Portrait Series

Molly Jeanne Lovewell works on a purple tree painting in the studio of Lee Hills Hall in Columbia, Mo. on May 3, 2015. Lovewell is a senior working on a BFA in drawing and sculpture at the University of Missouri. Lovewell said she paints "to better understand myself."

Carina Jimenez works on a painting of a hand in the studio of Lee Hills Hall in Columbia, Mo. on May 3, 2015. Jimenez is a junior at the University of Missouri working on her BFA in drawing and painting. "Painting allows me to meditate and cleanse my energy," Jimenez said.

Site Ma works on an abstract painting in the studio of Lee Hills Hall in Columbia, Mo. on May 3, 2015. Ma is a senior at the University of Missouri and is majoring in magazine design. "Painting calms me do," Ma said, "It makes me feel at peace."

India Watts works on an robot painting in the studio of Lee Hills Hall in Columbia, Mo. on May 3, 2015. Watts is a senior working on her BFA in drawing and painting at the University of Missouri. "I paint because of the rush I get when I'm creating something," Watts said, "it is truly what motivates me to live."

            I was looking forward to this assignment more than any other one this semester. I had everything planned out well in advance, and tested the lighting setup a few times to make sure everything was the way I wanted it. Then came the time to actually carry out my plan.

            The first issue that I had was finding people to participate in the shoot. I started about two or three weeks before I wanted to shoot. I had ZERO responses. I emailed professors in the art department, and talked to artists in the community. It seemed that I wasn’t going to find anyone. I finally got a professor to allow me to speak to one of his classes and I found my volunteers. This was the week before the assignment was due. They all agreed to meet on the same day.

            The day of the shoot went well enough with buying the supplies and getting everything setup. The first shoot went very well. I have no complaints. I made it about 10 shots into the second person and all of the batteries were dead in the lighting kits. I didn’t know that the packs could run on AC power. So I would let the batteries charge for about 10 minutes and then shoot until they died and repeated that process for the remainder of the shoot. The second person stood much closer to the glass so I lost the split lighting that I had created because she was catching the light that was illuminating the painting. The third shoot went ok. I didn’t notice until I opened the files on my computer that a ton of my shots had my reflection in the glass. I didn’t have that issue when I was testing because of where I stood when I was shooting. But for some reason this day had to be different. Another issue that happened was that I was getting a lot of spill in the background and I was able to see all of the stuff lying around the studio. I wasn’t able to see that on my LCD screen. So I had no idea that was happening.

            This was one of the more difficult shoots that I have had. And it was without a doubt one of the most depressing moments I have ever had when viewing my photos on my computer. I was already upset about the batteries not being charged, but then to know that out of 100-150 shots I was only able to get a very small number of usable images really set me off. It would have been one thing if I could see the flaws in the screen, but there was absolutely zero indication of that. I definitely plan to try this again and again until I get everything the way I want it.