DAY 175

PORTRAITS

Polaroid

BRUCE WOOLLEY, MUSICIAN

For a while my brother and I joined creative forces as photographers in London, calling ourselves “The Other Brothers.” This is a portrait we made as part of our collaboration with Bruce Woolley and his Radio Science Orchestra. We offered our photographic services to him backstage after a performance, and we later got a call from him to produce the album-cover photography for the next CD the band was recording.

This shot from a Polaroid 669 black and white proofing negative ended up as my favorite from the session, and quite elegantly shows the eccentric nature of Bruce, who cowrote the first song to ever be played on MTV (Video Killed the Radio Star by the Buggles). I printed the negative onto bromide paper using a lith developer and also a process of “bleaching back” the print and then redeveloping the print again to achieve the wonderful color and rich yellowy warmth to the midtones and whites. The background is actually a partially painted brick wall that I shot out of focus and lit brightly, contrasting against the dark foreground and shadowed portraits. —SA