Collaborating with Ken
During my time in Scotland, one of the photographers that really inspired me was a man named Ken. Before we began shooting together he showed me a number of photographic books by artists that he found inspiring, along with some of his own work. There was a similarity about most of the works he showed me and it gave me a great insight to the kind of images he enjoyed creating. He seemed to be primarily inspired by Chinese/Japanese artists such as Luo Yang, Lin Zhipeng and Ren Hang, but also photographers such as Sean Marc Lee and Osphilia. (links at bottom of page) Around his house (the place we were shooting) were a number of photographic prints, which I found very inspirational (mainly because they were quite different to the things I had been attempting to pursue whilst also having elements that related and intrigued me). One of those artists was Ren Hang. Below are a few of the prints that I noticed around the house that I really love:
I find the abstract nature of these images really enticing and the type of lighting used quite fascinating in it's direct bluntness. After talking for a fairly long period of time about the kind of work that inspired Ken, he picked up one of his several camera and began shooting. He mainly used an on-camera flash to create a similar effect, however it was a very old style, originally designed to work with one of his film cameras. The flash its self moved forwards and backwards inside the box that it was placed in creating varying levels of vignette. I thought this could possibly be re-created using a piece of cardboard with a rectangle/square cut in it and moving that closer to or further away from the flash gun. This is something I would like to experiment with. We spent 3 or 4 hours talking and creating photographs around Ken's house, looking at the images now, I feel they have an incredibly laid back, erotic feel to them which is something I would like to capture in my own photography work. I particularly like the first two as close up body shots, and this is something I would like to include more in my own work. A few of the shots we created are below:
"If there's one piece of advice I'd give it would be to make sure that you photograph what really interests you, something you have a passion for and don't pay too much attention to the so-called rules of composition/posing etc, often it's the mistakes that look best" - Ken. https://www.ignant.com/2016/05/20/luo-yang-captures-a-new-generation-of-chinese-women/ http://renhang.org/photography-2016 https://www.fire-cracker.org/ http://www.dazeddigital.com/photography http://www.c-heads.com/category/photography/ http://www.linzhipeng223.com/ http://osphilia.tumblr.com/ Ken also agreed to be part of a photographic project I started during my time in Scotland, but I'll keep that for another journal entry.
