undertones

In music, are you more interested in the notes or the space between? Do you listen first to the vocals or the percussion? It’s fascinating how as individuals, we can hear the same thing, so differently. 

I might be entirely wrong about this because I don’t always know what I don’t know, and I certainly am frequently too close  to see myself objectively; however, when people hire me for branding photos, I believe they’re hiring me because they want something unique to their brand and different from the norm. I say this because everyone has a camera at their fingertips, and you probably know at least three photographers. 

I created these photographs with Rich Malloy , and on our initial call, he said, “I love what you did with Lauren.” I swallowed. At once, I felt full of pride and also fear. Pride because I absolutely love that set I created with her.  Fear because I never quite know if I can replicate my artistic process in a unique way that’s relevant to each person. Perhaps, that fear is just imposter syndrome. Or, maybe it’s that I feel invested in  the product and service that I’m offering to people. 

So, I do it scared. 

I knew I wanted to use layers of shadow and  light, texture, motion via long exposures and double exposures to bring to life the undertones that percussion brings to life in music. And, I overshot the session because the weather was gloomy which is par for the course in mid December, and I was in Rich’s incredible studio, but that means I don’t know the lighting in the way that I do my own studio. As usual, I awaited the film scans with about as much patience as a toddler waits for Christmas. When I received them, I was blown away. So was Rich. 

This feels like an exceptional session on which to end such a strange year.