GRUDGE MATCH
So the series was tied. A week after my best shooting day ever, Charleston kicked my ass and I came home with goals unfulfilled.
Thankfully Cam and I had our annual trip scheduled for the upcoming weekend - a third consecutive weekend visit for me - and I told him I needed to redeem myself. Overall I felt great about my effort so far but the job was not done. I needed a fifth photo to give myself the best chance of getting selected and published, and I had one more chance.
We headed out on Saturday night, which gave me a few extra hours the following morning and offered a rare (for me) opportunity to shoot Charleston after dark.
“Job not done”
As we parked his truck, he told me the combination to get back in it if I ever needed to get in without the key.
Oh OK easy to remember; it’s the first five digits of [redacted family member]’s phone number, I said. A number we’ve both known for over three decades.
He stared at me blankly.
I never thought of that.
You mean to tell me you didn’t choose that number!?
Nope he said, they just gave it to me.
This was a great sign for the trip. Not only were the stars aligning, but after consecutive weekends of street photography I was dialed in to the details. I couldn’t wait for tomorrow.
Cam was waking up at 3:30 am to go deep-sea fishing, so we walked over to the harbor and scoped out the boat that would be taking him 60 miles off the coast. It’s the big white one with all the gear.
“Midnight at the Boat Library”
Returning to our hotel opposite the harbor, we saw this. It’s what’s referred to as ‘dry-racking’ or ‘dry-docking’. Out-of-water boat storage right on the harbor, with a mega-forklift to pick the boats like books off a shelf at the library. The entire business consists of those steel beams, a couple employees and a small kiosk the size and shape of a restroom that you’d find in a park or golf course. And they absolutely rake it in, all year long. Great business model.
The photo is shot with the long-exposure technique, meaning I set the camera somewhere - traditionally on a tripod, in this case a fence post - and let the shutter sit open for a pre-determined amount of time to let more light in. You have to adjust some other settings to compensate for the light, and then keep the camera completely still. As a result you get a glowing night scene full of detail and vibrant light trails. Long-exposure was one of my first loves in photography and I hardly ever give myself a chance to do it anymore.
I took the photo above while walking back to our room while the settings were still on a longer exposure from the boat library, so it kept capturing as I walked. Normally a blunder but…
I kinda love it.
Crop it down to a square and throw a Parental Advisory sticker on it and it’s a perfect late 90’s rock album cover, a time and genre near-and-dear to my heart.
Was I wrong?
I’d say either Fuel or Alanis Morsette but I definitely hear late 90’s angst when I see that. Foo Fighters maybe?
After a solid night’s sleep, I took Cam’s truck across the river and tried to find a nice free parking spot somewhere close to Meeting St. Shouldn’t be a problem this early. People weren’t even up for church yet.
I shot this out of the windshield on the way over. This is not a view of Charlie that you see in photos very often (ever). [Editor’s note: Don’t shoot and drive.]
I found a spot I felt good about and took off on foot. One of the first things that caught my eye was this hoop, and more specifically a hole in it’s backboard. I actually propped my self up on a ledge behind the basket and shot the other way through the hole, trying to frame a passer-by, but after what was essentially a five minute calf-raise to start a long day I decided to keep it moving. Thankfully I looked back up the other direction as I left, I like the dystopian-eeriness of big brother watching over through the ruins. It made me feel something, and that’s almost always what I’m going for.
More album artwork, except this is the back cover with the song titles over-layed, and it’s more like mid-2010’s backpack dope-rap like Troy Ave or Joey Bad@$$. Maybe they’re standing off to the right, one leg up on the wall, looking down the alley. I’m not actually gonna mock that one up though. (For now.)
“But I’m far from local”
I would learn from last weeks mistakes, and pace myself with the sun exposure. There was a path down the center of one these giant concrete tentacles. It had my name written all over it. I followed.
“Take me to the place I love, take me all the way”
“Under the bridge, downtown / I could not get enough”
I stayed with the path, it was great for shade and shadows, a practical and creative win/win. And man I’m glad I did.
It lead me to an unbelievable skate park right in the heart of town, one I previously had no idea about.
