jessica and shaf videos

Jessica

Shaf

pictures first, stories later

location opportunities and little time means stories will have to come later. i shot two people on the same day with no written story and only faint ideas of image, composition, lighting, emotion. i shot 3 rolls per person (45 frames) instead of the 2 rolls (30 frames) that i usually shoot.

we'll see how it goes.

testing light color with hotel lamps + pink cloth

2 layers

3 layers

jessica

shaf

homage [+ NEW EDIT]

to, guess who?

- - - 

new edit:

right side of face is overexposed, so instead of burning:

new levels layer -> darken midtones til desired exposure on  face -> erase all erased except for correct exposure on face

so everything stays the same exposure, and the face becomes correct

fiction #5, in the can

some film stills

Last Days (2005), Gus Van Sant

Lolita (1997), Adrian Lyne

Paris, Texas (1987)

[take note of green florescent light: sickly, otherworldy, surreal, off-putting. try to emulate this]

Lost In Translation (2003), Sofia Coppola

[inspiration for jessica's shoot. try low angles.]

a reminder; dan [edit: newer dan]

SHOOT MORE LOWER ANGLES

- - -

dan: added cyan + green for cooler highlights

[edit]

tilted to the left (see vending machine), burned in street area

tilted angle seems more dynamic

fiction #6

            He calculated the figures in his head in the most crude mathematics, nineteen dollars and ninety-five cents a month, almost two hundred and forty dollars a year, this subscription had better be worth it.  He could think of countless other ways of spending his parents’ credit limit, but in some fit of boredom and 3 a.m. libido he had purchased a year’s subscription of Internet pornography. This one seemed to promise a good time; amateurs, just-turned-eighteens, streaming video, but none of this was new to him now, just the magic words used by businessmen selling sex instead of toothpaste or hamburgers. Nevertheless, the fees had been charged and he intended to get his money’s worth. A Webcam strip-show sounded enticing.

            As he sat up in bed waiting for the connection to load, he wondered if these shows were indeed real. The girls on the other side of this glowing window, removing their clothes and doing God-knows-what as countless men masturbated furiously on the other side. He wondered where they were, if they really were from Russia or Brazil or wherever they claimed to be from. He wondered if they were having fun. What they needed the money for.  The connection loaded, and his eyes returned to the screen. It was in a bedroom, much smaller than his own and lit brighter than any normal bedroom should. What might have been deep purple walls in the background looked brown and dull on screen, like a bruise.

            He recognized her right away, as if she were familiar smell. A generic kind of pretty, the way she’d always been, and the way she’d been delicately made up only seemed to emphasize that. She was also much older than was advertised. He watched as she shifted on the bed, flashing coquettish smiles, waiting for commands. He remembered how she’d been only a few years ago, how she used to walk so confidently, how she carried her all her books in just one hand. They had never spoken, and though he’d tried to catch her gaze before, she always seemed elsewhere. Now, in this small window, she stared at him. Someone had asked her to remove her top, and he watched as she fumbled it loose. He contemplated writing something, her name, maybe his, maybe she’d remember. But he didn’t. She removed her pants. He watched.

Guy sitting in bed,  laptop glow under, yellow kicker light above/behind, dark all around

 

fiction #4 shoot, "laptop light"

in the can, so to speak

- - -

also, "laptop light" is an interesting light:

homemade reflectorfor fiction #5, location scouting for fiction #4

silver card + tape = homemade reflector

the spot itself may be a bit bigger than i had wanted. we'll see.

- - -

location for fiction #4, vending machine, corner of selegie and sophia rd

". . . his head thrown back in epileptic thrill."

behind the scenes

shane light setup

walter light

behind the scenes, walter

Edgar Degas

what i love about the impressionists is their use of light. as if to them, light takes precedence over subject, place, and time. just like with photography.

fiction #5

She sat on her bed for hours, waiting. Her hands were cold with sweat, she wiped them on her dark nylons but all they seemed to do was slick down her legs. Her face was choked with make-up she copied off a 1986 issue of Vogue. The lipstick she bought was thick like paste and she could taste it on her teeth, and her head was stiff with hairspray. If any of her old friends from school saw her this way, walking down the street or buying fruits at the market there was no way they would’ve recognized her. She’d say hello but they would likely just look at her funny, the way people do when strangers come up to say hello.

The stranger she waited for was surely on his way there. She stared at the door nervously as her glasses slowly drooped down her nose. It was the first time someone would be coming up to her room, let alone to have sex with her. It was only after weeks of sifting through sordid private forums on the Internet did she find someone who would make love to her without meeting her first, no questions asked. She wanted to look pretty for him, glamorous and seductive, she wore a top that she thought was too revealing. A knock at the door, and in too many steps she was there to answer it. There was a look in his eyes, a passing, emotionless look. For a moment she thought he would turn and leave. Instead he swept inside like a gust of wind, locking the door behind him. She stumbled backward and fell to the floor. He hovered over her like a sentinel as she waited for him, the fear and excitement inside her winding tighter and tighter together. 

"awkward" looking girl, very heavy makeup, sexy top, square glasses, wooden floor, spotlight

Sergei Eisenstein - The Battleship Potempkin (1925)