Feaverish Photography Blog

One of my all-time favorite photographers, Dusdin Condren, was kind enough to answer a few of my questions over email.

Aaron: One thing that always draws me into your portraits is the look that your subject is giving you. It’s often piercing and intense and seems meaningful and intimate, like the model is thoroughly involved in the picture, and not just a subject, and I’m wondering how that comes about. Is it a specific look that you’re trying to get, or just something you know when you see it? Do you have a way of working with the models that brings that out?

Dusdin: Essentially it’s a matter of the relationship between me and the subject. How well do they understand what I want; how well do I understand what they do. Whether it’s someone who is used to being photographed often or someone who does not like having their photo taken, I try to understand how they relate to the camera and use that energy in a way that suits my aesthetic.

Dusdin (cont.): To be honest, it’s a pretty unconscious process. It might be as simple as saying that I look in the camera until I see something I like, then I start taking pictures. I keep taking pictures until I know that I have shot something I can work with. Then, as I edit, I look for something that makes me happy / arrests me / excites me — whatever you want to call that sensation.

Dusdin (cont.): In terms of how I work with models, I probably spend more time saying “Don’t do that” than “Do this.” Sometimes I know better what I don’t like than what I do like. Most of the subjects that I shoot are people that I have only just met. So I try to make them feel comfortable. Or if they are uncomfortable I try to see how to make that lack of comfort look interesting. On the other hand, there are subjects like my girlfriend — and I’ve been shooting her regularly for over a year now. When we shoot, it’s not too different from anything else we do — we both know what sort of photos we like, and we just shoot until we think we have something that justifies the time and money.

Dusdin (cont.): For better or worse, I don’t really think about “poses” or “looks” that much. I really just rely on intuition and seek out something I like. I studied theatre, film and art history in grad school, so I thought about things like mise-en-scène, gesture, body language and so on. I imagine that has some kind of latent influence on my photographs. The last couple of months I’ve been taking a more aggressive approach to this issue, so lately, when I’ve wanted to think about specific poses, I’ve been looking at my friend Red DeLeon’s book (which everyone should buy).

Aaron: What’s the relationship between the kind of portraits you take and the kind of film and camera you use?

Dusdin: The camera makes a big difference. I use several different cameras, some of them are really light and quiet and some are really heavy and loud. I’ve been using a Canon AE-1 a lot lately, which is really small and fast and light and I take it with me most places I go. It’s great for getting close or for shooting impromptu photos. I can easily work with movement and blur and other formal things that interest me — without having to plan much. On the other end of the spectrum there’s the Polaroid 600-SE which is hard to use without a tripod — especially if I’m shooting Polaroid peel-aparts. That requires a certain slowness of composition and a static quality that, I think, has defined a lot of my work to this point. It’s the difference between a photo like this and a photo like this. I imagine this affects the subjects of the photos in some way, although I’m still always essentially asking for the same thing from them.

Aaron: Do you use an assistant or do much styling? A lot of your portraits seem very intimate, almost like a snapshot of a girlfriend, but you never know if there’s a bank of umbrellas and stylists standing just out of frame.

Dusdin: I’ve made a conscious decision recently to focus more on editorial fashion, so it’s been a logical step to work with more designers, stylists and make-up artists. For a long time my work had been pretty hermetic, just me and the subject, something that I think fostered that sense of intimacy you’re talking about. I like doing both though, collaborating and working independently — I’ve just been doing a lot more of the former lately. I rarely use assistants, but I like it when I do.

Aaron: How long have you been taking photos? Do you do it professionally? And either way, what makes you want to take pictures?

Dusdin: I started taking pictures as a distraction from grad school a few years ago. I moved to NYC and quit my grad program at the very end of 2006, with the thought to pursue a career in theatre directing, which I’ve done a little of. But over the next year or so, I found myself wanting to shoot all the time. I guess it was about a year and a half ago that I decided to really start thinking about photography seriously. I’ve allowed myself lots of time to figure out where I’m going with my work, both artistically and professionally, and I feel like that picture is becoming clearer and clearer all the time. I am very interested in photography as a career, so long as I can continue to treat it as a real, personal, creative project.

Dusdin (cont.): On the most basic level, I want to take pictures because it feels good. I think a lot of things (trees, girls, buildings, cats) are beautiful and I like looking at them. Having a camera really forces me to look at those things. I also think cameras are beautiful and I like the way they feel and the way they sound. I like the kind of people I meet through taking pictures, whether they’re models, musicians or fashion designers. But apart from that, there’s this anxiety I get from inertia, laziness, time passing and ultimately anxiety from the knowledge that “the axe will fall” as Morrissey tells us. Taking pictures is a way for me to fight that anxiety. Of course, thinking of photography in professional terms simplifies a lot of this angst. A waiting client and a deadline can also be an interesting motivation for picture taking.

