State of the Union - June 2016 - Featuring Hada Pixie

June 25, 2016

So the last time I did one of these posts it was back in September of last year. Upon reviewing it I realized that a lot has changed since then. Figured it was about time to go back and catch everyone up on the last few months and give a temperature check on where things are at.

Also, it gives me a good opportunity to share a few photos that I have been sitting on for a couple of weeks now. But first, the update.

Back in January, I moved out of my old apartment, leaving it and my studio space behind. It's been a bit of a challenge trying to find places to work. But due to some help and inspiration from a few different books, I am making things happen. Earlier in the year, I also linked up with a new business partner, who is slowly but surely working her way into the UNEX ecosystem. Soon I hope she will completely take over my booking process and begin writing and contributing her own work here to the Blog. We are making great process to moving onto bigger and better things.

2016 so far has been a busy one. I'm not shooting as much as I was last year with the 52 rolls project, but what I am doing has kept me very busy. Between the day job and my efforts here I am averaging 60+ hour weeks, and as of the time of writing this update I am going on day 50-something with only having had 3.5 "days off" in that time. But don't take this as complaining. I'm very excited for what is to come.

So what have I been working on lately? I tend to have a pretty good track record with keeping everyone in the loop as shoots happen. My friends over at Finite Automata and Ecto Proxy have kept me busy covering concerts, and of course, some of my old favorite models have stepped up and provided me with enough work to keep more than busy. But now I'd like to announce a few shoots that have kinda flown under the radar:

Right now Hada Pixie and I have three photo sets currently active over on Zivity (shameless plug, I always have 30 day free trials available, so email me to get one for yourself) one of which, "Stay Golden" was rated as an Editor's Choice!

Of course, I'm not going to spoil any of our photos from the sets in the blog here (Ahem, did I mention I'm giving away free 30 day trials?), but I'm happy to share a few of my selects that didn't "make the cut".

You may remember the photo below if you follow me on social media.

This was an image that didn't make the cut for our set "In the Sink" and below is a photo from "Stay Golden" that I talked about above.

Look at that golden sunlight? Pretty awesome right? I am kinda happy to admit that this shot was taken at like 4:00 in the afternoon, with sunset nowhere in sight. I've been growing so much in between shoots. Fully committing to my 2016 goal of "Learn More".

Pixie and I still have a few shoots we are holding in reserve, but I am able to give another sneak peek. During the same shooting day, we decided to document some custom latex work from Queen's Arrow Latex. These photos haven't yet been released into the wild, and more shall be forthcoming. Also, keep your eyes open for some more collaboration with Queen's Arrow coming soon (maybe? probably? call me!)..

So that's it for now. As always thanks for checking in and keeping up on what I've been doing. If you want to book a shoot of your own make sure to drop me an email from my contact page and let's talk about making something happen!

2015: A Year in Review

December 29, 2015

So here we are, Another year in the books. And like every year I just want to take a few minutes and share with everyone my favorite 5 images I have taken this year. This list will probably have more than a few "runners up" as well.

2015 was a year in which I decided to get back to the basics and start fresh. At the end of last year I was a little burned out with my lack of creativity, and my goal for this last year was simply to "shoot more" which I did in spades. See the 52 rolls blog for more information. My original goal was to not pick up a digital camera at all, which I failed, but instead of counting it as a failure...I'm going to instead call the work that came from a digital medium a huge success. Re-shooting on film has caused me to slow down (as I hoped it would) and I ended up with a few great shots!

So without further ado, and in no particular order. Here are my favorite 5 shots from 2015.

I met Bri through another model I worked with this year. After seeing what Morgan and I were able to create she jumped at the chance for us to work together. This shot was taken very quickly as the sun was going down. And the effect that the lighting had, combined with her posing worked out very well to create the image that I had in my mind.

Hada Pixie is no stranger to this blog. After meeting her around 2011 while working with a lot of other talented photographers and models during "Beautiful Darkness" we have off and on worked together in many projects for Zivity. A trend that I hope continues on into the future. This was shot as a bonus to one of our Zivity sets, and in all honesty I liked it better than some of the other images that came out of that shoot.

I shot like a madman at DragonCon this year. But most importantly I had the lovely chance to work with Atlanta's own "team tank" (which also were my gracious roommates during the long weekend). My third Con and probably my favorite so far. These folks provided me a lot of great opportunities to shoot, laugh, and enjoy myself to such an extreme level.

