and talks about just how much you really can accomplish with just a point and shoot. This shot below was taken with my new Canon S90.

    And, yet, he wouldn’t eat the raspberries when we handed them to him…

    by Spencer Lum

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  • 10/23

    Frolicking

    Shireen and Mark, 1 day before their wedding. Photographer: Spencer Lum

     

    Every time I post a picture, I’m always just a little afraid. Sometimes more so than others, but always a little bit. When you put yourself out there, and it really stands for something you believe in, rejection, though rarely personal, is still trying. Now, the nice thing about writing your own blog is that you really don’t have to hear people say “Wow, that picture was just awful,” but you figure it must be out there somewhere. In fact, the better the picture is, the more surely the case that there will be people who do not like it.

    I grew up with two siblings in a family that was both strong-willed and opinionated. And when you’re the third of three children, one of two things happens. You either become very resilient, or you become very accommodating. I was the latter. I really like to see people happy, and I like people to like what I do. Which is fine, except that I’m really no less opinionated than anyone else in the family, and I usually just don’t express it. It’s stifling. And that’s what I’ve done with pictures for a long time. I just keep them, sitting around with nowhere to go, because I’m afraid. But as 40 comes around the bend, if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that I am who I am, and nothing is really going to change that. Put myself out there or not, the pictures are there, so I may as well let people have a look and see what I’m about.

    Earlier today, I was at the PhotoPlus Expo, a photography tradeshow, and I saw something that really struck a chord with me. There was a crowd gathered around a speaker talking about posing, as he demonstrated how to make a couple go from one pose to another. It was quite impressive, really. He was fast, assured, and precise. And the crowd around him snapped picture after picture of the models acting out the poses. I’m not quite sure what they hoped to use those pictures for, but there certainly were a lot of photographers snapping away. The speaker explained that couples don’t just frolic by themselves. They don’t look sexy on their own. To get good results time after time, you need to pose them.

    That really resonated. Because I rarely have people frolic in my pictures. And it’s something I worry about. His statements assume that frolicking is good, and we need to be sexy. And fun. And happy the way characters are in musicals right before someone bursts into song. In short, that we want to be something of a cross between a perfume advertisement and a campaign for Juicy Fruit.

    Now, while I say all of this in jest, I do sometimes feel like everyone is looking for that joyous picture of themselves that says “This is love,” and I wonder whether the way I see romance is the way others do. In a lot of my favorite pictures, people aren’t even happy. They’re not necessarily sad or mad, either, mind you – there’s just a plain, everyday quality that’s a little elusive. It’s rarely just about a smile or a frown to me. It’s always this coupled with a hint of that. There’s an ambiguity to it all. To me, that ambiguity lets the moment live. You can dwell in it, conjuring your own idea about what’s going on inside a person’s head.

    So putting up this picture of Shireen and Mark is hard for me. There’s no frolicking going on here. I don’t have the sense of security I feel when I post a picture with a warm, fuzzy feeling. In fact, Shireen and Mark didn’t want to take a portrait of any type, but I persuaded them to let me get a shot the day before the wedding. I’m even skipping the happier variations and posting this one, because I think it’s the picture that resonates. There’s no smile and nothing cute about it, but there’s a thoughtful melancholy in her gaze. The type that we have only in the presence of those we are surrendered to. He looks at her with his arm suspended in the air, mid-moment. There’s a delicate and tenuous connection between them, which, to me, is just what romance is about. That we are bound by almost nothing, but we chose to be together because we need to. As I see it, this is about love, in a personal way that we experience in private, and it’s about them and the people they are.

