There was a time when I was quite inspired to produce my own set of works in print and decided to start on a project called Shen (绳). The chinese pronounciation sounds like with the word God / Deity (神), though the hanyupinyin for both words are different. So, fast forwarded it, I managed to come out with 5 volumes in total till date (August 2023).
I have been very proud of the quality of the prints and works that I had produced in the 5 volumes. But it actually took a longer hiatus than I would have loved it to be. Mostly because of work commitments and the sheer scale that I would like the next one to be. One of the reasons is that for every photoshoot session I do with my bottoms / models, I am very selective with the photos and hence usually less than 20 pictures will make the mark and to produce a book just based on 20 is not cost effective nor worth it for my supporters. And I would do both e-book and print, does not make economic sense for a book with 20 pictures. Anyways, I am excited that a volume 6 might be on the way for productions. The location and pre-production is already in its early stages as I am typing this. BUT the principal production, that really have to see the stars aligning to be able to come out with a proper photobook.
I digress from the main topic, but that is the thought process that went through my mind whenever I did a photography centric shibari session. Mind you, it is literally a one man operation – set design, lighting design, mise scene, artistic direction, tying, photographing, and post production editing.
Let’s take a peek in the behind the scenes photos that happened during this volume 5 shoot. It is interesting because I gathered 5 of my bottoms together one afternoon, and tie all of them up together. Such dramatic fun afternoon needs some quality behind the scenes shots. Hence got a close friend of mine to help me document the process, while the principle photography is still done by me.
It was one of the most fun ties I did thus far. I did not want every one to get bored waiting to be tied or bored and kinda immobilised. So can you imagine the speed I was tying every one of them? By the way, the whole photosession lasted about 3hrs, given the timestamp I had from the first photo of the day from behind the scenes to my last pic that I took.
Of course with me as the only rigger, it would be insane to go suspend everyone up for the shoot. Any distress in any one of them, or worse together, it would be a safety nightmare for all. But I still managed to suspend one for the group picture.
That is one hell of a session back then. Would not want to do it alone the next time, but still would love to have a group bottoms shoot again. (Which incidentally I did one very recently)
There is a very short reel on my IG for this shoot as well. And yeaps, I am not printing the book anymore and will be re-compiling the (newer and more) pictures in here to a new e-book which will be on sale here … soon.
Nawa Kenshin 