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03.09.2018
There's a weird dynamic in the case of traveling as a photographer. I'd like to believe that photographing one's city that they've been familiar with is completely different than traveling to a place where the culture can be different. There can be subtleties that link a common ground between these locations, but the differences are distinct to notice.
In other words, how I see San Francisco is different because I grew up in the Bay Area and I am more aware of the history and inner workings of the cultures, subcultures, and sub-subcultures within that context. If someone were to visit San Francisco then they would clearly see it differently. They wouldn't know that you aren't supposed to call it "San Fran" or even worse, "Frisco". Not unless you want to be seen as a dork, or something. That's your own prerogative.
As such, traveling to New York to help capture photos and video for my friends, JR and Dulce, in preparation for their wedding, was something that I've always wanted to do. I'll post their photos together under the commissioned tab once their wedding is done in May. We had decided to take a spontaneous trip, which was sort of intimidating since I rarely act on a whim (well, JR is the one that brought the idea up during one of our consultation meetings since Dulce has never experienced seeing snow before. I just had the fortune of being their videographer that follows them around, which I'm hoping this continues into their honeymoon because they're flying out to Rome. Note: this is probably unlikely).
Still, I was definitely looking forward to it, as I haven't been back since I was 10 during the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade of 2003. The only difference, aside from my age and lack of growth in height, was that I had a camera this time around. I wanted to really capture the essence of New York City the way I saw it, which, in my mind's eye was glamorized by the amount of movies and television shows I've consumed. Mind you, this is exactly why I want to emphasize that perhaps this has influenced my photos below.
On my second to last day, I had met with Victoria, a high school friend who has since moved on to the east coast to complete her masters degree which, as I'm typing this, makes me realize that she is drastically cooler than I'll ever be. We decided to reunite in a bar out in Brooklyn, which took almost three hours to get to, since the New York subway is not only difficult to navigate through, but it was going under major construction work, shutting down most of the lines leading into the borough. Needless to say, it was exhausting but it was all worth it to catch up with Victoria, or Vicky as cool friends like myself are able to call her. Vicky had given me advice to traverse my way through New York like a pro, which I had noted to her was coincidentally what I noticed through my own work during my stay there.
Compared to the vibrancy in colors of San Francisco, even during the winter, a lot of the images I captured in New York is significantly different in the attitude and sensibilities because I hypothesize that its because I chose to see it that way. I chose to highlight the colors of many of my photos to have either warm oranges or very muted fusions of grays and blues. In effect, in combination with natural lighting, there's a dramatic moodiness to a lot of the pictures, which I believed to reflect was this "don't bother me" persona that Vicky had mentioned. In a strange way, this also seems to echo a very self-reflective theme in a lot of the subjects that I photographed. I like to read the message as this very self-reliant spunk that is true to how I experienced New York, but I'm sure someone who grew up there can attest that maybe this isn't the case. Regardless, this trip was my first big creative outing for the year, and I look forward for more opportunities to come to get out of the Bay Area and explore more. Maybe North Dakota is next. No one my age really thinks about traveling to North Dakota for fun.
I do.