Term 2 Journal - Beware…8000 words ! Written on September 8, 2008, by .
Graeme Nicol
Photo MA Term 2 Journal,
combined projects, using different fonts for each as below.
“pre-Olympic post-Rock”: Wangwen Summer ‘08 Tour (Multimedia)
“Boutique” Issue-based (8-page print spread)
4th July
Today I flew down to meet Wangwen in Chengdu, before their show that night. I’ve planned this project for so long, I’m literally bursting with enthusiasm to get started. After stumbling into their hotel room, shaking hands and being handed a bottle of beer, I get straight to work, setting up the tripod and DV camera for an interview. I possibly should have been less keen, but it actually went well, partly I think because the band were still unfamiliar with me. Apart from Xie, we had hardly even been introduced to each other, and there was a businesslike efficiency to the proceedings. I’m not even sure if Xie had really told them beforehand that I would be coming.
I went to the show with them, started photographing the activity outside, looked round and the band were gone, I had pretty much been abandoned, or maybe I had abandoned them. It wasn’t so much that they were rude, more just that they were normal, without the usual display of over the top hospitality I’ve come to expect from Chinese. Of course I wondered if perhaps they found it a little unusual for me to be suddenly part of their lives. It wasn’t a problem though, I got to work again, interviewing and photographing the music fans who were beginning to congregate outside. Then Xie suddenly appeared from nowhere, noticed the red stamp on my hand to indicate I had already paid, and said “No, no, no, you’re with us, no need to pay money” and went to the door to get me my 30 Yuan refunded. So I hadn’t overstepped into their privacy after all, they were just focused on sorting things out prior to going on stage.
I recorded some video and took some photos during the show, and thought I had audio as well, but realised towards the end that I had forgotten to press record. Shit. I had the feeling it wouldn’t be the first time I would do that – the Zoom H4 recorder interface is OK but could be improved. After the show the band had disappeared again, and I did more photographing, more audio interviewing. About half an hour later all the band was outside, gathering their equipment before heading back to the hotel. They were going out for something to eat, and more to drink, and I was of course invited too.
We also discussed some rules about my role there as a photographer. Being left to my own devices was fine by me, possibly better even, but I was worried that by not living in the same hotel room as them, and also going away to mingle and shoot the audience, I would be left out of the loop regarding information, information that could help me plan when to film and shoot. I told them it was important that they let me know their schedule a little in advance, because I didn’t want to always be hanging around them waiting for something to happen. I needed to know when they would need time to themselves, so I could leave them alone, and when I should come back to hang out and start photographing at a time when it better suited them.
I was off duty from then on, just eating and drinking with new friends rather than documentary subjects. There were lots of things said that I would have loved to have captured on camera, but I could sense that there would be plenty more times in the future. I had to think for the long term, so no more DV tonight. So I got to know the others a little better that evening, but could still sense some distance between us, understandable considering that not only was I a foreigner, but the band had been travelling together for almost a month by now. I did a little more filming, and let people play around with my camera and DV player.
5th July
No early start. Up at midday, mad dash trying to get everything ready to go to Chongqing. I hardly spoke to the band. They hadn’t been able to get me a train ticket so I’d have to go there myself. No problem. So I said goodbye to them, jumped in a taxi to the bus station, and got a bus. I actually arrived in Chongqing an hour before the band, and had enough time to explore the city centre a little, grab a beer & noodles on the street, and then head to the show to meet them. Same deal as the previous night. I did my own thing, came and went, gathered material among the crowd, lost the band several times, always knowing they were somewhere in the area. I decided not to photograph this evening and concentrate on video and audio. The venue was more intimate and I was among the crowd rather than in VIP area above the stage. The speakers weren’t that good in Chongqing, but ironically I got a better recording. I found out my recorder isn’t great at recording a big grungy wall of sound.
The band found me after the show and informed me they were going for Chongqing hotpot. Only three of the band were there, plus others from the support band. I found it easier talking to the band when they weren’t all together. While we were there, one of the other band members came in with bad news; the keyboardist’s mum had just died. He was going to have to fly back to Dalian next day. They had been told when they got back to Beijing that she was seriously ill, which perhaps explains some of their apparent anxiety and tenseness. The keyboardist wanted the band to go and get blind drunk and sing his favourite songs at KTV. I sensed that given I had hardly ever spoken to him, it was best to give him and the band space, and I went back to my hotel.
