For the past three days, I've been promising myself that I'd get up and out to do some shooting. I've been down, exhausted and discouraged with my work lately but it felt nice to spend the time alone to do something productive. The legs on what would be my third tripod broke and my wireless remote is not so responsive with my 7D so I had very limited options for what i wanted to do today.

Self portraits have always been a safe place for me, though they're not very easy.  It's a complicated relationship to explain seeing as I'm actually quite shy when being photographed by someone else. Call it exercises in identity, call it what you will, but the reflexive sense of familiarity and control both in front and behind the camera give me the same rush of endorphins, the same euphoric feeling as 30 minutes of level 10-ing on the cross trainer downstairs. Whatever it is, self portraits hold a certain protected place in my practice and in my art.

I liked the way the sun was shining on a lilac bush behind my house so I decided to see what I could do with it.

While editing these, I was listening to a playlist I created made up of CocoRosie songs. This song in particular, titled "Animals," exactly matched my mood during and after this shoot. Listen to it to see what I mean.