Jack Bridgland

0:00 [Applause]

0:06 hey guys how's it going oh yeah sorry I forgot to put that out there my name is jack richland I'm a fashion music and commercial photographer and yeah I'm going to talk about my journey basically of how I've ended up being kind of a photographer and doing what I do so I started off I didn't really know if I wanted to do photography or what I wanted to do at uni at school sorry and you know.

0:29 I just started to feel get a feel for what I could do work experience wise etc and a guy like four years above me in school called ed cook who's here with me tonight was I kind of looked up to I didn't know him.

0:41 But I just thought he was really cool and I loved his photography and I was like wow like not a lot of people do photography especially like I'm from surrey that's not it's quite a boring kind of town and yeah I kind of didn't realize a lot of people did photography so I was like really interested in doing that.

0:56 So I messaged ed on tumblr and which we all had our we all loved back in the day and yeah. I had I had a blog I made a blog firstly called shoe porn which was which was a blog that was all shoes and I was just like blogging shoes basically and yeah I reached out to ed on tumblr and you know I didn't I didn't know if he'd get back to me and pretty sure if he didn't get back to me I wouldn't be here today.

1:23 So I dropped him a message and he got back to me and said yeah come and assist me and yeah.

1:30 So I went up and assisted him. And in that one day that I assisted him I just learned like so much about photography and kind of you know at school you're learning a lot about the technicality of photography and like old photographers but you're not learning how to beat on time to a shoot how to meet people how to interact with people etc so from this I you know.

1:49 I started shooting my own stuff so so this kind of work was me going up to london every saturday I was working in a week so always kind of tried to find time every saturday and without a doubt I'd go up to london and photograph someone or photograph someone with friends and for me shooting someone with friends just meant I got more photos so I love doing that and from there I kind of was able to develop you know what I liked shooting I could get a feel for what I kind of enjoyed shooting etc and got to meet kind of loads of different people through that and here you can kind of see I'm kind of testing out different lighting techniques and yeah just shooting generally people around london in in their kind of everyday lifestyle and having fun with it and exploring that.

2:35 Basically.

2:37 And then after this I ventured out to new york and transferred this kind of vibe out there again you know reaching out to people on instagram that's something I want to mention is like one of the most important things as a creative is reaching out to people on instagram because a lot of the time people don't know you're there until you say hello or you know you show passion and you show yeah positivity towards them and you tell them you know you want to shoot with them or collaborate with them so through that I was able to kind of meet music artists meet general artists fashion designers etc and start photographing them around in new york and basically just you know shooting candid stuff basically nothing that required a big budget or anything just people in the street that you know kind of anyone can can do and then from here. I went to la and then la is like where this completely opened my eyes to to the world really in terms of like everything I'd seen in movies was just in this one place and it was like the coolest place ever like I absolutely just can remember thinking oh my god I remember I was in an uber from the airport and california love was playing by two pack and I was like literally have my hand out the window just it was absolutely yeah it was amazing and it was like wow I'm actually in california like all these songs and all the rapping and all this music that relates to it is yeah I'm finally here so same again I went out every day with my camera just a 35 millifilm camera and walked around and just photographed people in the street and kind of a quote that I go off is you miss 100 of the shots you don't take so whenever I was scared of me you know bumping into people at the top at the top there is a rapper called lil zan who's yeah kind of fallen off now but he was he was he was he was really big at the time.

4:25 And I saw him I saw him walk I saw him with all his mates and like surrounded honestly by 20 people. And I was like oh my god that's lil xan like I could just go and take a photo of him.

4:34 And then I've got him on my portfolio so I plucked up the courage and kind of walked over and kind of had to repeat myself a few times because they weren't listening and then finally yeah and then he was like yeah man like let's take a photo so I kind of took him to the side and put him against kind of a white wall and photographed him. And I think that's another thing in the importance of photography is like look at your surroundings and try and make the best out of that surrounding so if he he was originally standing in front of a pretty tacky shop window it's kind of seeing what you can use in that space and and using that.

