The Real Fauxtographer

The 5th Wave

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 00:16:00 +0000

The 5th Wave, originally uploaded by margotwood. (Click here to view this at a larger size.)

The latest fauxto in my Young Adults series was inspired by The 5th Wave by Rick Yancey.

Brace yourself for a long story, because this shot deserves a long post.

For those of you that haven't read The 5th Wave yet, allow me to brief you on what it's all about. ALIENS TAKE OVER THE WORLD. Okay, you've been briefed.

This photo is not a spoiler, but if I give you the background to it I will certainly spoil some of it for you, so instead, the only thing I'm going to say about this specific scene is that it is a literal interpretation of a scene in chapter 19 of the book. There was one sentence that totally stuck with me (okay, so this is an interpretation of just one sentence) : "We stepped into the bright sunshine, the man in the gas mask and the girl with the teddy bear."

To achieve this fauxto, all I needed was a gas mask (thank you Amazon), a teddy bear (see below) and a dude to pose with me. Enter my father, the hero.

Some of you may know that my Dad has brain cancer. Technically, it's called a glioblastoma and all you need to know about that is that it's a fucking bitch. He had one operation on Christmas Day and two weeks ago we found out that another tumor popped up post-surgery, post-chemo and post-radiation. That, my friends, is not good. Where my Dad's tumor is located is right in the middle of the memory part of the brain, so what we were most worried about with this second surgery was memory loss.

So, the Wood family made plans to come back into town for surgery #2 and I booked my trip a few days ahead of time so I could have some time to take some fauxtos. I knew I wanted to do a fauxto for The 5th Wave as I seriously adored the post-apocalypse novel, and since the book takes place in the Ohio valley I thought a trip home would be the perfect location for the shot (since I am from the Ohio valley).

My Dad has been in front of my camera several times over the years and when I told him about the idea I had for the shot he jumped at the idea of getting to wear a gas mask and hold a gun to my head. (We have a special relationship.) With the help of my Mom who did some location scouting along Route 52 that follows the Ohio river west, we found the perfect location - an abandoned 19th century stone house that sits right on the edge of a cliff that shoots down to the river. Here's an unedited photo of the front of the house, we shot behind it:

So my Dad and I took off for an afternoon adventure driving the hour west to find this stone house my Mom had spotted weeks prior. A few wrong turns and we finally found it and promptly ran inside the building (not a good idea) and got the crap scared out of us because massive vultures had taken up residence inside. Fun times. After clearing the house of vermin, we decided it was too bright (see how bright that photo is above?!) and I was missing an essential prop: a teddy bear. (Photographers take note: It is really, really difficult to shoot in bright, full sun. Never shoot at noon and always try to wait either until the "magic hour" or at least a few hours past noon to avoid the harsh light.)

Back in the car, we drive back east a few miles until we spot a janky old ferry that's taking cars across the Ohio river into Augusta, Kentucky - a tiny, TINY, town built in the late 1700s that pretty much the same still. There, we proceeded to raid the antique shops (we bought an old book on poison cooking) and found a teddy bear at the home / gift shop of some local resident. (PS - I decided to leave the teddy bear inside the house for the next adventurers. He can keep his aviary roommates company.) Next up was lunch at The Beehive Tavern and time killing until the light was better.

2pm and back on the ferry we go, back to Ohio. When we finally get back to the house it's still "shiny" out (my Dad's word) but better than it was before. Showtime! We took about 50 different shots, trying out various styles. Dad had fun pretending to shoot me and I had fun pretending to be annoyed. (Here's a closeup of us in the photo above since most of you are probably looking at this post on tiny phones.)

As for the fauxto, well, I'm in love. I was worried it was going to be too bright (or shiny) and I wouldn't achieve the look I was going for, but a few tricks in Photoshop turned all the greenery into fall colors and the river on the right paired with the house on the left makes for one of my favorite shots to date. Unfortunately for internet friends, this photo is best viewed as large as possible as Flickr seems to compress the image on smaller screens making it look sharper than I intended. So if you can, try to view the shot on a large monitor - I want you to get the proper effect!

All in all the shot was captured and another adventure was had. This was a day for the memory keeper and will probably go down as one of my favorite times I've ever had with my Dad.

As of this morning my Dad's surgery was complete and he is awake and talking and, amazingly, the surgery did not affect his short-term memory. He remembers our little dragon-slaying adventure. So here's hoping that this next round of chemo works better than the last because I intend on having him star in as many future fauxtos as possible.

Faux Cover: Gone Girl

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Mon, 15 Apr 2013 14:19:00 +0000

Faux Cover: Gone Girl, originally uploaded by margotwood.

A lot of people have asked me if I ever hope to have one of my fauxtos on the cover of a book. The answer is an obvious yes, but unfortunately up until now, it's been unlikely any of them would be. I've spent the last year taking very specific photos inspired by books, which has been a blast but since these books already have covers, it's unlikely you'll see any of these shots gracing paperbacks anytime soon.

Therefore, I decided to start taking "stock" photos in addition to the YA inspired ones. (Don't worry, I'm not stopping my original series, just expanding on it.)

These stock photos are still going to have the Real Fauxtographer touch - meaning they will be conceptual and stylized and moody, but aren't specific to any one book. I do plan on taking a variety of photos, however, that are specific to genres.

The intention with this, of course, is not just to make money, BUT FOR THE GLORY AND HONOR [insert battle cry here]. Stock photography is not a lucrative business. Annie Liebowitz is my cautionary tale, so I don't plan on putting all of my eggs into the photography basket. I've never intended on becoming a full time photographer - I'm still and always will be a fauxtographer - but if one of my photos ever made it on the hardcover or paperback of a novel, well then, I can check that off my bucket list.

So, for this new "series" I'm doing, I'm making fake covers. All of the shots you'll see will be available for covers (if you're interested) and I will be adding title treatments to them all so you can get an idea of what it could look like as a cover.

(Important boring info for any designers interested in purchasing: All photos in this series will be shot in RAW. So, yay for you! If you're interested in this shot, email me.)

This shot you see here I thought would be a good fit for Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn. Her expression is slightly startled and a little frightened, which reminded me of Amy and I chose Gone Girl for the title treatment (mostly at random) but also because one of the main characters is named Margo (without the 'T', but I'm willing to overlook imperfections) and I'm partial to any story with my name in it.

The thing I like about this shot and the title treatment is the retro look and feel. Reminds me a lot of the original American Psycho cover. Makes me wish more book covers would take this approach!

I'd love to hear your thoughts on this new series! Would you prefer to see the photo without the title treatment?

More boring technical info for people who are interested in that kind of thing: I shot in RAW (my new favorite thing) in really low, natural lighting filtered through my window and increased the exposure quite a bit. That's how I was able to achieve that nice looking skin. (Maybe it's Maybelline, or maybe it's Photoshop.) I then added my own special cross processing treatment in curves and then did a "beauty enhancement" I recommend all Photoshoppers do: whiten eyes, darken iris rims, darken eyebrows. Voila.

Mila 2.0

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Tue, 12 Mar 2013 13:48:00 +0000

Mila 2.0, originally uploaded by margotwood.

This fauxto was inspired by the new sci-fi young adult book, MILA 2.0 by Debra Driza.

