Bronson

I'm busy - or at least trying to be - with portrait shoots of friends. I'm trying to push boundaries; my own and also theirs.

Recently I photographed my friend and clothing designer, Sheila-Madge Bakker. You can read about it over here.

I had also been tossing around another idea to have a portrait sitting with my friend Dietmar Gerber. The idea behind it was from the film, Bronson; based on a true story. Dietmar kind of reminded me of Tom Hardy's character in the film and I wanted to recreate the imagery from the film.

A happy accident, whilst testing my lighting.

Earlier this week when our schedules finally aligned we met up at StorySpace to make some images.

I started off with him in a suit and tie, to just get some sort of flow going and to get comfortable; we had some time, otherwise I would've gone straight into the setup like the one above.

I like these images, but they weren't the end goal. I wanted grittier, darker, harder light with an element of intimidation to it, so we moved on to the next setup and got out the body paint. I believe in the film he might've used shoe polish, but I wasn't going to put Dietmar through that much hell :)

I want to reiterate how great it was to have Dietmar as a subject and how he took what input and coaching I gave him and ran with it. Especially in the final image I wanted him to give me a scowl, however to make it come across as real I asked him to laugh almost maniacally.

It's always gratifying creating new work and I need to keep reminding myself of that; to create more often, practice this craft, become better, get off my ass and get the f*ck to work, like Zack Arias would say. So that is a bit of a call to you reading this; friends, strangers. Let's get together, conceptualise and make images and get to work!

Thanks for reading,

Winter

I am not going to lie. This winter was a tough one. It wasn't particularly cold or anything, but I was flying by the seat of my pants in regards to my work. I questioned my decisions. I doubted my abilities. I made it out alive though.

When I am not creating work, I tend to not want to create work; if that makes sense. I believe I am a hack and that this has all just been a fluke up until now and I should just go back to working some desk job.

Then I remember that I've pretty much only been on this full-time photographer train for just over a year and for five months of said year I was interning with Zack Arias. It takes a lifetime to build a career and I've not even made a ripple in this pool. Hell, I am not even in the pool, yet.

Roughly a month ago I decided enough was enough; I needed to shoot new work. Just for myself. I needed to grease the gears and shake off the dust. On that first shoot I could feel I was out of sync. I wasn't as confident in myself as I had been, but I was shooting again and that felt pretty damn good.

Here's some images from the shoot with my friend Annicia. Thanks for sitting in front of my camera.

Thanks for reading

17 March 2014: A year in Review

Today marks the one year anniversary of that fateful day.

What day; you ask? March 17th. My last day working at the IT company whose employ I had been under for over 2 years. I'd given my resignation a month prior and this would be the last day before I embarked on the rollercoaster ride of being a full-time photographer.

What's it been like? In a word; exhilarating and perhaps terrifying. I can't think of how many times I have used the word terrifying in the last year, because it's true. Being a full-time freelance photographer (or anything for that matter is a little terrifying). It's also really rewarding. I am really happy about this leap of faith I made.

In this year I have worked for really cool clients; Terrestrial, the SABS Design Institute (South African Board of Standards). I photographed RnB singer, Loyiso Bala.

I lived in and travelled America for 5 months interning for Zack Arias, meeting other heroes like John Keatley and Sara Lando. You can go read about that here.


I worked on album art for The Ocean Doesn't Want Me, which I will be sharing in another post. I photographed the concert pianist Charl du Plessis and I have been working on an array of personal work to round off my portfolio. One of which I have already posted - The Spanish Dancer - and one that I will be teasing you with over the weeks leading up to Easter.

Charl du Plessis performing privately for me and my team whilst shooting.

Charl du Plessis performing privately for me and my team whilst shooting.

To say it's been a wild ride is an understatement. I also finished my Dudes with Beards project after 2 years and 80 bearded dudes and it's been great. Thank you to everyone involved in that. Now let's make a book and have an awesome exhibition to complete the final chapter!

This post feels so frantic and rushed and I feel like I need bigger words to describe how grandiose this has all felt, but has it really? I did really small, little, tiny things that resulted in all of these bigger things happening. I wrote a letter and sent it to America, quit my job, shot a really big project for two months, went to America for 5 months, came back and started planning shoots and doing admin and getting people involved that I wanted to work with and then shooting that and now it's just rinse, wash & repeat the latter part.

I am busy trying to build a studio with a good friend of mine whom many of you know; Ett Venter. That will hopefully be up and running by the middle of the year; if we can get our shit together. I NEVER in a million years thought that I would be where I am right now. I still don't quite know where I am right now, but man, am I enjoying the ride.

Thanks for reading