Along with Team Tank, another one of my Con roommates was Nikki Nuke'm. Shortly after the release of Fallout 4 this year Nikki decided to let her inner vault dweller out into the world, and we captured this image among many. My only regret was not snapping a horizontal image of this one, but even the image I was able to capture I am in love with.

My final official favorite image from the year comes from working with Finite Automata. They saw my work and wanted some new photos for their press kit. After taking time to decorate a basement into a working set, we were able to snap a few great photos, including this one which ended up being one of my favorites for the year.

But of course I can't stop there, 2015 also brought on many great opportunities and even more wonderful people that I worked with. There are so many that I can't name or post from everyone here. But don't fret, I want to let everyone I shot this year know that I appreciate the time you spent with me, and I hope that we were able to create something awesome in the process!

"Titan Addams" was the first set I ever shot on a digital full frame camera (surprise I know). I loved how the tones came out, and that bokeh. Hope to see more come from Titan and I in 2016.

Stan, Justin, and Cody all helped me back to back while I was working the kinks out of my DIY black background. You can find more of that in an earlier Extra blog post.

Blix, Stevhan, and K all stepped up to the challenge when I needed to keep the 52 rolls project alive. Also a big thank you to Clockwork Calamity and Caprica Song. Clockwork and I did some great work for Zivity this year (hopefully more to come), and Caprica worked very hard for a spot in Poisonous Pinups magazine! So be sure to keep your eyes open for that very soon.

I definitely can't forget Ilker and the rest of the team at REGen Magazine. Thank you for allowing me to cover a few great shows this year, and an even bigger thank you for publishing my photos in the mag. So happy to have been a part of your culture in 2015.

And finally, as much as I hate to end this year on a down note. I wanted to share a photo of my fluffy cat. Although she is no longer in my life, she was a big part of keeping me together in 2015. She may have only been in my life for about three years, but I miss her dearly. I'm happy to know she is in a better place and no longer in pain. <3

Sorry if I missed anyone. I've been trying to put this blog post together for the last month or so, but couldn't decide which images I wanted to show. Thank you again to everyone I worked with, and everyone I have yet to work with. Here's to 2016!

Week 26 – I Hope These Turn Out – Fuji Superia X-Tra 400 (+1 Stop) (Exhausted C41 Chemicals?)

September 25, 2015

Pixie from last week also introduced me to Clockwork Calamity (Zivity profile, still just as NSFW as last week). And we had a great shoot (albeit very bright and sun-hurty) where she was cosplaying as Black Canary (Set totally should be live on Zivity if you wanted to throw me a few votes ;) ).

Seeing as how I have been having a hard time getting models to work with, I wanted to make sure I snatched up the opportunity to get some more people into the blog. The sad, and very unfortunate thing is I really should have taken my own thoughts to heart in "week 24" and bought new C41 chemicals. The negatives turned out SUPER thin (or at least look that way before scanning them). I'm not sure if I will get anything that remotely looks like the correct colors out of this roll.

As I'm prepping this blog post I am about to purchase more, so hopefully my Dragoncon photos (Spoiler Alert...they start NEXT WEEK!) will be processed much better. Also we are up to 41 rolls as of this update!

(Ninja Edit: Yep. It was totally the chemicals. The DragonCon Color photos turned out great!)

Ninja edit: Excuse my language, but HOLY SHIT. I bashed on Photoshop for the longest time and seriously saw it as a crutch and not a tool. But after seeing what I was able to recover from these images I am seriously impressed. I bet someone much more skilled than I could have even done a better job. I mean, look at what came out of my scanner from these:

I guarantee you they look worse in "person". I'm willing to accept the loss in sharpness that I had to take in order to get rid of the scanning artifacts in order to rescue even a few of these images. Especially considering I was trying for a result more like this (taken on my digital camera):

Development Notes:
Unicolor C41 Kit - Probably exhausted

Week 25 – Hada Pixie: Flexible (BTS and Outtakes) – Ilford Delta 100

September 18, 2015

These images were taken at the same time a friend of mine, and professional model, Hada Pixie and I were working together this weekend. Pixie and I met at an arrange photo shoot event many years ago when I was still new to Atlanta. We exchanged contact information then, but it wasn't until almost 2 years later that we finally shot together for the first time.