The book is about a teenage girl who lives her life thinking she's a normal girl, only to discover that she is actually an android. This book has been optioned to be a TV series with producer Shonda Rimes! (She also produces Grey's Anatomy and Scandal)

(Spoiler? This isn't really a spoiler, more just me helping put this shot into context since this book just came out and you probably haven't read it yet. )

This shot is a recreation of a specific scene in the book after Mila discovers what she is. She is given a USB card to download the files off of, and to do so, she must insert the card into her android body's hidden USB slot in her wrist.

The thing about doing fauxtos for sci-fi novels is trying not to go overboard. I could have done many "out there" concepts but instead I chose to make this moment, this scene, this fauxto as real as possible. The heart of MILA 2.0 is that Mila feels human. She has no idea she is an android and spends the entire novel grappling with what it means to be human...and machine.

Now, I did make some style decisions that also reflected the sci-fi of it. This shot is really bright. REALLY BRIGHT. I did that on purpose (in Camera Raw, by the way, not with lighting) because to me, something about starkness and high contrasts equals high-tech. I don't know why I think that way. I'll go ahead and blame it on Apple products.

As for taking this shot...holy mother of god was this a pain in the ass. As with any closeup photograph, the important thing is making sure you get your focus right. Doing that while being in front of the camera and having no one to help you out makes you want to pull your hair out. I think I went back and forth about 20 times trying to get this right. If anything, this experience could mean one of the last times I'm in front of the camera. It's incredibly frustrating, time consuming and exhausting. My entire process would be so much faster if I could just learn how to convince people to pose for me.

So that's my next fauxtographic goal. Expand my network of people willing to pose for me. If you're a friend of mine, lookout, because I'm coming for you.

Anyways, if you haven't read the book but are now intrigued to do so, my job here is done. If you have already read it, I would love your feedback on this shot!

Note on sharing: As with all my fauxtos you are free to share, tweet, tumble, pin, whatever my shots as long as you give credit where credit is due. Just a simple link back to this site or my Flickr page is fine. Respect the artist, respect the art. :-)

Anna and the French Kiss

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Mon, 18 Feb 2013 21:39:00 +0000

Anna and the French Kiss, originally uploaded by margotwood.

This fauxto was inspired by the YA novel ANNA AND THE FRENCH KISS by Stephanie Perkins.

Now, clearly as you can tell by the selection of books I have done fauxtos for, I don't read that many realistic fiction novels. It's not that I'm against them, I just haven't gotten around to it lately. But all that changed this month when I decided to go on a realistic teen binge.

I started with this book and am now not only hooked on the genre, but also hooked on Stephanie Perkins' characters.

For those that have read this book, yes I adore Etienne St. Clair. And yes I would have loved to have traveled to France, found a hot young man to pose for me inside an old movie theater looking British and sexy. But c'mon people, AIN'T NOBODY GOT TIME FOR THAT.

So I decided that instead of focusing on the romance angle of this book, I wanted to instead capture the girl that Etienne falls in love with: Anna.

Sometimes when you read YA novels, it's always this awkward, silly, mildly attractive girl who somehow snags the hottest, most perfect guy in the world and I'm left wondering, "Hmmm okay, now how the hell did that happen because that shit would NEVER happen in real life."

But for me, there was one scene in particularly where it all clicked for me. I finally understood why St. Clair, this sexy, perfect young man would fall for a girl like Anna. It was this one scene in chapter 16 when Anna and her pals (including St. Clair) go to one of their favorite French cafes:

"'You have Nutella on your chin,' Rashmi says, pointing with her fork.

'Mmmmm,' I reply.

'It's a good look,' Josh says. 'Like a little soul patch.'

I dip my finger in the chocolate and paint on a mustache. 'Better?'

'Maybe if you didn't give yourself a Hitler,' Rashmi says.

To my surprise, St. Clair gives a snort. I'm encouraged. I redip and pain one side up in a swirl.

'You're getting it wrong,' Josh says. 'Come here.' He dabs his finger in the edge of my sauce and adds the other half carefully, with his steady artist's hand, and then touches up my half. I look at my reflection in the restaurant's glass and find myself with a massive, curly mustache. They laugh and clap, and Mer snaps a picture.

The men in elaborately tied scarves sitting at the table beside us look disgusted, so I pretend to twirl the ends of my Nutella mustache. The others are cracking up, and finally, finally St. Clair gives the teeniest of teeny smiles.

It's a wonderful sight."

And that, my friends, is the scene I attempted to capture. I fell in love with Anna in this scene. She is positively adorable and is willing to make fun of herself in hopes of cheering up her friends. (Also, according to the scene, Anna's best friend Meredith takes Anna's photo, so in a sense, I'm playing a character as well! Kinda cool.)

When I was reading that scene I just nodded and smiled and I finally got it. I got why St. Clair falls for her and I wanted to capture just how adorable Anna truly is for my fauxto.

Now, as for this fauxto, I have to give a huge thanks to Jamie of The Perpetual Page Turner for being a trooper and being Anna for me. She totally captured Anna's young, cute and carefree spirit. It takes a special lady who is willing to give her self a chocolate 'stache in the name of art, and I think Jamie nailed it.

Shadow & Bone

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Tue, 22 Jan 2013 00:07:00 +0000

Shadow & Bone, originally uploaded by margotwood. View the larger size here.

This fauxto was inspired by the young adult fantasy novel, Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo - one of my favorite YA fantasies ever!

I was originally going to tell you guys all about the ridiculously frustrating attempts I made to do this photo and all the crazy original ideas I had for it before settling on the one you see here.

But I learned a very important lesson while shooting this today that I think artists, writers and basically anyone in a creative field needs to know.

JUST DO IT.

Yeah, whatever, I know it's a dumb Nike slogan but it is also incredibly good advice.

Before this, I hadn't taken a YA-inspired fauxto since Thanksgiving. True, I could easily blame some family shit or my busy job as a distraction, but those would just be excuses.

I think artists sometimes get hung up on their own success or creativity. They produce something that is so epic and so awesome that for their next project they feel stunted because they are worried they will never be able to achieve that same level of success.

I am totally guilty of falling into that dumb trap. I have spent the last two months stressing out over trying to come up with the next brilliant fauxto. Instead of doing, I was obsessing. And it is never a good thing to obsess. Obsessing over something like a photo idea can lead you so far down the rabbit hole that it's hard to make your way back out.

For this photo, I was bouncing around 8 million insane, wild ideas. I was going to rent leather wings and do double exposed photos layered with all this crap. Then I was going to go to the mountains upstate just to get to snow. The ideas were great, but they were grand and completely unfeasible given my resources and funds.

Once I realized my original ideas were never going to happen, that's when the artistic depression set in. I started whining and bitching about my project (to no one other than my very unlucky boyfriend), to the point where today he just turned to me while we were eating donuts (a great source of inspiration if you're looking for one) and said "Margot, just do it. Just start taking something, anything - and once you do, your creativity will start flowing again."

I didn't want to take his advice. I was scared. I didn't want to start taking anything without a plan in mind and just be continually disappointed in the results. But like he said, I just did it. My original batch of photos were awful, and I almost stopped right then and there but then, like the boyfriend predicted, the ideas started flowing and finally got a shot I was excited to edit.

