Five Polaroid Photos from our First Film (+ The stories behind them)
Instax Wide 300 Camera Review + Photo stories
Capturing moments has always been of utmost importance here at Gritty Vibes, which is why amongst the artist interviews, music reviews etc, I squeeze in an article or two with things I simply want to document & archive. Instant cameras have been of particular interest to me, for two reasons: One, I'm impatient and after trying out point and shoot film photography I realized that I don't like waiting for days to see what I captured. Two, there's something about the look and feel of a polaroid photo that can't be replicated. It is perfectly imperfect, and it arrives immediately. The Instax Wide 300 is my perfect traveling buddy and it gets the job done.
Right off the bat, a con of the Instax Wide 300 for me is that you have very little control over the outcome of your photo and some photos can come out under or over exposed. This happens a lot if you're not careful, so it's a must that you have decent lighting or the flash on. The only other con is technically also why I like it: The camera is huge. It's not ideal to just grab and go but after using small instant cameras like the polaroid go, for me the Instax Wide is a good change of pace and provides a nice size photo in comparison.In case you didn't know, I am a filmmaker (Ahem..Award winning filmmaker, my bad). I took this camera with me behind the scenes of my independent film debut April Again. If you haven't seen it definitely go check that out! I took hundreds of polaroids from the shoot but I decided to share five with you all. Not because they're great or anything, but just because I really dig the stories behind them. I hope you can create and document great memories with your instant camera as well, and if you're seeking to do so, the Instax Wide 300 is a good camera to go with.
Justin Kirkland
A common theme you'll find in this photo series is full circle moments. For example, featured in this photo is Justin Kirkland, the lead actor for April Again, but also a former hooper from Queens like myself. Justin and I met at basketball camp in eighth grade. When Justin began getting into acting post basketball, I was getting into directing, so I reach out to see if he'd be a part of my film, hoping he'd remember me. He did, and the rest is history.This photo in particular embodies the film in my eyes. We were filming at night, with fake pistols as props. Looking back the whole situation was dangerous and borderline illegal, like most indie films are. Luckily, we got it done. If you're looking for him now, you might see him on TV, as Justin was featured on a national Mountain Dew commercial afterwards.
First Day of Filming
This day was the very first day of filming and we were all nervous yet excited. We shot at my old elementary school and like the entirety of the film, we did it without permits. I snapped these as we were waiting for the actors to show up (While wondering if they'd actually even show). What I remember about these shots is that faculty from the school came out and threatened to call the cops for filming without a permit and it was really discouraging to start out on that kinda note. We kept it going and filmed anyway though, and I'm glad we did.
A Tribe Called Quest Mural
One of my favorite days of filming. We went to almost every mural in Queens, New York to shoot and create our title sequence. A few moments were particularly touching: The Sean Bell Mural for one. Sean Bell was shot 50 times by the Police on the morning of his wedding. As a black man from Queens, this hit home long before the Black Lives Matter movement was a thing. Getting that into the film was a must.On a lighter note, I managed to snap the above photo of my brother by the A Tribe Called Quest Mural. The mural is on the block made infamous in their Check the Rhime video so I was hyped to include that. If you look closely, you'll see that my brother's Jordan shirt was themed after A Tribe Called Quest's Midnight Marauders Album cover (One of the best album covers of all time).
Immanuel Wilkins
Another full circle moment. Immanuel Wilkins now, is one of the leaders of the new school when it comes to Jazz music (As we suspected he'd be). The New York Times called his album "Omega" the top Jazz album of the year and Rolling Stone Magazine had high praise as well. When we met in 2017, he was a student at Julliard, making a name for himself as one of the best Jazz saxophonists around. He performed on my turf in Jamaica Queens at Jamaica Center for Arts and Learning and I asked if he'd be willing to work with me on an original score for the film.
At the time, I wasn't even sure how music scores worked and honestly, I was wondering how just one musician could conduct it all without a band. That night, I got a crash course, and got to watch Immanuel play various instruments, and layer them to sound like one band, one sound (Shameless drumline reference). These photos are from that session, which took place at The Julliard School. As we mentioned, Immanuel went on to become who he is, and I later premiered the completed film at the same place I first seen him play. If that's not full circle enough, I now work at that place, Jamaica Center for Arts and Learning, and I get to work with dope Jazz artists and creatives in general, full time.
Post Production and Post Premiere
This is a photo of me, back when I was still living at home. A little context here, we had just completed production for our film and now it was time for editing and post production. I had no idea how to do any of that so naturally, I tried to hire someone who did. After realizing the cost of a film editor, I decided to edit the film myself. The only problem was that the high res files crashed my little laptop again and again. On a whim, I decided to buy an iMac to edit the film.As you can see here, I didn't have an office set up at this time and I was learning how to edit the film in my childhood bedroom. The room was absolutely sweltering, and I spent the entire rest of the summer and Fall editing. (Also, I lost all the files and had to edit the entire thing twice but that's a different story). By Wintertime 2019 the film was ready which leads me to the next photo...
This photo was directly after we premiered the film in Jamaica Queens. I was counting up a few hundred dollars in donations from the premier. We put all that money into film festival fees and took April Again on the road! Moral of the story: Go for what you want in life and with camera's like the Instax Wide 300, it can be super fun to document it along the way.Hope you enjoyed this photo journey. Watch my film April Again here!Learn more about how we made the film here