As a professional photographer, there are times you are stuck into a loophole of doing the same kind of assignments again and again. You sure enjoy doing what you do, but there is a need to stop, see and reflect on your work and get back to your roots.
For quite a while I've been majorly working on video projects, and completely immersing myself into the whole process of conceptualization to producing the final cut. I feel contented by this gradual transition of photography to also making short films, and learning aspects of filmmaking on the go. But I miss those days of just using my camera to explore the person in front of me where the energy takes over any predetermined agenda or client's vision.
Just a simple setting, with one light, and focus on connecting with the person in front of you. No pressure of delivering the photos in time for usage, or removing a little hair which your client may notice after pixel peeping at 200%. ;)
And when my friend Karishma tells me she has got a few days off, I grabbed the opportunity to set up a test shoot. Kash is one of my very close friends who has no connection with what I do for a living, but I have always looked at her as a camera-friendly person. And she was instantly on board with her full energy!
I put on a simple one light setup and decided to utilize the natural light of my terrace as an alternative. Kash did all her makeup herself and we collaborated on the styling from her existing wardrobe. It's a lot of fun when the subject you work with is with you on your trial and error process and is ready to change into any outfit without hassle. Keeping the makeup to bare basic helped us both to focus more on expression and posing.
The day went very well but we both concluded after looking at the overall vibe and the photographs we could set up one more session the very next day. This time I decided to use one of the minimalistic paintings of my dad as a backdrop and to keep a simple lighting setup and concentrate more on building a rapport with Kash instead of changing the lighting setups. And it just worked and I had one of the smoothest sessions where almost everything we shot turned out to be keepers!
Doing these kinds of test shoots for me is more process-oriented instead of focusing on the results I will get, but I am glad this one turned out to be worth sharing. I can't wait to share more of my work with you on this blog. :)
Cheers,
Ankur.
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