So am I happy with this final product? Absolutely. No, it isn't as fantastical as the book and yes I could have included some more details from the story, but I still think this captures a moment from the book as well as the tone.

I think it can be hard to make a photo inspired by a fantasy novel look realistic. I mean, it's fantasy! But that's why I think people gravitate towards my photos in the first place - they look real. They bring the stories we love so much to reality and I think this photo achieves that.

So to sum everything up, if you're a writer or a painter or a photographer and you feel stuck and are afraid to produce something that isn't to your standards - just stop worrying and do something. Go back to the basics and start small and simple. You may be surprised and pleased with the results.

Shadow & Bone by Margot Wood is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. Basically, this means you can share this photo on your blogs or via social media but if you alter it in any way or don't credit me as the artist I'll hunt you down like a dog. :-)

How the Grinch (aka: A Brain Tumor) Stole Christmas

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Sat, 29 Dec 2012 22:35:00 +0000

Snowpocalypse, originally uploaded by margotwood.

Happy winter everyone!

As you can tell from my blog, I haven't done a YA-inspired fauxto in some time. There are a few reasons for that and I'd like to share them with you.

I was holding off on new photos since Thanksgiving because I had an epic vacation planned in the Canadian rockies. There, I was planning on doing photos for Shiver, Unearthly and Shadow and Bone. This trip was going to be amazing and the photos were sure to be some of my best work yet, given the landscape and opportunities.

However, that trip never happened.

On December 23rd, while I was in Boston, I got a call from my Mom. She told me that she was in the hospital because my Dad had an accident.

Well, shitballs. (Yes, that was my immediate reaction.) I figured my Dad had done something stupid and gotten mildly hurt. He's been known to do such a thing. I mean, let's be honest. This is the man who willingly dresses up like a storm trooper and jumps in pools for my photos....he's prone to accidents of a silly nature.

But that's not what happened this time. This time, while cycling, he fell off his bike and had a 3 minute seizure. Luckily for him, he rides with a big group of fellow surgeons and they were with him at the time. They quickly called an ambulance and got him to the hospital.

Turns out, my Dad, the biggest supporter of my photographic adventures, my biggest role model, the guy who is invincible. . . has a brain tumor.

Pardon my language but, WHAT THE FUCK.

Dads aren't supposed to get sick. Dads who dress like Superman are DEFINITELY not supposed to get sick, let alone have a freaking brain tumor.

So, what did I do? The only thing a daughter can do. I got on the next flight home on Monday to Cincinnati to be with my family.

On Tuesday, Christmas day, we celebrated in the hospital room. My Dad did his best to partake in the fun, and we did our best to act happy and jolly. Suffice to say, it's a bit difficult to spread holiday cheer when you're stress eating Christmas tree cookies and pounding the bourbon with your sisters who are equally as sad/stressed/scared as I am.

On Wednesday, he went into surgery and had the tumor biopsied and removed. I'll spare you the medical jargon but to sum things up, it was a malignant tumor that somehow grew in the span of 2 months. (My Dad had his brain scanned at the end of October and it was clear. That little tumor bastard grew in two months. Fuck you, tumor. Fuck you.)

The surgery went well, the doctor was confident he removed all of the infected tissue and amazingly, my Dad was able to come home on Friday - two days after brain surgery! He really is Superman.

While my Dad has a long way to go, chemo, radiation, physical therapy and who the hell knows what else, he did tell me one thing before I left for NYC.

He told me to take as many YA fauxtos as I can and really try to get published this year.

So that's what I'm going to do. To honor him, to honor the books I love so much, to honor all of you who cheer me on and provide amazing support, I promise to take as many photos as I possibly can - starting with this stupidly cheesy photo (the one at the top of this post) I took right after our little conversation. Until my Dad starts having fun again (he is a true believer in the High Church of the Fun Machine), I will do my best to make him smile.

So stay tuned in 2013. May it be tumor free and filled with fauxtos. As Rae Carson (author of the book from which this fauxto was inspired) noted in the comments, it's going to be a fauxtopocalypse.

I wish you all the best in the New Year!

PS- Enjoy this throwback photo of me and Dad.

Beauty Queens

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Fri, 23 Nov 2012 12:57:00 +0000

Beauty Queens, originally uploaded by margotwood.

The latest addition in my series of photographs inspired by young adult photos. This one was inspired by the YA novel, BEAUTY QUEENS written by Libba Bray.

This book is about a plane full of teenage beauty pageant contestants who crash onto an island and must use their pageant skills to survive.

Oh dear god, what is there to say about this photo? It's a disaster....in the best possible way.

I owe a huge debt of thanks to several people for making this photo happen:

1. My mom for handmaking those sashes which each represent the state those girls live in. Even though you can't see it: California, Kansas and Georgia.

2. My boyfriend for actually helping me to buy those tacky pageant dresses. He graciously braved a shopping trip and even picked out a few dresses, claiming the ones I selected weren't "pageanty enough".

3. My sisters (the two on the left) and my cousin (on the right) for not only allowing me to put awesomely-bad makeup on their beautiful faces and mussing up their hair, but donning those dresses a few hours before Thanksgiving dinner and braving the cold ocean air in front of MANY families to pose for me.

4. A big thanks to the author of the book, Libba Bray, for writing such a visual, hilarious and entertaining story. The second I started reading this book I knew I wanted to do a fauxto for it. So thank you Libba for sparking my imagination is giving me a memorable project to work on during the Thanksgiving holidays.

Yes, we got a lot of raised eyebrows and a few "what pageant did you just come from?" questions, but mostly what we got was this awesome photo. This, to me, may be the closest a photo has ever come for me to looking exactly how it is in my head. Most photos look different in my head than they do in the final product, but this is the closest so far.

I feel like after this photo I have a duty to add more comedic books to my roster. Because if they are this fun to read and then do photos for, I need to do MANY, MANY more in the future!

The Girl of Fire and Thorns

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 23:27:00 +0000

The Girl of Fire and Thorns, originally uploaded by margotwood.

This photo was inspired by THE GIRL OF FIRE AND THORNS, a the first in a young adult, fantasy series by Rae Carson - and one of my favorite series of all time.

I have been dying to do a fauxto for this book every since I finished it a few months ago. I was instantly obsessed with the idea of attempting to recreate the scene where Elisa, our once fearful but now fearless Queen, crosses the desert TWICE to save herself and her kingdom.

I mean, come on. A DESERT SCENE. Now that would be a challenge considering I live in New York City and have no plans to visit the Sahara anytime soon.

Luckily, I had Thanksgiving plans set with family on a small island outside Jacksonville, FL. Perfect! I figured I'd somehow make a beach look desert-y, and thankfully, the beach was littered with crush shells on the day of the shoot, giving the sand a rough, dry texture.

Now it came down to figuring out Elisa's costume. Not going to lie. I stressed out over this way more than I should have. I watched as many desert movies as I could, especially Resident Evil Resurrection (don't judge, I love those movies) and came up with an outfit in my head. Luckily, I had all the pieces of the puzzle with me. Yes, I do own a cape....what? You don't?

I am so happy with the way this photo turned out. My younger sister was just fearless enough for me to don a cape on a beach with many an onlooker and I think she captured Elisa's tough, determined spirit.

Up next for this series: A photo for The Crown of Embers and the final book in the series, The Bitter Kingdom!

