"There is a moment when you want to read a magazine, not a novel" - Bono

Current listening: Jon & Vangelis – Private Collection

I’m going to do some shooting at London Fashion Week at the end of the month, and some of the images can be uploaded in to a competition run by Canon, with the stipulation that they be submitted at a maximum of 45 minutes after the shoot. The subtext is surely then that they should be unedited, or at the very least, without days of manipulation to create something almost wholly unrecognisable from the reality they claim to be depicting.

With this in mind, I decided to submit some work to the brilliant Dreamingless magazine, who only accepts photography that has had no editing on the models. I found them on Twitter after taking part in #sbhour (from 8-9pm on a Sunday) and sent off 2 projects of mine, both of which included little (or no) editing at all.
I’ve had some work in an online magazine before, as well as my own (Magpie), and that’s fantastic and of course I’m very grateful, but for me there’s something much more satisfying about having my work in an actual printed magazine, as that was what I fell in love with in the first place (both magazines as a genre, and my work that had magazines as a final destination in mind). The experience of being able to sit down and flick through the magazine, which, as the title of this blog (which was stolen from Zoo TV era Bono) references, there’s also a lightness to them (in comparison to a book) that I love. Even though they are essentially the same format, it made me think of the way Stephen Shore compared the difference in feel between Polaroid SX-70 prints and then trying to recreate the square look on the Hassleblad: “it always felt weightier; it never had that light touch”.
Anyway, I’m very flattered that Zoe Michelle at Dreamingless (who is also a talented photographer) liked my work and my writing, so here is a little snippet of each project before they come out in their March and April issues respectively:

The Space Between

This first shot of Tia was taken without the following notions, but now I can see they were present in my subconscious thinking: The use of pure, white high key light to reflect a youthful, enthusiastic innocence I wanted to capture, and her looking up at us and drawing us in like a doe-eyed Jean Shrimpton-esque character, and the tousle-haired, black lipstick look that hints at (with a little subtlety) sex, but not in an overly gratuitous way.

However, this second shot shows a more real, unbiased view of Tia: Both have our eye contact, but with very different connotations, more relaxed and a picture of someone who loved being around her friends and laughing.

This is the Tia I know, and by having these friendships with the people I shoot, I can capture this, much more indicative of her personality than this shot, which is a construct of the male gaze.

I think it shines even brighter amidst the trash

With these shots, I jumped in head-first with an “everything and the kitchen sink” approach, influenced in particular by a quote from sitcom, Frasier. Upon Frasier Crane deciding he needed an orchestra for his radio station jingle, his brother Niles asks "Haven't you heard of less is more?" to which he responds "ah yes, but if less is more, just think how more more will be!"

When using a piece of equipment for the first time, I like to be as experimental as possible; to use everything at the very peak of its ability so I know what it's capable of, before dialling it down for the desired effect.

This time my intention was to take things that I usually gave a wide berth (saturated colours that blew out detail, melodramatic wind machines, cheap plastic gems etc.) and keep everything on “full”.

The title comes from an interview with Bono in Rolling Stone from 1992 (“There is a lot of soul - I think it shines even brighter amidst the trash and the junk”) in regards to their fantastic Zoo TV tour of that year, which eschewed the earnest B&W Joshua Tree image in favour of a widescreen colour makeover, in which they embraced all the contradictions of the rock world, and Bono’s new onstage persona became a leather and shades-clad lounge lizard, sans sincerity.

I didn’t want to manipulate the images afterwards, so another reason of turning the colour up as far as it would go is that I didn’t want to boost the saturation digitally after the fact, so the colours you see here are what the room looked like: I liked the idea that they looked so drenched in colour your hand would turn pink if you touched them.

These are images that won't be featured in the magazine features (but from the same projects, respectively) so keep a look out for the brilliant Dreamingless magazine!