'I absolutely love the way that light is hitting Bryant's face in the image below. It definitely is creating some interesting shadows as the light falls away and the shadows creep in. Of course, I'm definitely drawn to the catch lights in his eyes; they are part of the reason why I stop at this image each time that I look through the catalog of Bryant's images.'
The longer I work on FH, the more I have come to appreciate artists to push the boundaries and challenge the rules. I explored the theme the first time I profiled Reyj Photography's work and his images of Tomas. If someone had described Tomas to me, if completely honest, I may not have had much interest to see more. With Rey's images however, Tomas exuded a powerful sexuality, unique and compelling making Rey's images some of my all time favorites.
With the Austin photographers images of Bryant, another rule has been challenged. Often I write about the steps photographers take to connect with models to ensure they are comfortable in front the camera. As Rey shares however, there was very little connection, very little conversation for that matter, during his work with Bryant. Although incredibly professional, there was little more to their working relationship.Sometimes incredible images come without a connection between artist and model. Sometimes the connection is between a model and a camera, other times, it stems from an artists connection to a theme or concept. With these images, I think a connection was linked between Rey and the goals and objectives he had for the shoot. Having seen images of Bryant before, he knew what he wanted to accomplish. Strong portraits capitalizing on Bryant's incredible face and eyes, and a chance to use the boxing gear he had purchased for a previous Halloween. I love the results and intensity that Rey's connection to his objective created. The words below are pieces from Rey's blog entry about his shoot with Bryant. To read the entire entry, head over to Rey's site HERE:
'Since I did not have a personal connection with Bryant, I approached the shoot as an experiment. The hotel that I was staying at had a these awesome plantation style shutters on the four windows in the bedroom. I could use the shutters to direct, to a certain extent, the light where I wanted it to go as well as how much natural light flooded the bedroom. The great thing about Bryant's shoot was that it was held in the afternoon and had plenty of light to work with for some natural light portraits.'
'When I went down to San Antonio, I went with the intention of photographing Bryant as a boxer. Yeah, I had purchased a boxer costume for Halloween one year and wanted to get some additional mileage out of it. So, when I saw Bryant's image, I knew that I wanted to photograph him as a boxer. What I didn't know at the time was that Bryant was an amateur boxer and knew quite a few techniques that he was willing to go through during the shoot. So that was definitely one of the highlights from the photo shoot.'
'I love the boxing images because of the intensity of Bryant's stance and boxing pose. The poses are definitely cool in the sense that I haven't captured anything like them before. I believe that I've mentioned that in previous blog entries - I'm always interested in working with models that can bring something different to my portfolio, especially if it's unique posing. It's definitely one of the reasons why I become more ecstatic as I worked with Bryant during the boxing series. Plus, there's a sense of authenticity in the poses since he knew what he was doing as he throwing jabs and hooks as he did his shadow boxing. It was definitely cool to say the least.'
'My favorite image from the photo shoot turned out to be one that focused on Bryant's face. It's not that surprising given how my last few blog entries have been as well as the images that I have been highlighting. Anyway, I did a series of Bryant in the shower because I wanted to create something similar to the images of Porter. Plus, I like the repeating tiles in the shower of the hotel that I was staying at. I was happy that I was able to get an awesome shot from the series and that it became my favorite from the shoot.'
'I do like his facial expression in the image and the fact that he is not looking directly at the camera. I also like how the lighting pattern plays out across his face. The shadows falling just on the right side of his nose but stopping before reaching his eye is definitely cool. On top of that, I like how the water drops pick up the light and creates some interesting highlights around his face. It's always interesting to work with models and water.
Again, I love being able to capture details in my images. While I love the lighting and pose, I absolutely love the fact that I was able to capture the water drops on his face as well as the the ones in his goatee. I go love how the light plays across the texture of his skin along his forehead as well as his lips. I'm always interesting in seeing those details in images instead of seeing skin completely smoothed out.'
