Portraits, part 1 ... by Edward

 I almost broke the camera, but only for a second. Being the tallest, Matt ended up holding the light thingy (flashgun maybe?) for most of the day, though the rest of us managed standing on a chair quite well.

 

 

And of course we were entertained throughout by Orlando The Dog, who posed magnificently, even if I did end up with quite a few nose shots.

Making The Cut ... by Edward

Photos have been taken, cropped, edited and printed and now laid out across the table we've been making the cull: keeping our favourites and ruthlessly removing anything not up to scratch.

It was a tricky process of first finding themes and connections between eleven different people's photos, all very different in style, all coming at the queer in brighton project from different angles, and then selecting from these the ones that worked best, the ones we loved.

There was, of course, quite a bit of disagreement. Some photos were removed and returned to the keeping this pile a few times before the end of the day. And it was tricky partly because we don't know yet what the photos are going to sit beside, what the text will be, how the page will be laid out, even what size they will appear in the book. But we picked from instinct. What grabbed us, what said something.

Third week already! ... by Edward

Bursting with ideas this week. Not all of them good. Some of them too big of course! How many costumes am I planning on buying for this project? How much new camera equipment? Stop that, I don’t need that. Must remember to keep it simple.

I have started to think about themes of identity and self and representation. Kinda big themes but also nice and open. I’ve got lots of room to explore those things. Lots of ideas, so I reckon I'll just see how they pan out. Take the photos and come back to them later and see what I’ve got. Take them all along to the group and see what the others make of them. It is very easy to edit your ideas in your head until you end up with nothing left.

This week’s theme: family. In our first session we all talked about "friends as family" in the queer community. So I'm thinking about that, and thinking about my own family too.
Who do I call "my family"?
And why?