selfies!

The self-portrait assignment was one of those times when I have difficulty coming up with an idea—but when I finally come up with one, I start to build on it and the whole thing starts to come together extremely quickly. In this situation I decided to play around with rear-curtain sync (called second-curtain sync in my camera’s manual). So I put on some music (a combination of Green Day and Charlotte Church) and danced around my room for one to eight seconds at a time. I then realized that in some of the photos it looked as though I was interacting with a portrait that I took of my FVA academic advisor Adam MacDonald that I have tacked to my bulletin board. So I decided to play it up and really interact with the portrait (mostly using implied line, though in some of the photos I got up close and posed with the photo: "scolding" him, posing with the photo as though it’s the most normal thing in the world—all the while fighting back a serious case of the giggles), as well as sticking my face in front of the camera like people do sometimes with point ‘n’ shoot cameras (a night out with the girls, etc.). I ended up having so much fun that I didn’t get to bed until about midnight—on a school night.

I shot the photos in my room, primarily because that’s where all the elements of my idea are based. Although I could’ve done the shoot somewhere like the first-floor lounge—which would’ve given me more room to move around—I’m glad I shot it in my room. Besides, it was quiet hours (ten PM to eleven AM on school nights)—and as a result, I lowered the volume on my computer (I was playing the music off of iTunes).

I’d learned about rear-curtain sync in Lighting: Available Light and On-Camera FlashTech, and although I haven’t used it much since then, I decided to try it out for this idea to capture the movement. I tried different exposure times and light configurations (floor lamp on or off, table lamp on or off, etc.).

Except for all the junk in my room, I would probably show them. I’d probably do a reshoot in a bigger space that doesn’t have so much stuff on the floor (a living room, perhaps—but definitely not a lighting studio: it would look too formal and stuffy for the look I’m after). But in general I’m very happy with the portraits.

Maggie Jean Chestnut Residence and Renaissance College (which is attached to the residence) have been the setting for a lot of my assignment photos that weren’t taken in the lighting studio: my Freedom to Read photo, one of my photos for the target assignment for Re-Presenting Ideas and my photo for the first assignment for Professional Practice being some of the most recent shoots.

The residence and the college (especially RC) have a lot of interesting nooks in which to take photos, and I have yet to run out of ideas for shoots—either for assignments or for myself.

I would probably print them at about 8" x 10"--definitely no smaller. Since I've been using the studio's printer, I've fallen in love with printing BIG--probably because I've never had the resources to do big prints before. And because I've finally been won over by RAW format.

2/24/11: PS I came up with a title for the photos today while uploading them to Facebook and Flickr: Self-Portraits of the Artist with her FVA Academic Advisor.