February Photo Essay

February has been a month of artistic experimentation for me. The university that I attend is still holding a fully online semester, and zoom classes have been slowly killing my creative and intellectual drive. So, I made it a point this month to play with different techniques that I am not so familiar with in film photography. 

Long-exposure photography became my conquest that for this photo essay. Although some of the photos didn’t come out as planned, I learned immensely from the experience of trying something new. With film photography, in particular, you don’t really know how your photo is going to look like until you get the scanned images of them in the future. Also, long-exposure photography involves using a long-duration shutter speed while elements of the image are blurring or moving, a technique I do not use in my photos. 

As a young artist, it is imperative that one tries out different mediums and techniques to challenge the artistic talent that one already possesses. Even though trying new things can be daunting and almost frustrating, one doesn’t need to produce the perfect thing, but rather something that they are inspired to show. I get inspired by things that make me feel exhilarated and captivated. Before COVID, finding inspiration in my daily life was simpler. This past year has been an interesting one for artists as they have to pull from past inspiration or conjure new inspiration from the mundanities of their lives. Like most artists these days, I became obsessed with long-exposure photography, specifically portraits, by going down a rabbit hole on Pinterest. In the grand scheme of finding inspiration, artists really just grab and cling to aesthetics that they discover from creators before them and ultimately make one certain technique personal to their story and motives.