There were three skaters already out there at 9ish AM. Rise and grind, literally.
THPS2
I started snapping away, and as soon as I had one I was proud of I knew I had to introduce myself and share. The homie in the action shot above was named Gabriel. He could not have been a nicer dude. He actually said he’s dating a photographer that works for [a different] Charleston magazine and had previously pitched her on coming to park to shoot. I was happy to fill in for the time being.
He actually insisted on giving me a twenty for some portraits, something I rarely get to shoot anymore. I threw some shadows on the one above and some vintage looks on the one below. Matched the classic American tattoo and graffiti styles. Pretty rad, as the skate park homies would say.
Shooting a skatepark in the morning was an incredible warm up for the day. Subjects in motion, street art on the walls, light shining through the interstate infrastructure. It offered for endless chances of mixing composition, athleticism, skill, and say, a graffiti Bart Simpson, for example.
‘Poetry in Motion’
After hanging around for probably twenty minutes I came up with a photo in my head and asked Gabriel to collaborate. It didn’t completely translate - they don’t always do - but it was worth the effort. I call it ‘Poetry in Motion’, of course.
I met and got the info for the other two skaters (see the whole gallery here) I took off for downtown.
It wasn’t long before I was back in familiar scenes like this one:
Unmistakably Charlie
This scene was familiar but for a different reason: it looked like Italy, some of the more updated parts of Milan to be specific. The architecture, the colors, the courtyard. Sono molto Italiano.
Another thing Charleston and Milan have in common, aside from being extremely old, of course: They have Louis Vuitton stores. The King Street storefront always has incredible window displays, and I have spent a lot of time playing with the reflections.
“King Louis”
The shot above features their LV monogram in the foreground, with the world-famous King Street in the reflection making up much of the remainder of the image. The combination of the two, of course, results in “King Louis”.
This one is fun if you use your imagination a bit. The real life bike-courier on the left is ‘reflected’ as a figurine bike-courier in the Louis Vuitton display on the right. It would be one of my cooler images ever if it were more pronounced, more obvious. It’s a slight stretch but you have to include those when trying to see the world differently.
I took this in the hallway outside the Louie store, located in ‘The Charleston Place’ a super bougie, yet quirky southern mall between King and Meeting. This guy was rocking a fully functional vest; pockets, straps, buttons and all, made up of nothing but Swisher Sweet wrappers. I obviously asked for a picture and then offered to send it to him. He went simply by ‘Josh’ and said no, thank you. No socials, no e-mail please. The reason? He believes people will hound him for the jacket, or for him to make more, or for directions to make their own. He simply did not want to be bothered with that.
Well OK then, I chuckled. He must be speaking from experience.
Typical King Street traffic (above and below)
After a lap up and down King I decided to head towards the stables and City Market, which are in the same general area. I would give this unicorn shot one last try, just for good measure. Once again, I already got exactly what I wanted two weeks prior but the photo wasn’t cropped in a way that lent itself to being on a cover with a title over-lay. I thought maybe, since I had all the tools, the know-how, the location and everything, that I might be able to shoot one that was 10% wider, and therefore 10% better.
I found this lady in the City Market, a decent addition to my outfit-matching-their-surroundings series. It was the rare case where she said OK to the picture but no face please, which I did my best to oblige. Probably gang-related. The opps are watching.
I didn’t feel like hanging around the stables again, knowing that the best you can do there is about a 7/10 but I did enjoy this art in the alley as I passed by.
My unicorn horn framed by the Market entrance.
There are a few downsides - cons, you could say - to this particular area at this time of the day. It’s hot. It’s crowded. The Rose Boys were getting aggressive. I was hanging out on their turf after refusing to buy a rose, and we were both getting snotty with each other.
[Editor’s note: If you are unfamiliar with the Rose Boys, they are middle-school to high-school age kids from the area that peddle ‘palmetto roses’ around the Market. Their tactic is similar to the mall kiosk guys, but twice as aggressive and very rude if you turn them away. They try to goat you into confrontation, knowing back-up is on a bicycle right around the corner if they need. The pitch is always a high-school basketball tournament, it’s always in Georgia, it’s always four hours away, and it’s always next weekend. Except they’re at the Market every week. So, cons, you could say.]
