A Small Conversation on At-Home Photography
No, no. I will not give advice on how to shoot the perfect Instagram post while you are chilling on your couch. Consider this as a gallery of what has been done for the last couple of months (the writer realizes that ‘the last couple of months’ is about to add up to a year. gasp.). Or at least a grasp of what I have seen on my feed, on the sites, on my gallery, etc.
I am not one who likes to share much on social media. Yet, I travel (was traveling. These in-parentheses writings are starting to make me sad.) a lot within the boundaries of my city. And as I discover a scene that is worthwhile to time-capsule into my memory card, I would just hit that button that makes my phone go “click.” Sometimes it was a silhouette of a friend, sometimes a pair of old Levi’s filled with soil and used as a wallflower. Yet, the thing to notice is that these moments were either aesthetic coincidences within friend meet-ups that I didn’t want to forget or things that I happened to see while wandering on the street that I would probably vaguely recall if I hadn’t shot. Now, that I don’t have the option to sail beyond an approximately 1 km radius of my apartment, having those discoveries got harder. That’s when I started to dig deep into my home.
Apparently, it is not only me who turned her head inside the four walls. At-home photoshoots are getting increasingly popular -or, perhaps they were already popular. Whichever way you want to believe. Decreasing the number of crew members and allowing people to stay in-doors, it is definitely the safest choice of this virus-ruled era.
The shoots I’ve seen usually consist of one to two models and home-departed props. The majority of the compositions focus on the beauty of our homes, on how much more we can do at our homes, or on the basic chores of daily life, as most of the artists are currently revolving around these topics. The rest are again the appreciation of home life, yet in a more artistically composed way.
At first, it was hard for me to find things that were worth shooting. I played with shadows on empty, monochromatic walls. Then, I tried placing the aesthetic-enough objects that I discovered in the closed doors of wardrobes into a composition of cacophony. Later, I dressed up and used myself as the focus object. I tried shooting the sky. The people I see from my window. The park. The bird that nested on the balcony… The list goes on. I definitely kept myself busy, definitely trained my mind to find something worthwhile to look at in the borders of home. I am happy that I am somewhat developed in Photoshop.
However, would I trade the outdoor shooting? Nope.
nOPE.
Thumbnail image via Su Karaca
