While I was in the process of revamping my website and figuring out a better system for cataloging my archive, I came across these photos. These are from my first trip to New York City back in 2017 while I was on my first paid travel freelance shoot (expenses paid for by my client). What makes these photos special to me is that they were all taken in the span of 15 hours and this was my fist time developing color negative film.
During this time I was still working full time at a coffee shop in SF and balancing freelance jobs here and there. While I was at work, I got an email from a previous client asking me for my availability for a shoot and that they had a surprise. After a bit of back and forth, we lock in dates and my client revealed to me we were doing a 2 day shoot in New York! I was in shock. I never thought that I would get the opportunity to get paid to travel for a shoot. Excited about the news, I immediately talked to my manager to get the days I needed off. Long story short, I could only get 1 of the days off effectively turning a 2 day shoot into a really packed 1 day shoot. And to make matters more difficult, I had to come back the same day in order to make it to work at the coffee shop the following day. So I booked a ticket for a red eye flight (8:40pm) from SFO to JFK and return red eye (9:10pm the following day) from JFK to SFO.
Fast forward to the airport, I had a bag full of gear with me (Camera, 3-4 lenses, tripod, external mic, extra batteries, tripod, laptop, and chargers, my film camera, and 2 rolls of film) and I’m waiting to board my flight in the terminal. While I was waiting, I was going over the schedule for the day. We had call time for the first shoot at 8am-11am in Brooklyn and a call time for 12pm-3pm for the second shoot in Manhattan. This gave me about 2 hours of free time upon my arrival and 6 hours of free time before my departure. When I finally got to JKF, I quickly figured out how to navigate the NY MTA and get to Brooklyn as fast as I could. I managed to make my way to the Brooklyn Bridge and walk about half of the span, then squeezed in enough time to wander around DUMBO before making it to the first call time.
After the first shoot, we hopped in an Uber and headed to Manhattan. Seeing the busy streets of NY from a car for the first time was very overwhelming especially compared to the streets of SF. This got me excited to hit the streets as soon as we wrapped on set. After we finished on set, my client and I parted ways and I was free to wander the streets of Manhattan. I made my way from SoHo, to LES, to East Village, to Time Square, to Grand Central Station then booked it back to JKF in order to catch my flight back to SF. I was so tired from walking around and carrying a heavy bag that by the end of the night, I fell asleep in my seat before the plane even took off haha. I drank so much coffee the following day just to keep me up.
Looking back I really wished I had brought more film with me on this short trip because every place I went I had to think about if the shot was worth taking. I had my digital camera with me but after using it all day on set, it was nice to snap some photos and wait to see the results. I was really pleased with how these came out. I’m not sure if its because of how I developed it or how I scanned it but I’ve never been able to get replicate this look from this film stock. In any case I think that is part of what makes them special to me.
Shot on Kodak Gold 200 with a Contax G1 using a 45mm and 90mm Zeiss Contax G lenses.
