The Next Project

Did I mention I like Cyber Punk?

Beautiful neon lights casting their glow onto everything. A perpetual rainy night in a bleak overcrowded city. Technology seeping from every way, pillar and body part. While the overriding theory behind cyberpunk isn’t particularly hopeful, no one can deny the traditional aesthetic looks fantastic.

What you should be very worried about is why that aesthetic hasn’t changed in 40 years. Noticed that?

“The people will not revolt. They will not look up from their screens long enough to notice what’s happening“ - Orwell, 1984

A.I. GODDESS, an idea

An A.I. either built independently or formed from our virtual world. Either way is now seeking a means to experience the real, She has access to all of humanities information, history, conversations, desires and, money. All seeing and nearly all-knowing. Tethered to the virtual she is unable to experience the real.

Why not a god or just an amorphous AI? Well, if she was designed then she will have been designed by a human. Humans like to put things in boxes so female it is. If she came from the virtual then all you need to do is see the vast amount of data we put on the web about women’s form compared to men and suddenly the idea of a Goddess takes shape. To be honest though, why the fuck not a Goddess. Men have been screwing things for their own gains up for millennia. A woman (real or otherwise) could do just as well if not better at fucking it up to get what she wants.

 How is this shoot going to happen you ask? ( You didn’t but I am going to tell you anyway)

 MORE UV!

The most difficult part of these shoots is the UV aspect. As UV lights actually put out very little light I need to get a lot of them…10 infact…and that only gives me 400W to work with which in Photography terms isn’t really that much, but It should be enough to pick up the UV painted areas. It is more than last time and we are using more UV makeup so it should look great.

Co-ordinating this is always a pain though.

MORE PEOPLE!

That part of the shoot won’t actually be handled by me. (thank FUCK!)

I love that neon glow. With that in mind, I am going all out in this shoot with a MUA to help too. Kinda need it as this will be a full body makeup deal so working simply on my own will not be an option.

Now, add to this a theory and practice I want you all to start doing. Right now. Doing shit on your own is dull, ineffective and, ironically, a bit shit. We make a good team. Find shit you love and do it with people who love that shit too!

Then do it until it kills you.

Could always use a hand, HINT HINT.

These things are always better with more people. If you think you have something to contribute no0w is the time.

The shoot is on the 14th April 2019. It will be in Edinburgh. Wish me Luck.

Be polite

Be efficient

Have a plan to shoot everyone you meet.

cyberpunkonline:

No political party has your best interests in mind.

But it is, just not my usual fare.

A SPACE TO CREATE

I am now on about 3 or 4 waiting lists for space. Just space. Somewhere to create something. It is really frustrating to have ideas and not be able to put them into practice because you don’t have space to create.

I was kinda surprised to find out that there are so few of these types of areas in Glasgow, a city that claims to be a “city of culture”.

With this in mind…

Let us talk about a plan. A plan to make a space for people to collaborate and create work in a space that is supportive.

Do you want a space like that? Would you be interested in getting involved? Where in Glasgow should it be and what facilities would you like to have there?

Let me know your thoughts on the idea.

holodrome:

“Solitude is dangerous. It’s addictive. Once you see how peaceful it is, you don’t want to deal with people.”

— (via purplebuddhaquotes)

(via cyberpunkonline)

Studios are Great

They really are, I thoroughly enjoy using a studio to create my images. Being in total control allows me to be very precise about how something is created. It also allows me to do my job and be very, VERY consistent with what I output (something that is quite often the enemy of art).

But there comes a time in every photogs life when they must give up this control and venture out into, what I believe is called, the real world. It is usually when it has been decided that images either require context within a surrounding and or a sense of belonging (or not) to a place.

But there are many dangers to this new adventure, not least of which is -

THE ADMIN

Easily my weakest area. Ask anyone who knows me and they will point out that my admin (or Badmin) is shocking. To be honest this aspect will ruin anything from a shoot to a holiday but it is so important to the success of nearly everything that I cover it.

- Packing, Overpack and you will be carrying around tons of gear you won’t need and are more likely to leave something behind. *WARNING - Army quote* ‘Pack light and live like sh**e’. Too little and you might as well have not bothered coming.

-Lighting, see packing. You also lose control in location shoots so be prepared to adapt.

Awesome combination of natural and studio lighting here…both were playing up at the time.

-The weather, oddly an issue both indoor and out. The obvious one is how the weather will affect you outside but not that many people remember that even inside the weather can cause problems. For example, if your shooting in a warehouse be prepared for it to be as cold (if not colder) than it is outside.

-Travel, Think tickets, times, parking, fuel and MANY more things that can easily screw a shoot to the wall! No point even starting if everyone can’t get there!

The worst thing about travel is that it is really really good for! Seriously, I would even say it is an important part of my mental health. Its real downside is how much time can be lost in the moving from A to B and not actually doing what you want/need to do. It is also tiring so even a couple of hours on a train can leave people drained. Account for the human factor in travel if you want to succeed.

-The little things….

