Tagged: Zinn Star

Zinn Star

I’m a romantic and I have a romantic view of life.  Do I have rose colored glasses? No, but they are tinted. For me, the way I approach photography mirrors my approach to life. Optimism. Beauty. Capturing the best that the moment has to offer. Sharing. Loving.  Respect. The journey is more important than the destination – because the journey defines who you are – your values, your struggles, your vision, your humanity. Do you remember graduation day, or the years it took to reach that moment? Which is why I document each journey to reach the images I create. The viewer may just look at the images (and they should be strong enough to stand on their own without my words….if not, I’ve failed as a photographer and an artist), but I hope you share in the joy of reading my words and sharing the journey it took to capture that moment.  The results without the journey is one dimensional.

For these images, I had a concept  for my mask series.  The Jester  slowly grows in importance (and size) in the image with a model in the foreground. The model would at first be indifferent, then become aware of  “the presence”, then be fearful of that presence. Then I wasn’t sure how it would end. My original ideas was badly. I didn’t know how it would end….until I shot it.

Enter Zinn Star…..and how collaboration shapes your vision, which is the second part of my photographic journey.  The joy of sharing a vision, someone else embracing it with you and working with you on that journey to realize it, providing their own shape to make it happen and the end result becoming an enhanced version of what you intended. A version you could not have accomplished on your own – Love’s Journey, in an artistic sense.

Zinn’s boy friend was going to drop her off and she wanted to know if he could stay around, or just drop her off. I’ve had bad experiences with “escorts” – partly my fault in being the polite Southerner and not wanting to neglect “a guest” in my home and partly the result of the escort’s attitude of “are we done yet?”  So, because of my own limitations, and actual escort limitations, I generally don’t like people hanging around a shoot, unless they are involved in it, like a MUA. However, the more I thought about it, some concepts I had would work better if a “live” person was involved as someone for the model to react with.  So I proposed Mr. T (her BF) participate in the shoot as a “prop” – the Jester in these images. He accepted the “challenge”, and without his participation, these images would not be as meaningful.  I shot the first three images in the series as I imagined them…..but how to end it?  My original thought was badly…trying to be edgy.  But as we worked together to create the images…a collaborative bond created.  My own world view is optimistic and through this bonding, I changed directions and ended it on a happier note. 

So these images represent LOVE’S JOURNEY:  Independence and self-absorbsion, awareness of a precense or possibilities, fear, and finally ACCEPTANCE.

And this is my journey to create LOVE’S JOURNEY.

Oddly enough….the artistic’s Love’s Journey mirrors real life.   Recently, there  was someone I was interested in dating.  She saw the images I create, and resulted in REJECTION, not ACCEPTANCE.  I’m not traditional enough.  I love where I am in life where someone’s narrow minded view of life does not cause me to take off my tinted glasses view of the celebration of beauty and true love.  The Journey continues. :)

Zinn Star: Love’s Journey

Or,  Zinn Star Magic with Fabric.

As part of a recent studio set, I wanted to take some silky fabric and stretch it and wrap her in it.  Not a unique concept, but wanted to see if we could do something unique with the idea.  WOW…with the grace of her posing and the lighting, I really like the results showing off the contours of her body, the tension and “emotion” in the shots.  Again, ably assisted by Mr. T providing the anchor to the fabric.  In fact I’ll give him credit for the idea of the one shot wrapping the fabric around her leg. We also played with sheer fabric and I love the dark, mysterious look of the images and emotion with the fabric and her skin seeming to flow together.  With these and other recent work…really having fun in the studio again.

Zinn Star: FabriCadabra

As part of a recent shoot with Zinn, we were working on some images from the mask series that I’m doing.  One of my goals was to do some where she was reacting to the masks.  We had just finished one series like that (blog coming soon), and she had the idea of having her boyfriend Tristen wear a mask, then we draped a black cap around him. I lite it with one large beauty dish so that she was highlighted, but he faded to black so it would appear as if a figure was there as she posed around him, but only his Joker mask  would show.  I love the grace and style of Zinn’s poses and the little story that it tells. I created one compilation from it and showing the others as well.

