Category: Projects

Kay and Betsey Johnson

Kay

When Kay came over to be photographed for the series a few weeks ago she brought a selection of Betsey Johnson dresses and crinolines with her to wear. They were all pretty specular but I loved this one the best because of the bright mix of colours. I usually ask my portrait subjects to bring a few different items to choose from and wear during the shoot. Part of the fun of inviting women friends over for these photo shoots has been getting to see their clothes.

Kay

The funny thing about the shoot with Kay, that I didn’t really think about beforehand, was that it didn’t really matter what she was wearing. I was shooting with a specific idea in mind and her clothing was mostly hidden from view. Towards the end of the shoot I decided the fantastic outfit just couldn’t go to waste and did these shots with Kay seated on the floor to showcase the dress. I love how this gave me the opportunity to try a different perspective from my usual style of portraiture.

Last Colours of Autumn

Last colours of autumn

My friend Kai was the second out of town guest in Vancouver during the month of October, and of course I made sure to take her portrait for the series. Kai has a red winter coat just like I do and I wanted to include it in the shot. I hadn’t intended to fill the whole scene with red, but with coat, umbrella and Japanese Maple tree all in gorgeous shades of my favorite colour, red ruled the day. (As it should.)

Burn brightly

The Japanese Maple I had in mind for this shot wasn’t fully turned at the time, so after I took a few shots and wasn’t satisfied with the results, Kai suggested another spot with red trees. She’d just happened to be in the Queen Elizabeth Park area a few days before and noticed a whole street with them. This turned out to be the perfect spot to shoot what I had in mind and it was wonderful to see so many Japanese Maple trees covered in red leaves all in a row.

Threads & Needles

Threads and needles

In September I kicked off my new portrait series with a bang by shooting four of them in one month. In October I decided shooting two a month would be a more reasonable pace, and both subjects ended up being people from out of town. My sister Kathryn was in Vancouver visiting for eight days over the thanksgiving weekend so I took advantage of the timing to include her in my series.

Threads and needles

The idea behind these shots was based on a suggestion by my friend Susie. She liked the idea of emphasizing my sister’s very thick and curly hair by making it crazy and nesty with birds and bugs in it. Since the only way I could pull of that idea was with a huge amount of photoshop work, I opted for something less elaborate but that still made use of her hair. My sister is a knitter so I went with knitting needles and yarn. I ended up having to string the yarn into different corners of the room for the shoot and then Kathryn had to sit VERY still while I took photographs. It was hilarious and we finished with the moustachio’d shot below.

Moustachio'd

The yarn draped over Kathryn’s shoulders is made by a local Vancouver yarn company called SweetGeorgia Yarns. Felicia Lo is the owner and she makes beautiful yarns in rich colours that even a non-knitter such as myself can covet.

So Many Books, So Little Time

So many books so little time...

Monique Trottier was the fourth person I photographed in my portrait series. She is a voracious reader of books and writes reviews of some of them on her SoMisguided blog. Of course I came up with an idea to photograph her with books – lots and lots of them.

The concepts I came up with for her shoot ended up being the most complicated so far and have required extensive post-production in photoshop to construct each of them. I had two ideas, one is the above shot with a tiny Monique sitting on a tall pile of books. The other idea is still in progress and involves EVEN more books than this one. Neither image worked as I’d originally planned and shot, which was frustrating, and I was going to reshoot until I finally came up with a solution. Sometimes art is about problem solving.

I love the final version of this shot because it’s cute, colourful and came out even better than I’d been picturing it in my head.

The Power of Flowers

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The power of flowers

“Flowers have incredible power. Their fragile beauty ad brief life can teach us to enjoy without attachment, to experience deeply while knowing full well the experience is temporary. It is the same with all life. We will have pleasures and they too will be transitory. We are free when we are able to enjoy our pleasures without trying to hold on to them, when we are present without emotion-charged memories or looking forward to the next time. Life will have its joys and sorrows; to live fully we must live from the source, without attachment to either the pleasure of the pain.”
~ Open Mind by Diane Mariechild

I found the above quote a few weeks ago just as I was about to upload to flickr the dahlia portrait of Ariane. It seemed very appropriate given the subject matter of the shot and it also relates to some of my thoughts lately. I purchased the dahlias for the shoot from City Flowers Express at the Kitsilano Farmers Market earlier in the day. I chose dahlias specifically because both Ariane and I love them, and also they happen to have been in season at the time. Dahlias are amazing works of art in flower form, and they come in a wide range of colours and shapes.

This shot was inspired by the Spring is In the Air self portrait I did earlier in the year. I like how both shots are so happy and fun, and yet they each have a completely different feel. The photo below is a behind-the-scenes shot I took because it was amusing to have Ariane’s feet sticking out though the bunches of flowers.

Behind the scenes: The power of flowers

Ensnare

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Ensnare

I’m a little behind with posting on my blog about the work I’ve been doing on the portrait-series-with-no-name. These two photos are from a shoot I did with Kirsti a few weeks ago in Pacific Spirit Park. We went into the forest looking for the perfect location, but the early evening light was too low. Instead I found just the spot I needed in the bushes at the edge of the road right where we’d parked. I love how this portrait turned out with the beautiful green leaves and Kirsti’s striking gaze.

