This is an entry I started writing on June 7th, 2009, but didn’t published until now

As an Aries, I’m supposed to be impulsive and spontaneous. I am. Usually. When it comes to my art, I have always followed what I lovingly called “The Chaos Theory” – chaos being about random occurrences. This meant that I would, for example, do a shoot with someone and let what ever happens happen. Ideas come, they always do. I am, after all, an idea person. I’ve never been want for ideas. In my art, I can usually do pretty well without any (or very little) planning. However, if I’ve learned anything from interning for David LaChapelle, it’s that to pull that shit off, you need a mess of planning.

I therefore decided to try it out for size. Real, honest to goodness planning. I thought of a concept and gave myself two weeks to pull it off. I wrote down ideas, held a casting for a female model, booked the male model straight away, shopped for props, and wrote down a list of potential shots. I even created a project folder in which I kept all my inspiration images, data, and notes. I thought about the shoot for two weeks straight. I corresponded with models, found a make-up artist, and imagined how I’d dress the set. It was all starting to come together.

Naturally, Murphy’s Law is always a major player in any event. At the last minute, my make-up artist canceled. As someone who is adept at getting out of things and coming up with a million reasons why I couldn’t go into work or school, I realized at once that she was probably lying. I think this for several reasons: She didn’t call to cancel, she emailed. Her excuse was that she’s gotten an horrible eye infection and was headed to the emergency room. It just seemed so grandiose. People tend to think that the bigger their lies are, the more likely people are to believe them: A UFO crashed into my house and I can’t come into work today because the aliens took my keys. One thing I’ve learned about lying is that if used correctly, it’s a very powerful tool. A better way? I once lied about going into work by saying that “the recent rains had warped my front door so I couldn’t lock it. I had to wait for the landlord to come fix it”. Not bad, right? Later, my boss at the time said that it was such a random excuse, it had to be true. Obviously.

After the make-up artist canceled, I was faced with potentially rescheduling the shoot. How could I find a talented make-up artist in less than 24 hours? No one would do it. Especially since it wasn’t a paying gig. I posted an ad, asked the Universe for a make-up artist and lo, I found one. I accepted that I might not find the best make-up artist in the world, but that anyone with a make-up kit could do the job. It so happened, I found a lovely girl who was not only cool, but talented to boot! I got real lucky. In fact, I made some calls and got about 6 responses. Because of the fairness, I chose the first girl who responded first and crossed my fingers. I hired her sight unseen. And you know what? It worked out.

The result of all my hard work was that this shoot was the one of the best I’ve ever done. Everything fell into the place. The models were phenomenal, the make-up artist was professional and skilled, the set looked great, the costumes were amazing, the lighting was spot on, and the final images are just to good to be true.

What I learned from all this is that planning goes a long way. Even with as much planning as you can muster, something always goes wrong. The important thing to remember is not to panic.

The second lesson I learned was that you can’t do it alone. Even with all my planning, none of this would have happened without the help of my beloved AJB. His help and support through all of this made everything run smooth. He’s my go-to guy and I can’t tell you how important that is to me. I know that I can count on him and it’s invaluable to have trustworthy help on a big shoot. As they say, no man is an Island and no one does anything all by themself.

People keep asking me what I’m going to do with these images. That, I don’t know. I need to figure that out. I assumed I’d only use them for my portfolio, but if there is a way to use them in some other beneficial marketing way, I should go ahead and do that.

I also have yet to figure out how I want to Photoshop them. I’ve played around with different styles, but nothing is slapping me in the face with it’s awesomeness. Naturally, the longer I take to figure it out, the likelihood of moving onto something else comes into play. I’ll post pics when they’re done.