HoliNYC is basically a camel of color blended with the normal trappings of a festival in an industrial park.
I need to be able to read someone in a shorter time than usual and art direct them to better capture their essence. How nuts is that? I mean who knows you better than you? What your frame of mind is at that moment? Who am I to tell you how to be? It’s not something I take lightly, but also something that is incredibly exciting and daunting every time I try to do it.
So I went to Holi and I tried. I found that the normal ways I observe and shoot or direct just didn’t work here. Folks don’t know what a profile is and aren’t as forthcoming as to the better side of their face. But most importantly, they are uncomfortable with silence, not knowing what to expect and in those in-between moments, I caught a glimpse of a few folks.
For others it wasn’t smooth. Not pictured are lots of very awkward people and/or bad portraits I took, but thanks to the internet you won’t see any of that! Whenever I ran out of time — I had 30 seconds to 3 minutes per person — I always felt like I cheated them and myself, but I do feel that I got a little better at reading people. Take my man below here.
He and his girl came over so boisterous and excited to have their photo taken and after a few images the energy disappeared. When he turned to leave I noticed a glimmer in his mouth and commented on his grill. That lead to his chains. Which lead to his hat coming off which lead to this image he described as fire. I grinned and knew I had gotten something we were both proud of.
Let’s hope I can catch that fire some more.
Many thanks to HoliNYC for inviting me and my über talented friends at Pursuit of Portraits and allowing us to shoot.