Typically when Pixie and I work together it's for a website named Zivity where photographers and models work together to create photosets and ultimately make a little bit of money in the process. I'm not exactly sure when this set will go live (it very well may be by the time this hits the blogs) but be sure to check out some of the work we have done at zivity.com/photographers/UNEXPhotography Please note that anything past that link should be considered NSFW for naked parts. This blog entry on the other hand...should be completely fine.

Development Notes:
Stand Developed 1:100 Dilution Rodinal
1 Hour, 30 Seconds of Agitation at start.
Standard Fix

State of the Union – September 2015

September 16, 2015

Wow. 2015 so far has been a wild ride. It has had its fair share of ups and downs, and I'd like to take a few moments to update everyone on what has been going on. This is going to be a wordy one, so please bear with me and at least skim through.

First: If you are new here to UNDEREXPOSED: Alternative Photography, welcome. I am just a pretty regular guy with a passion for taking photos of things that by most standards people wouldn't consider "normal". I try to provide the best content I can on a regular basis for all of you to see and enjoy. If this isn't your first time checking out the site or the blog, thank you for your support.

Second: As you can see from the screenshot above I am at week 31 of my proposed 52 rolls film project. This was designed with the idea that I would shoot a roll of film a week, for all of 2015. This project has grown beyond my wildest thoughts, and what I figured would be something I did and possibly struggled to complete has been the exact opposite. As of today I have shot 51 of my 52 roll goals. Even though the project is only on Week 30. This is mostly my fault as instead of numbering my "weeks" by roll, I in most cases, spread multiple roll weeks into their own entries. Meaning that I am well ahead of schedule. As of right now I have about 12 more rolls left in my fridge which puts me at both a loss of how to "finish" the project, and about 10 rolls short of having 52 entries (more on that in a bit). I'm going to be saying "Thanks" a lot during this peek behind the curtain, but I mean it none the less. if you haven't been following the updates up to this point please take a moment to check out the link to the blog here. And if you have, you know that for the last 9 months I have been producing weekly content for you all to view and enjoy. What would you as my audience like to see come of this project? Would you purchase a book for a reasonable price? Would you want prints? Please let me know. I have learned a lot about myself and my work (exactly what I wanted to do) and want to be able to continue moving forward.

Third: Because I had plans on doing the 52 rolls project, I wanted to take all of 2015 and have it be a "non commercial" year for me. What that means is, well, that's a longer story that I plan to delve into right now. At the end of 2013 I had the opportunity to leave my job at a well known computer company and take on a store manager position for what was proposed to me as a new concept that was going to take off. For all of 2014 I worked my ass off trying to build the business. But at the end of the year I found myself uninspired, frustrated, and tired after each day of working. I produced the least amount of work that I had completed since starting UNEX as a company, and while it wasn't "bad" work per se, it wasn't where I wanted to be. I felt that I was just going through the motions. I was just pressing the shutter and hoping something happened. I needed something to kickstart my creativity, and thus I came up with the concept of the 52 rolls project. 2015 started off with a new drive to make things, and of course, had and has been going on well. I wasn't planning on trying to monetize the project, I just wanted to have a year of doing personal work instead of paid gigs. And then I lost my job.

In March I was let go/resigned from my position as store manager, and suddenly was left trying to live on the money I had set aside (and credit cards...oh lord at the credit cards) until I found another job. My car needed repairs, and I was forced to beg and borrow money from family just to stay in Atlanta. In June I was offered a position where I had to take a significant pay cut, and am still living at a deficit every month because of that. I'm not complaining (much), things could be a lot worse (but they could also be a lot better). I started taking on odd paid gigs, smaller weddings, and just about everything I can to try and break even (you may remember this failed attempt at an advertisement I put into the world).

But throughout I have tried to separate my "art" from my "life".

Then the vet bills started coming. There is probably no doubt if you have been a fan of mine and specifically the 52 rolls project that I am a big fan of my cat. Well, truth be told she isn't so much my cat, as I am her human. But that's a whole other story. She starting having some issues about using her litter box, and in taking her to the vet (to the current tune of 400+ dollars) I found out that she needs a significant amount of dental work, and possible steroid treatments for the rest of her life. Right now I am scared of what that will cost, because I already am having a hard enough time paying the bills as is.

Now I know what you are thinking, "He's about to ask me for money", well yes. But not outright (not right this second anyway). I hate this current trend of "crowdfunding" that seems to be hitting the web. Everyone and their mother seems to be asking you for money, but instead of doing that alone I'd first ask a couple of things instead.

