{flow}

formspring.me

Tue, 02 Mar 2010 08:23:44 -0700

Why is it that the definition of “erotica” seems to mean “black and white”?

that’s a good question, and one i have no ready made answer for.

it does seem, that “Erotica” in the main is comprised of grainy black and whites often poorly exposed or including at least some motion blur.

I imagine that a good part of this is historical. most forms of photography have their beginnings in black and white, naturally.

there are forms of voyeuristic photography mainly coming out of japan that are made up of men going into the public parks which are frequented by couples looking to hook up, and sneaking up beside them with fast film and taking pictures.

to avoid shutter lag, and the use of a flash they end up grainy and black and white will render forms without concern for color problems from low light.

and this is where i think we end up in black and white. three primary reasons.

1. the first mainstream erotica was brought to us by the big name photographers in the 20’s and 30s so naturally it’s black and white, but many modern photographers have kept that line because black and white is better for form, and pattern (reducing visual elements to their basic forms) and you get photographers like ralph gibson to bring sexy, but also art.

2. black and white is more tolerant of poor light. you don’t have to worry about color casts, colors coming apart, color balancing or that swollen purple member color matching.

3. related to #2, i think a lot of “erotica” is shot in natural light settings. because lots of it is home made. natural light = less light = more grain (digital or film) = more color aberrations.

but mainly.. i just think there is a body of work established and most people follow that style, as most things go. we have an established language of erotica and perhaps trying to communicate something to the fringes (and erotica does still fall into the fringes) one might take shortcuts, or easier paths to their audiences rather than trying to refine the medium.

ive been playing with erotic Polaroids and i think it’s possible we could see a big shift into that in the next few years. as sentimentality becomes a commodity, then sexuality, then regurgitated en masse.

all those thirteen year old girls on flickr taking nostalgic Polaroids of tea cups and abandoned houses are going to grow up into sexual women at some point, and i can’t see them leaving their sentimentality behind when they do.

i’m open for questions, ask away?

17-Year-Old Thinks She's Getting Into Photography | The Onion - America's Finest News Source

Sun, 28 Feb 2010 22:43:58 -0700

17-Year-Old Thinks She's Getting Into Photography | The Onion - America's Finest News Source:

is there a photographer out there that isn’t familiar with this?

Carla Fedje: Photographer: A Thousand Reasons Not to Toot Ones Own Horn

Sun, 28 Feb 2010 17:03:32 -0700

Carla Fedje: Photographer: A Thousand Reasons Not to Toot Ones Own Horn:

Ok, not a thousand reasons. But maybe some coaxing on the dangers of becoming an egomaniac. Here’s my own narrow take on it, inspired by two recent encounters with someone I used to know (but not very well). Both times I saw him he bragged at length about how amazing his camera is, and how…

I have many thoughts on this topic myself, but no time to realize them, so give this a read.

Strobist: It's Time for the PC Jack to Die.

Fri, 26 Feb 2010 15:36:03 -0700

Strobist: It's Time for the PC Jack to Die.:

no kidding. I’ve dropped hundreds on them and without fail they are the single bit of gear that slows me down during shoots.

"the camera does not add ten pounds. it adds recognition to the fact that you’re an unattractive..."

Fri, 26 Feb 2010 14:03:46 -0700

“the camera does not add ten pounds. it adds recognition to the fact that you’re an unattractive human being.”

- (via becomingnothing)

DIY (DI-Husband, really) Beauty Dish!

Sun, 14 Feb 2010 10:49:00 -0700

this is why carla should be blogging, and also why you pretty girls should marry someone good with their hands.

carlafedje: check out how she forced her husband like chinese child labour to modify an ikea light fixture to a nice profoto beauty dish.

formspring.me

Wed, 10 Feb 2010 21:26:47 -0700

Riddle Me? http://formspring.me/ruzz

i know i’m behind on my shoot updates.. i’ve been...

Tue, 12 Jan 2010 15:29:48 -0700

i know i’m behind on my shoot updates.. i’ve been sick.

so to pass the time why not look at these pretty pictures.

formspring.me

Mon, 11 Jan 2010 12:49:09 -0700

Ask me anything http://formspring.me/ruzz

Beatrix Mae.. For a long time I had this photographer’s...

Tue, 17 Nov 2009 13:22:00 -0700

Beatrix Mae..

For a long time I had this photographer’s crush on this edmonton based model. She’d worked with some photographers I liked, and had modelled some of tasha’s designs along the way. I sent an overly exuberant email off to her way back then professing my photographers love which generally kills any hope of working with someone as you seem a bit too eager, and it did for a while.