6th July
Up again later than hoped, feeling tired, travelled with band back to Chengdu. It had been an unplanned backtrack due to lack of onward sleeper tickets from Chongqing, but there were also no seat tickets to Chongqing, so we stood for four hours. Apart from Xie, it was a during this journey that I really properly had time to speak to the other band members on their own, and that night, in Chengdu, with no show to film, and with tired legs and a hangover, my own motivation for filming lacking, I felt I was now beginning to feel what the band felt. I was starting to adapt to their pace, their routine, feeling the same need to catch a nap, or relax with a beer and do nothing. My arrival two nights ago now seemed a long long time ago indeed.
7th July
I was now on the overnight train with them to Changsha for 20 hours. It was too noisy to do interviews, and there’s a limit to how many variations on train shots you can do, so we talked a lot, and ate noodles, and drunks some beer, and chilled out. The guys in the band were now quite at ease with me, and even more so after I showed them a slideshow of the photos I’d taken so far. I’m less of a fly on the wall now, more like the family dog. They now seem totally used to my camera being among them, The change in mood, or pace, had been as much a change in myself as a change in them, and it lead me to question my approach of trying to shoot right from the beginning. I’d say I was justified by the fact I was still there on the tour with them, and was seemingly accepted, I clearly hadn’t pissed them off that much, if I had at all. There were certain photos and interviews that I could only have got during that initial stage, just as there will be those that I will only be able to get now I am acclimatised. My life before the tour is starting to fade into distant memory.
8th July
We arrive in Changsha. I’m exhausted, I didn’t sleep well. We go for food at around 11am. The whole day to explore Changsha, except no-one can be bothered, and neither can I. My tiredness turns out to be more than just lack of sleep, and I retreat to my bed for the afternoon with mild food poisoning. I’m now much more aware of their routine, when the band are most responsive to being probed for interviews, when I’m likely to get good visual material, and when I’m just wasting valuable storage space. The Changsha show is much like the others, I get much the same photos. I had initially planned to travel with them for the whole tour, and had been worried that cutting it down to these four shows wouldn’t give myself enough time, but now I realise four is enough. I’m repeating myself, and the band are kinda withdrawn, gone into autopilot. I record the show anyway, and get enough good photos to justify bringing my camera. My stomach seems to be well enough to handle beer. I go out with them after wards like previous nights.
9th July
Wuhan tonight. Up early for real this time, four hours on the train. The band make up for their late night but I find it difficult to sleep on trains. I’m exhausted. I really can’t be bothered photographing again tonight. I ask the band how they keep themselves motivated. They shrug. That’s about as exciting an answer as I’m getting from them. Right now I don’t really care. I realise that the band are no different to how they were in Chengdu, if anything their jet lag induced indifference was even stronger back then. The reason I got better material from them then is because I pushed for it more. I think I was right to go in strong at the start I think, because by now I could hardly care f I get material or not. Food, hotel, beer, show, train, food, hotel, beer, show etc…. I need space from the band too, I’ve done the equivalent now of a 40 hour week with them. I need my own space for a bit, a change of scene. The band are in their hotel room, no doubt saying lots of profoud things that won’t be on my multimedia piece. Too bad, huh. I sleep for a bit, then explore Wuhan a little on my own, to keep myself awake as much as anything. The venue and hotel is way out in the suburbs though, and there’s little to see of any particular interest. Xie calls me to tell me they’re soundchecking. I’m curious to see the venue. It’s a good one, the best yet. The band tell me they’re looking forward to it, and sure enough its a special atmosphere. They rise to the event, playing a great set, and I too snap out of my malaise, kick into professional mode and take some of the best photos of the tour so far. Afterwards we go for food again, but I really begin to come down with a fever and headcold and back to my wonderful windowless hotel room early.
10th July
Sleep until noon in the pitch dark, dozed up on cold relief tablets. Wangwen have already checked out and according to the several text messages on my cellphone are 15 km across the city buying clothes. This is the first time in a week that anyone in the band has had the time or energy to really have a look around any of the cities we have visited, but I need to head back. I quickly book a flight back to Dalian for later that day. Even if I didn’t have to go back anyway for other reasons I’d probably be heading back anyway, I feel like shit, need some personal space away from the band, and am running out of motivation to collect basically the same material every night. I take a taxi into the city centre to meet Xie, who is getting his guitar fixed, and I wander around the old colonial part of Wuchang with him and two people from last night’s support band, even taking a few photos, before saying goodbye and heading off to the airport. It feels in some ways like the end of an era, but also feels good. I’m free again. Nothing to document. Serfdom over. For now…
13th July
My Visa was sent off today for processing. Another weight off my shoulders to have all that sorted out, but it does mean I now can’t leave Dalian until I get my passport back.
