ESCONDIDO, CALIFORNIA - I love my passion projects. These are the shoots that help us try new techniques, experiment with new ideas before I use them with my clients. They also help me satisfy my thirst for creative shoots that run through my head. I also use these times to reflect on myself, believe it or not. Sometimes they are deep thoughts, and sometimes they are just mundane things. Through them, I get to talk to people and get to know more about the world around me.
Thus comes the shoot with Diana. We met Diana in one of our shoots for our Old Hollywood Portrait Sessions. She was amazing, and you probably have seen her photos in my ads because she was one of the best sessions I had for that style of photography.
As time passed, we've kept in touch through small comments on Instagram. I wouldn't say we are inseparable but more of acquaintances. The point is that I loved photographing her at that shoot, why? Because she is a pretty little lady. True, but that answer is a lazy one. One of the things I've learned about how I choose people to use in passion projects is that there is a difference between beauty and beauty. I know it's confusing, right? Well, as I grow older, I've learned that beauty is worthless.
A person can be beautiful, flawless even. But if that is all that she is, her beauty is worthless. Especially in today's society. With social media promoting that beauty is looking like a Kardashian. We have young beautiful people magnifying their imperfections or what they think is imperfect. They run to do fillers, nose jobs, liposuctions, breast implants, all trying to look like one of them. If you don't believe me, open your Instagram and TikTok and look at all the young people flaunting themselves, almost wearing nothing, promoting themselves to get the local perverts to send them money for a tease or more. Don't get me wrong, to each their own. My point is that society has lost its view on being different by simply being themselves and knowing that it's okay to have thin lips, a slender body, a wider nose. What they have forgotten is what really makes them interesting is their confidence, their struggles, their battle scars, their wisdom. It's not how much you can lift and how ripped you are or how much your lips resemble the behind of a baboon in heat. That is not what triggers my imagination. My instinct about this is not wrong because the people I have used for passion projects like Diana here are so much better to work with because of their confidence. She, like the rest of my models, can give me the emotion I look for because they know the pain of life to give me the mood, the look I am searching for. Mistakes that don't define them but are thankful for because they become the strong women we all know them for. To me, that is beauty.
