Jorge Quinteros
Blogger, web enthusiast & avid photographer based in Brooklyn.

21st August 2009

Photographer Spotlight: Joshua Longbrake

Joshua Longbrake is 26, a photographer and a student at Mars Hill Graduate School in Seattle, WA. His writing and storytelling photographs can be found at thelongbrake.com but you can also find him participating in the Twitterverse.

1. How would you define your photographic style?

The detail in the everyday is always what catches my eye. There’s something beautiful about documenting one’s own simple experiences. Simple details more than anything draws me to photography. I think it helps me remember that I exist, that I feel and sense things.

I enjoy getting jobs and projects from clients, and I really love photo-journalism where I get to travel, but no matter where I am I still tend to take a photograph of my cup of coffee every morning. I think more than anything I want to be authentic and honest, to convey life as I see it with the hopes of connecting with other people. In some ways I’m saying This is my story. Do you see me? Is this your story too?

What does your camera equipment consist of?

I primarily shoot with a Hasselblad 500C/M, using Kodak 120 Portra NC film as well as Polaroid 660 film for my Polaroid back. My secondary camera is a Canon AE-1, and mostly I try to get expired film, but it’s not as easy to come by as I would like it to be.

I also shoot with a Canon 5D and sometimes a Polaroid SX-70, but not often. I have a few lenses for the Canon cameras (50mm, 135mm, 16-35mm). I have some basic lighting gear but I hate lugging it around, so I don’t use it very often. Also, I’m terrible at using lighting gear.

3. What’s your post-production software of choice?

Photoshop for the computer and a darkroom when I can manage. I plan to build my own darkroom if I ever buy a house. Right now I live with 5 other guys and I doubt they’d want their bathroom smelling like chemicals.

But here’s an idea that’s a bit off topic: What if someone made a perfume based on the smells of the darkroom…can you imagine walking down the street and passing by a girl who not only catches your eye but also smells of developer? I’d get on one knee then and there.

4. Are you considering any equipment upgrades in the future?

I want to get a 220 magazine for my Hasselblad, but I’m not really into gear all that much. I use what I have and try to get by as best as possible. All of my money goes towards film, printing and processing. I’d love to get a digital Hasselblad, but, you know, I don’t really have $20,000 in my dresser drawer. Wait let me check nope just old socks.

5. Share with us you proudest photograph?

I took this photograph outside of Uptown Espresso on Westlake in Seattle. There’s an emptiness to the photograph, but there’s also evidence of someone’s existence. Someone was there, sitting, working through things, smoking and drinking as time passed by. And what I love most about it is that it’s important to me, that I bring my own story to the image and draw meaning out of it for myself.

Maybe you see it differently, and I’m sure you do. We all bring our own experience to a piece of art when we interpret it, and everyone’s own experience has value. Maybe that’s why simple images draw me in so quickly; they leave so much room to draw out meaning and significance.