14th July
After some well earned rest after that frantic week of travel and shutter-clicking, I really now need to be back out trying my Seagull medium format, which was brought back from Beijing at the end of June and which I haven’t had time to try out yet. But so much has happened in the Chinese media in the last month during the busy intensives and then my trip away, there’s the Weng’an riots down in Guizhou, and more affairs related to the Olympic build-up. I need to catch up. I really feel I’m getting a much deeper understanding of China by observing closely the rollercoaster events of this bizarre year. Which is great in the long term, but not helping me with my project in the short term.
If I’m honest, I’m having doubts about this Beauty project, not the subject itself, but my approach. It seemed like a good concept a month ago when I was presenting it, but now having done much of my other documentary, one that I’ve been absolutely immersed in and focused on, this one seems lightweight in comparison. But I have no other option but to plough ahead. Perhaps a better idea will come to me as I go…
15th July
I took my Seagull TLR to Zhan Ping for a quick once-over check. He seems to think its fine, shutter a bit sticky at slower speeds, but on the whole, looks ok. Now I just have to find a decent tripod. I had been planning to use the cheaper one I had but I left it in the bar in Wuhan after the Wangwen show, probably for the best, as it really wasn’t great quality. I buy a new one by a Japanese company called Slik for 480 Yuan, and slick it is too, both rigid enough for stabilising a TLR and smooth enough in terms of movement for sticking the DV camera on. I also buy a reflector.
16th July
I go down to Echo Coffee shop with the Seagull and a roll of expired PPN portrait film to test what sort of results it gives. I need to sort this out before I start shooting anything.
I have the idea that perhaps I can concentrate my documentary only on Peace Plaza, a new retail development in Dalian next to where I live, look at all the ways that people can spend money there in order to improve their image and status, so there’s mens & women’s clothes shops, manicure stalls, massage places, hairdressers, beauty parlours, yoga centres, weights gyms,
17th July
The results of the first Seagull portraits are a success. The exposure doesn’t exactly match my DSLR, but it’s close enough to still allow me to meter off it. I’ll probably have to darken the scans, but that’ll also create some quite vignetting, which might look nice.
18th July
I get prints made and take them back down to Echo to give back to people, and notice that they’ve now got a display of vintage cameras for sale. They even have one or two vintage Polaroid cameras, plus a book called “The Polaroid Book”. I’m engrossed in it. Of course I’ve seen Polaroids before, but never looking like this. The soft vintage tones and faded charm aesthetic of Polaroids would be perfect for my documentary portraits. But how much Polaroid film is there left ? And can I afford to shoot a whole project on it ? I spend the evening on-line researching everything to do with Polaroids and trawling through Flickr’s archive to get a feel for the Polaroid tones.
I’ll judge the situation based on how many Polaroid cameras I can find next week when I visit Beijing’s Wukesong camera market and how much film there seems to be available. Perhaps there is even a film I can use with the Seagull that would give me a similar look ? Fuji Velvia perhaps ? Its high saturation will be balanced by the Seagull’s tendency to overexpose the centre and make it milky, and there’s a definite colour tint to it, which I can tweak in processing to give Polaroid-ish tones. I’m really still learning how film works, but I reckon the overall tone will be harder to tweak on a film which gives faithful colour representation.
20th July
I start to properly sift through the first of the tour photos and see just what kind of stuff I’ve actually brought back. I spend a few hours putting moving photos back and forward between folders and post-processing. I also upload a few of the Wangwen photos to Flickr to gauge the level of interest among an international audience. It’s favourable. I also continue finding out what all the buttons on flash gun are for. The tour was the first time I’d really ever used such a proper flash before, and it was kinda trial and error.
21st July
My visa is processed, I have my passport back, and can now leave Dalian again. I get an overnight train to Beijing in the evening.