Between all the people crossing Church Street, the Rose Boys really testing my patience, and the low-hanging sun, the wait between each horse felt like forever. First one came through a very busy intersection. The next one, what seemed like an eternity later, had a canopy overhead. It had been almost an hour of me circling, loitering, avoiding. I never saw the white horse, and I never even got close to a good shot.
This was as good as I did all day trying to re-create the unicorn shot.
Instead of letting that bother me, it did the opposite. Even with all the knowledge and skills needed to replicate or even improve on that unicorn photo, I couldn’t do it. Not on command at least. There was indeed some magic to it.
As I trekked back through the peninsula I took the prettiest shortcut in the world, the College of Charleston campus. It’s a dreamscape of Spanish moss and brick pathways, each building a little more charming than the next. It crossed my mind so I looked it up, and no, I couldn’t have afforded to go here, in any lifetime. In-state currently sits at a fairly reasonable $6259 per semester… Out-of-state? Oh that will be $19,672 per semester please and thank you. Whew.
The pink flower image above is a nod to the power of shooting with manually-adjusted settings, something I don’t often do in Charleston. Street photography is about capturing moments, coincidences, magic. You simply do not have time to change your ISO. Urgency is key.
But when you have the time, it’s of course always better to get it right. In this case the sun was pouring down over these flowers in the heat of the day, and on ‘auto’ the photo turned out far too bright. I turned everything down to the point that hardly any light was getting into the camera, and for a very short amount of time. The result keeps the highlights down, allowing the pink to pop and keeping them from appearing white and washed out. I could lift the shadows but I like it how it is. Almost like a dark greenhouse with a hole in the roof or something.
People go to school here (?)
It was the top of the afternoon and I had to go pick Cam up soon. I passed by this 25 foot tall shrub, something you don’t see often in it’s own right, but at this very moment it had a particular cloud passing by above it. I took 4-5 shots trying to sit it right on top of the shrub to create the look of a palm tree. It just so happened that there was a smaller cloud trailing behind it.
It was the South Carolina state flag.
Don’t see it?
Allow me to help:
Whether shooting in the driveway or out shooting Charleston; you gotta leave on a make.
And this was a swish. I’m going to pick my homie up and we are going home. My job here is done.
EPILOUGE
As I’ve been reviewing photos, editing and writing this blog post I wanted to stay in the Charleston state of mind. So what did I do? I turned on Southern Charm in the background. And instead of watching the latest season, which I did previously in March, I turned it all the way back, over a decade, to season one.
At first it was a tough watch: TV from a 2015 looks like TV from 2004 for some reason, and several of the characters that I had gotten to know had not yet joined the cast. But what I found wasn’t the drunken socialites from the most recent season. These were (mostly) fully formed, interesting people that made up the fabric of Charleston in their own unique ways.
The season featured Thomas… wait for it… RAVENEL, the son of the man whom this giant bridge I just crossed was named after. Not only was I enthralled by the connection to my recent adventure, I was also truly surprised that the guy the bridge was named after (Arthur Ravenel Jr.) was still alive. Apparently he’s the one that brought all the funding together for it as a congressman. I figured you had to die to get a bridge named after you.
And get this: Arthur’s such a confederate deep-red die-hard that in his only appearance in the show, while eating lunch with Thomas, he tips the server $5 - more than usual - because he can’t bare to have a picture of Abraham Lincoln in his pocket. It was said heartily, and hardly a joke. They chuckled, but he meant it. I thought back to the brutal columns rising over the Cooper River. Maybe they were evil after all.
The show also features a trust-fund baby named Shep, whose last name is Rose, but his lineage is the ‘Boykin’ family. There is a town named after them, and it’s now famous in the south for breeding a particular type of dog - the Boykin spaniel. Our shop dog at work, who I spend six days a week with and love with all my heart, is a Boykin spaniel. Miss Daisy Dooskers.
Man’s Best Friend
I just entered Daisy in a ‘cutest pet’ photo contest for Grand Strand Magazine, and she made it into the June/July print edition. That marks two issues in a row with images published for me, and I can say I bought a picture of Daisy at Barnes and Noble yesterday. [She made the top ten, vote for her here!]
