Tagged: environment
Portraits: Marcus
Photographing theatre producer Marcus Bernard was my second attempt at an environmental portrait and this time the weather was on my side.
After our initial chat, we decided to shoot at the the Bunker Theatre, which has sadly since closed. I made a visit a few days before to check the light and agreed on a time to meet up.
The light, bright and sharp, was just the way I like it. I shot Marcus against the light at the entrance at first before heading indoors. We photographed in the bar, the back office and the auditorium itself, but my favourite shot was from the office: the mixture of ambient and practical lighting, along with the clutter and theatre paraphernalia within the room, really worked for me.
Later, Marcus requested one of the images taken outside, which I was happy to provide. I learned a lot about light in this session and I would love to further experiment with this in future.
Portraits: Daniel
Daniel, an actor, writer and director, was one of the first people I approached to photograph in an environmental portrait.
I had been fascinated for some time about Arnold Newman‘s environmental portraits, as well as the set design set-ups in some of Annie Leibowitz‘s portraiture, so I set about approaching people who interested me in film, theatre and journalism to photograph in this way. Daniel was one of the first to respond.
After an initial meeting and conversation about his work, we decided to take the photograph outside the Royal Court Theatre stage door. I visited the theatre on days before to work out when the best light would hit and we agreed on a time to meet.
The big day came… and it was raining. It was cloudy and cold. All my predictions and preparations had gone out of the window. Daniel and I met, got the permission of the Royal Court to take the photo and I got to work quickly.
Maybe a touch too quickly: I raced through a number of set-ups with an aim to get us away from the location as soon as possible without getting soaked. Maybe I should have taken a little more time on some different set-ups, or tried a more sheltered location nearby? But, this was my first attempt and I was learning. And I was up for trying again.
The air around us
Following my WHO Health for All film festival entry, I decided to follow up on another idea I had for an environmental short film.
The idea was concerned with air pollution: I’d read news stories about people suffering respiratory illnesses near busy carriageways like the North Circular Road and Park Lane; also Ella Adoo-Kissi-Debrah’s case had been in the newspapers for some time.
On researching air pollution’s effects on the body’s organs, I depicted these with watercolour paints on a pristine white shirt, intercutting them with images of road traffic.
I enjoyed making some work around the subject of the environment, which is becoming ever more urgent as time progresses. As usual with any creative endeavour, there are many things that I’d do differently next time. Nonetheless, I learned a lot, which I hope to bring to my next short project.
Burning Details 
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