One Man Band Man | Becoming the Subject and the Shooter During Quarantine
Tools: Canon 7D camera. Calvin Klein tee. Apple box. Levi’s jeans. Manfrotto tripod. Beat-the-hell-up Authentic Vans sneakers. Fourth Floor Los Angeles Garage Light. Stance socks. Tom Ford glasses.
Around of the middle of the summer, I got pretty bummed out. Like I’m sure y’all did, I had big plans for 2020. Creative ones. By July nationwide stay-at-home mandates kept us in for months already and all of the projects—short films, photo shoots, brand packages…—I booked as lead producer had officially transitioned from “indefinitely postponed” to an almost laughable “Let’s revisit next year.” As marketing budgets dried up and production money sank, I was thankful that my journo and copywriting background earned me invites to make key contributions to campaigns for Nike Los Angeles and Valence. Still, I felt stagnant, as if my other make-stuff muscles and skills were atrophying. So I did something I don’t think I’ve done in ages, maybe decades: Pouted and moped.
“The ‘Rona won’t let me be great!” I thought from the couch. After my moment, I decided to be my own team and subject. Inspired by GQ’s Robert Pattinson cover (Batman shot the pics himself), I ordered a remote for one of my Canons so I could do the same. Since then, I’ve been “location scouting” all over my apartment complex, finding spaces to take photos and record myself, then loading the footage into Adobe Premiere or Photoshop to edit. The images in this post are from the first day I tried, a quickie garage shoot I did while my daughter napped. I threw some clothes on and split.
This set should be called Let’s See How This Shit Goes… Folks were parking their cars and looking at me crazy. “Don’t mind me,” I *should have* said. “I’m just taking very elaborate selfies to scratch an itch. Carry on.” Instead, I’d sheepishly pull out my phone and fake like I was waiting for someone else to arrive, then restart when the coast was clear.
Like Pharrell says on “Freq,” “You gotta go inward.” These self-shoots allowed me to explore myself and my confidence is growing in unique ways. I’m not getting a check for the work, but I definitely think these feels are better than the cash I deposit at Chase. I can’t wait till we’re all vaccined up and I can create freely with my squad. Until then, me, myself and I are like ’07 Swizz Beatz: One Man Band Man. More to come…