5:04 Basically and through that here's kind of some of my more recent la work I started thinking more about you know what props we can use or you know still shooting people in their environment but also just having like more mood to it and more energy and there's actually quite a kind of funny story with the guys in the middle there I yeah I saw the guy on the right walking down the street and I was like look he looks really cool but I didn't like what he was wearing so I was like look I wanna I'd love to photograph you in like two or three days or something and ended up photographing him again he turned up in like a superman t-shirt and I didn't like what he's wearing and I was like this guy doesn't know me. And I'm just going to tell him to take his top off and because I knew for me the photo I needed of him was a photo of him without his top on or something you know a white vest or just something plain and cool some not what he was wearing basically.

5:56 So yeah. So from that I was starting to get a feel for like what I actually want someone you know it can be as far as styling it can be as far as mood lighting etc it can be way more than just the photo you.

6:06 Actually can start to like develop ideas on how yeah how people are dressed how sets are dressed etc etc so from this I was able to pick up a lot of you know coloring techniques and like you know get the inspiration from the la colors and yeah I kind of had a sit down with myself and kind of you know went over everything I've kind of had done and was like right what is inspiring me. And I was like to be honest it's not movies and it's not so much photos it's actually like cartoons obviously yeah I absolutely loved watching looney tunes when I was a kid I loved all the sweet branding I love how you know you go in a shop the brightest thing in the shop is like sweet color sweet wrappers because it's for kids and it's kind of like it gives you that child in yourself you kind of just like jump at it like it draws you draws you in basically.

6:53 So yeah. So from this I kind of started implementing these colors into my work and you know exploring with it. And I think another important thing is like england being the drizzy brainy place it is kind of slowed down my whole like approach of shooting off shooting these people in the street because every time I planned a shoot it was raining so I started to think you know I need to develop and and start working in a studio basically.

7:18 So I was transferring this energy and these kind of people but you know putting a bit more thought into it putting a bit more yeah like props putting a bit more energy into it again just playing more and more with colors and giving it a real a real feel that I loved and like growing up as a kind of a 90s kid I I loved all that aesthetic and my my old brother used to leave like xxl magazines around the house and I always used to read those so that like heavily inspired just having this old-school feel to everything.

7:51 And then yeah this is kind of some of my recent work for magazine stuff again this is where I'm kind of pushing from my personal work it starts pushing more into like the magazine world.

8:01 And then yeah here's some kind of more more examples of my my recent stuff where you can just kind of see where I'm just kind of going crazy with colors and trying to trying to basically experiment as much as possible and then.

8:13 So this after kind of having this experimental feel and like posting this on instagram etc I was hit up by a really big model called jordan barrett who he kind of hit me up and he said look do you want to do a photo shoot together. And I was like absolutely yes like I knew of him I'd seen his face everywhere.

8:31 And I was like super excited so like after like three years we finally were in the same country and I kind of came up with this idea of having you know someone wearing sportswear that juxtaposes with them like doing unhealthy stuff like smoking or eating etc and I in all honesty like a lot of people I reached out to do the shoot with just didn't get it and didn't want to do it and yeah like three hairstylists they didn't they just didn't really get it. And it wasn't for a magazine so a lot of people were put off. And I think that's another point I kind of wanted to say is like I think doing your own personal stuff like completely personal with no restrictions is really healthy for you know your portfolio etc because it gives you a chance to literally have no boundaries and do exactly what you want so after this shoot this kind of got shared very very heavily on instagram and it was my first kind of shoot where.

9:22 I started getting you know I guess followed by like big up like high up kind of people designers and companies etc and like started to really feel like wow like my work is getting noticed and you know it felt amazing in that sense of life finally like all these ideas I had like is now getting shared to more and more people. Basically. And then. This is the final one here.

9:44 But the reason I've kind of gone through that shoot is because this was what caught the eyes of the actor robert patterson which he found online somewhere which was awesome he I don't think he has instagram but he found that online and he said to his agent that he wanted to do a shoot with me. And so I got an email from his agent which I actually completely missed and didn't read it. And then got a I got a I got a call.