Ensnare

I have to say that Kirsti is one of my favorite people to photograph because she’s very photogenic (despite her claims otherwise) and she’s game for the dressing up or stand here, stand there requests I make while shooting.

I should mention Kirsti’s work has been featured on the Canadian Design Resource Blog twice in the last week. Once for the “Octopus & Frigate Birds” Illustration she created for Lulu lemon, and once for the logo design she created for me.

When you come to the edge of all you see…

When you come to the edge of all you see...

The title is inspired by the following quote by Patrick Overton:

“When you have come to the edge Of all light that you know And are about to drop off into the darkness Of the unknown, Faith is knowing One of two things will happen: There will be something solid to stand on or You will be taught to fly”

I like this shot, but it ended up needing more post-production work than I’d originally intended. I don’t think that’s a bad thing, it’s just hard to see how this will fit in as the series evolves. The location of Jericho Beach park didn’t end up working well as a backdrop for what I had in mind, so I decided to shoot a new location to use instead. I went for an illustrated look, and I really wanted to capture an upbeat emotional quality, which is very different than my previous portrait of Susie.

Things are going well so far. I’ve actually ended up shooting these portraits more frequently than I’d originally planned. I’m working on the shots from session number three this week, and shooting session number four this weekend. Here’s hoping I can keep up the momentum…

The start of something new

I read somewhere that the periods in which inspiration and productivity run dry in the life of every creative person is as all part of the cycle of creativity. They are a necessary, though often frustrating and painful, part of how artists produce work and should be used as a “rest period’ in which to gather strength/thoughts/inspiration/whatever it is one needs to move forward into the next phase of work. It is much like the cycle of the seasons, with growth in some periods of the year eventually leading to dormancy and rest in others. It’s just not humanly possible to always be productive, and the creative muse likes her time off too.

It was with these thoughts in mind that I gave myself time off over the summer. It’s never my most productive time because there are so many distractions and I want to make the most of the gorgeous summer weather while it’s here. I decided I would ponder what I wanted to work on after the end of the 52 Weeks series of self portraits and begin something new in September.

Taking shelter

The above shot is the first in the new series and is inspired by the self portraits I took for 52 Weeks. I wanted to take some of the themes, ideas, and techniques I came up with in that series and apply them to portraits of other people. I’ve decided to concentrate on women as my subjects because I think my style is better suited to the feminine. My goal is to shoot one portrait about every week or two, which means planning ahead and being organized.

I’m excited about working on this and can’t wait to bring more of my ideas to photographic life.

52 Weeks Blurb Book

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I feel as if the summer of 2009 has been a very satisfying one as far as finally accomplishing some of the things I’ve been meaning to do for years… The collage post cards were one of those things I’d been thinking about forever, and publishing a Blurb book was another. Finally both are a reality, and it feels pretty damn good.

52 weeks blurb book-2
52 weeks blurb book

Because I plan to have a show of the 52 Weeks self portrait series I decided I would produce a self published book using Blurb as part of the process. It felt like the first step in narrowing down the selection from the 52 images (which is too much for a show), and also figuring out whether it could actually work as a show at all. I really struggled with that last part because I experimented quite a lot with different styles and techniques over the course of the series and felt it wasn’t very coherent as a show. Showing the work to a new group of people helped me see it more clearly and convinced me I wasn’t crazy about showing the 52 Weeks photos in a gallery.

The blurb book features only a small selection of the 52 Weeks photos. I chose what I felt are the best and most creative work, while trying to keep in mind how these will work together/compliment one another both in book form and hanging on walls. The 12″ x 12″ copy I ordered this week will work nicely as a one-off portfolio of this body of work that I hope to shop around while looking for a space to show. If you have any suggestions for places that could work in the Vancouver area, please let me know.

The 52 Weeks book can be purchased online through blurb.com. The size is 7″ x 7″ and comes in softcover or hardcover with dust jacket. Click the blurb badge below to see a sneak preview or purchase it on blurb.

A Year of Self Por…
By Rachael Ashe

Other Blurb books I thought were cool:
Masque de Gaz | Geoffrey Nicholson
The Devil’s in the Details | Laura McCabe
BenoitP | Benoit Paille

The Birds

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The Birds

I’ve always wondered whether the two lovebirds, the only caged birds in Alfred Hitchcock‘s movie “The Birds“, were actually the evil ringleaders causing the bird attacks on people. Lovebirds do tend to be troublemakers…

In my original concept for this shot I’d planned to use fake birds, and spent a bit of time searching for places to buy them. The only birds I was able to find were fake crows and they were far too ugly and misshapen to pass for proper birds. I decided to pull all the bird photos from my archives and composite together in photoshop the shot I had in mind. It took about four or five hours of masking, manipulating, and layering to bring it all together.

It was created for a project called, “Scenes from a Movie” organized by Stephanie Vacher. The idea was for each participant to choose a director’s name from a hat and then create a shot to reference that person’s film work. I lucked out and chose Alfred Hitchcock.