It occurred to me while chatting with Daphne Chan that I feel like the Greek Mythology figure, Cassandra. If you haven't read Edith Hamilton's Mythology recently I'll save you the pain-staking detail and relate that Cassandra was a mortal that Apollo found to be quite beautiful. Beautiful enough, in fact, that he gave her the gift of prophesy. When she did not return his love he cursed her so that no one would believe her prophesies. She had predicted the Battle of Troy along with the Greek Deception of the Trojan Horse, but no one would believe her as a part of her blessing with a curse.
(Okay Jeremy, get to the point... You're a nerd and you like Mythology.)
My point is this... I read Zack Arias' latest blog post on the rundown of how to build your book and it reminded me that I promised Zack and Chase that I'd make a book and send it their way... Sort of a "Did I take a step forward this year?" type of thing... I might even send one to David E Jackson while I'm at it... I love that guy. Then I realized that it's been nearly 6 months since the class in Seattle....Already! It's crept up on me like creeps like to do.
It feels like I have made some progress but while going through my work I found that I have holes in my work, but more interestingly I've found that I have extra work that doesn't fit in my book. The above photo (a model by the name of Cassie, btw...she fits well withe the Cassandra story...) doesn't fit anywhere right now. I'm seriously considering shooting more work like this. I LOVE this look.... 1)It's moody as hell. 2)This is the look I get when experimenting. 3)It feels like I'm actually working my ass off to try new things. I really think my photos are awful, but when I hit this type of stride it feels like I'm batting .100 instead of striking out. Grounders to Right Field anyone?
The point is: I don't know what to do with work like this. I don't know where it's going to fit.... but I have this insatiable desire to shoot more of it. More stuff you don't see all the time. I hate the Smiley-Cute-CookieCutter shit. Everyone shoots that. If you hire me to shoot it, I'll totally do it for you and work my ass off for great photos to make you happy...but my soul needs more than that. This work is simple to pull off... but it makes me happy... I'm working at being happy.... and that's so freakin hard.
Do you understand?
I love the moody stuff - would love this type of shoot when I'm ready (mentally & financially). It's something I believe I can pull off & no one would expect since I am such a smiley, cheeser in real life.. Keep doing what's in your heart J!
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