A Boykin and her bun buns
The first season also featured a lady named Cameran (spelled different than my homie) who was selling real estate downtown, which at this time was right before a market boom and huge uptick in prices. It was fascinating to see the insides of some of these museum-like homes that I pass by and photograph each trip.
One guy, Craig, who now has a sewing store on King Street, was interning for a TV-famous lawyer here in South Carolina that has a billboard up in my neighborhood (Don’t scream, call Akim!).
Not only was I noticing the connections to my own life mounting, I couldn’t help but notice this was just a more substantive, interesting watch. Thomas was running a dumpster-fire Senate campaign against my current Senator, the un-honorable Lindsay Graham. Craig gets fired (spoiler alert, sorry) exposing Akim as a serious lawyer when I previously, based on his commercials, I could only assume otherwise. Cameran was showing in real-time why I was getting priced out of living anywhere near this place.
That’s when something occurred to me: What if Charleston was the same? As in, what if it used to be way better? What if what I love right now, is actually the season 11 ‘all socialites, no substance’ version of Charleston? What if it used to have even more charm? What if it used to be even more enchanting? I almost shuttered at the thought.
THE SELECTIONS
The very first person I showed the unicorn photo to was my niece, Ava. She’s nine. When I showed her the image, still on my camera, she instantly stated, without missing a beat:
“That looks like a unicorn.”
My hear fluttered. The exact reaction I was hoping for. So this was no brainer. Entry #1. It’s what I set out to do, and honestly, it’s even better than I ever imagined. What happens from here does not matter, because I am wholly satisified with both the effort and the results. Dedicated to Miss Ava Jane, “Charlie the Unicorn”.
Entry #2 - I posted this on Instagram and was re-posted by both Charleston Magazine and Mary Whyte, the sculptor of ‘Lily’. Again, a success regardless what happens from here.
‘Buckets’
Entry #3 - I couldn’t decide on the exact crop for this photo for a while but ended up turning it in like this. I just posted a full set of photos from the basketball court that night to Instagram and received some decent feedback. I don’t expect it to make the magazine but I am very proud of it and the story behind it.
It was about a month ago on the Bill Simmons podcast when he was having a playful debate about who would win, five MJ’s or five Wemby's (the answer of course, is five Lebrons, but I digress). The idea of using redundancy as a force; replicating your strongest features, accentuating your highs and quintupling down on them resonated with me because I was in the midst of trying to put together my own team of five.
So the question was… do I turn in two Wemby’s? Would a team of five very different photos that highlight a diverse palette of Charleston life be a more effective strategy when trying to get published in this semi-national magazine? Or do I put in both Wemby’s (the two unicorn shots) and hope one - or both - of them go nuts? If you have a second unicorn pic that’s only 90% as good as the first one, but still more creative and “So Charleston” than almost any picture in last year’s contest, you don’t sit that on the bench right?
I made my coaching decision. WE’RE STARTING TWO WEMBY’S. ‘Charlie the Unicorn’ pt. 2 is Entry #4.
For the last selection I went sentimental. Not only is this a really unique place to be standing in Charleston, but when I took it I was standing there with my best friend; one that offered me and opportunity long ago, and I took it. I would not know Charleston, or South Carolina, or the American South without my buddy Cam. He believed in me, I believed in him; and we have not let each other down.
When I submitted Entry #5, I knew that none of that would be evidenced in the photo. It’s just a bunch of boats and lights and reflections. But I know. I know that none of this would be possible without our trust in each other, our love for each other, and our hard, hard ass work. We are so far from home in this world, and we have made it work, together.
Thank you Cam, I love you brother.
It’s late June as I post this, and I should know within a few weeks whether I made the magazine or not.
But I don’t have to wait to know that this was a success. I set out to do something, something I created in my brain, and I went out and made it real. There is no amount of failure or rejection that the magazine can provide that can overcome my satisfaction. This was a win: and no matter what happens, I am going to be back to try again next year.
Dear reader, I can not thank you enough for your time, your love, your support. If you are reading this, you are the reason.
Thank you, and God Bless.