The One That Started It All…
One of my favorite themes to conceptualize and execute is noir photography. I’m a big fan of film noir (Like The Maltese Falcon, The Big Sleep, Touch of Evil and The Killers). I also love old detective novels and pulp fiction stories from Raymnd Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, Chester Himes.
I had never really thought about the noir concept in my photography until one of the Flickr groups I belong too, Utata, offered up a challenge in their Iron Photographer entry (Iron Photographer is like Iron Chef on the Food Network…the admin throws out a set of three things and you have to craft your photo around them. It’s a great project to keep you creative!)
In this case the elements were: Liquid, a weapon, and shot in the noir-style. I immediately got excited to figure out how to execute this and this one came to me pretty quickly.
To me, noir is about being abit left of center. You can’t tell who’s good and who’s bad and sometimes even the good guy is a little bad, or has his faults (like an unhealthy obsession with bourbon.) A dame is usually involved and she can be either good or bad and when she’s bad she’s good. And of course, noir is black & white (but not…you know what I mean).
So I had the concept and then I had to execute it. Making it even tougher, when I shot this, I remember being home, my wife was out and at-the-time two month old was sleeping so I didn’t have a lot of time until I had to give her a bottle. Luckily, it came together pretty quickly. I shot it in color and converted it to B&W in PS3, also threw in some vignetting and some grain to give it an older feel. I deliberately left the person abit obscured so that the person looking at the shot didn’t get hung up on who was in it, just what was happening.
And what is happening? Or what is going to happen? A murder? Suicide? Both? Or just a down-and-out guy looking for inspiration in the bottom of a bottle. The actual caption I put with this photo was Once the wedding ring comes off….. He never knows if the drink…or the gun…should go in his mouth first.
This was one of those photos that came together how I saw it in my head and I was happy with it (guess Utata was too…they made it the front page of their website the next day). And this photo also gave way to a new project that I continue to add to called Jersey Noir….There noir, and then there’s Jersey Noir.
This isn’t Sopranos photography, but something to harken back to an earlier time when gals were dames and guys kept a well-oiled gat under their arms in case they had to blast their way out of a situation. I’ve now done about 17 Jersey Noir-style photos and will post them here from time to time.
The best part is that I was able to bang out this photo, put the (prop) gun away, and still be ready for when my little girl woke up for her bottle. I just finished the bourbon alittle later…
Image specific: ISO 400, f/5.6, 1/13 sec, 66mm, 0/2 EV
© Mark V. Krajnak 2008 | JerseyStyle Photography | All rights Reserved
Unless otherwise noted, images captured with a Canon 20D, SanDisk digital film, finished with PS2 and Nik Software
JerseyStyle Photography 
Great shot Mark and one of my favorites from your Jersey Noir stream.
Have a great Thanksgiving!
Jeff
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