If you've read the book I would love to hear your thoughts! Share them with me in the comments!

Cinder

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Tue, 09 Oct 2012 01:55:00 +0000

Cinder, originally uploaded by margotwood. View in a larger size here.

This is the latest addition to my series of photographs inspired by young adult novels.

This one was inspired by the book CINDER by Marissa Meyer - a retelling of Cinderella, set in the future and Cinderella is a mechanic cyborg.

Oh Cinder. Oh how I struggled for MONTHS to figure out what I was going to do with this photo.

Originally I was going to set up shop in Chinatown, NYC and recreate the market scenes with Prince Kai but then I realized how extremely complicated THAT would be. So I decided to instead of doing a literal interpretation of a scene in the book, this is just more of a look at the character of Cinder and her every day life.

A few quick facts about this photo you may not know or possibly didn't see upon first inspection:

1. Iko - That glowing orb in the bottom right corner? Yes, that is my interpretation of Iko....well half of Iko. You see, that is actually a trash can that was conveniently photobombing this shot so I decided to just go with it and turn it into Iko.

2. Cyborg hand - No, that is not a glove. If you look at it closely you might begin to notice that it actually IS my hand, just with some photoshop trickery.

3. Asian influences - A friend of mine pointed out that the toolboxes in the original photo had some English on them and since this book is set in "New Beijing" it would be a good opportunity to subtly work in some Asian influences. So I did some Googling and put in some Japanese words / phrases. $10 if you can translate it.

If you haven't read Cinder, go pick it up because it is a wonderfully written fantasy / steampunk / sci-fi / dystopian and one of my favorite books of this year.

Did you read Cinder? I would love your feedback on this fauxto! Don't be shy, leave a comment...

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Anna Dressed In Blood

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Mon, 03 Sep 2012 21:10:00 +0000

Anna Dressed In Blood, originally uploaded by margotwood.

The latest addition to my "Young Adults" collection is this photo inspired by the creepy book, ANNA DRESSED IN BLOOD by Kendare Blake.

Essentially, I am playing a girl who was murdered 60 years ago and now I spend my days haunting a house in Canada (but in this shot....New Jersey). Oh and I murder people...quite gruesomely.

There's waaay more to the story than that, but I'll just let you read it to learn more for yourself.

So I jumped at the chance to do a photo for this one. I mean, come on. A bloody ghost?! Hell yea I want to do that. However, this is one of those photos where the idea in my head didn't quite come to fruition.

Things started out great. I found the perfect modest, white dress for less than $30 and I procured a jug.....no seriously, a JUG!!.....of blood. Things are looking up at this point. I even found a friend of mine who knew of a creepy house in the middle of the woods in New Jersey. Double score! Then I wake up this morning and it's cloudy out. Triple score! (For non-photog people, if it's cloudy out, grab your cameras because the lighting for any photography is 1000000x better when it's overcast.)

So my friends and I make our way to the Hacklebarney State Park in Long Valley, New Jersey and we start hiking out to the house. That's when things start going a little off course.

1. The bastard sun came out. Now all those deep rich colors I got from the forest are bright greens and yellows. YUCK.

2. The fake blood is basically pink.

3. The "house" in the woods turns out to be a bathroom. Ha! But that's okay, I snuck around back and assumed no one would come by for awhile since we didn't pass anyone on the way out there.

4. We make do with the blood. Everything is all set. We take a bunch of photos before I realize that I had the wrong settings on my camera. HEY, REMEMBER, I'M FAUX. I STILL MAKE TONS OF MISTAKES.

5. By the time I get my camera settings all right, we get about 5 more shots under our belts before SURPRISE! An Asian tour group shows up and stumbled upon my odd scene.

Now, imagine you are out hiking on a nice day with your family. You see a bathroom house, and go around to the ladies entrance and you see a girl in a white dress drenched in blood. You'd probably freak out. And these Asian ladies did too. They furiously began pointing, whispering and jaw dropping until I decided to stop letting them freak out and I showed them my jug 'o blood. Immediately they relaxed, giggled and then proceeded to take pictures. I asked if they wanted a photo of me with them....they declined.

6. So once I was spotted, I knew my time was up. I didn't have a chance to check any of the shots we had before cleaning up and heading out so I just shrugged and figured everything would turn out in the end.

So after MANY layers of work in photoshop, I was able to achieve this final product. I am happy and pleased with what I have here, but I think I couldn't have made a better photo. I think it would have been better for me to be behind the camera on this one, but oh well. It's hard to get people to pose for you when you tell them that fake blood will be dumped on them.

And by the way...I'm two showers in and that blood STILL hasn't worn off. And yes, New Yorkers will look at you funny if you walk around Penn Station looking like you just killed your dinner.

So anyway, voila! Here is it. I hope is as creepy as the book is, which I doubt because the book IS really creepy. But hopefully this captures some of the essence of Anna and her turmoil and the life she is stuck with. A life of sticky fake blood, Asian tourists and stinky bathrooms in the middle of the woods.

Tiger Lily

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Fri, 17 Aug 2012 02:57:00 +0000

Tiger Lily, originally uploaded by margotwood.

I don't even know where to start with this book. Tiger Lily by Jodi Lynn Anderson is hands down in my top 5 favorites books of the year...okay, maybe even of all time.

Here's how this book begins:

"Let me tell you something straight off. This is a love story, but now like any you've heard. The boy and the girl are far from innocent. Dear lives are lost. And good doesn't win. In some places, there is something ultimately good about endings. In Neverland, that is not the case."

This is a retelling of Peter Pan, but told from Tinkerbell's point of view and it really tells the story of Tiger Lily. The fierce warrior, crow feather-wearing tribe princess who falls for the mischievous and mysterious Peter.

Tiger Lily is no Wendy. She is raw, unhinged. She makes mistakes, she fights, gets dirty. She is a warrior and I loved her. So she became the focus of my photo for this book.

I've been waiting to do this photo for a while. I knew right away I couldn't be the one to play Tiger Lily. I needed someone who looked more wild, someone with a raw, unusual beauty. Luckily, I knew just the person.

This beautiful woman you see here is my younger cousin (and architect student - beauty AND brains!) Rebecca. While on a family vacation in upstate Michigan she agreed to pose for me. My Mom was able to acquire some crow feathers for me (no idea how she managed that, but that's the magic of Mothers...isn't it?) and with a little red paint and a de-stuffed animal, we were ready to go.

This photo doesn't even come close to portraying the beauty of not only Tiger Lily the character but also Tiger Lily the book, but if you haven't read it and this photo intrigues you, then you most certainly need to locate a copy immediately. You will not be disappointed.

Don't Breathe A Word

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Sun, 05 Aug 2012 21:50:00 +0000

This photo was inspired by the young adult novel Don't Breathe A Word by Holly Cupala. The novel is about a girl, Joy, who decides to runaway from her emotionally and physically abusive home in Seattle for a life on the streets. This book is much, much more than that simple description, so I suggest checking it out if that's a topic you're interested in reading about.

The scene I'm depicting here is Joy's first day on the streets. She's still clean, still has her stuff with her, but there's an immense amount of paranoia and fear plaguing her. Can she survive the streets? Did she make the right choice leaving home?