10:12 This is just a kind of behind the scenes I got a call from his agent it was about 11 p.m and I was at a bar and I was probably a little bit tiddly and I got a call and she was kind of like do you like rob patterson love to shoot do you mind if we put you forward for a shoot with gq global and I was like played it super cool I was like potentially I was like potentially no I was honestly yeah I did play it really cool I thought I thought that was quite important I don't want to be like yes like screaming down the phone whilst I was actually on mute screaming but I did that.

10:48 And then. I was like yeah played it cool like cool just let me know.

10:51 Anyway two weeks went by and then. I was in a bar with my friend ed again actually and and I got a call from gq just like yeah we just want to we want to confirm you for that.

11:00 So I was like oh my god like this is absolutely incredible this is the moment I've wanted I'm going to put my 100 everything into this shoot like there's just no way I'm going to like do this and not do it how I want to do it so obviously with kind of this is kind of behind the scenes stuff of the the pre-light but obviously with like him promoting batman etc I felt like initially there was going to be a lot of pressure for me to promote batman and have it you know very stripped back and kind of clean but they kind of were like rob and his team and gq as well were kind of just like look go go do your thing like that's why we want to use you for this shoot is your style and I hadn't really had that a lot in the past like everyone's kind of like oh yeah like your work but like you know it needs to look like this.

11:45 But this was like no no no like do your thing like do that jordan shoot like we want that. And we want like a few of the other things you've done like just do that so originally like I still was playing it safe so I kind of had this idea of like having rob as like a biker boy and having all this like you know rising around a bike in the studio etc and it just I think initially it just felt it felt too safe so I had this one like idea. And this whole treatment I'd written of all these different ideas of biker and fight club kind of thing I had this one idea that was someone getting tattooed and I kind of chucked it in I nearly took it out and that was the one that rob rob loved and I was like wow like he loves the he loves a really crazy like wild card that I put in so me and rob kind of developed an idea of creating a shoot that's him like transforming into something.

12:32 And something. That's just a bit random and weird and not related to batman just something. That's just like gonna yeah hopefully just catch the eyes of people and be really cool so that was amazing to be given that foundation to like be able to do that with him. Basically.

12:45 So yeah I'll talk you through the shoot so we start off with rob looking like as he does kind of super casual very very clean very pristine and you know quite classic to gq quite quite safe and then we kind of start moving into kind of old 2000s again the image like before didn't necessarily correlate or match this image I just loved this vibe so this kind of whole shoot is like eight different ideas for shoots but I just put into one because this was the best person to do it for and the best you know publication.

13:20 So this is kind of like more old 2000s and then.

13:25 This is influence you know I love eight mile I love that movie and I've always loved the lighting in the toilet at the beginning so this was always this was inspired by that.

13:35 Basically of him kind of transforming and putting in bleach etc and then him in a kind of lab environment again kind of mysterious you're not sure what's going on we're not kind of sure what's being promoted it's just a bit bit random but again I was able to like have my say and bring in pink because I love the color pink and I love the fact that it contrasts with the blue and like brings out a lot of color and then here again kind of transforming having his teeth taken out and you know replaced with gold teeth and then this shot here on left is probably like my favorite photo I've ever taken because for me like starting up when I was shooting you know photographing people around london and stuff and starting to get a feel for what I wanted them to wear I kind of started you know putting white vests on people if they're if I didn't know you know if I was going to photograph someone and they didn't know what to bring to where I'd always just use a white vest as that was the safest option as it just always looks cool so yeah.

14:32 So this shot for me was kind of I got everything I love I'm obsessed with grills I'm obsessed with kind of shooting people in white vests I got the cut that we did in the jordan shoot and kind of got this sinister face that kind of I don't know it feels just different and not how he's been shot before. Basically.

14:46 But yeah. So after this he kind of progresses into this kind of sinister character and then again this is the tattoo shot that was on the treatment that we recreated and kind of gave a really cool feel and yeah and then it ended up on the global gq cover which got kind of widely shared which was awesome and yeah kind of honestly this shoot skyrocketed like my career and probably is why I'm kind of standing here today.

15:16 So I'm very very grateful and special thanks to they're not obviously here but will welch and rox from gq global because they gave me the chance to actually be able to do something and trusted me to shoot a global gq cover even though I'd never done it before then a very subtle quote here don't give people what they want give people what they don't know they want thank you you