Zinn Star: Flirting with Joker

This is a story of collaboration and how the dynamics of working with a talented team evolve into creating something wonderful. It’s not a unique story. We’ve all experienced it. But it’s a story of one shoot I did recently with Zinn Star. I like it as an example of how when you work with talented people, great things happen. And in the end, it says more about Zinn’s perseverance to capture a vision, team dynamics and realizing a shoot is not over until the whole creative work flow is complete from shooting to editing.

In general, in my work life and in my artistic one, I work collaboratively. I like setting up a general environment and end goal, throw talented people into the mix and let each of us each have input to executing it. In that way, we all take ownership in creating and have fun doing it together rather than each of us just being a tool. Working with Zinn, one idea I had was to create an image of two dolls with different looks that appeared to be hanging on display and then another picture of someone watching them and stitching the three images together. Sometimes I get these images in my head, but turn out to be impractical to do either with the equipment or space I have. We first did a test against a wall in my house. I wasn’t sure if I liked the color of the wall. Then we rigged some fabric as a backdrop. The results looked like a bad image from a cheap workshop. So we went back to the wall and decided one look would be silly and clown like with Zinn wearing stripped leggings and a mask and another one sexy in a black cat suit.

We rigged some rope from the rungs of the stairs and stretched it across looping it under her arms. Zinn’s boyfriend, Tristen, lent a hand by helping with the rigging and served as the anchor point on the opposite side. Then we tried some test shots using a ring flash with Zinn in the leggings. You can see one example in the gallery below. I loved her pose. I loved the lighting. But, I hated the look of the picture. I realized my original idea was not going to work in the setting I had.

So we switched gears. I changed the lighting to use a 22 inch beauty dish set to full power but aimed away from Zinn to provide more artistic, indirect lighting , hopefully casting some shadows. She changed to do nudes. She and Tristen worked together moving, posing, and adjusting the rope to create angles and shapes. I kept shooting trying to find the right perspective. But I could not find anything I really liked reviewing the images on camera. I was about to give up so we could move on to a different concept. This is where the team dynamics come into play. Zinn and Tristen kept working it. They had bought into it and were determined to get something. I watched as this rough rope was starting to burn Zinn as she twisted in the rope trying to contort her body and the rope into interesting shapes. I could not let all that effort go to waste. So, I jumped back into the game trying some new perspectives and shooting from every possible angle.

I still wasn’t sure about the results until I started editing. And BAM. As I tried different styles this fantastic film noir type images emerged with wonderful shadows of rope and form. Zinn’s use of the rope, posing and emotion are beyond superb. The rope work would not have been possible without Tristen’s assistance. As it turns out, this may become my favorite set of our work together. And the final gift was finding the “picture within the picture” from our original ring flash image. The light really accentuates the beauty of her pose and her body.

YEAH TEAM. Here’s to CollabEvoCreate and seeing something to the end.

Zinn: CollabEvoCreate

Zinn Star and I have been talking about working together for two years, starting when she lived in Pennsylvania (and now CA), we could never connect. So on a return trip home to PA (and before she “retires” this year), the stars finally aligned and we got to create some magic together. We did a wide ranging shoot from some creative studio work (including some additions to the carnival mask series I’m working on this year), to some location shooting in the snow in a 19th Century village.  The results were even better than I imagined from this talented artist.  The Fine Art Nude community will miss her, but I am sure that she will shine at whatever she sets her mind to.  I finished at least one image from each set we shot as a teaser (hehe). As I finish each set, I’ll be creating postings in the future to showcase them.  Thanks again Zinn!!

Star: The State of Zinn

Monty Wordpress Bayesian Spam Filter has blocked 61384 access attempts.