***

So for this shot, I did an entire day of location scouting. Many of you know I live in NYC and I do all self-portraits. Ver rarely does anyone help me out, so doing an urban/homeless shot in NYC, I needed to find a location that was visually appealing to me but also safe enough and isolated enough that I'd feel comfortable leaving my Nikon D7000 on the tripod without fear of it being stolen. I walked all around my Brooklyn neighborhood, and sadly because it's summer, every single location I went to was just packed with people. Frustrated, I went to my "go-to" location for photos, my roof. I hopped buildings, and shot this on a neighboring building, actually quite close to where I shot the Divergent photo.

The second most difficult aspect of this photo was nailing down the expression. I needed to show fear, uncertainty and a touch of sadness. I was lucky enough to get this shot (1 out of many, many).

The final obstacle for this shot was turning my naturally reddish/brown hair white. HOLY CRAP! I assumed it would be easy as hell. I mean, I've turned red hair into blue and purple, so how hard could white be? Way harder than I thought. I had to spend about 2 hours tweaking about 10 different layers to get my hair to look natural.

This was as close as I could get it. It's not quite white, more like a really bleached blonde but hopefully readers of Don't Breathe A Word won't mind that detail too much! And yes, making my hair white was worth it, because oddly, Joy's hair color does play a bit of a role in the story, so I'm glad I stuck with it and got it as a place where I was satisfied.

Hope you enjoy the photo and definitely check out Don't Breathe A Word - it's a great, short stand-alone novel that deserves to live on more shelves.

Under The Never Sky

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Fri, 06 Jul 2012 23:14:00 +0000

Under The Never Sky, originally uploaded by margotwood.

Under The Never Sky by Veronica Rossi is the latest young adult novel that truly inspired me, well one scene in particular.

This is a dystopian / romance / survival story set in the future where most people live in pods, protecting them from the outside, savage world. Aria, the young protagonist, gets thrown out of her pod and left to fend for herself in the wild "outside." Along the way, she meets a native outsider, Perry, who agrees to help me find her way back home.

That is the plot in its most simplistic, basic terms.

There is a scene in this book, in chapter 18, that really stood out among the rest to me. No it wasn't the action scenes, or the vast descriptions of lightning storms, it was the simple scene where Perry teaches Aria how to tell if berries are poisonous.

It is a calm, sensual and sexy scene - and as a outdoorswoman/hiker myself, I really appreciated how Veronica Rossi turned a basic survival skill into something HOT. So, kudos to Miss Rossi!

Since this scene stuck with me, I thought I would do a photo inspired by it. Since there are three things Perry tells Aria to do with a berry to tell if it's poisonous, I felt it would make a perfect 3-part photo, which I'm calling a triptych (thanks AP art history!).

The hardest part about achieving this piece was the middle photo, the touch part. The lens I use is a closeup lens, and I was struggling with using the tripod, remote and getting far enough away so the camera could auto focus. This one is probably my least favorite of the three, but overall I'm actually really quite proud of this mostly because of the lighting. Most of my photos have such rich, deep contrasts and while these do as well, they also have a certain lightness I think works well.

If I could redo these photos, I would. I would take them in an actual forest to get the color scheme that I feel would fit the book better, but unfortunately, I live in New York City, so I had to just make do with what I had and decide to instead do closeups, and focus on the sensuality of the moment rather than the accuracy of location.

I hope you enjoy these fauxtos and if you've read the book, would love to hear what you think! (And if you haven't.....)

Where Things Come Back

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Sun, 17 Jun 2012 04:44:00 +0000

Where Things Come Back, originally uploaded by margotwood.

WHERE THINGS COME BACK by John Corey Whaley, is one of those rare books that long after you've read it, you still get it out of your head. It's not about zombies, although they do make brief imaginative appearances, and it's not about a dystopian society, although sometimes it feels that way. It's about a boy who is coming of age in a small, backwoods town in Arkansas. It's about a boy who feels trapped by his surroundings and is desperate for change. It's about a boy who must deal with the sudden disappearance of his beloved younger brother. It's about a boy trying not to lose hope and trying to find himself and occasionally trying to find a woodpecker. No seriously....this book is all over the place but somehow still cohesive enough to be remarkable.

At least, those are all the things I get when I read this book.

This is a quiet, special novel and it deserves a calm, reserved, special photo to go with it. When coming up with an idea for the photo for this book, the most important aspect, I felt, was that I try my best to match the tone of the book.

I really, really want to tell you all about the particular scene I'm recreating here (on page 56 if you have the book) but I can't do it without spoiling too much of the story or without giving any background info. So I'm going to stay away from that and instead just tell you how I achieved this shot.

Step 1: Find a young man who'd be willing to float in a river for me. I tapped two brothers who I used to babysit, who are now in their late teens. Man I feel old....

Step 2: Find the perfect body of water. A lake wouldn't do because I needed a current. A steam wouldn't do because the boy needed to float. A river would do, but it had to be shallow enough for me to get in there as well. So I settled on the Little Miami River, a smaller river in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Step 3: Wade across a semi-deep river without getting your fancy camera wet. Yeah, I have no sound advice on this. In retrospect, what I did was a dumb idea and could have been disastrous. My advice is wear a swimsuit (which I didn't do) and put your camera in a zip lock bag and then inside a water proof bag, just in case. Thankfully I didn't trip on the rocks while crossing the neck deep river, but still...BE CAREFUL.

Step 4: Find a tree that is overhanging the river so you can crawl up the bank, shimmy up the tree, balance over it and photograph the floating boy from above. Once again....my advice is to think that through before you spontaneously decide to photograph that way.

Step 5: If it's sunny out, photograph in shade. Bright sun is a death sentence when it comes to photography...shade is always better!

Step 6: Mute the colors in post-processing. Bright flashy colors would not work for this photo because when I read the book, the color palette in my mind was all subdued or darker earth tones and shades of dirt.

Step 7: Show it to the author of the book and sit back and smile because he loved it. :)

And I hope you like it too. If you haven't read the book, I suggest you do. It's so different from anything else I've read in the young adult world. If you HAVE read it and want to chat with me about it and the photo feel free to email me! I want to hear from you and get your opinion!

And finally.....

Check out this photo in a larger size!

Pure

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Thu, 31 May 2012 02:44:00 +0000

Pure, originally uploaded by margotwood.

This is the 10th in my series of photos inspired by my favorite young adult novels. Holy shiz this was a hard one to do. It's for the book PURE by Julianna Baggott - a dystopian / post-apocalyptic / survivalist young adult novel that was one of the toughest, most upsetting books I've read, but also one of the most visually inspiring.

Here's the premise: Pressia barely remembers the Detonations or much about life during the Before. In her sleeping cabinet behind the rubble of an old barbershop where she lives with her grandfather, she thinks about what is lost-how the world went from amusement parks, movie theaters, birthday parties, fathers and mothers . . . to ash and dust, scars, permanent burns, and fused, damaged bodies. And now, at an age when everyone is required to turn themselves over to the militia to either be trained as a soldier or, if they are too damaged and weak, to be used as live targets, Pressia can no longer pretend to be small. Pressia is on the run.

