The Art of Visuals: Thrift Shop Vibes
Sunlight streamed through the shops windows, dancing among the inaudible buzz of voices, the squeak of hangers, and the technicolor palette of clothing that filled the room. I ducked into the alley between two coat racks, and the staccato click of a camera shutter joined the white noise all around me.
It was a day for experimentation, a day to create.
Most of the visuals I produce are centered around the outdoors, but sometimes I like to create art that touches a different chord in people, in myself. Portraits and portrait culture are something I really haven't immersed myself into, so I took a step back and thought about it.
I always ask myself, how does the photo make me feel. It's how I choose what content I like to create. For nature photography, it fills me with exhilaration, makes me want to be there, for my levitation series, I want to feel wonder, fantasy.
Jung posing in front of a statue in Empire State Plaza
For portraits, I never knew what I wanted to feel, so I decided that I needed to figure that out.
Thrift Shop Vibes
Driven by excitement and good vibes, I met up with my crew (Amanda, Jung, and Olivia) and headed to a Goodwill. I love wearing crazy sweaters in the winter, and Hawaiian shirts during the summer, so thrift shops have become my main spots to find clothes.
Amanda killing it in a thrift shop sweater
There was something about the colors that day that really popped out at me, so that was what I tried to focus on, shooting a mix of photo and video just to open myself up creatively.
I borrowed a friends 50 mm 1.8 and loved the way it shot in the light from the dirty, thrift shop windows. Positioning models has never been my specialty. I like to use an old radio station interview trick called 'dead-air chicken'. That's basically when you snap a few shots of them to get your settings correct, and just wait until they get nervous and do something interesting. I feel that it draws out the spirit of the person, helps you capture new looks.
I learned that I liked to get shots from low angles, looking up at the models face, and position objects in my way to focus around. It adds depth to an image, and changes the way a typical portrait looks.
Playing with depth and Amanda rocking more thrift shop apparel
Golden Hour in the Empire State Plaza
We moved locations, running to catch the remaining sunlight on this wonderful, February day. The Empire State Plaza in Albany is an amazing location to catch that pre-sunset golden glow.
I played with shadows and depth again at the plaza, using the setting sunset to highlight the face. It was amazing, the way the golden light touched stone and flesh, turning them orange and gold.
Capturing Amanda, highlighted by a beautiful sunset glow in the Empire State Plaza
The temperature started dropping as the sun began to set further, and our fingers began to grow cold as they pressed the camera's shutters. Still I couldn't stop until the last of the light had bled form the sky.
Shooting Portraits
Olivia and Amanda posing for album of their girl band in the Empire State Plaza
I've always been fascinated with light, how it streams through cedar boughs, the way golden hour rays gild the world, beams of sunlight streaming through distant snows from a mountaintop. It fills me with such euphoria that I grow giddy and high on it. It's an addicting feeling.
That feeling, that light, is what I want to capture in my images. I want to play with light, or the lack of it, work with shadows, braid sunlight into flesh and bone.
Sunlight tangled in Amanda's hair in the Empire State Plaza
As I wrack my brain trying to figure out the point to my ramblings, I begin to understand why I love capturing photos.
Feeling those vibes, living in those moments, that excitement of seeing the way a photo comes together, that subtle nuance of a pose, that light touch of sunset or sunrise on a models face, I want to feel all of that. Capturing that excitement in a frame, that is what I love to do.
Olivia breathing in the coming dusk outside the NYS Museum