Recently I've had to come to to terms with loss. One of my hard drives without warning died on me, I lost a good chunk of the photos I had taken over the last 2 years including a bunch of sets for the site. The majority had already hit member review but a couple will never return.
As an artist, I sometimes feel that a big chunk of my ego is poured into my work and while they aren't persay pictures of me and my experiences they set nice little time-stamps as I can always go back to a shoot, look over it and remember where I was at that point of my life and what I was doing when I shot the photo. Other than some "ghosts" that are on the internet in low-resolution format, the photos are gone forever, and in a sense so is part of my life. I also factored in the current state of the site where there's tons of hopeful photographers and tons of models and how competition is extremely stiff these days where everyone just shoots as much as they can and girls have 4-6 sets shot at the same time without the proper outlet to feature them. With 365 sets of the day and 1,000+ member review sets the numbers simply don't add up.
I used to be in love with the photosets from the gorgeous girls who I felt had personality and brought it to the set. I looked forward to sets from some girls and now these days I just click a few and move on and the photographers just get lost in a sea of photos. While I never thought about quitting shooting all together, I did toy around with the idea and the idea of myself becoming redundant. It's a hard time for photographers in the world right now and I'm starting to see how that's effecting myself and other staff photographers on this site. But what can be done? In someways I think the best way is to keep doing what I'm doing to bring my photos to the next level so that they DO stand out but I'm not sure what else to do with sets that would be able to change the 'format' but I believe it does need to be a fairly significant change to convince the general public, but the style is so iconic on the site at this point. I looked over a lot of my old work and saw how my style has changed over the years, and while I do notice a change in it all, i'm not sure how to describe what it has evolved to, I know its better than when I first started but why do I not feel as accomplished these days when I do? Is it just too safe because I know I got to that point where I can consistently churn out a strong set without much forethought? Maybe I need another challenge but not sure exactly where to go from here.
I took a break. I didn't shoot any sets, and when I did shoot non sg stuff, I came out of them feeling empty and wondered if the hard drive crash was the start of something bigger in the grand scheme of things. It's tough to think back to all the images I hadn't even touched yet that were loss but at the same time maybe it was what I needed to appreciate the work I do have and figure out what it really means to me and this was a chance to have a clean slate.
After receiving the news that my hard drive was unrecoverable (after sending it into 3 places), I decided to pour a little extra bonus money from a few sets I sold, bought new hard drives and bought new memory cards for my camera, backed all my files up I currently had and booked a ticket to Hell City in Phoenix Arizona. Seeing how I've been on Suicidegirls for the last 5ish or so years, I thought I had at least had to go one time in my life and @kush convinced me this was the thing I needed to get back into the swing of things.
and we also shot a set
Shot a few more sets as well:
@raleigh
@reed
@sedona
@onyx
fellow staff photographer @sawa
@indi
When a girl tells me post shoot "I think i like the idea of "modeling" more since working with you!!" and she's shot with other photographers I know and respect I really have to wonder what it is that gets me to that position when sometimes I only think i'm a glorified button pusher, but there's meaning in that statement and a reason why I shoot how I shoot to get me to this point. Sometimes I feel that's exactly what i'm supposed to get even though i'm not sure what it is, but in the meantime at least I'm having fun which in itself is good in itself. I'm still trying to figure things out but this direction might be a start.
Images from Hell City below.
Hell City was definitely an even that everyone involved with the site should visit at least once in their lifetimes. I'm glad I got to go to hang out with a bunch of really rad people and finally meet some folks like @alissa for the first time. So between shooting, seeing all the amazing tattoo art, getting almost busted by security for 'unsavory' actions all in all I had fun and it was a great time. So maybe next year as well. Thanks @elody and Dave for being awesome hosts and my travel buddy @toxic and to all the other people who helped me out here and there @troa, @jezel, @ramonne, @cdo, @sedona, @onyx, @reed, @turbulence, @sunshine, @sawa, @lyxzen, @sean, and whoever else I forget to mention at the moment.
I did manage to squeeze in one final shoot when I thought I was finished to do some personal work, and I'm glad we found this 20 minute bubble between being busy and the sun setting to shoot these with @reed
On other set news
I hope you checked out this girl's set!
she's a Portland hopeful that should definitely go pink
other recent sets of mine @stormyent when she won the reddit contest and was flown to me
other sets in the future
@mendacia
@discordia