So why is there a baby doll's head for a fist? Well, in the book after a cocktail of atomic bombs go off, the people who weren't protected in the dome fused with the objects around them. Pressia, the protagonist, was only a child when the bombs went off and was holding her baby doll at the time, so the head of the doll fused with her hand, thus giving her a baby doll headed fist. Creepy, I know. (UPDATE 5.31.12 - After speaking with my father who is a doctor and part-time superhero, he has agreed to write a guest post for me on the medicine behind fusings...if it's actually possible and what happens when it does so stay tuned for a follow up post!)

I was so obsessed with the idea of doing interpretation of that. How tragic, disgusting, creepy and oddly beautiful that must be? I searched and searched for the perfect baby doll, eventually found it, but when it came to actually doing the photo, I just couldn't make it right. What you see here is not at all what I had envisioned, and it was a humbling experience realizing that my Photoshop skills aren't as awesome as I like to claim they are. I am just not good at manipulating or creating things in Photoshop so making the transition from plastic doll head to forearm look realistic was a struggle for me. I'm an expert photo editor and retoucher, but if someone asked me to make something from scratch in Photoshop, well...they would be sorely disappointed in the blank white space I'd give them in return.

So yeah, I would have loved to have done a closeup photo of the baby doll head fused with her arm to really get at how gruesome this mutation really is (at least in Julianna's descriptions and in my head), but I'm just not good enough to make it look real, so I settled with a view from further away.

Anyways, this is a haunting, bleak and semi-depressing story. But the world building and imagery in Pure is so unbelievably strong that if you can stomach many gross details, you should certainly pick up.

This photo is very, very tame compared to the source of inspiration, so if this shot intrigues you, then perhaps the book will as well.

UPDATE (5.31.12) - So after sleeping on it, I decided I need to say that this, like The Forest of Hands and Teeth fauxto, is one of those books that if I ever had a large enough budget and a crew, I would totally redo this photo and also do many, many others for it. For example, I don't want to be too spoilery but, I would totally do a shot of the suburban moms in a sort of Vanity Fair styled photo. If you've read the book, you'll know exactly what part I'm talking about....thoughts?

Masque of the Red Death

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Mon, 14 May 2012 23:35:00 +0000

Masque of the Red Death (Alternative), originally uploaded by margotwood.

UPDATED 5/17/12: Death, disease, destruction combine with fashion, beauty and elegance in The Masque of the Red Death, the new young adult novel from Bethany Griffin.

I went into reading this one not knowing anything about it. The cover seemed cool and I knew about the original Edgar Allan Poe story that this book "retells" so I decided to give it a try. Wow, this was a lot different than I expected. It was dark, dreary, gothic, a little disgusting but very intriguing.

The world building in this novel is what sets it apart from other steampunk / dystopian novels. It is rich, both beautiful and grotesque all at the same time. So why did I decide to do a photo for it? Well, the people in the novel must wear masks to keep them from contracting an airborne disease. A photo of a beautiful girl wearing a creepy mask? I'M TOTALLY DOWN WITH THAT SHIZ.

This photo was a team effort, a whole Family bonding experience. First I had many consultations with my Dad who happens to be a surgeon about types of airborne diseases and the masks people would wear to prevent contamination. This was then followed by another consultation where he borrowed several different types of masks doctors or patients wear in the operating room and he gave me a walk through with each one. The variety of masks he provided was amazing, and also a little bit creepy.

Next, I knew I was headed out to San Francisco for my younger sister's graduation and I thought, "Hey, she has the prettiest green eyes, she can totally play Araby!" (Araby is the main girl in the story, by the way.) So after a little coaxing I got my sister on board and we were good to go.

There were two key elements to this photo I had to make sure I included. One was the mask and after several shots with all the others, I concluded that this was the best one photographically. The second key element was the eye makeup.

Glittery eye makeup makes several appearances in this novel, so it came across to me as something important to the author and therefore should be included in the photo. All we did for makeup was buy some cheapy drugstore glitter, swipe on some mascara and a little black liner and we were good to go.

Now, in the book Araby has dark hair that she has dyed purple, hence the purple hair in this photo. Originally I liked the version of the photo without purple hair but after sitting with it for a few days, I decided that the purple hair version is more true to the story. The non-purple hair version is great (in my humble opinion) but I think those who have read this book will appreciate the purple haired version a lot more.

Questions, comments, feedback? Hit me up in the comments!

Crewel

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Sun, 22 Apr 2012 21:44:00 +0000

Crewel, originally uploaded by margotwood.

Imagine if the world we lived in was built and sustained by a network of threads, creating a weave, that was built, maintained and manipulated by women called Spinsters. Being chosen as a Spinster is everything a girl could want. It means privilege, eternal beauty, and being something other than a secretary. It also means the power to embroider the very fabric of life. But Adelice isn’t interested. Because once you become a Spinster, there’s no turning back.

Ladies and gentlemen, may I present to you the 8th in my series of photographs inspired by young adult books. This photo was inspired by the upcoming (on sale in October!) book CREWEL written by Gennifer Albin.

View this photo in a larger size here!

There's a story behind this photo, so bear with me. Somehow, through all of you awesome people who have helped spread the word about my photo project, Gennifer Albin found me on Twitter and said something along the lines of "Oh I wonder what she would do with Crewel!" and that my friends, was the beginning of this challenge.

I contacted Gennifer and from there she was kind enough to send me an advanced copy of her book and I proceeded to read and fall in love with it. It's a story that borders on sci-fi and dystopia with such a cool idea that I was really excited to try and figure out what I was going to do for a photo for this.

The book has some beautiful imagery. From the art deco lounges, to the descriptions of the oceans and especially to describing the weave and the looms. I imagine that getting a clear picture of what these two things are might have been a challenge for Gennifer but she handled it gracefully.

I originally thought about recreating a scene from the book, but decided that since it doesn't come out for a few months, it would be better to instead create a photo that I felt conveyed the essence of the story. I wanted the photo to be beautiful but also mysterious and hopefully spark some interest in finding out more about this whole "weave and looms" business.

To achieve this photo, I combed through Manhattan's fashion district and visited several fabric stores. I wanted to find a reflective, sheer fabric that could be stretched. I found three different ones, bought a few yards of each and then went home to take the test photos.

I was originally going to do this shot outside and use natural sunlight, but this test shot came out so well I'm not really sure I need to redo this! I would, however, LOVE to still recreate a scene from the book, especially a scene with my favorite character Cormac. So when you end up reading this book, try to think of a scene with Cormac that you think would be great for a photo because there's a good chance I'll be doing it!

Graffiti Moon

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Sun, 15 Apr 2012 23:07:00 +0000

Graffiti Moon, originally uploaded by margotwood.

Oh Graffiti Moon. You are one of my favorite books I've read this year, dare I say even ever? Possibly. You are that good. And that is why I had to include you in my young adult photo series.

So let me introduce those of you who haven't read this to Graffiti Moon, written by the amazing Cath Crowley. I was lucky enough to get my hands on an advanced copy of this book, but it's so good I bought a hard cover copy as well. It's worth it. This book combines so many things that I love: well written characters (especially Shadow who is my book boyfriend), suspense, romance and most of all graffiti.

I have been photographing graffiti ever since I got my first digital camera. I love the colors, the expression the danger to it all. Graffiti has been one of my favorite mediums of art for as long as I can remember so when I heard that there was a YA book coming out that was about a graffiti artist I was super excited to read it. The best part was, the book exceeded my expectations. It was 10x better than I expected and I went through a little withdrawal when it was done. I wanted more of Shadow, more of the dual narrative, more poetry, more art talk.

