instead of what you want. Or more correctly, getting what you need and what you want.
I’m participating in the pro version of Project 52. I needed to shoot for the first assignment, chocolate. I had an idea and Rebecca, a favorite model, volunteered to help realize that.
I did get what I wanted – a structured beauty inspired shoot featuring chocolate. But Rebecca expanded that idea, and enabled me to get some fun shots. This is really what I needed.
She did this by brining a host of other candies – bubblegum, Twizzlers, cotton candy, and cheap lollipops. So exactly what do you do with all of this stuff within the confines of a structured set and a model prepared for a specific shot? Why, you improvise!
Well, we tried. It was awkward for a time.
In what I’m sure was a moment of desperation, I suggested that she simply put the Twizzlers over her eyes – stupid, but fun. The result is a featured image that works – it is fun and spontaneous.
Don’t get me wrong – I did get the shots that I had planned. They did fulfill the assignment. I got my beauty shots (lighting and all), as planned. It was flirty and a little playful, But it was planned.
I do have a feeling, though, that it’s the other shots, the unplanned ones such as this, that I’ll remember. I love the innocence and the playfulness. The spontaneity. The color. And the sheer joy that Rebecca brings to this image. She isn’t modeling. She’s being Rebecca. And I’m not just a guy with a camera; the camera disappears. It becomes a part of the farce – an enabler of some private joke to be shared among friends.
And I kind of like that.
