Now that May has officially started and I am exactly one week away from the end of my French and Philosophy degree I thought it was high time that I write up some things that ive learn over the past few months and in general the four years. Between essays, translation assignments and the vast amounts of socialising one has to do before they leave University I have somehow still found time to take photos and bag myself a contract to take some architectural photos based around the Church system in the city of Edinburgh. But more on that later....
Exhibition
At the end of March I had the honour of putting on a lil exhibition for a weekend at the great WhiteSpace 76 in Edinburgh. The exhibition was a multimedia experience where people could come in and not only see the photos and read the stories of the people involved in the 102 Days Project so far, but also listen to the soundtracks the participants picked to go with their stories. This was made possible with the custom creation of Spotify codes and an hour or so of gluing and sticking home made information cards together whilst watching re runs of New Girl.
The weekend's success was beyond anything I could imagine. The opening night filled with good spirits, fun stories and a great bunch of people. A steady flow of people would arrive one by one into the gallery throughout the Saturday and the Sunday, this allowed for some great conversations with strangers and some lovely compliments for the work on the walls. My favourite comment was from a lady who said to me, " You've got something here, its important " .
So thank you t everyone that attended and to everyone who let me take their photo and ask them a lot of questions about their lives without any filter. I love doing it and I am excited to take the project to its next physical and metaphorical location very very soon.
All photos below provided by the wonderful India
Events
There has been no shortage of events In this final semester at University. A last second call out to photograph a halfway Vet ball at the start of the year was surprisingly very fun. It allowed me to use my newly purchased X-Pro 2 and a direct flash which gave me some Met Gala/ Oscars after party look images of very drunk students in a reconverted wine cellar.
A massive charity ball and then a two time return trip to my favourite ceilidh venue amounted to 10 hours of hardcore photography work in the middle of dissertation hand in season. But all these started after 6pm, and i don't touch an essay or assignment after 4pm so that was ok for me ( Self care is key <3) . One of these events involved me cutting up some freshly printed off raffle tickets for half an hour a so. A task which for many people may see menial but for a dyspraxic like me who hasn't touched crafting scissors in four years it was akin to literally being part of squid game. If I messed up one cut, the raffle ticket would be lost and with it the chance to win a signed book on paleontology or a massive geological map of Scotland.
One thing I can take away from all this ceilidh work is that I now know every ceilidh dance and where to stand to capture them and most importantly how to quicky doge past very fast people swinging each other around a a dance floor.
Whats Next ?
Well I would be lying to you if I knew exactly what I was doing in 6 months time, the job market is fun for a humanities and languages graduate and I have been rejected twice by the same library in Paris. What I do know is that on the 14th June I will be jetting of solo to America to do a bit of sightseeing along the east coast seeing friends and continuing the project over there. I have applied to some jobs in Edinburgh that are to do with photography and then some jobs in European cities that I think I'm qualified for, but will be proven wrong probably very soon. Currently I have one event left to do and a commissioned project documenting churches in the city which I am really enjoying enjoying.
Photography is still my passion, if I can do it full time professionally then I will. Being freelance is hard as the employment is sporadic, there was one week where i made £1000 and then two months where i made nothing this past year. It's not all about the money though, I've made some amazing friends and business partners since taking this up seriously 4 years ago. We learn together share tips and clients and just in general have created a very supportive community between ourselves. So if you're reading this and need a couple of wedding photographers or any kind of photographers for that matter we are always on call. Kinda like batman, except we don't work much at night because natural light is key and AA batteries for flash guns are expensive.
It was an honour to be able try and create a physical representation of how my brain works through the exhibition, I hope it gave you some fun little experiments to do involving picking a playlist and seeing what you can see in the world around you whilst listening to a song.
The song I was listening to when this self portrait was taken was This is the life by Amy Macdonald.
Keep creating and pointing out cute moments to each other
I'll see you down the road
tom
x
