HNT: Watch, Camera, Ring

Watch, Camera, Ring

In my first post on my blog at ComstockFilms.com I related that various of my art professors recommended journaling, a practice rejected until only a few years ago.

Similarly, when I was in school, many of my female photography student colleagues went through self-portrait phases, but I remember this being far less common among male students.

Better late than never. More about making this photo after the cut.

This photo was made in the same room that we shot MARIE AND JACK: A HARDCORE LOVE STORY. Credit the rich adobe color of the walls to my wife, who, aside from being a great interactive designer, is also a great interior designer and garden designer. Obviously I’m using a mirror. Slightly less obvious is the light source – it’s one of those clip-op reflector lamps with an ordinary 60 watt bulb, clipped at the very top of the mirror and pointing almost directly down. If you look at the shadows under my chin, nipples and hand you can work your way back to the direction of the light source.

I am using a Canon PowerShot SD770 IS, which I both love and hate. I love it because it’s about the size of a deck of playing cards, holds about a bizillion photos on a 8 gig card, and fits in a $30 splash-bag. I hate it because it is almost impossible to control the focus. While I’ve been writing this, Peggy’s just come in from the garden infuriated by trying to take close-ups of flowers and setting fruit.

This image is one of about two dozen, checking the results on the LCD screen as I went. This is perhaps the very best aspects of digital photography. Before digital, professionals would spend as much or sometimes more on polaroid film before loading up Big Yellow and making the final images. Closing the feedback loop is invaluable, both for learning and the ongoing creative process.

Image selection and editing was done in iPhoto. Final crop decisions, a little fiddling with noise suppression, sharpness and color balance. I like the painterly effect all on it’s own, but it also covers up the fact that I have less than perfect skin.

I like that in some places the figure is relieved from the background because it is lighter (like on my shoulders,); in other places because it is darker (like on my right hip); but no where is the figure/ground relationship indistinct, despite the fact that both the figure and background are of similar hue.

I have railed against coy cropping in the past, but we’ve all but decided that this blog is going to be non-explicit. I get a feeling of tension (which I like) between the details of the watch, camera, and ring, and the mannered cropping of both my identity and my overt sexuality. The camera stares back in a way that almost feels confrontational to me; the silver, black, manufactured look of the camera standing in contrast to warm, organic look of  my body. The title provides a nudge towards seeing that tension, but I think (hope) its there on it’s own.

I’m not entirely sure what presenting myself in this way means for my crediblity as a filmmaker or intellectual. A number of institutions have expressed enthusiastic interest in my lecture The Intent to Arouse: A Concise History of Sex, Shame, and the Moving Image. I don’t know how this image, or CameraPlayForCouples.com might change that. Time will tell.