One of the things that I have been getting back to in an attempt to make a little extra money is getting back into shooting Zivity sets. Thankfully long time friend and model Hada Pixie stepped up and asked me to work with her (and a new friend-model Clockwork Calamity). At the time of this update we currently have 4 sets that are fresh and live, and a back log of a few other sets as well. If you can, and are a member of the site, please drop us a few votes. Each one of those nets me about $.30, and while that isn't a large amount. It's something. If you want to get a free 30 day trial to the site to see what it is all about. Please DM me on social media networks, or email me at info@UNEXPhotography.com

I am also available for more Zivity shoots, and will gladly work around my day to day schedule to collaborate with you. I am also making myself more available for other paid shoots as well. And if you are by chance a magazine that likes the quality of work I put out, please contact me as well. I'd love to get my work in the eyes of as many people as possible.

But it hasn't been all bad news. One of the positive things that has fallen in my lap is the recent collaboration with a local Atlanta band, Finite Automata. I was contacted by Dom and Scott from the band and asked to contribute photos for their upcoming tour press kit. Keep your eyes peeled for a look at those photos coming soon to the Extra blog.

Another thing I am thankful for is an opportunity that I have been provided by my current day job. As a part of my position I have the chance to purchase a new camera package at a significant discount. Since I am not sure if I can talk details I'll just say that even though I am stupid to even think about any expenditure of money, this investment could potentially set me up creatively for the foreseeable future. Barring an affordable medium format camera comes to market, or I suddenly find myself in the presence of a boatload of money.

So what does this all mean? What does the future hold for me as a photographer? And what am I asking you, dear reader, to do about it?

For short term goals I'd love to finish the 52rolls/year of film project. As I mentioned earlier I am about 10 rolls behind having enough to finish out the year. If I stick to only black and white film, I could purchase enough film to keep the project funded through the new year. This would be about $40. Even though it sounds like a little bit of money, it's something that is not really in the cards for me right now. Any donations that could go to my car repair/cat repair funds would also be beyond wonderful (for sake of argument let's call this around $5000 to get everything up to snuff on both).

In the medium term (is that even a thing?) I would appreciate it from the bottom of my heart if I could possible bribe all of you with some assistance to raise around $1500.00 for new camera equipment, and to replace the aging gear that I am currently using. This would allow me to create better quality work, work that I would not be ashamed to send out for publication or deliver to clients. I'd also love to continue/finish out my Self Censorship project as well as other projects that I have floating around in my concept book.

For the long term I see three goals that I would like to achieve. One is to raise enough capital to make the move full time to taking photographs, and be able to devote all of my time and energy into becoming self sufficient running my own business. As part of that plan part two would be to raise a small chunk of money, say around another $1500 in which to invest in my "brand". This money would go to promoting posts on social media networks in order to get more eyes on my work. (I hate that it comes to this, but sadly most of you will never see this if I posted it to Facebook alone.) I would also be able to spend some money in advertising both online as well as in the traditional sense (and invest money into my website and such). And finally the end goal is to raise enough money to get some sort of working studio space, so that I am not just working out of my apartment. I don't know how much that would even run– But I'll worry about crossing that bridge when it comes.

What am I offering in return? Well I can tell you for one thing, I don't want your money. I want your business, I want a CAREER. I want to use this chance to prove to you all that I am not just a one trick pony, and that the work I can do with support is so much more valuable than even I can comprehend right now. As an incentive to you, dear reader, I will be more than happy to offer discounted/free prints of work, or consider any donations made to the cause as payment/a deposit for future works. If you have an event, or would like some photos taken please contact me and lets make some magic happen.

Or if you just wish to donate funding or make purchases directly, I also won't complain. Any small bit helps out in a substantial way. I have a paypal account set up here, and have an Amazon Wish List set up as well (Hey, a boy can dream right?).

There is a long road ahead, and as you can probably piece together I am in need of serious assistance in order to make things happen. As much as I would love to do it all myself, I am in need of some help.

In summation, thank you all once again from the bottom of my heart of hearts for your continued support. I couldn't keep going without that support. I hope that the rest of the year is just as wonderful in a photographic sense as it has been. And I also want to extend a promise that I am not giving up, and I intend on putting every bit of spare energy into making the best work possible for you well into the future. Please continue support me by spreading my work around your social media pages, by viewing it yourself, by placing votes on sites like Zivity where I show my work, or however else you are able to help.

Until next time, keep living your dreams, keep checking back for more new content, and most importantly stay inspired.

Blake Griffin
September 16th, 2015