Katie Toupin

Explanation Part 2, second picture. While I definitely could've tacked this picture into the last post, I felt like this picture deserved its own post and I wanted to deep dive into it more. This is mostly because while I was going through the roll, this picture caught my eye instantly and I really wanted to try to express all the reasons why I felt like it caught me off guard.

It's definitely the case that, as I mentioned in an earlier post, this roll caught me off guard by how many nice pictures I felt I took. However, a few pictures really struck me and this is one of them.

At a glance I feel like it might be relatively obvious why I thought this picture in particular felt a bit special. It's both really clear and simple, yet it also has a lot of complexity in it and I want to try to unpack that incongruity.

Before I really start unpacking this picture I do want to say that during this entire set, this was the image I was trying to capture, so I'm really happy it turned out as well as it did. What I mean by that is that I knew what place I needed to stand to take this picture quite early in the show and knew roughly what kind of lighting conditions I wanted, as well as the positions of both the guitarist and Katie. It just didn't line up for the majority of the set. I want to say I waited about a minute or two eye to the viewfinder waiting for this moment. It was pretty late into the set so I knew I wanted to give it one more shot to get this picture since I knew I hadn't quite put myself in the right place and opportunity to get this.

Anyways, let's unpack the picture itself. Obviously the dual subjects is a nice structure that lends some level of complexity to it. The coloring on Katie is happening because of a strong magenta light to her right at roughly the same angle as the blue light behind her. The magenta and blue lights can be seen on the guitarist as well as a subtle coloring on his face.

The focus is clearly drawn closer towards the guitarist who is mostly clear besides a bit of blur from his fingers moving and playing. The drums and Katie are both a bit out of focus but still very readable.

In terms of lighting, this picture is metered as if the bright blue light behind Katie doesn't exist. This requires making sure she's occluding the majority of that light otherwise it'll blow out a significant part of the frame, see the Parker Chapin post or some of the other pictures for examples. It's also nice to see the guitar itself occlude and cut off some of the light for a bit of an interesting effect. This wasn't necessarily intended but is more a function of where he's standing in the frame.

In terms of grain, this is where I think that optimal level of graininess comes in. For a digital picture in broad daylight you expect no grain and the optimal level should be none. For a film picture in lower light conditions, this is a really nice sweet spot. Obviously this is a bit less in my control as its a function of the film itself and the development process, but it's worth noting. I also think that unlike the kind of degradation that digital ISO can create, this is a very smooth grain that doesn't detract from the picture at all.

Largely, Katie's role here is to act as a contrast. She's pretty harshly lit, appearing entirely magenta which obviously isn't a natural to the eye look. However, in this picture she serves to, as mentioned before, block the bright blue light in the back, but also draw the eye back and forth between herself and the guitarist. As a viewer, you're enticed to look past what's clearly in focus up front and pull more towards the "back" of the picture. As strange as she appears, when contrasted with something more normal, it elicits the question, "why does she appear this way?" If the entire picture was just her lit in that manner, I'm not sure that question would matter as much. Equally so if she weren't in the picture at all.

Overall, this picture is a really exciting one to me. It maps a clear idea and image I had in my mind to a concrete picture, one that while it isn't exactly what I thought when I took the picture is perhaps more interesting than I originally imagined. I like the amount of nuance it has and the complexity of it lying beneath its relatively simple structure and construction. That said, I want to continue taking more and different pictures. Consistency may be key to making something a living but experimentation is the key to growth and change. Ultimately, I love knowing that with the way I imagine and perceive things that this is a picture I can take. But I want to take the pictures I can't yet imagine or perceive too. There'll be time yet to be more consistent.