So the only way I can continue to live in Shadow and Lucy's world is by photographing them. And thus you have this photo.

This shot was much simpler and easier to take than almost all of my other YA photos I've done. What made it easy was that I already knew where I wanted to photograph. Finding decent graffiti can be hard in New York. I didn't just want some crappy tags on a wall, I wanted color, texture and grit that would also be beautiful. Hopefully you agree with me that this spot I chose was worthy of Shadow's art. If I could change anything about this photo, I would hire a real graffiti artist to recreate one of Shadow's paintings. That would have been really cool....especially the one with the upside down bird.

So have you read Graffiti Moon yet? What did you think? What were your favorite parts of the story? I'd love to hear what you think of it!

Click here to see this photo in a larger size!

Across The Universe

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Sun, 08 Apr 2012 00:02:00 +0000

Across The Universe, originally uploaded by margotwood.

This is the sixth in my series of photos inspired by young adult novels. The book that inspired this creepy shot is Across The Universe written by Beth Revis.

This sci-fi / dystopian novel is about a girl, Amy, who in the not-so-distant-future is cryogenically frozen along with a hundred other people and placed onboard a spaceship bound for a new Earth since the current one is not doing so well. She and the other frozen people are supposed to be woken up in 300 years, but Amy is unexpectedly woken up about 50 years too early and now Amy is stuck on that ship and mystery, murder and a budding romance ensue.

So why did I decide to do a photo for this novel? Well, the idea of doing a photo of a cryogenically frozen girl was just too good of a challenge to pass up. The scene where Amy is being frozen is raw, haunting and made me feel very, very cold. Literally, I think I had chills while reading it.

So if you read my earlier post you'll know that I had some trouble coming up with a way to execute this shot. The most important things to me were making sure that I got the blueness of the liquid correct, a tube that goes down Amy's throat and that Amy has red hair.

My original thoughts were to shoot this in a pool with a disposable underwater camera. I contacted my gym who has a pool and they were a little weirded out about having me reserve the pool all to myself so I nixed that idea. Next I thought about doing the shot in a bathtub, but I couldn't find a bathtub that was big enough. Then I thought about buying a giant aquarium and filling it up with colored water, but nixed that idea because it would be expensive. So finally I came up with a solution.

I decided to honor the beautiful color of this book and have Amy be lying down, like the black silhouetted girl on the cover. To get the frosted, frozen effect I took the glass from an 11x14 frame, wiped it down with blue Listerine and stuck it in the freezer for an hour. Once it was frozen, I took it out, where it promptly froze over the way I wanted it do when you take frozen glass into a warm room, and then held it in front of "Amy" and took the photo.

As for the tube. Well, I did contact a doctor about cryogenic freezing and what kind of tubes they would use. He said they'd most likely use something like an endotracheal tube in a size 7....whatever that means. After some googling, I realized I would never get my hands on such a tube unless I robbed a hospital and since I don't know any currently practicing doctors in the area, I figured I'd have to come up with an alternative.

So can you guess where I got the tube that's in this photo? It's from a pet store. It's the end of a blue tube that they use to pump water out of fish tanks! Cool huh? So in total, this photo cost me $20 to make and I could achieve from the comfort from my own apartment.

Seriously, never underestimate the power of creative problem solving.

But a big thanks goes to Beth Revis for writing such an inspiring novel! I hope this shot does the book justice!

Ashfall

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 02:29:00 +0000

Ashfall, originally uploaded by margotwood.

This book. Oh this book. Ashfall by Mike Mullin is one of the best dystopian I've read since The Hunger Games. There I said it. It was so good, I just HAD to include it in my YA photo series.

Unlike other dystopians that have come out post THG (Divergent, Maze Runner, Delirium, ect) this one could actually happen. There really is a volcano beneath Yellowstone National Park (I should know, I did just visit there this fall), and it really could erupt at anytime and we are "overdue" for a volcanic eruption. So what would happen if that volcano erupted? Well, that's the question Ashfall answers.

This book is raw, horrifying and sometimes hits a little too close to reality for my own comfort, but that's why it's so good. The story follows Alex as he treks across states lines directly after the eruption. I would have preferred for this portrait to have been one for Alex, but since I could find anyone who looked the part and was willing to let me destroy their face with "ash" (I'll to that part in a second), I decided to just do a character portrait for Darla, the girl Alex meets along his trek.

Darla is a badass. She is by far the coolest female character I've read since THG because like Katniss she starts off a badass already, she doesn't suddenly become a badass throughout the story, she just already is. But she's also completely real and flawed (aren't we all?) and that's why I love her so much.

Now onto the actual taking of this photo. Ash.....such a simple concept, an ash covered face, but you'd be surprised at how difficult this was to actually pull off.

First I tried to create real ash so I burned some paper and that did nothing but set off the smoke alarms and make my whole apartment smell like a camp fire. Next I tried a variety of makeup powders like black and grey eyeshadows, but they weren't thick enough and there wasn't enough there to cover my whole face. So finally, I gave unbleached flour a try and voila! A little Vaseline was used to make it all stick and then some retouching in Photoshop helped give it a greyish tint to it.

I took several shots and even finished editing a completely different photo that was really dark and really textured (a much different vibe than from this one you see here) but ultimately decided to go with this shot for a few reasons:

1. I like that Darla is looking up, as if she's looking up to the sky where the ash is falling from.

2. The color scheme and tones fit the cover of the book better.

3. This is a little less intense. My other fauxto was darker and more intense, but the more I thought about it, the more I remember the lighter, funnier moments of Ashfall as well as the darker moments, so I felt that the photo shouldn't be as "dark".

What do you think? Have you read Ashfall? Does my fauxto do it justice or should I go back to the drawing board? I'm on the fence, I do like it, but I still think it isn't 100%. Thanks in advance for your thoughts!

PS- This photo I took while visiting Yellowstone this fall totally reminded me of this book.

PPS- I thought I should mention that if anyone also tries to do a photo using flour, I should share my "lessons learned": DO NOT wet your hair before adding the flour, because the moment you step in the shower afterwards to wash it all off, the flour will become dough and it will get supremely stuck in your hair.

The Giver

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Mon, 26 Mar 2012 00:07:00 +0000

The Giver, originally uploaded by margotwood.

This is the 4th photograph in my series of photos inspired by young adult novels. Recently, I picked up a copy of The Giver by Lois Lowry - a novel I should have read in middle school, but sadly, never actually read it because I was too distracted at that age to actually read a book.

So when I finally got around to reading it this weekend, I couldn't put it down. I've read a lot of YA dystopian novels recently, but this one was very different from all the others I've read, and much more powerful. It left me debating with myself the meaning of certain elements in the book, particularly the color red and an apple.

I could sit here and debate with myself (or you) for hours on the significance of these two things as well as the ending (salvation or death?) but I don't want to be spoilery for anyone who hasn't read it yet. This is a classic YA novel that absolutely needs to be on the shelf of every YA lover out there, or anyone in general for that matter.

As for the photo, I knew I wanted to portray the red apple amongst "sameness" so finding a nicely textured background was the important part for me. Luckily, the tree outside my bedroom window has finally bloomed and its white flowers gave a nice lightness to the background that the apple could be held in front of.