22nd July
In Wukesong I look through the whole place for Polaroid cameras and/or Polaroid film. There’s nothing, some Fuji Instax, but no Polaroid. I scrap the Polaroid idea and buy 12 rolls of Fuji Velvia slide film instead for using with my Seagull. I costs me less than half of the price of the same film in Dalian. I also stock up on other kinds of film, for no particular purpose. I spend almost 500 Yuan on film. It somehow feels good to now be the owner of all this hard to obtain film, but will I ever use it ? I also buy a cable release wire. I’m kinda relieved in a way, and realise that I had been getting distracted somewhat by the idea of Polaroids. I could research the methodology to death. What I need to do is get out and shoot.
Also in Wukesong I buy a wireless adaptor for my flash. Hopefully I’ll try it out at the show in two days time.
24th July
Meet Wangwen at their Beijing show. They seem glad to see me again. It feels strange rejoining them, but I’m much more aware now about how to readjust to their tour pace. Once we get inside the venue it’s business as usual, they soundcheck, I shoot the crowd, we’re both back in the routine, a routine which involves beer and food afterwards. I don’t use wireless flash, but experiment with synch flash. Again I got enough good photos to justify coming to Beijing, and lots more usable interviews in English with the crowd, who are on the whole more clued-up about music in general.
25th July
Travel back to Dalian with Wangwen. They’re now asking me to take photos of them when they want a shot taken, and I can have them all posed within seconds if I want to catch a quick album-cover style shot. I’m now pretty relaxed towards my project. I know I’ve got enough good stuff. I can take my foot off the pedal. The band too are almost home, tour over for another year.
26th July
Last show of the tour, I don’t bother recording it, just turn up a the end for some photos. We go out for beers and kebabs afterwards, a huge group of thirty of us, me the only foreigner, all sitting in an L-shaped kinda row. Once drunk, I have the idea of handing my equipment over to the group, giving them the DV and sound recorder, and DSLR with flash, and letting them just shoot and record as they please. It works really well. I get over two hours of audio and video. The younger people are especially at ease with a DV camera and voice recorder. They really get into the roles. Some of the footage is hilarious, proper Dongbei humour. It will take a lot of time to translate into English though. We all get blind drunk. I barely remember getting home, but somehow all my equipment is still in one piece.
28th July
More editing and processing of photos. I’ve almost got my first edit from the first trip away finished. No doubt I will add to this as I look through it all again and find more shots that have a place.
29th July
My project grows an arm when I am phoned up by one of the younger guys who was drinking with us the other night. His band “Which Park” are practicing that evening and want me to go and film them. Sure, why not…turns out they will be spending the next week in the studio recording their debut album. I go out for a meal with them after, and who turns up as well, but Xie and Gengxin from Wangwen. We all get drunk.
30st July - 3rd August
I spend a lot of time in the studio with Which Park. Xie and Gengxin from Wangwen drop in and out too. This is great for Wangwen project. The band adjusting back to ordinary life back in Dalian, and mixing with friends, and passing their experience on is something I want to capture as part of the documentary. The contrast between Wangwen, slightly older, around 30, 31, and Which Park, who are all between 20 and 25, is good too, different sides of the One Child policy cut-off, plus 5 – 10 more years of exposure to globalisation. Overall I record another 2 hours of DV footage plus another couple of hours of audio, and many more photos, on top of what I already have of Wangwen.
4th August
I must admit I’m finding it hard to motivate myself to go out an shoot the beauty-based documentary portraits. I really need to get it started before the Olympics start, because I know I’ll end up getting distracted by the media coverage surrounding that. Part of the problem is that I still don’t have the project sufficiently resolved in my head to be suitably enthusiastic about going to shoot it. I thought it would come to me during the previous three weeks, but it hasn’t. I’m the sort of person that invests so much of their time and energy in something, to the detriment of all else around. I’m the same with conversations, and with relationships. I’ve been totally focused on the Wangwen project, and now I’m trying to switch track to these portraits, but still with one eye on Wangwen, and in trying to juggle two things at once, to multitask my energy, I end up doing neither.
I’ve also brought back over 1000 photos on my hard drive, many of which are still unprocessed. All my momentum is pushing me towards resolving those, seeing that work come to some kind of fruition. By now I’m fairly well in control of my DSLR habits. I rarely go on an all out trigger-fest, snappping away in hope. I’m almost as disciplined about shooting digital as I am with film, perhaps because I also shoot film. I tend to delete lots of shots in camera, edit as I go, and by the time I reach a computer I pretty much know which shots I’ll want to use. Some people say I should retain all these shots, but I don’t agree. I’m not taking these photos for posterity, for the benefit of someone looking through my contact sheets. If the occasional great image is deleted, then so be it. The bottom line is that overall, my approach to the Wangwen project has delivered the material I wanted it to. Thus my creative fire has been quenched for now, my obsessive need to press the shutter has been satisfied for another month. Before I can go back out and shoot more, I need to feel that hunger again, that spark, and I probably won’t feel it as long as I don’t quite have the portrait project suitably resolved in my head.
