Day 318

318/365, originally uploaded by Aaron LaRue.

Today was Cinco de Mayo, and after today, I firmly believe that sombreros are my photographic kryptonite.  
"Cinco de Mayo?" I thought to myself, "Easy, I'll go get a sombrero and take a self portrait. It's almost my duty." Well I got the sombrero, but for the life of me I couldn't get the background I wanted for my portrait. I had 5 lights out, some on stands, some hanging off of chairs, gels everywhere, it just wasn't working. Finally I got frustrated, spewed some expletives, and packed it all up. 


After ditching that set up, I figured I could do some cool gritty looking stuff with different people wearing the sombrero as they filtered through my house, and then I could combine them all into something kind of interesting. Well let me just tell you know, it's hard to make a sombrero look gritty. They don't take well to low key photography, and again, I couldn't find a good background to shoot on. Again, I got frustrated and I tore it down.


After two failed set-ups, I just needed a picture. I figured I'd using my posing doll, it'd be easier to shoot an inanimate object than a person, right? Well even the doll wasn't cooperating, and while I was setting him up, his head fell off. So after ten minutes of miniature screwdrivers and fighting with a weird spring system, I had him reassembled. I threw the sombrero on the ground and put the posing figure on top and took the damn picture. Then I went and celebrated the holiday.

I love taking pictures, but sometimes you just have to throw your hands up in the air and admit defeat. Lord knows I'll be taking pictures tomorrow, so all is not lost. 

I do think I figured out the problem, though. A lot of the time, conceptually anyway, I start with a black canvas in my mind, and then I try to build up the image using light. But this can be tricky, and trapping, because sometimes you don't want a black base, and that was the case with today. Sombreros aren't dark and mysterious, and my methods just weren't working. I read a great blog post the other day about working in the opposite way, starting from a white canvas and building down, rather than building up from black. Had I gone with a more "reductive lighting" set-up, I think today would have been much more fruitful. The fact that I learned something takes the sting out of today's crummy picture. 


On a side note, we went to the liquor store in I.V. to prepare for tonight's festivities and this is what we were greeted with as we walked through the door:




I couldn't help but laugh. You can bet that there was a serious dent in that pile the next day, too. I.V. is a silly place, I'm going to miss it.