Over the last few years, I have been thinking/obsessing over the idea documenting myself sleeping. I wanted to photograph the movement of my body while I am asleep. In order to talk about the states between being in control of both my mind and body and only being aware of my mind during sleep.
This idea lead to a longer dialog between what is the best way of executing the idea and how to obtain the best image possible. Early on I knew that I wanted to mount the camera over my bed and have each photograph represent one night of sleep (4-6 hours). Thanks to the help of my friend and fellow photographer Viet Nghiem (website), we found some speaker mounts at Target and modify it to accept a quick release system to mount a camera over the bed. The next step was figure out what is the best way to make a four to six hour exposure. I knew that digital was out of the equation because digital sensors times out after a period of time. (However, Nikon recently released a new firmware update to allow an untimed exposure.) I knew that film would be the best choice because it didn’t require any electrical component and I had a good enough understanding of its chemistry to be able to get the negative to where I wanted it go.
Going into it I had to slow down the film speed because of the long shutter exposure. Which means I had to stop down the lens to f/22 and use a 2-3 stop ND filter to give me an effective f/stop exposure of f/45. I also knew that even with the constricted light. I needed to pull the development by 2 stops. However, I would get a flatter negative as a result from the developing. I settled on using Ilford Delta 100 because the film’s high contrast would combat the decrease in highlight development.
The first images from the study I think are quite unsettling but at the same time still and quiet. I hope over the next 5-6 months. I’ll have more images in which to pull from and create a fully realized project.
Let me know what you guys think. I always appreciate your feedback.
Talk to you all next time,
Alex
P.S. The images presented in this post’s gallery has not been edited for dust but have been edited for contrast in the shadows and highlights.