Looking support on over 25 years in the photo business, and mild counting, my memories often flip between thousands of captured moments in sunless and white and then attend to the same weird world in color. For over a decade of my career I was living and working in Los Angeles, California, taking photos of celebrities and most often on the red carpet.
From that description you might assume I was one of the paparazzi, those unfriendly stalkers of well-known people photos. I may have stood side by side with some of the paparazzi during my time on the red carpet, but I was hunting for a very different type of image.
It started benefit in March 1992 when I was hired as a runway photographer for that years Academy Awards. As someone who enjoys shooting people, I have always valued the subtleties of any shoot. To obtain the best results, you must pay attention to all the details; the styling of clothes and hair, the build up, the weather and angles of light wherever they are coming from and the various facial expressions of the subject.
When hunting for perfect celebrated people photos, you may lift thousands of photos during an event and from all those exposures you are very lucky to gather one or two favorable shots. It is very rare that all these puzzle pieces approach together in one click. This is probably why most paparazzi shoot for quantity, not quality.
My official job on that sunny day help in March (and for the next 10 years) was to shoot the standard posed paparazzi style famed people photos. My agency wanted standing, smiling at the camera type shots ready to be splashed on the tabloids all over the world the next day. It took me only a few seconds to realize that I would be missing a vast opportunity if I miniature photos to such a narrow notion.
As I stood shoulder to shoulder with the other photographers on the world's most eminent 60 yards of carpet watching the waves of celebrity pass only a few feet in front of me, I played a dual role. I was one cameraman for my agency snapping the standard noted people photos and with my second camera and mini telephoto lens, I shot for my personal collection, mostly in gloomy and white.
For as many years as I covered the Academy Awards, there is really nothing that can prepare you for such an event. Aside from the time pressures and all the technical maneuvers this sort of shoot requires, the advance circus atmosphere all around you creates an recent work zone.
The event attracts hundreds of photographers lined up side by side with TV crews, reporters and producers all dressed in sad tie and evening gowns. There are long lines of parking attendants in red uniforms, big throngs of fans screaming to be heard by their popular star and a dozen helicopters circling endlessly like bees round a hive. In less than two hours over a thousand limousines topple off celebrity after celebrity with each stars arrival pushing that invisible "on" button for the media machine setting off a shock and horror of flashes and activity.
And deep within the madness that is The Oscars, somewhere slow all the smiles, intellectual lights and endless interviews are those magic moments waiting to be captured. With my conventional 35 mm SLR and mini telephoto lens, I waited for the perfect smash in the storm that is the red carpet. In an irregular design, as those renowned faces crossed my path; the mix of camouflage legends, shapely models, music icons, foreign directors and action heroes, my mind became detached. My senses all joined together in my virtual hunt for those perfect renowned people photos and my work took on a very meditative quality.
These types of photos are few and far between, but they bellow a chronicle that the average celebrity shot objective can not. With a lot of care and patience and a minute luck, a photo can inaugurate a doorway into the mystery that we all esteem to build around our celebrities. As any movie fan can issue you, a smiling head shot is attractive, but well-known people photos that nick through the facade, even a puny bit, are worth their weight in gold. These are the images that raise our awareness of the individual as well as the art execute.
I no longer live in Los Angeles and no longer shoot the annual event known around the world as The Oscars. My photography muse has taken me into other aspects of the medium, but whenever I want to revisit those magical afternoons I can simply pull out my special book, my noted people photos, the ones I carefully hunted down oh so long ago and am unruffled proud of to this day.
Tidak ada komentar:
Posting Komentar