Then she moved to Calgary and we began discussing a shoot. Somehow we’d always be out on schedules, or one of us would get sick, or I would be overcome by my normal bouts of massive inadequacy and chicken out. yes, I still have those after all these years with some people. Then we finally set a date.

I’m suffering from a malaise of shooting indoors, in the same location too often and for too long and it’s really soured my eagerness to shoot, which tends to happen this time of year when outdoor shoots are iffy and the daylight is short but while she was getting ready i decided to hang some cloth against the wall to give some extra depth to things and give a sense of space I haven’t been doing in shoots lately. things fall out of habit so easily.

I had my lights in place early for this one and we tripped into beautiful light from the outset. It buoyed my spirits and I felt even if my eye was faltering the light might save me. sometimes the gods are kind in moments of weakness and within about 20 frames we had a publish worthy shot.

I was hoping for some grace and beauty and i found deep wells of it hiding between awkward moments. Like so many young models she hides in girl energy when unsure, but my prediction that she had a beautiful woman lurking unmanaged behind that was founded and it slowly eased out.

I did my best to capture it for you.

set intent. release. repeat.

Thu, 10 Sep 2009 01:35:04 -0600

set intent. release. repeat.

on non model models. when i first started shooting I worked with...

Sat, 05 Sep 2009 16:08:03 -0600

on non model models.

when i first started shooting I worked with regular people. Friends, neighbours, girls i was dating and found the results pretty much showed that. while i miss working with continuous light i don’t miss the awkward over modelling most non models do. It’s and odd fact that non models generally model more when they pose for you than more experienced models. the finer the model, the less she relies on dramatics, more on subtle variation.

So I went to see Miss Singer dance the succubus at Conventia De Mentia a few weeks ago, got loaded up on jack daniels and pilsner and acted like a total rockstar asshole sending people off to bring me one of the dancers that caught my eye. Fortunately I had enough jack in me to pull off the swagger, and probably more fortunate I had doug’s (my new assistant :P) iphone to show her my work. I’ve learnt if the work is good enough you can probably get away with more than you should. so we exchanged contact info.

we set up our first shoot and when she got there it was strange to see her not covered in makeup and feathers and tribal dancing in the dark but I still had the sense it would work out. your gut can screw you or save you and without realizing it you refine your eye over time for what sorts of people can pull off your mood. this new girl, nikki, might not be a conventional beauty in the high fashion sense of the term, but she’s got a very open energy and moves with some grace. That often can be far more important than entirely perfect beauty.

we all have oddities in our physical makeup. my lower jaw is way too big for my face, and almost every model I’ve worked with (being mostly amateur models) has something thats not quite there. thats the difference between photos and video work I think. We can shoot around small flaws. light them, frame them, or abstract them out of the way. Video makes that much harder to do.

But, then, really I’ve never been much about perfection or conventional beauty anyways. I think every woman has beauty in her given the patience to wait for her to trust you with it.

so we had our first shoot and surprisingly it took very little time to get into a flow. My intuition about her movement paid off in getting poses from her (Sometimes mid movement) that i’m unable to get from more established models. I’m concerned this success may turn me into creeper guy in the bar handing out cards and “talent” scouting but I will try to keep that under control as best I can. It would be nice to break out of the modelling scene with all it’s politics and dramas and there are so many fantastically beautiful women out there..

if there’s a moral to the story, and i hate morals, it’s to trust your gut and take some chances. sometimes it works out for you, and when it doesn’t.. well, you lose a few hours of your life. big deal.

test from my crackberry.

Wed, 02 Sep 2009 22:43:54 -0600

test from my crackberry.

the everything is love shoot. marla and aura were having a...

Thu, 27 Aug 2009 14:56:02 -0600

the everything is love shoot.

marla and aura were having a little love fest for one another in the comments of photos of each other and watching it i had possibly the greatest idea ever. What if we take marla singer, and we take aura and we put them together under the same light?

I suggested it and both were on board. It wasn’t easy to schedule for three busy people and waiting for it was killer. they arrived after a joint shopping trip during which they matched up their underwear, which i thought was a nice touch. We made sure we were amply stocked for wine and foodstuffs and returned to the den of sin.

earlier in the week i picked up my first light meter. I’ve never been much for precision but the idea of measuring light seems so exotic and interesting i couldn’t resist. I spend most of the week measuring the EV differences between one end of my curtains and the other. Fascinating stuff.