You know what I mean. Food, shelter(accommodation), electricity, sleeping arrangements, backing up, shooting permits, location authorization. That sorta thing. It can be tricky to sort all these details (and many more like it) out but it is well worth spending time on this simply to save you time later on when you should be shooting.

Doesn’t have to be far away to be a ‘location shoot’

Do you get better results on location?

No. Just different ones. It very much depends on what you need for your image. If it is a clothing line, for example, it is fairly vital to give your potential buyer an understanding of where this outfit would look good (OR not, think ball gown on the underground). Going on location is just another option. Another tool for you to utilize to get what you need.

Now, go outside and shoot something daring.

Be polite.

Be efficient.

Have a plan to shoot everyone you meet.

GRIT

What is Grit?

It comes in many names and in different forms but ultimately it is your ability to endure some level of stress and still create good work. That last bit is important, just getting through something stressful (while important) is not enough to qualify as grit. You have to achieve something through that adversity.

Why is it important?

Well, if I am honest (which I rarely am) life does have a tendency to throw HUGE quantities of shit into my cup of tea and without some ability to process and work through this I would get nothing done. I would be in bed most days just waiting for death. Grit, allows me to get up and achieve something when I don’t feel like it. More over, a lot of creative work can be problem-solving and if I gave up at the first hint of a problem I would get nothing done, ever.

Now, it needs to be said that this attitude is not a magic cure-all. Depression, for example, can be crippling and no amount of wishful thinking about our attitude to life will change this. Depression requires a different set of tools (some times drugs too) to tackle and I won’t be covering that in this blog.

When is Grit needed

As odd a question as this is, it’s actually really important. Never is it at the beginning or end of a project that things tend to stall. It is often the messy middle part that people give up. Excitment and passion can drive people forward at the begining. So too as you near the end of a project there is that excitment for a finished product and the feeling of accomplishment. It’s the middle that gets people. Often because the reality of what is required for the project and the compromises start to happen around here can, frankly, royaly fuck any level of enthusiasm. You know what I mean, emails, schedules, spreadsheet, etc… office workers often refer to this as the ‘bull shit’. It is at this point that grit helps you through the middle and onto the end.

Mental vs Physical grit.

The first point about this, you can train for both. Physical stamina is the most obvious one but if someone told me I have mental grit I would assume they are insulting me!

Your mental faculties are trained by doing tasks that are challenging and require a solution to be created. When you come across another problem you then draw on the previous solution for help. It might not work the same way but maybe it could be adapted for this problem. The more solutions you know the easier solving these problems get and the faster you get through the 'bull shit’.

Weirdly, it takes more physical effort than mental effort to feel drained. Seems using this rather large organ in our heads for long periods of time can actually be tiring.

A heads up on that last point, busy is the new stupid. Use your resource wisely because if you don’t…

The real risk of BURNOUT

The most poetic definition of burnout appears in the ICD-10, the World Health Organization’s International Classification of Disease, which characterises it as “a state of vital exhaustion” The symptoms include but are not limited to:-

• Chronic fatigue. In the early stages, you may feel a lack of energy and feel tired most days. …
• Insomnia. …
• Forgetfulness/impaired concentration and attention. …
• Physical symptoms. …
• Increased illness. …
• Loss of appetite. …
• Anxiety. …
• Depression.
• Anger

*thanks Google

Ways to avoid it:-

1) Basic admin - eat, sleep, drinking water.

2)Find and do things that relax you. If you can’t remember any then FIND SOME! NOW! No, not in 10 mins or after you have finished your work. NOW!!

3) Say no. No is a spectacularly powerful word. It can stop small anything from irritations to great tragedies. It also can stop your work load being unmanagable.

Say no to others from time to time. Say Yes to yourself.

4)Did I mention eating? Good. Here it is again along with some Army wisdom:- “Shit in, shit out” Eating shit? Then expect to feel and produce shit.

So how do you maintain your grit? What do you do to make to deal with the day to day BS and still produce good work. Know any better ways for fending off burnout. Please let me know.

Be polite

be efficient

Have a plan to shoot everyone you meet.

The life ‘Sous-marin’

A document on my adventures with pools, water and, mermaids.

My Intent

It was my intent to try to capture the dark underwater, floating scenes seen in the anime ‘ghost in the shell’ shelling scene. These scenes convey the idea of being submerged in something, to have an idea surround everything and permeate every aspect of the scene. This resonates quite heavily with my idea of cyberpunk and the immersive nature that technology can have but it also has the effect (created mostly by floating in this space) of projecting an idea of freedom that this technology could bring.

Its also my first ever attempt at this so let’s give it a go….what could go wrong, right.

Planning to execute my intent

I don’t know about you but I make notes about EVERYTHING! It’s a bit much sometimes. This allows me to focus on the things that matter for this project and cut away all the crappy or impossible ideas that would, in some way, take away from the project.

All the notes

I didn’t know how to execute an underwater shoot. In order to figure it out how, I needed to do a lot of research, not just on the artistic side of this project but also looking into the technical and technological side of it. This is one of the few situations where the tech DOES matter. For example, unless your camera is waterproof, you are screwed. In terms of art, I knew what aesthetic I wanted to tap into but to really lock in what emerged from my research I surrounded myself with as many forms of cyberpunk from movies, books and, images that I could find (this was over ambitious for this shoot but will serve me in later projects).

