We Started Shooting "Closer"

hey.

we started shooting the new project this saturday gone (the divali saturday setup rel fail). it was bess. a real 'well oiled machine / go team go / five minute break / i need another one over here! / ways that come out rel good / shit the flash not firin / high five / gimme a hug' kinda saturday :]

and between dave and brianna and my brother russell and michelle and our new friend stefan - everyting rellll get handle. hard. hard, hard, hard. everybody was all over everything and basically all i did was hit the shutter button over and over for about four or five hours. i have to get everybody a new car or a show horse or something. anything riduclous like that. these are some of the photos:














in case you're not familiar, the project is a kind of experiment to see how comfortable we are around each other. its simple; we set up on the promenade and asked passersby to stand for a photo with a stranger, however close they were comfortable with, and to look each other in the eyes. thats the photo.

its an issue i have, im sure im not the only one. and especially with other men, and especially more recently where i'm very, very aware of who i look at when i'm walking around and how uncomfortable i am with making eye contact with anyone and goin crazy about what they might think it means. knockin it around with friends recently, we boiled it down to something like 'is either u want to fuck or u want to fight.' - just basic eye contact. and either is negative as a first impression walkin down the street. and how come u can't really just look at somebody cus they have an interesting face or something? and is this a problem for everybody, or just for me?

anyway. thats really what the investigation is kinda. i hope i didn't put it too awkawrdly or devalue anything for you by putting it in a personal context. im just saying its not for nothing. thats why i think its valuable and why im doing it. i shouldn't feel so much like i need to explain myself, ent? probably din even give u a chance to have your own thoughts about it.

its late.

the people? they were very, very different. and many (we shot over a hundred people). so the pictures were also very different. i hope thats coming through with the ones i chose to show, im always partial to the ones that are technically better shots but sometimes, they're not the ones with the most valuable information in them. lots o times on saturday, the flash didnt fire when a visiting pacific islander tentatively rested a hand on a grown gentleman's elbow and they had a rare little moment or i was nowhere around to make a photo when a disgusted lady scheupsed and walked off on a man who didn't find her attractive enough to take a photo with - which are all the things we're made of.

i hope i caught enough of what we're made of to make this an interesting set of pictures is what im really thinking. and that im not the only one into this.

we'll be continuing. you know how things like this change and change the more you work on them.

take care
-rodell