I like what Terry Gilliam is saying in the video clip below.

In public interviews you normally get the filtered comments that are afraid to do real comparisons for fear of offending. Not Terry. Not in his interviews, and not in his films.

And I think he makes a legitimate point in differentiating the work of a commercial success like Spielberg and an artistic success like Kubrick. My taste runs along the lines of Terry’s — good art raises questions and makes you work. No spoon feeding.

Terry himself has a body of work that is wildly inventive, takes huge risks, and raises more questions than it answers. Examples include The Fisher King, Twelve Monkeys, Brazil, and Time Bandits as a writer/director, and all the Monty Python classics as a writer.

Sadly, writer/directors like Terry and others in that vein (David Lynch, Darren Aronofsky, Alejandro González Iñárritu , etc…) have an absurdly difficult time raising funds for their films despite a track record of masterpieces.

Video interview after the break…..!

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This is the first of a couple views behind the scenes of the Louver shoot that I recently posted images from. The time-lapse covers most of the shoot with a frame taken every 10 seconds. It was a half day shoot with just a few looks, which is relatively short.  It gives a sense of the process on the shooting stage in my studio.

Lighting was very simple in this shoot, we wanted to clearly light the models to show the details of the clothing, though also wanted some drama with deep shadows to create mood and give the images some geometric shape.  I used a grid on the soft box and feathered it to limit the spill of the light and create some quick fall-offs into shadow on the wall. Lighting was a Broncolor Unilite and Verso pack.

A second light was used to create a pattern of light/shadow at an extreme angle on the back wall adding to the geometry and the dramatic effect. This was done with a Broncolor Pulsospot4 strobe (you put metal patterned slides inside between the lens and the flashtube, then focus to the desired degree of sharpness with the lens on the light).

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I’m deep in pre-production and experimentation for upcoming projects, so have been distracted from the blog.  But the things I’m working on will lead to material I’m looking forward to sharing here — both the final results and the creation process.

Along those lines, I recently came across several interesting ideas regarding the creation of ideas from Steven Johnson, author of the book “Chance Favors the Connected Mind” (via Ted Hope).  Steven lays out his premise in this particularly thoughtful TED talk below, and I think he’s onto something.

First, ideas are not clearly defined, self-contained units.  Rather they’re stringy nebulous networks with lots of branches connecting to other ideas and assorted assumptions and underlying facts and impulses.  Furthermore, ideas do not tend to happen, as is typically characterized, in a single moment of inspired breakthrough, but rather gradually as hunches evolve and mingle with the hunches of others. They fade into view rather than pop into existence, generally by examining and comparing the hunch with the contributions of others — either through direct dialogue or through research of pre-existing work.

And therefore, the best environment for generating new ideas is one in which we can mix and compare our ideas rather than cultivate them in isolation. This explains why so many of the leading writers and thinkers and artists and scientists have come out of well defined creative clusters.

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With many forms of print distribution steadily migrating to digital platforms, many previously still-only uses now have motion possibilities. And these motion-capable outlets have  different needs than content made for tv or theaters.

When digital out-of-home signage first appeared, there was a rush to use existing tv content on it. The backlash was immediate due to the rapid, distracting, disconcerting flash of motion that was not comprehensible in the brief moments given to such a communication platform. It was just visual noise. Nobody is going to stop and watch an unfolding narrative when on their way to through public transport centers.

And we consume magazine editorial content differently too.  In magazines, we like a curated collection of content around the title’s theme. Magazine’s are not where we go to watch a full program. And usually the visuals are complementing a written story — even on digital devices. It’s the mix that is rewarding in magazines, and they tend to be quicker reads than longer-form storytelling.

I love shooting portraits, and they are an essential staple of magazines. Portraits for me are the intimate, low key balance to the more elaborate conceptual and fashion productions I do. I feel that conceptual and fashion shoots are like sculpture, where you meticulously craft an image or scene. And portraits are more like jazz, where the photographer/director and subject spontaneously improvise and and riff off of each other.

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We’re ramping-up for the shoot with designer Anthony Franco that I posted about previously.

It’s going smoothly thanks to the team in place which includes not only Anthony, but also Francis overseeing casting, Geordy our brilliant master of all things audio, Lonny the master of digital infrastructure & workflow, JP helping with location scouting and visual effects planning (yes, a some fun effects planned), and Raymond who will be leading the editing with the two of us working closely on shaping the final form of the short film — I plan to be in the edit booth too, I love the film editing process (tinkerers like me can’t help it).

I cranked out the script with more speed than I expected, the concept came to me in three pieces over the course of a week at which point it just felt right. The team is pumped up about it, you can tell when the people around you are into a project — that makes such a difference.

This script is consistent with my style and tone in some respects, but in other ways a departure. I’m looking forward to it as a step into what I see as a new creative phase. Periodically there are clear changes in the vibe of my work, and I feel I’m at one of those points right now. I always feel when one of these transitions is coming on — it’s a mix of eagerness to move forward and break the old mold and some ambiguity in that I’m taking new risks by abandoning many of the methods and techniques that have served me well in the past. But this kind of performing without pre-established muscle memory is how we advance our work (and, in fact, ourselves).

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Digital Photo Pro magazine was kind enough to include an article on my work in their “Masters Issue” this year, on newsstands now (and on the web, but the article looks much better in the print layout here). The title I believe came form some elaborate ideas I layed out in terms of what’s to come in my work, but none of that is in the article (nor in this post, but stay tuned).  Here are some additional interview outtakes that did not make it into the article:

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DPP Mag: Your style is so unique, and even more so for a ‘commercial photographer”. Commercial photography and fine art photography are often mutually exclusive. How have you managed to combine the two worlds and get away with it?

AB: I’m not sure I’ve gotten away with anything, I certainly loose a lot of jobs because my work does not fit in the right slots. But I was never after those jobs in the first place, I wouldn’t have entered the field to do those things. I make the work that I find meaningful and engaging and then put it out there. We’re all defined by what we show the world, so we’re only going to get hired for what’s in our portfolios. I showed the kind of work that I wanted to do, and those who connected with that work responded. I never heard from the rest, which is fine with me.

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I recently ran across this great quote from artist Chuck Close in the book Wisdom:

“The advice I like to give young artists, or really anybody who’ll listen to me, is not to wait around for inspiration. Inspiration is for amateurs; the rest of us just show up and get to work. If you wait around for the clouds to part and a bolt of lightning to strike you in the brain, you are not going to make an awful lot of work. All the best ideas come out of the process; they come out of the work itself… Inspiration is absolutely unnecessary and somehow deceptive. You feel like you need this great idea before you can get down to work, and I find that’s almost never the case.”

While I agree with this from a practical work ethic standpoint, at the same time we have all felt genuine inspiration and it’s such a source of power. Even Chuck does not deny its existence.

Inspiration is powerful in two ways. First, it helps us discover what matters to us — the emotional response to something we find inspirational reveals what’s important to us thematically and aesthetically.  We often then find ourselves reaching most ambitiously in directions we have been inspired in some way.

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If you are 100% completely confident when first releasing your work into the world, then you played it too safe and/or waited too long (and are probably wrong anyway).

Public exposure is like oxygen for ideas and art.

All art is risk.

“Victor by Hasselblad” magazine just ran a “Masters Portfolio” on my work. With all these magazine profiles, they do long interviews and pull parts from the exchange. Below are a couple outtakes from the interview they conducted. These questions address post-production and personal projects. continued below…

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