I am a planner.
Not when it comes to vacations, mind you. That, I very much do on a whim, with no concrete plans other than a plane ticket or a date of departure… just ask my roommates.
Rather, I am a planner of the weeks and the days, of the hours and the minutes. I plan the goals and achievements I want to accomplish, perhaps because it allows me to feel like I have some control over what my future will look like in this stage of life that is so uncertain.
Surprisingly, or perhaps not, this aspect of my personality has also bled into my creative pursuits. I find myself planning my photoshoots down to the very last minutia, spreadsheet and all. Perhaps all creatives have a logical side to themselves, somewhere buried beneath all the costumes, layers of paint, and wistful daydreams. Before I even find the model and decide on the date for the shoot to take place, the costumes have been planned, the location decided, and the hairstyle and makeup chosen. This is the only way I have found for me to be able to keep creating new work and to create work that I am happy with… sometimes being a perfectionist does have its downsides.
And while my lack of planning when I travel has allowed me to be led to some of the best places and experiences I’ve had, I often hesitate to allow this way of thinking to make its way into my everyday life, especially with my photography. Despite my obsessive scheduling, however, on rare occasion, I do find it a blessing when things don’t go according to plan.
And sometimes I find myself pleasantly surprised when a shoot I did not plan turns out as beautiful as my most recent Dia de los Muertos inspired shoot did.
Originally, I had planned another set of images to be taken the day we did this shoot. Despite my meticulous planning, however, a few key props I had ordered specifically for the shoot had not arrived. Feeling a bit scrambled, I was unsure how to proceed and briefly considered rescheduling with my friends-turned-models. Rather than cancelling the shoot, however, I decided to take advantage of the time we had fit into our busy schedules and told my friends to come over anyway for a night of experimenting.
With the help of Pinterest, our night of experimenting turned into an evening spent photographing two skeletons in my dining room.
Very beautiful skeletons, that is.
With Halloween approaching, I knew this evening had now become the perfect opportunity to take some photos that fit the slightly spooky theme. While I had always wanted to do Halloween inspired photos, my tendency to over-plan had always prevented it. The thought of conceptualizing, planning, and editing a shoot all in the space of the few short weeks between when fall started and the 31st seemed overwhelming to me and so I never even tried. It seems a bit ridiculous now, considering the fact that I was able to create these images in the space of two weeks, no planning necessary.
My quick perusal of Pinterest before my friends came over inspired me to dig out my face paints and silk flowers, creating the scene for a slightly spooky Dia de los Muertos photoshoot. We spent the night giggling and laughing as I painted their faces, dressed them up, and ran around placing house lamps here, and lighting equipment there. To the outside eye, it may have looked haphazard and more than a little bit insane, but I thoroughly enjoyed the spontaneity of it all.
While I thought my lack of a plan would leave me feeling frazzled and unsure, by the end of our shoot I felt quite the opposite. Of course, I still enjoy the creative process of planning and creating every last detail in my image exactly to my imagination’s specifications, but perhaps in the future I will remember to allow myself to start with the blank canvas every once in a while. To push aside the story board, the spreadsheets, and the carefully thought out plans in favor of trying something new.
Who knows, perhaps something as beautiful as these pictures would be the result? I would certainly be ok with that.
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