It also suddenly strikes me that much of Wangwen’s adjustment back to reality seems to involve beer. It almost seems they are delaying a return to real life. I wonder if I too am guilty of this. How important really has recording this Which Park offshoot been ? I think I can link it in with the longer version of the Wangwen documentary, but can I really ?
The guys in Which Park give me a call. Not only have they finally finished recording the album, but it’s also someone’s birthday, they’re all going out for barbecue down by the beach. Xie and Gengxin arrive too. I say I’ll go down for one or two, but end up having several. Hey that’s what summer is all about after all. I deliberately don’t take my camera, but after a couple of beers I end up hijacking someone else’s DSLR and shooting away like an idiot anyway. Most of it is probably crap.
5th August
I wake up with more than a hangover, it’s food poisoning again… oh bollocks…
I don’t even have the energy or drive to upload to Flickr…that’s when you know I’m really ill…
6th August
Get a call from guys in Wangwen. They’re going out for beers in the middle of Dalian. I meet them, without even taking my camera. It seems they are already quite drunk. My stomach is still a little dodgy from two nights ago, but I drink a little. In their drunken wisdom, that ask me to become their official full-time videographer, a proper member of the band. They now seem to trust me though to the point that when I am speaking to them on my own, they are telling me things that they don’t want each other to know. I’ve changed from the fly on the wall, to the family dog, into something akin to a Catholic priest. What implication does this have on my ability to tell a story. In contrast to the beginning where I was given an official story by Wangwen that fitted the group consensus and had to dig for additional info, I’m now being given all these nuggets from the band about each other, off the record, that would make great twists to the story and inject some juicy gossip, but I know I can’t use them. There are some things that stay between people and shouldn’t become public. I don’t want to stir up trouble. Now I see that it is me that must impose constraints on the real story for the benefit of the group and present an officially approved story. I must be dishonest with myself. I must water down and filter the truth. This of course means that I lose respect somewhat for my own project and question what purpose I am really trying to fulfill.
Gengxin is also talking about opening up a live music venue in Dalian. He says he’s doing it because he never wants to go back to the day-job. I could document him as he looks for potential places, but really, how interesting will that be ? Would I be in danger of just gathering more material that I will never have the time to sift through ? Multimedia is so easy to accumulate, and it’s not like photography, when you can count your success immediately in terms of successful shots. With multimedia though it’s far easier just to shoot one more cassette, do one more interview, just in case it turns out to be useful. Everything is “just in case”. You need to be so much more disciplined, you have to know when to stop, and to do that you need to know your story. But how can you know that until you really know your topic, and your subjects ? Won’t the story change ? So much of what is pissing me off right now about the Western media’s coverage of the Olympic build-up is that it seems so many have come here with their headlines pre-written, all they need is to flesh it out with details, fitting the evidence to the crime instead of listening and observing what they see on the ground. This isn’t the sort of journalism or documentary work I want to do. How much do I work into my plans the potential that all plans cease to exist, and how much do I need a certain amount of structure to see the project through in a way I am happy with ? I guess it will come with experience.
I’m also concerned about the amount the band (and myself) are drinking. It’s true it’s the height of the hot lazy humid summer, and they haven’t gone back to work yet, and there was the Dalian beer festival last week, and their friends were in the studio, and now this week there is a certain pre-Olympic carnival atmosphere in China, but I want to document their return to daily life to contrast with the tour. It doesn’t seem like they are in any way trying to return to that normality yet, I’m convinced of that now, they’re still “on the road” in their heads, and as long as I’m there with a camera, I probably am too. I’m driven by a need to finish off the project and get some “closure”, but I wonder if even by being there, I am in fact actually delaying that process. I can surely be as much of a bad influence on them as they are on me. It’s probably best if I take some time out away from the band. I’ll wait until the Olympics are coming to a close and then re-visit the project.
7th August
Ok, new regime, more exercise, no beer, for a bit anyway. I need to sort out my computer as well, it’s so blooming slow and buggy. I reinstall everything, takes me a whole day to copy stuff off onto hard drives and almost the same time to re-install it, but it seems better, and I really need something reliable to be going on with for editing the remaining photos. I hate computers.
