In the spring semester of last school year I took one of my favorite classes to date. Basketball. When we were doing a drill, I had two guys throw the ball to me at once. I caught one with my hands and one with my face. My glasses broke right down the side completely cracked. So several months later now, of course, I headed into the store downtown to see about repair or new frames. The woman helping me with my new frames was extraordinarily wonderful to work with me on my adventure to new glasses. Just earlier that afternoon I was assigned to photograph a stranger and here I was with a nice young lady who I thought might be able to help me out. I posed the question and she says..,"now!?" With reluctance, she agreed to be photographed. I learned a little bit about her while we shopped. Her name is Rachel and she certainly has a keen eye for fashion flair. I didn't want to ask her her age, seeing as that is just generally polite to stay away from. We mostly talked about different designers and tv shows like project runway and America's Next Top Model. I think this experience was mostly a lesson in how to create comfort with an unfamiliar subject. I made sure not to take out the camera even after she agreed. We just kept talking about everything else. I started to divulge things about my majors and what I like about photography. I talked especially about all the little ads they have set up around the store and just how difficult it must be to do lighting for a glasses advertisement. This was one strategy I had to gain her confidence that I know what I'm doing. The next was to actually show her the camera and take pictures of other objects around the store and show her what they looked like so she could get a sense of my work. I was also trying to gather photos that set the mood for the encounter like this:
I showed her this photo and she said, "it looks better than real life!" I figured she was getting more comfortable with me and she must have been because she started making some suggestions for what might look cool. She must have read my mind for suggesting the next shot.
While Rachel answered the phone, I tried to find something that could really show the essence of the shop. There is a large chandelier in the room and I thought it would be perfect. The store is filled with elegant yet modern leather sofas and chairs as well as crazy designs on everything, even the coasters. It works well when you're promoting brands like D&G, Vera Wang, Kenneth Cole, and Michael Kors.
We went and made some final decisions on the frames I would like to get. New glasses can always be so exciting, but I think I'll just be sticking with the same old style. If someone lets me photograph them like this, I usually like to give them a copy of one of the prints just to maybe thank them for their time somehow. I was particularly grateful for Rachel to allow a stranger to take her photo. Can't wait to head back in soon.
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