Humans on this Planet Now

Stand there. Now turn your head and look out the window. There. Perfect. Don’t move. Oh my, that’s amazing. The light is so good here and you look timeless. Every photograph we took today has led up to this. This image. It was worth my drive all the way down to Scotts Valley.

Sometimes I can take a photograph that makes me step back and say “Okay, I’m done now. I never have to take a photograph again”. That’s a portrait. That’s what this is all about.  I can’t promise that it will happen. It doesn’t happen all the time. But it happens often enough to make me believe that there’s something going on here beyond my feeble abilities.

But most people just want pictures. They’re not looking to discover some greater truth. And either am I. I just want to see something beyond what’s on the surface. Most headshots are just reflections. I’m looking for something just a little deeper than that. It doesn’t have to be a masterpiece. It just has to speak without words to something beyond what is seen.

Not everything can be explained. What comes through in a photograph like the one above is a wordless energy. We see a person. Not a CEO or a mom or anything with a name. That’s all I’m aiming for. I just want to see you as a human being. I want to feel that when I look at your picture. I want to remember that moment when it clicked and your surface identity receded into the background for a moment and we both occupied the same space. Humans. On this planet. Now.