8th August
The mother of all distractions has just kicked off in the Caucausus, dwarfing the Olympics and any photographic projects I might be trying to concentrate on. It’s unfolding before me, and I have a real motivation to find out about why it’s unfolding the way it is. I can go back and review the events later, but it won’t be the same, and once the event has died down, it’s not guaranteed that I will even have the motivation to do so. Right now, the world’s media has gone into top gear, and as a consumer of that media am I in top gear too. I’m hyper-motivated to learn, to absorb, and to think, and I know myself well enough to know that I have to follow the motivation. I’m in the zone, digesting almost the entire history of the Cold War and US-Soviet relations in one sleepless night of internet research.
Of course it may not be purely external motivation, as seperatist movements have particular interest for me right now, being a Scot. We have a seperatist government in power, and a possible independence referendum within two or three years. The reality is that most Scots are ambivalent, there are a few diehard unionists (or if you like British nationalists/European seperatists) and a few diehard Scottish nationalists, but the majority, myself included, might feel Scottish but also part-British. But what is Britain these days ?Is it an idea worth believing in, worth me giving up part of my Scottish identity for ? I’m not convinced. Apart from the odd article in the Guardian, the mainstream media have just parroted the government line in this Russia-Georgia conflict, and the government have, just as they did in the build up to Iraq, parroted the US neo-con line. Britain is as much of a proxy of the US empire as the likes of Georgia. More worrying is the endless excuses and climate of appeasement being produced to justify it all. Does nobody think critically any more or are they worried it might be picked up on CCTV camera ? Of course there’s oil involved on both “sides”, but I think it’s about more than that. The French, Italians and Germans still seem to have some sense of diplomacy, of dignity, of mutual respect, even if it’s a veneer, it’s a good veneer to have. The idea of a multi-polar Europe seems to hold more future right now than a USA seemimngly intent on cannibalising itself, or the idea of a London-driven puppet Britain whose body is kept on life-support by virtue of some lingering nostalgia for days when it was more than just a glorified stock exchange. I’m gripped by existential angst, world politics, media, and needing to vent. I’m suddenly aware that my concerns still lie very much events around the North Sea as well as the Yellow Sea, I feel at odds with the Chinese society around me, as if I am a first time foreigner, just arrived in the country. I’m in no fit state to be going out taking photos.
9th August
Back to the beauty portraits. I stick a roll of Velvia slide film through my Seagull. It gets chewed up. Bugger…it worked fine before, what could be wrong now ? What do I do if this can’t be resolved ? Polaroid after all ? Holga ? Use my DSLR even ?
I’m sure I could churn something out quickly using Digital, but its a compromise I’m not willing to make. I know I only have finite energy for going out and making these portraits. I’m not going to waste it all on shots that I know from the start are a second-best option. I may become a professional photographer, but I will always be a photographer first and a professional second. Digital is not an option for this. It has to be with the Seagull. Perhaps only Polaroid would be a suitable Plan B
10th August
Research colour profiles. I become the all-time grandmaster of all things coloured and prolific, for about an hour, and then forget most of it. I do know though that I generally shoot in Adobe RGB as a matter of course, but I guess sRGB will be ok for the multimedia if it’s going on the web. I can convert. I also decide not to rock the boat by trying to edit in Lightroom or Photoshop, and I will just continue with no-frills package Irfanview, which I know so well, I can virtually edit with my eyes closed.
11th - 22nd August
Edit photos for the multimedia bit by bit, five or six a day, slowly but surely, enough o keep it going without distracting me too much from the Beauty project. I upload them to Flickr and generates a fair bit of interest, receiving 100 or so hits a day from my own “fans” tuning in to see the latest installment. I might not be getting paid for it, but it’s satisfying to know that all that time and effort is finding some sort of audience, even if it isn’t in its final form.
During this time I also make my first attempt to categorise all the audio recordings I brought back. I begin to listen to them all, to see what I can use. There’s so much to translate, too much for now. I’m going to have to just do a short version for now and leave the final full version for later.
I’m also not so sure about the Peace Plaza idea any more. I want to scrap the idea of holding up signs that reveal more about the people, scrap the idea of Peace Plaza, and all different manifestations of beauty and image and status. Abandon any idea of making slightly contrived comments on consumerism. Documenting alone will be enough, but to make it a worthwhile document I need to tighten it up somewhat.