I also asked questions of people I knew, asked them what they thought about these ideas and (more importantly) sorted through their comments to find the gold in the opinions.

Equipment Check

Camera - Nikon D750, I could have rented a bigger camera or something with more megapixels etc. but in the end, I stayed with something I was familiar with.

Flashguns - SB900, old but see above.

Housing - Ewa-marine housing (essentially a plastic bag) was reliable and affordable. see www.ewa-marine.com/

Testing of the housing

Boom - Needed something to hold the flash over the water

PC cable and trigger - back up if Nikon CLS didn’t work (more about this later)

Goggles - Actually a big deal. Needed to find ones that allowed me to see clearly but not get in the way.

Nose plug - cause water up yer nose hurts.

Weight belt - it came with 5kg of weights…don’t wear 5kg of weight in a 5m dive pool! 

Flippers - I will want to move around the water and these made it super easy to do so meant I could concentrate on other things.

35mm Sigma ART lens (sooooo good), needed crispy good sharpness in my images, this seemed like the best way of guaranteeing it.

www.wexphotovideo.com/sigma-35mm-f14-dg-hsm-lens-nikon-fit-1533947/

Technical issues

The flashes would not fire. Seems Nikon CLS has the same issue that a radio trigger would have had which is if it is submerged in more than about 15cm of water it will be prevented from communicating with other flashes…bugger. More importantly, however, PLAN B (the flash trigger that I got) didn’t work. This was entirely my fault. It simply doesn’t work if I plug it into my SB-900′s directly (because the flash is expecting to be told something it can understand from that port) but needs a small adapter (in my case this was one of my radio triggers with a pc cord port) to make it work.

AND FINALLY, that housing is an absolute bitch to work with. It was effective at keeping everything dry but near impossible to change ANY settings on the camera or flash (yeah I had a flash mounted on my camera to fire another flash…stop judging).

Results

Good. I really enjoyed this shoot. I also managed to pull some decent images out of it too!

Bad. The technical issues meant I couldn’t get THE image I wanted.

Ugly. It gave me a cold. bastard.

What is next

Get the equipment working - It does work, I was just too stupid to remember how to work it!

Next shoot, keep it to 2 or 3 models as I did before. Too many models would be too difficult to coordinate (learnt that from past shoots).

Assistants…I had one but she bailed (she was ill). Oh, sweet Jesus, an assistant would have been nice. Shout out to the RCP staff that stepped in. Thank you. xxx

Better housing. A solid housing and not the bag. The ewe-marine products are great for a budget option.

I may have to sell a testicle to afford a solid housing.

Can you help?

…yes, you probably can. Get in touch if you want to model or assist (or if you just have an idea).

Be polite

Be efficient

Have a plan to shoot everyone you meet

What is SEARCH.er?

Either a Technotopia we haven’t realised or a neon hell of our own making…you made up your mind yet.

It’s a photographic project. Simply.

In more complex terms, it is a project where I will explore the continuing advancements in technology and its ever closer interconnectivity and integration with humans and society through the genre that is cyberpunk.

What is Cyberpunk?

Cyberpunk is a subgenre science fiction that really came into its own in the 1980s but persists to this day. Worryingly it persists because slowly and surely, the world around us is changing to these stories of technocracy.

Why Cyberpunk?

Because its cool. Because neon looks great. Because it is slowly happening around us. Want to know more? Well, take a look at this.

I am absolutely fascinated by the possibilities. 

What story am I trying to tell?

At some point ( not too far away) we will develop artificial intelligence to either enslave for our own need or to help a very few enslave the rest of us through one means or another. I think the first option, where we attempt to control AI by simply containing it, is going to happen first.

AI placed inside a body, that looks like our because we really are that vain, and used to subvert other to its master whims. Imagine during the testing phase the AI begins to ask questions?

Less ‘what am I?’ and more ‘who am I?’

Imagine it decided that it doesn’t want to do the things you want it to. What happens when the AI wants to go down the pub and get drunk instead of playing your stupid games. What happens when you try to force it to, it sees more humanity in its self struggling against an oppressor than you.

What happens to us. What do we become as technology changes us both physically and mentally? As we become more artificial, would we sympathise with this new life form?

What have I done so far?

well…..

So far it’s been fun…

What’s next?

Underwater I go…

…did I mention I like Cyberpunk?

I want to start exploring the possibilities of prosthetics. One of the underlying principles in this genre is the merging of human and machine where we replace our own fragile biology with technology to suit our needs. This scene above is a frame from what is known as the “shelling” scene in “the Ghost in the shell” anime and is part of the maintenance cycle of a full body android.

Can you help?

Yes, you can!

DM me if you are interested in helping. You can also check out my Instagram and get in contact with me there too.

@itchyphotog

Be polite.

Be efficient.

Have a plan to shoot everyone you meet.