New York, 1999, captured on Super 8mm.

1999. My last year at St.Martins. We are heading to New York. The MA students are going and I am the only one from the BA course that can join them. It was a great trip. We visited quite a few design agencies and got a glimpse into the design industry in New York. I decided to stay for another week. Until now I had been getting “down and dirty” with type at the Southampton Row’s basement with letterpress printing. Learning type from the very basic. Understanding the vocabulary. Going back to QuarkXpress was suddenly not a mystery anymore. All the commands came intuitive. Same as coming from a wet-room/darkroom and exploring Photoshop for the first time. The terminology makes sense.

New York is a great city and, yes, it is easy to party like it’s 1999. I didn’t stay behind to party, I stayed behind to capture. I had borrowed a super 8 camera and used it in single frame mode. Could get over 3000 exposures out of one roll! Shooting super 8 and treating it as still medium, and not moving images, was one of the ways I pushed the photographic boundaries.

Coming from a traditional photography background (as an apprentice), and at first attending a BA commercial photography course at Kent Institute (KIAD), I managed to swap to Saint Martin’s halfway through the first year as it was the only place that would push you to explore. Of course, it would be easy for me to do mostly all the assignments as a photographic solution, however, why take the easy route out? Hence, my struggling to understand the world of typography. Working with type was the biggest challenge and therefore the one I set out to master and understand.

However, The MA students had completed their tour and the party was over. Time to explore. The extra week went fast and here are some more of the captures, enjoy:

New York, 1999, captured on Super 8mm.

New York, 1999, captured on Super 8mm.

New York, 1999, captured on Super 8mm.

New York, 1999, captured on Super 8mm.

New York, 1999, captured on Super 8mm.

New York, 1999, captured on Super 8mm.

Related Posts:

Advertisements