I think if I were to redo this photo I would try to get an image of Jonas or The Giver in there, but since I don't personally know anyone who could fit those roles, I went with something simpler and easier to accomplish.

What other "classic" YA novels would you like to see me interpret?

Daughter of Smoke and Bone

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Sun, 18 Mar 2012 22:23:00 +0000

Daughter of Smoke and Bone, originally uploaded by margotwood.

I am very excited to introduce you to the third in my series of photos inspired by young adult books! This one was inspired by Daughter of Smoke and Bone written by Laini Taylor. This book is a fantasy gem filled with angels, demons and one badass chick with blue hair. Seriously, blue hair - how could I not do a photo for this book!?!?

Click here to view this photo in a larger size!

The biggest challenge with a book like this was figuring what I wanted to portray in the photo. There were so many possibilities, in fact if I ever won the lottery, I would totally redo this photo and instead do the scene with the giant marionette on the bridge. (If you haven't read the book yet, stop what you're doing right now and go get a copy!) I also briefly thought of portraying Karou in art class sketching a naked dude, but ultimately decided that was probably not the best scene to do, even if it would have been fun.

I finally settled on an easier idea for this photo, I wanted to portray both Karou and a door through which she enters the demon world. Why those two? Well Karou is an obvious choice because she's the blue haired protagonist who is such an unusual and unique character that I had to honor her in someway. I wanted to include a doorway in the shot because doors have a lot of meaning in this book and they are a central point to the story. I amended this post (mainly just this paragraph) because it was revealed to me that previously I was being to spoilery, so instead I'll just tell you that you'll have to read the book to truly understand the scene I'm trying to capture in this shot.

The second biggest challenge for this photo was finding a cool doorway. I went on two scouting trips in my Brooklyn neighborhood and while I did find some cool doors, especially on a few old cathedrals, I ultimately went with this location because it was isolated from cars and humans - I had the whole street to myself. Since this was a self-portrait, it was important that I find a place where I didn't have to fear someone stealing my camera or having people watch me with confused faces.

I also chose this spot because of the white building. I knew in my head I wanted a muted palette so the blue hair (and Karou) would stand out and a darker building would have been difficult to photograph blue hair against. When I read the book I just envisioned a world of dark greys, blacks, ash, smoke and bone, but I also imagined all those colors being subdued, hence why I wanted a muted photo.

So thanks to a little Photoshop wizardry, I was able to add the handprint to the door and those tattoos (no Dad, they aren't real, you can calm down now) -and voila! You have my tribute to the fantastic and beautiful Daughter of Smoke and Bone!

Divergent

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Mon, 12 Mar 2012 01:06:00 +0000

Divergent, originally uploaded by margotwood.

Divergent, the young adult dystopian thriller written by Veronica Roth was the inspiration for this photo, the second in my young adult series.

Whew! This one was fun to photograph. A big, big thanks to my friend and actress Julia Bray for bravely taking on the role of Beatrice (Tris) Prior.

I had a zillion ideas for a Divergent photo. Originally, I wanted a shot of Tris jumping out of a moving train, but since that'd be really hard to pull off with zero access to any abandoned trains, I had to move on to the next idea. The next idea was going to be a shot of that scene with Tris at the top of the building about to zip line to the ground…again, difficult to pull off with limited resources.

So finally, I decided to not do a literal scene from the book, but to instead just do a shot of Tris doing something I imagine her doing with the member of Dauntless, and one of those things (at least in my head) is a lot of rooftop hopping and running and being awesome.

So to the roof we headed. I chose this roof because there are no modern buildings in site (except for the skyline in the background), but there's no fancy, modern glass apartment building or anything. This roof scene was older, which sorta fit well with the whole dystopian thing.

Divergent is a really action-packed novel, it reads like a Bruce WIllis movie, so I wanted to honor that action with an action-oriented photo. While this photo could have been shot way more intensely (at night, with more people, ect ect) I think for now I'm very happy with the way it came out. I'd love to be able to do a reshoot with fancy equipment, cooler locations, the works, but until that day comes when I have butt loads of cash to put towards this project, I'm pleased with the way it turned out and I hope you are too.

So what book is next on my list? Was thinking Blood & Chocolate by Annette Curtis Klause - maybe that scene with Viv wakes up with blood on her hands. Or maybe a photo taken at The Strand bookstore for the book Dash and Lily's Book of Dares! Who knows, but by all means, please lend me your suggestions in the comments and stay tuned for more photos in the series!

Want to see this photo bigger? Click here!

The Forest of Hands and Teeth

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Tue, 06 Mar 2012 16:18:00 +0000

The Forest of Hands and Teeth, originally uploaded by margotwood.

Some of you follow me on Twitter, so you know that I love books, young adult books in particular (okay, so they're actually the only books I read) but nonetheless I love them. But I also love photography, and this winter I decided I was going to come up with a way to combine my two favorite past times and thus this new photo series was born: photos inspired by my favorite young adult novels.

While this is an ongoing project, and my goal is to complete 20 photographs by who knows when, I want to keep you all up to date with my progress, thus I am blogging about the first one I've completed.

This photo was inspired by the book The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan. It is one of the most visually stimulating novels I've ever read, Carrie Ryan truly has a knack for descriptive settings and I wanted to honor her talent by creating a photo that was equally as visually stimulating.

Her book does indeed have zombies and it follows the main character, Mary, as she escapes her weirdly religious cult-like village during a zombie invasion. At certain points in the novel, Mary fantasizes about giving up and giving herself over to the undead and accepting her fate. The expression I tried to capture on my face was during one of those moments, when Mary's will to survive seems to dissipate and her acceptance of death reigns.

Am I happy with the outcome of this photo? In some ways yes and others no. This isn't really the photo I had originally envisioned, but given the fact that I had NO resources and only one other person to help me (my friend Allison whose hands you see here), I have to say I am damn proud of being able to at least accomplish this with such limitations.

Another thing I'm proud of with this photo are those hands. Allison's hands in the original, unedited version are just normal hands with a little bit of dried mud here and there. So I had to learn how to zombie-fy them in photoshop, and I'm proud to say that now I'm an expert in that, although they could use a few open sores and gaping wounds.

I plan on editing those photo even further, perhaps adding a hand on my shoulder or neck from one of the other photos we took, and if I do, no doubt I'll be back here to tell you all about how I accomplished that in photoshop because as of right now, I'm really sure even I know how to do that and make it look real.

So stay tuned for updates on this photo and hopefully another YA inspired shot coming soon...

Deadwood

noreply@blogger.com (Margot Wood) — Tue, 06 Mar 2012 02:05:00 +0000

Deadwood, originally uploaded by margotwood.

Because my job (my real job, not the one I wish I had where I get paid to travel the world and take awesome photos) is getting busier and busier, I find that I don't really have time anymore to just aimlessly wander around and snap photos. Thus, I am forced to either plan out my photographic adventures in advance or recycle through old ones that I never edited.

Tonight, I'm doing the latter and this photo was shot in Yellowstone National Park at the Grand Prismatic Spring - an incredibly colorful hot spring. Even though I could have easily edited this and made it into a crazy, colorful, rich photo, I decided to go for the opposite effect and try a little Ansel Adams inspiration. This is the resulting fauxto.