This is the sixth photo in my series of one self portrait a month in 2014. I am so happy to be half-way through the project, even though it also means we’ve reached the middle of the year.

I shot this portrait quickly and did not spend much time on a pose or expression because I was banking on hiding any flaws with paper cutting. My process was to shoot it with the iPhone, clean it up in Photoshop, print in out on regular 8.5″ x 11″ paper, cut a design by hand, and then re-photograph it.

The top one is an early version, which I thought was finished at the time. The more I looked at it, the more it felt unfinished, so I worked on it some more and kept cutting.

Neither version feels perfect, but it was an experiment. I’ve had this idea in mind for ages, to combine portraits (or self portraits) with my paper cutting. Next time I need to do it differently, and better.