I still like the idea of finding shops in Dalian, but getting access will be a real problem. Knowing Chinese culture, connections are everything, and if I walk in off the street I’m unlikely to have success. If I find places to shoot through a friend of a friend I will have much more success. Having someone who knows me well to vouch for me is important in making people at ease. Echo Coffee is my best bet. Although its only a few months old, I’ve known both the owners for two or three years, and I know a few people in their extended social circle, which overlaps a little with the social circle I know Xie from Wangwen through.
12th August
Yesterday’s idea for the beauty portraits has evolved into something that seems to have reinvigorated my desire to go out and shoot. It’s ridiculously simple, in theory. Portraits of shoppers, trying on new clothes, and in the caption, what it is about the clothes that leads them to they buy them or not. That’s all, I think that’s enough. It’s much narrower and specific than my previously vague and over-ambitious project, and correspondingly I’m much more driven to shoot it. Unfortunately my Seagull is still chewing up the film I put through it.
The key is also finding a suitable shop, both one that can allow me to bring in a larger narrative context to frame it, and one whose clothes fit the aesthetic of the Seagull plus the Velvia. I need to find the right one. I write out a note in English and translate it into Chinese which I will take along to Echo Coffee. Writing it in Chinese myself is really important. The Chinese love it when a foreigner can speak Chinese writing it is even better. It opens doors on so many more levels than just having better communication. It shows them that I’m not the typical aloof English speaker stuck in a neo-colonial rut, relying on a linguistic balance of power being tipped globally in my favour to provide me with a willing army of helpers. People may think these symbolic gestures aren’t noticed, but I’m pretty sure they are, symbolism and “the gesture” means a lot more in Chinese culture. It’s also partly why I’m set on using the Chinese-made Seagull camera.
I put my note up at Echo. The owner actually puts it up on their on-line message board as well. They seem hopeful that I will get access through it. The only problem is that I’m still when I’m going to go, how long to wait until I fix my camera. If I begin to waste people’s time then they will not be so willing to help me.
13th August
I find out the problem with the Seagull. The shot counter is broken, and there’s something loose in the winding mechanism. It’s not stopping after each shot, there’s no resistance, just keeps winding. If I’m very gentle with it I can put a whole roll of film through without it chewing it up, but in order to avoid shots overlapping, I need to calculate how far to turn the handle each time to advance it. After a lot of measuring I think I’ve got a system that I can attempt to use without just wasting film. Of course I need to test another film first, but not with Velvia bought in Beijing this time.
14th August
My judgement of how many shots to take on a roll seems ok, and the film doesn’t get chewed up if I’m very careful. I wasted quite a lot of the film I shot, but I should still be able to get 7 or 8 shots per roll without too much risk of overlapping or going off the end of the roll. Just need to find a shop now.
18th August
I hear that someone at Echo has news of someone who knows someone who has a shop that might be suitable. I ask them to make inquiries, and arrange for us to meet. I don’t expect it to happen tomorrow, it might take a week. I wrote out more sheets in Chinese and photocopy them to give to shoppers.
22nd August
I get a definite thumbs up from a shop, down near Renmin Road. An interesting area, but I have no idea what kind of shop it will be. I have to go and meet them in two days time.
I’d better do it quick. For some reason I thought I had planned to have this done for the end of the month, but it seems I’ve made a mistake, it’s the 25th we need to have something ready by. I did write it down in a diary, but I never thought to check until now.
23rd August
I decide that for the short version of the Wangwen documentary, I’ll ask Xie to write something, and then we can record that, I’ll mix in their music and sequence the photos accordingly.
24rd August
I go down to the shop. It’s a small women’s boutique, quite classical yet modern clothing, elegant, stylish and the walls are painted pink and purple. This is absolutely ideal for using Velvia with. It’s also run by a feisty retired woman with a real story to tell, and got a very set demographic context, of shoppers with money from the offices of the nearby business district, wanting something a little out of the ordinary. I set up my camera and tripod, and wait, and wait…only one shopper that afternoon, and she doesn’t want to participate. Apart from the lack of customers, it’s absolutely ideal for what I want. The lack of customers is a problem though…hmm. Apparently midday to early afternoon is the best time. The woman who owns it isn’t convinced I will have any more luck finding people to participate though, but is welcome to me trying again nonetheless.
