More Than a Pose

I have an unquenchable passion for human and animal body language. I love to watch it around me, observe the fluctuation in self, as well as capture it by lens. It's an expression far more expansive than words. It describes reaction and feeling in a raw intuitive way that if caught on camera can tell impacting stories. I feel as though I am just getting to know myself, at the same time have had to face a lot of complexities within my personality that I am slowly getting the hang of how present the expression in an art form. Modeling is a hands on experiment from the opposite angle of my first love, photography.


(taken August 16th, 2008. )


I have a couple of shoots coming up that I am very excited about. Mainly because I grow more confident to be more vulnerable with acting out my expressions each time that I shoot. The above shot of me was one of the first professional situations I had encountered. At the same time, the photographer Jorge Benjamin, became my mentor and friend. He taught me how to gage and predict the angle of the camera from my prospective by thinking in grid form, similar to the game battleship. This mathematical way of attack, presents the body from the most flattering angle. He challenged me to study my structure from 360 degrees, understand my physical/mental strengths and weaknesses, as well as to learn how present myself in the industry, in a serious no B.S. don't mess with me type of way.


(taken August 15th, 2008)


For my first shoot with Jorge, I was in prime physical shape. Primarily because I had just completed a long distance bike trip from Portland Oregon, to Corvallis the previous week, (About 81.3 miles.) I approached the two days with Jorge with an open mind and raw energy, as it was a completely new experience for me.



Jorge introduced me to Gabriel Choy, executive producer of Seattle Fashion Week. This was a move that would open a plethora of new opportunities and doors in the industry. Gabe and I clicked right away. I felt like a giddy little kid whenever we'd talk and we became close buddies almost immediately. I spent just about every weekend the last part of March and close to all of April in Seattle for Fashion mixers, local fashion shows, and the biggest of these, Seattle Fashion week. Gabe introduced me and let me loose into rooms full of photographers, models, and designers. It was up to me to "sell myself" and present myself as a serious up and coming model/photographer. I made business cards and planted many collaborative seeds amongst the local fashion scene. The pace and excitement of these two months put a momentum in my heart that has yet to stop.



Below was a mug shot that Gabe took of me for fashion week, the raw runway, and one of the many shots taken on the runway.







The newest challenge I present to myself is something I am calling "energy modeling." Sex sells in this society; sexual vibes and innuendos are the majority of what you see in advertisement. We so often forget about the power of every other vibe and emotion to get our point across. First of all, the idea of consumerism and corporate America disgusts me, but we will save that for another post as I am focusing on the art of modeling here. I would like to incorporate my fascination of emotion through body language in raw form in my next shoots. This is basically acting without words, captured in the 1/30th of a second that explains or at least makes you question why the subject is feeling and acting out in this way.




"Emotions, by their very nature, do not follow fixed rules…..they just happen, based on what a person feels at a given moment of time. And likewise, there’re no fixed rules for capturing emotions, too. The same scene can evoke different emotions in different people, hence emotions are subject to personal bias. From my experience, my best pictures depicting emotion have ‘just happened’. I don’t remember meticulously planning for them. Does that mean the photographer has no role to play in this? Far from true. As far as I'm concerned, the one most important rule of capturing emotion is to first feel the emotion yourself. Then, you have to click at just the right moment." Article by photographer Jitesh


I am learning to predict emotion through observation. My present specimen is self, and how my own reactions and emotions are caught on film. Through this, I am able to compare how I was feeling in that moment to what it looks like to the eye of the beholder once printed. This has much to do with timing and predicting; Measurement and intuition. This practice then helps me predict when to press the shutter in my own photography, to capture the essence of the situation person place or thing.


An amazing model models from the heart out. What is captured in the eyes are the soul. It is much beyond a hollow clothes hanger. Many people can become fit, some people have a great bone structure, few people have nice hair, skin, and model proportions, very few people have all of that plus a large heart with much depth. I can see why too. Often, beauty is a mask. It's easy to fall into the idea that all people care to see from you is exterior beauty, especially in this industry. The key is letting your spirit shine through that sets you apart. I never want to forget that.