    Mark is an artist, working with sound as his medium, and Shireen is a lawyer working in London, but, by no means anything like what you think when you think “Lawyer.” As a former lawyer myself, I feel that I’m quite qualified to say that. She chose to wear a custom made dress based on a kimono, and he wore a custom tailored suit both created by Kelima K in SoHo. The wedding was in Williamsburg at Monkeytown. There were no formalities, barely a ceremony, and if you went to the bathroom, you’d find some disposable cameras and hear an audio clip of a robotic voice telling you jokes. The bathroom humor was Shireen’s idea, by the way, and it was that type of wedding. Even though they weren’t looking for a large-scale, meticulously planned affair, every element they did put in really meant something, from performances by friends, to food, and even their choice of shoes. It was intimate, casual, and cool without being too cool, and though I’ve never seen a wedding like it, it was just what a wedding should be.

    by Spencer Lum

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  • 10/21

    What’s in a Portrait?

    Irina, 2009. Photographer: Spencer Lum

     

    “You will not understand the power and beauty of your youth until they’ve faded. But trust me, in 20 years, you’ll look back at photos of yourself and recall in a way you can’t grasp now how much possibility lay before you and how fabulous you really looked.” – Mary Schmich, Chicago Tribune

    I love that line, probably made more famous by Baz Luhrman than its original publishing in the Chicago Tribune, but great either way. There is so much that so many of us have, but it’s only in loss that we realize it and treasure it the most. I don’t think of this so much as a bad thing, but rather the nature of things. I’m tempted to say “it is what it is,” but I just read somewhere that the phrase was on the list of most overused phrases for 2009, so I’m trying to restrain myself. Too bad. I liked that one.

    The passage reminds me of fatherhood. I used to have so much free time. But I didn’t really realize it until Evan, my son, was born, and now I have so much less that I’m left wondering to myself why I didn’t manage to do more with all that time I had on my hands that I never realized I had. But if it’s true for free time, I think it’s even truer for youth. And youth isn’t just the thing that we had when we were 5, 10, 20, or 30. It’s the thing we had the other day that somehow changed today. We lose youth in tiny little increments. It’s the day after we first realize that a new generation of people were born the decade after we were. Or the first time we notice that little twinge in the back after sitting too long. Or when we first say “When I was that age…” Youth can be yesterday, and even when it isn’t in reality, it sure feels like it was.

    I like to play around with equipment in the office on occasion, and I snapped this picture of Irina at lunch. I know it isn’t her favorite picture of herself, but I really like it. I think it’s intimate and honest with a youthful quality to it. Her gaze reveals an innocence about her. Someone who is free, and, though a little unsure, who is also eager and spirited. She isn’t worn by the weight of the world. And that’s exactly how I think of Irina. The beauty and power of youth Mary Schmich speaks of isn’t about how we look, and not even how we look relative to our future, older selves. So it can’t be found in a gym, a beauty product, or a mirror. The beauty and power of youth is our ability to unabashed live freely in the world. To walk, run, leap, dance, and tromp down the block without a care, and to wake up and have unlimited potential. To be ourselves, before our selves ask us to become someone else.

    All of this is to say that I think yesterday becomes more important tomorrow. Maybe right now, we see ourselves, and we’re not as beautiful as we hope. But maybe we’re all a little more beautiful than we know, and tomorrow, we will see that. It’s a tall order, but I simply ask everyone to believe in who they are. There is more to each of us than we can know at any time in life, and that’s what makes pictures so magnificent. If we let them, they will speak to us for the rest of our lives.

    by Spencer Lum

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  • 10/21

    Carol and Mark

    Busy, busy, busy! It’s non-stop around this time of year, which is something I’m thankful for, most certainly, but it’s keeping me from my blog! I’ve had to neglect it for a couple of weeks (and I thought I was doing such a good job keeping up!). Mark expressed his concern about their modeling skills this morning, but, I have to say that they were actually great! There’s just something about the two of them. They feel at ease and natural (check out the shot where Carol is looking at the camera during the prep!), and they connect so well. And thanks again for the Riesling, you two!

    Click on the image above to see the full slideshow. Some excerpts below. The permanent link is at 5weststudios.com/weddings/2009/carol_mark/wedding/slideshow/

    by Spencer Lum

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