p.2 #1 · Curated China : Guizhou (my first China book - of 16 planned over the next 2 years)
Douglas L wrote:
I can't tell you enough how much I enjoyed looking at the unscripted photos of the ethnic folks. I know a lot of photo workshops in China and many parts of Asia have paid models for their shoots, such as old ladies in colorful costumes smoking pipes, fishermen in a little sampan casting fishing net at sunrise... I can pretty much tell by the perfect background, lighting, matching colors, etc. They can fool a lot of people if not disclosed. Kudo to you for not using these kind of paid models in your book.
Thank you Douglas ! I understand some people may want 'perfectly scripted' images but personally I prefer them to be more organic / natural. I still use flash where required but all of the portraits in the book are 'on-the-spot' requested shots. With the exception of the Suoga Long Horn Miao images.
The Suoga Long Horn Miao have these amazing headdresses composed of generations of hair woven and then ca. 5m is twisted in a figure 8 around a cow bone tied into their own hair. Its painful and heavy but centuries ago was used as a form of protection for the ladies from leopards and tigers in the region (by making their heads appear much larger). Sadly no more tigers but there are still a few protected leopards.
I spent a whole day in their village without seeing a single lady until beckoned over, they asked for a small fee to start from scratch and weave the Long Horn Miao headdress into their hair. These are pitifully poor people, boxes for storage and nails with plastic bags hanging on them for shelving in their home.
I was very happy to pay the small fee requested, I knew it was likely at least a week's wages for each of the 3 ladies. It was amazing and they asked me to stay for dinner afterwards.
p.2 #2 · Curated China : Guizhou (my first China book - of 16 planned over the next 2 years)
AGeoJO wrote:
Wow, Kevin, you deserved a big applause for accomplishing that. Whether with AI help or not, since you did everything yourself, the book showcases your dedication to the art of photography and the love for your adopted country. Since the first one is the hardest, the subsequent books should and would be easier to produce.
Wishing you the best,
Joshua
Thank you Joshua! A labour of love!
I only used AI for help with Affinity Pub 2, even though sometimes it had to apologise profusely for 'hallucinating' procedures - haha. It was still much faster, and direct to the point, than scanning through manuals or watching YT videos. And if something went wrong I could describe the issue and AI would almost always know immediately what the problem was or mistake I had made (or sometimes because I was in a different version of Publisher than the AI thought I was).
It was also good for advising what is the 'professional publisher' design and scripts to use. Strongly advising me against my chosen script with a list of reasons why ! And helping with margins / printers marks / colour print formats etc.
All should help with subsequent books. It's a very steep learning curve but by saving presets and templates it should dramatically speed up work on subsequent books.
p.2 #3 · Curated China : Guizhou (my first China book - of 16 planned over the next 2 years)
gmccroskery wrote:
Nice work, Kevin.
You did a wonderful job of capturing enough variety in these images to give the reader/viewer a feel for the life of a people many of us will never experience.
You did a masterful job of layout in my opinion, which certainly is one of the most time consuming parts of such a project. Honestly, I spent so much time laying out wedding albums when I was shooting professionally, that viewing this could make me break out in hives!
Seriously, I applaud your ambition, skill, and perseverance in this project and hope you find it both rewarding and successful.
Greg
Thank you Greg !
The layout is, as you say, one of the most difficult aspects of preparing the book. I made a lot page templates I could drop the photos into, based on studying a lot of other work / books and appreciating their designs. Lots of work had to go into cropping the photos to fit these templates / layout but without being detrimental to the image.