So I had this concept, as far as me and concepts go, of having them together and using a red gel on the background to give this brothel/erotic feeling. Given the space constraints of my tiny place thats a task and a half. I spent probably two hours trying to get the lights right while the girls sat around talking and drinking wine. after numerous technical problems with the meter (and my cabling for my pocket wizards) I gave up on the gel and put the meter down. Theres no point in having two amazing women available if you’re going to spend the entire time working out your lights.

I was pretty down at that point. I really wanted to use this shoot to learn more about gelling backgrounds and my recent addition of hair lights with grid spots seemed like it was going to be a deadly combo, but you’ve got to roll with it when its happening and what i learnt is gear gets in the way sometimes. Light meters are for learning on your own, or staged shoots where its pre-planned, and my shoots tend to just grow organically.

i won’t think about how that meter is 1/4 of the cost of the new lens i want.

within moments of shooting, while i was still doing test shots for light they were full into it and giving me more than i could handle.

you never know what you might get when you put two people together. it may seem like it will be amazing but often it fizzles as they try to relate to one another. I’ve watched painfully as it happens wishing for it to be over. this time though, they really interacted together amazingly and there were probably more great shots than i will have time to process. these are the sorts of problems one wants to have.

aside from that, it was just fun to hang with two aweosome people for a night.

i’m not sure i will ever be able to translate the fluid, moving nature of the photos i want to capture into the correct light. the two seem opposed sometimes, and when you catch exactly the right shot it seems like pure chance. i want to lessen that random element and yet keep the open ended nature. its something that will require many more years of work to achieve.

the first shot in the above slideshow seems nearly perfect light wise and it was a real eye opener for me. I saw clearly for the first time flaws in my light when comparing to that image and now the work begins to understand why they are different and how to get to producing that quality of light regularly and predictably.

My first attempt at the long portrait. I’ve wanted to do...

Sat, 01 Aug 2009 11:46:58 -0600

My first attempt at the long portrait. I’ve wanted to do one forever and it wasn’t easy. video is way more work than photos, but i think it worked out and captures some of the fragile beauty i see when i look at tasha.

the song is Beauty’s Colors by Serena Matthews who is brilliant, and also was kind enough to let me use it for this video.

www.serenamatthews.com

Another shoot with tasha last weekend. We had this awesome idea...

Tue, 28 Jul 2009 13:24:00 -0600

Another shoot with tasha last weekend. We had this awesome idea we were going to try to pull off but were scared away by the prospect of hiking and outdoors shooting in 30+ weather for hours on end. Okay, i was. heatstroke is not my friend so thats put over till fall for now.

instead we borrrowed her sisters beautiful home in hillhurst for the afternoon. I love new places. so many new options and possible photos. it makes you see things differently. I also love taking something fairly ordinary looking (like those flowers) and bringing it into a larger more interesting feeling.

we lucked out that the fabric she had nearly exactly matched the flowers. and i got to use my octabox outside for the first time which helped produce some great images that i think otherwise might not be possible.

it was a good shoot and yet another step towards what i want to shoot. Higher and higher quality light. better poses, better compositions.

I’m getting a lot of flack lately that my images are getting “pretty” and i’d like to dispel that right off. my images reflect the scene and mood in which they were made not some overall mandate about what i want. If i see pretty, i shoot pretty. if i see dark, emotional grit, i shoot that. If a model will show me her flaws and ugly parts, i will gladly share them with you. if her energy is more traditional i will show you that.

i have no prediliction for grit. though i love it. I will shoot beauty, or fashion, or kittens, or anything else i see that moves me.

I find it midly ironic I hear “try something new” all the time from people, but the moment something changes it ‘not your style’.

beauty is my style, whatever the form.

new flickr account - uncensored!

Tue, 28 Jul 2009 12:56:20 -0600

new flickr account - uncensored!

the secret

Wed, 22 Jul 2009 13:19:26 -0600

here’s a little secret maybe some of you models don’t know. Photographers group together by how closely they see the light, then they talk about things. Rarely details about light, usually model horror stories.

what that means is if you are the star of one of those stories chances are you’re burned with another photographer because of it. we’re all busy people, trying to make photos (some trying to make money and photos) and we share info about the people who move us, or scare us.

this sounds unfair. because perhaps you had a bad day, or just didn’t vibe with the photographer, or we’re off your meds (really). but it’s not done for the pleasure of it, it’s done to help one another weed out the problem models before too many people work with them. in the same way models tend to tell stories about which photographers are creepy, or wouldn’t give pictures (newsflash: no pictures = shitty shoot, usually. you don’t want them).

as models you should want us to compare notes. we understand what the other wants pretty well and it can lead to some great connections. but it can also shut you out of the better photographers if you bring a lot of drama with you. this is good for everyone. you don’t have time to waste, we don’t have time to waste, and if you’re actually in it for the work, it should comfort you that your photographer takes the time to qualify you before booking.

unless your batshit crazy. there is that.

summer is here and it makes me want to take all the pretty girls...

