Iridium official launch! A long, long-exposure journey
From 2012 to ...?
The only source of light is the one in my hand
I’ve been repeating this over and over for the past ten years, but what does it means? For the technique itself, it is quite simple: I have a light tool in my right hand (a light-painting tube, a reflective sheet of paper or an acrylic piece…), and this is what I am using to light up my subject. I am never using strobes or a separate tool.
When I work with this technique, I have to accomplish these three things:
1- get great light on the subject
2- create an interesting shape of light that is going to be part of the composition
3- light up the surroundings (generally the floor or the ceiling)
All of these pictures are created within a few seconds (between 1 to 8 depending on the complexity). The rest of the settings are usually iso200, f5.6, 24mm, 2000 lumens. I just posted a couple of behind-the-scenes video on the project page: https://ericpare.com/iridium
The Iridium Project
“There's no one behind the camera. The complete performance happens in front of it. Rather than framing the subject, I’m actively collaborating with the dancer, crafting the light by hand, creating a captivating interplay of shadows and highlights that emphasize the subtleties of the dancer's stillness. Revealing the human body in a striking and intriguing way, each image is unique as the light is flowing without following a defined path. Being part of the creation is the experience and the complete process.”
Iridium is a long-exposure photography collection based on over ten years of crafting the light by hand. Stories, details & behind-the-scenes available on https://ericpare.com/iridium
Why is it called “Iridium”?
We’ll get to that at some point, but for the moment, it is a simple way to organize our work in a clear category. Everything in “Iridium” is about single camera studio light-painting. The four first pieces are from 2021 which was a very productive year at studio 101 (the single camera studio at Xangle).
The tools
Most tools I use can be made from simple DIY products. I explain about DIY tubes here and some other tools here. But of course, there’s a shortcut if scissors is not your thing: lightpainting.store.
Digital Collectibles
At the moment, four art pieces are minted on Foundation via a Manifold smartcontract. Number 2 (with Kim!) has been collected yesterday in Sloika’s World at 0.43eth. Minting these pieces is a way for us to set the provenance, play in the web3 economy and be part of various upcoming events / galleries.
What’s next?
We still have 10 bidders edition available! This might be the easiest entry point for our Night Reflection series (outdoors light-painting with Kim). We’re going to list another piece from the Iridium collection very soon. Announcement is going to be made right here on substack (plz subscribe?) ;)
Week recap
Sloika Originals World (Foundation) went live on Friday! We’re part of it with one piece!
We went shoveling at my parent home in Granby a few days ago which turned into this vertical extension edition for our Winterland series. It was not too cold and we’ve been able to shoot for a whole 90 minutes in the snow!
The Vanishing Point has been listed into the “The Stage” world on Foundation (thanks CryptoMoves!!). We’ll release more details about this one next week
Kim also listed a piece in The Stage: Timeless 2.3.
Amazing work from the community we noticed this week:
gm .. Stoked to find you here Eric. really well-put-out sub, and nice to read through how you create and what you use. Big fan of your work and happy to now follow your words.