Jason Tag Photography

Now that the month of September is winding down, I figure it’s a good time to look back at all the thing that happened this month.

Julia - September 6 2008

This month I got to work with four models I had worked with previously.  The first shoot this month was with Julia.  A very beautiful and energetic woman.  I love working with her because she’s not really a model and so she thinks differently from most of the models I work with.  Because of this she doesn’t get locked into modeling poses.  When she poses it’s more organic and natural.  I also love that she is a free spirit.  She seems as though she wants to just experience as much as she can and truly enjoy the moment.

Ashleigh - September 6 2008

The same day I shot with Julia, I also got to shoot with Ashleigh.  Another amazing woman who is just a joy to work with.  This was our second shoot together and I would say that she seemed more comfortable with me and the work this time than the first shoot we did.  Ashleigh is another woman who is fun to work with because She really seems to be able to look within and get really introspective during a shoot.  The shots we get tend to feel more personal, as if I’m capturing her experience.  Capturing a moment in time that is beautiful and magical.

Sarah E. - September 10 2008

The third shoot of September was with Sarah.  Sarah was one of the models I had worked with early on.  At the time of our first shoot I was still working out a lot of issues and trying to figure out how to work with models.  As a result I only got a few shots that were any good and I always I felt I could have done much better with her.  She moved away shortly after our first shoot and I felt sad because I was unable to work with her again and fix the problems of the earlier shoot.  So when she wrote me to say she was moving back I was stoked!  I couldn’t wait to shoot with her again.  I also felt that at the time of our first shoot, I didn’t have the experience to capture her properly.  She is one of those models that is able to internalize and to create a feeling of peace and persoanl reflection.  A truly beautiful woman who I’d like to work with more.

Sylvia - September 21 2008

My fourth shoot of the month was with the model who started all of this… Sylvia.  This time we got to shoot on the Island of Oahu.  She had wrote me and had said that she would be on Oahu for a few days.  So I took the chance to work with her in my playground. Sylvia is an amazingly talented model and a beautiful person who also has a good understanding about photography.  Working with her is a joy because I learn so much whenever I work with her.  Everything from the business of photography to getting a better angle for a shot or finding the right setting for a pose.  She also has a great sense of peace that makes being around her a real treat.

Overall September was one of my busiest months ever and it was a great deal of fun to work with these four amazing women.  I hope that I’ll get to work all of them again soon.

During the shoot with Ashleigh this month, she suggested that I should put together a calendar featuring my images.  I told her about my book(which is available on lulu.com!) and how I’m working on a second book focused on outdoor nudes and already thinking about my third book which will be featuring images of nudes in and around trees.  We continued to talk about a lot of other things that day but the calendar idea germinated for a while.  So a few days ago I decided that the calendar idea is not a bad idea.  So I put one together at RedBubble.com!  Of course prints of my images are also available at RedBubble as well.

If you buy a book, calendar, or a print let me know so I can thank you personally…

Aloha,
Jason Tag

After hearing about RedBubble.com on twitter. I decided to take the plunge and post my work on another art community website. Up til now I’ve been dealing only with DeviantArt.com and I love the feedback that I’ve been receiving there as well as the encouragment. I’ve tried posting my work on a few other sites and had some problems with a lack of respect for the models or the art in general. So I was quite hesitant to try redbubble based on the fear that I would get a lot of people not understnding the art or being disrepectful.

Redbubble isn’t like that. It’s a great site with a great community of artists. From the first image, I felt that there was a greta deal of respect form the other artists as well as the fans. Thanks redbubble for making such a great site and for creating a great community.

You can check out my RedBubble portfolio at: www.redbubble.com/people/jasontagphoto

Aloha,
Jason Tag

P.S. I’ll be posting an official “Lessons Learned” on the shoot with Ashleigh in a few days. Right now I’m a bit sick and need to rest. Stay tuned!

I was getting worried because I wasn’t sure If I was going to be able to afford a shoot this time around.  I usually shoot about every two weeks because thats what my budget can afford at the moment.  The price of gas and all that plus bills, had me pretty worried.  But I picked up an extra gig this week that will allow me to do it.  So I scheduled a shoot for tomorrow morning.

The model has never done nude modeling before so it should make for a challenging shoot. If you’ve been reading for a while, you’ve probably figured out that I love to be challenged.  It forces me to be better.  It makes me work harder in communicating ideas and poses.  It also makes me really analyze how I shoot and how I compose the shots.  I can’t wait to work with her and see what else I might learn!

I’ll be updating the site as I usually do after every shoot so stay tuned…

This morning I woke up and had an interesting thought. Does anybody work these days as Muse? I began thinking about this as I drove to work. What occurred to me is that it might be interesting to work with someone on this level because it would be a collaborative artistic relationship. Which I find to be the most exciting of all artistic relationships. One where the Muse and Photographer create ideas and share a common vision. The purpose of which would be to create art that satisfies both Photographer and Muse. I find this idea fascinating because it would allow the Model/Muse to be more creative than in any other Model/Photographer relationship. She would have the ability to select poses, locations, wardrobe items, accessories, the whole nine yards. Just as much as the photographer would.

Of course this raises some interesting questions. Who would own the copyrights if the images contain ideas of both Photographer and Muse? Can the images be published? Under what circumstances can they be published? Who benefits from the publication?

As I wrestled with the issues of this type of artistic endeavour. I came up with a few ideas. This would be a relationship where the model isn’t being paid to pose for a photographer because the Muse is working as an artist as well. This is not to say that the Muse wold not be able to make money from her work. In this kind of collaboration, the Muse should have the rights to publish any photos from this endeavour commercially. And maybe the Photographer should be allowed to publish the work but only in a limited capacity. For example, the Muse could sell the work as prints and the Photographer could only publish through the web at a slightly lower resolution.

The problem that arises is that both Modeling and Photography are inherently expensive. A models time is valuable and if they’re buying wardrobe or accessories for shoots it can get very expensive. Photographers of course have the cost and maintenace of the equipment to worry about as well as their time. So both persons would have a need to publish the work commercially to recover any costs incurred in the process and to make a profit in order to continue working in this manner. Who has what rights and how the work should be published is up to the Muse and Photographer to agree upon.

I am definetly interested in this idea and I’ll have to spend more time thinking about it.