A Post With No Name

From a fairly early age, I knew I had creative and artistic aspirations. I also knew I couldn't sketch, draw, paint, or sculpt worth a damn. I tried music-- first with a trumpet and, later, the organ and electric keyboards. Alas, I wasn't particularly musical. Besides, I already figured whatever artistic talents I might possess or develop resided in visual media.

Then, when I was twelve years of age, my father presented me with a special and exciting gift: a Yashica Penta J 35mm SLR camera. Dad didn't give me this camera because he was keenly aware of my artistic desires, he gave it to me because he thought I needed a hobby. The fact that I already had some hobbies, like fishing and other sports, didn't seem to matter to my Dad. I guess he figured another hobby wouldn't hurt, especially as I entered the dread, teen years.

Regardless, it was a present that changed the course of my life and, somehow and some way, I knew that cameras would be tools I'd be working with throughout the course of my lifetime.

I can't say I ever suspected where my photographic journey would lead me and I'm pretty sure it hasn't finished leading me to wherever it still might go. It's already taken me to some interesting places. When I was in high school, for instance, if anyone had told me that, one day, I would routinely be photographing beautful, naked, women, and being paid to do so, I would have thought them, uhh... what do the Brits say? Balmy?

Today, as I go about my job of shooting pretty girls (always 18 years of age and older I should add) I sometimes find less and less satisfaction in it. This condition has nothing to do with pretty naked women becoming tiresome to my eyes or boring as subjects in front of my lens. It has more to do with the style in which I often capture them. Everyone is answerable to someone and in my case, probably your's as well, it's answerable to whomever is writing the checks. The check-writers have certain expectations and those expectations don't usually include experimentation or pursuing "art" on their dime. They don't want art. They want craft. They want skill. They want what they want and what they want isn't always what I want... to shoot, that is. Again, I'm not talking about the subjects I shoot as much as the style and manner in which I capture those subjects.

I spend some time, probably less than I should, shooting for free, for fun, for the heck of it. I love shooting. Make that, I love shooting women. For me, the female form is the most beautiful thing in the world. It captivates, it excites, it arouses, and no matter how often I look upon a beautiful and shapely woman's sumptuous form, it never ceases to awaken something primal and earthy and, as far as I'm concerned, completely natural in me.

I don't believe there's anything wrong or, as some people think, perverted in this. To my way of thinking, it's a completely natural male response. How a man behaves and conducts himself is the deciding factor that might or might not register on society's Perv Meter or, at least, that's how it should be. And I'm good at masking both my cerebral and primitive responses, as well as the physical sensations it awakens. Models, once they've become somewhat experienced working with photographers, develop a keenly accurate Pervdar and it would be a rare and unusual situation for my presence to start blipping away on some model's Pervdar screen.

All this doesn't mean I necessarily and, as a rule, want to photograph women as angelic figures on pedestals or Goddess-like. Sometimes I do and sometimes I don't. And I don't simply want to shoot them purely as sex objects which, often enough, the check-writers require me to do. Frankly, I don't have a problem with that. And I also don't have a problem photographically objectifying sex and the women who are the object of that sexual objectification. Is doing so such a bad thing? Okay, I'm sure a few feminists have a problem with it as well as those with certain religious convictions. But, hey! We're guys, right?

Men's natural desires for women are complex. Those desires take many forms. Sometimes I enjoy, as an example, exploring (photographically, of course) some of the darker sides of the myriad of ways in which men's desires for women manifests itself. What's wrong with that? Beats me.

You might be wondering if this blog entry has a point. I'm wondering that myself. I'm simply going with the flow with some thoughts I'm having and, honestly, I'm not sure where it's going or if it's even going anywhere for that matter. Maybe it's already run its course? Maybe it's just some words to go with some pictures? Maybe it's just some blogging form of pseudo-intellectual masturbation? I really don't know. You try writing this stuff everyday.

Katie is the model in the images accompanying this post. She was fun to work with and provided some welcomed respite from the stuff I usually shoot.