Dusdin (cont.): On a more theoretical level, I take pictures because it’s a way of saying something without having to say something literal. To say something that can be both abstract and simple. I get a bad feeling when people talk about “capturing” something with photography. That way of thinking seems lazy and false. For me it has much more to do with the impulse to pretend or to remember something creatively. Seeing something real and wanting to imagine how that real thing would be if it were a fake thing. Alienating and distancing. Putting the artifice of a lens between myself and reality. Forcing the present into the past, and so on.

Aaron: Besides portraits, are there other kinds of photography that interest you, or that you’d like to explore more?

Dusdin: Yeah, of course. I really like landscapes. I’d like to work more on that. Objects and animals too. Small people in big surroundings. Whatever the content is, I am always most interested in creating or altering scenes. One thing I don’t want to do is take pictures of “real life.” I like documentary photography, but I’m not that interested in trying to convince anybody that something is “really happening” in my photos. Not right now at least.

Aaron: Do you have an opinion about digital photography? Most of your photos are very analog, with the old Polaroid films and lots of expired-looking medium format. Do you use digital at all? And if so how has that changed the way you work or the kinds of photos you take? And how do you feel about digital retouching? What comes out of the digital is obviously very different from what comes out of a pack of 669, and it seems like photographers either embrace the digital image for what it is or try to make it look like it came from an analog camera.

Dusdin: A good photo is a good photo. I feel like people make too much an issue of the dichotomy, especially considering that ultimately it all either gets printed or goes on the web — digital photos become pieces of paper and photos shot on film get scanned and wind up on computer screens. There are a lot of very talented photographers who take brilliant photographs with digital cameras. I take digital photos that I’m really happy with. I have nothing at all against digital cameras. I find myself using them more and more all the time, and not just out of necessity. But yes, probably 95% of what I shoot is on film of various sorts.

Dusdin (cont.): I’m definitely turned off by that kind of popular, cultish love for analog formats, as if they were somehow more authentic. Obviously I love Polaroid film, but I’m not about to buy a “Save Polaroid” bumper sticker. I start to feel uncomfortable when people make such an issue of the medium, it feels too ideological or programmatic. Some people write with wooden pencils and other people write with mechanical ones. I’d like to think I can find the same quality no matter what camera I’m using.

Dusdin (cont.): It is a temptation to make digital photos look like they were made with a film camera, and I think that’s probably a mistake. It’s always my first impulse when setting out to edit a digital photo, and I try to fight it off. I want to figure out how to use a digital camera in a way that isn’t determined by my preference for film and Polaroid. That may take a while still.

Aaron: In general do you do much post processing or editing of your photos?

Dusdin: As far as retouching and editing goes, my process is evolving. I used to only use Photoshop in order to make the digital version of a photo correspond to the negative or the Polaroid, but now I’m a little more liberal. It depends on what the photo is for. If the client will be happier with a certain amount of retouching, I do what’s reasonable. If it’s just for me, I don’t do much at all. In general, I try to think “What makes the best photo?” rather than “Am I the sort of photographer who retouches this sort of thing?”

Aaron: A lot of your photos have a very simple setting, often just a blank wall and bare floor. Do you prefer that to shooting someone in a busier scene?

Dusdin: I like both. But I recognize the value of a good location. I spend a lot of time fretting about where I’m going to shoot. For example, I have to shoot a band on Friday and I have no idea where to tell their label to have them meet me. I know how I want to shoot them, but I don’t know where — and that can be a hard thing about New York. There are so many interesting places but it’s hard to access the good ones without a budget or even a car, so I often wind up shooting in familiar places. That said, there’s definitely a virtue in acknowledging something attractive in the austerity of a blank wall and a bare floor, of your own hallway, bed, and bathroom.

Aaron: I first discovered you on Flickr, I think. Has Flickr been very important for you, in terms of getting your work out there?

Dusdin: I don’t think I can overstate how important Flickr has been for my work. Both in terms of finding and understanding an audience and in terms of developing my aesthetic and my self-concept as a photographer. To be honest, without the encouragement that I’ve gotten on Flickr, I doubt I would have taken myself seriously enough to go in the direction I’ve gone. I’ve definitely had work come directly through people finding me on Flickr (or via blogs that link to my Flickr photos) and I’ve made connections with other photographers whose work I like — and that often leads to shared contacts and more work as well. So, it was a really instrumental part in my development and although I’ve kind of changed how I use it lately, I still really enjoy putting stuff up and seeing so immediately how the community responds.

A big thanks to Dusdin for taking the time to answer my questions, and be sure to check out more of his photography at his website and at Flickr.