Polaroid Portraits with Lou Noble

This is a guest post by PolaCon attendee Lou Noble.

Everyone is performing all the time. With each other, at home, in front of the mirror, it’s all performance.

What I endeavor to do with my photography is interrupt that performance, to elicit from my subjects, for the camera, something my subjects did not intend to give me.

I tell them this, as I see a photo session as a collaborative endeavor. I then employ various tools and tricks to create that interruption. Anything from having them jump around, to having them shake their heads back and forth, to punching me as hard as they possibly can (anywhere but the face ((money-maker)), the camera ((picture-maker)) or the groin ((baby-maker)) is acceptable).

That is the reasoning behind how and why I take the pictures I do.

But for you, my fair reader, you may want to take different kinds of portraits. You may want to elicit a different reaction that you can then document with your camera.

For that, I have four steps that comprise something I call The Noble Method, because I get a kick out of it, and my last name is cool.

1) Self-interrogation. Look at all of your photos! As this is an instant film society website, I hope your photos are Polaroids. Spread them out on the floor in front of you, bathe in them! Within them are the seeds of your style. Find the patterns, the visuals you are repeatedly drawn to. Look for your obsessions, your pre-occupations. Once you’ve identified them, it’s time for step 2!

2) Repetition. Those pre-occupations and obsessions and visuals you’ve found repeated in your work? Now it’s time to create those On Purpose. Again and again and again.Take those photos only, excluding all others, until that melange of pre-occupations, obsessions, visual flourishes become front and center in each and every photo you take. May take days. Weeks. Months. It will come. And once it does, once your Style has emerges, it’s time for step 3.

3) Communication. Now that you’ve figured out what you want in a portrait, now that you’ve figured out how to get that, let your subject know! This step often runs in tandem with step two because repetition of certain portraits requires the participation of the portraiture subject. Talk with your subjects, take an interest in them, allow that to influence the photo session. Once you have become comfortable with this (and this may take some time, many of us photographers are introverts by our very nature), it’s on to step 4.

4) Competition. Ah, this one is grand. Compete with yourself! Your best pictures, how can you do better? Compete with your friends! They’re fun photographers, how can you photograph something they’ve already taken pictures of, but in a way that is unique to you?

Most fun of all? COMPETE WITH YOUR ENEMIES. DEFEAT THEM…ARTISTICALLY. Learn from the things in their work you dislike, use that knowledge in your own photography!

Once you’ve gone through these steps…DO IT AGAIN. Make them part of your artistic practice, draw on them whenever you feel stuck or trapped or stymied. Have fun with the process, the process, that’s you being ALIVE. The pictures Will turn out better, whatever Better means for you, but don’t forget, this is all in service to having a grand time with your life.

GO FORTH AND HAVE A GRAND TIME!

All images by Lou Noble.