25th August
I also find out that there is another boutique next door to the one I was at yesterday. Its owner is happy to let me shoot there as well. I get three decent portraits between the two shops. Not only that but I get a phone call from someone else about a “streetwear” store elsewhere in the city that will let me shoot there. I thank the woman at the clothes shop and head to the other shop. The owner is cool, into photography too, and even gives me a free t-shirt, but no customers arrive. It’s quiet, he says, because the students aren’t back at university yet. Next week it will be busier. Eventually a customer arrives, and I shoot a portrait, but he tells me afterwards that the customer was a friend who lived locally. He had made a phonecall to him telling them I was there. Although I think the customer bought the t-shirt for real anyway, can I still use this shot ? First things first though, I need to see the results of today’s work, and stick the film in for developing.
26th August
I meet Xie in the evening and see what he has written. It’s good, more personal than I could come up with, and less complex, due to it not being written in his native language. I tidy it up a little, with a view to recording it that night, but by the time I’m finished, Xie is too drunk to talk.
27th August
I get the results back next day. The best portrait has a huge light leak across it. This is the first time I’d seen this. Knowing the Flickr crowd, this sort of stuff goes down well, but would magazines take it ? Apparently yes, Both DJ and Robert Pledge also seem to think it adds something. I just need another few portraits of the same quality as the best one I have so far.
Xie is unavailable this evening for recording. Tomorrow apparently is ok.
28th August
I get a taxi across the city at 10pm to meet Xie, to record what he has written. We meet at his flat, and of course I brought my camera too, for a portrait by his front door that will be useful in the final edit.
29th August
The weather is stormy today. Even in the unlikely event of there actually being any shoppers, I’m not standing out in the torrential rain with a camera that no doubt leaks more than just light…it dries up a little later on though later on though and I go down to get a portrait of the owner before she closes up shop. I interview her as well, to get the information I need to go with the story. She writes it in Chinese, and the people at Echo Coffee later help me decipher her handwriting. I also take my camera in past the photo lab, where they said they might be able to fix the winding mechanism and counter. It seems they could. For now at least the Seagull works again.
I also start working on editing the audio. It probably shouldn’t take me that long, but I’m a perfectionist. I write songs in my spare time, for fun, sitting for a whole afternoon with a guitar, crafting, honing, tweaking, getting that sense of continuity, or else change. Being a musician as well as a photographer is surely a bonus in terms of audio quality, but not in terms of time. The process must be painstakingly frustrating for anyone to watch. I actually quite enjoy editing audio though, as much as I enjoy editing photos. I have the idea of making the audio so it works as a standalone mp3, as well as together with the photos. Done in this way, considering it to be its own project, audio isn’t really a chore at all.
30th August
Back down at the shop again. I get the shots I need, I think. Unfortunately the only person in Dalian who goes anywhere near E6 chemicals, a guy called Huang Laoshi, is away for the weekend. I won’t get my film back for two days then instead of one, which means I’ll miss the deadline and get bad marks for Term 2. Yeah, it’ll all be because of Huang. Blame Huang…
1st September
After a last minute blitz on getting my long overdue Term 1 essay polished up (much of it was already written), I get down to the photolab for my prints. A couple are slightly out of focus because of the viewfinder not being the brightest, but I can still use them. I also grab a couple of contextual shots in nice evening light with my DSLR and wide angle.
2nd September-8th September
I’ve missed the deadline for handing both of my projects in. I didn’t have anywhere online to put them in any case. Now I do though, my new Hostgator account is running again, it’s just a case of building a new Wordpress blog and seeing if I can remember how I embedded my stuff before. The whole of the rest of the week is spent trying to fix my computer which appears to have taken a turn for the worse, after seeming fine for a while after I re-installed everything. And of course I spend a lot of time editing, the multimedia mainly. I have a week apparently, and I use every last bit of it. It’s a real marathon, I’m surviving on five hours of sleep, simply because I’m so in the zone. I’m getting to bed at 5am most mornings, having dreams that involve conversations I had when I was away “on tour”, and then spending around 16 hours a day hunched over on my couch, and combating this ridiculously unhealthy lifestyle with occasional bursts of weights at the gym and two fruit-smoothies a day. There’s much more to do than I had previously thought, mostly as I said, because I’m a perfectionist, and have boundless reserves of patience for fiddling and tweaking all things audio-visual. I have to go back through all my photos again looking for photos that fit. Final version is five minutes long. In contrast, the print project took only about three hours to put together with InDesign, although I had previously done the post-production and done the writing to go with it.
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