Mon, 13 Jul 2009 17:26:00 -0600

summer is here and it makes me want to take all the pretty girls out into the woods and.. shoot them? yes.

carla was telling me I would dig this girl, aura, who she said was pure muse material and encouraged me to work with her. Then marla ( the other half of the ‘arlas’ in my world ) mentioned her too and so we started talking about shooting.

I was moderately concerned about things going into the shoot, having had some bad luck lately, and having gear issues as well, but she got to my place and we decided to chance getting caught in the storm that looked about to erupt. it only took a few frames for me to realize we were going to be just fine.

we went down to a park near my place, and played around on stairs (which failed to satisfy my desire for stair shooting) and then went to the river, under an overpass for the transcanada highway which provided some kinda magic light. then off into the woods a bit and then back to my place for some sweet octabox love.

It was one of those shoots where you’re feeling it, the model is working, the light is working and you remember what excites you about shooting. I forget my favorite lens (70mm f2.4) on the bridge for 20 minutes but recovered it, then dropped a flash on concrete and killed it but otherwise.. i was happy with the entire day, and moreso as I find time to work on the photos.

Model: Marla Singer (c) 2004-2009 i.m ruzz’ favorite sin I...

Wed, 08 Jul 2009 12:46:00 -0600

Model: Marla Singer
(c) 2004-2009 i.m ruzz’ favorite sin

I originally posted this on my flickr, but thought it could go here since i’ve all but given up the idea of making money from this and thus have no potential customers to impress or profile for.

Want.

“—that moment when I took custody of the fantasies of the other men in the room”

I was recently talking to judekyle about how sometimes when men are chasing a woman, we desire that particular woman, and sometimes (maybe more often than not) we are chasing the heritage of desiring woman experienced through the spectre of male upbringing. Then I found this quote in a book im reading (which is otherwise mostly boring) and was working on this picture which couldn’t be less about who marla is as a woman, much less a person. It’s about an idea of a woman. Svelte and curling. somewhat blurry and as far from mentally concrete as possible. It seemed apt to include the quote and the thought behind the photo. I think some men might find it uncomfortable to think an image like this is stimulating for any other reason than theres a half naked woman in it, but in truth one of the few things that binds men who would otherwise either be modernly civil yet disliking of one another, or outwardly hostile is a resolute desire of woman (not A woman). wanting women is part of the mythology of being a man and one that is almost violently obvious to boys and young men. And we collect stories of want, and conquest and take them to the locker rooms in our mind and compare them to the stories we heard in hockey rinks and school gyms. from uncles sharing beers or the feather haired ladies man of the neighbourhood. we collect them but never resolve the conflict that caused the desire to collect them and so we share them yet again with the young men and boys in our worlds (because they are non-threatening and fall below us in the order of things).

it becomes complex because there is biology involved as well, and dividing biological want from “manhood” want is like splitting atoms, or separating white wine from water. Photography brings yet another complication in that it echoes the unsatisfiable nature of that want. we can find ourselves entered into some childhood fantasy but we cannot consume it. it cannot enter us and become part of us. The want is never sated and the experience becomes trapped in the mind, both while its happening and once its expressed itself. it becomes deeply unhealthy and wildly destructive as we chase and chase that woman coming in and out of focus, emerging from the shadows and slipping gently back into them. We are with her for moments in our mind but never touch her in any meaningful way, never have our fill of her, never find resolution to the riddle. The results are horrific for men. Passing on real tangible pleasures and viable relationships at the merest whisper of her. The results for woman horrific as well. They find it nearly impossible to get a man to engage them as they are and operate on the mistaken assumption we are only interested in their body which creates friction that lets itself out in the ugliest ways, when in truth their bodies are often only potential keys to unlock a desire that previously confounded them but promises to be answered on your hip. We are with you, yet, without. the suffering for both sides is massive on a historical scale and punishing on an individual scale, and so far as i’ve searched i can find no resolution to wanting this creature whom i cannot touch, or love, or consume and even the wreckage i see behind me is a mild deterrent. a momentary deterrent until i become lost in her hair again. or convulse at the fold of her arm. or burn for the arch of her back.