Still Flying / SGA
Title: Still Flying
Rating: G
Fandom: SGA
Prompt: Write about an hour of the day.
Summary: An outside look at John and Rodney. (McShep.)
My name’s Melissa Grier, and I’m a photography student. (This isn’t my choice. It’s a required course for all Multimedia majors, and it’s been the bane of my existence since classes started in August.) I’ve spent all semester sacrificing things like food and electricity to afford the required film and paper, and I only have one more assignment before I can quit forever. That means I’ll never have to take another picture, or lose another roll of film, or worry about aperture versus shutter speed, or stain a perfectly good shirt with development chemicals.
Only one more assignment, and then I graduate. I’ll be able to eat again.
Of course, Doctor Williams saves the hardest assignment for last. I’ve been hoping (praying) that it would be posed people, because I can buy costumes for cheap at Goodwill and ask (demand) my friends act as models. A controlled environment is considered paradise in the photo world.
But no, we don’t get to shoot models in my living room. We get to shoot candid people, and it’s bad enough that you get about three worthwhile shots per roll, but Doctor Williams actually sits down with us and says, “Now, candid photography has more legal issues these days. When you go out to get your pictures, make sure you have your college ID with you, and if an officer or security guard asks you to leave the premises…”
I lose him at “legal issues”. I’m risking arrest for the sake of my GPA. In times of terrorism, who wants their picture taken by a weird girl on the park bench? What parent wants a stranger taking photos of their children on the swings?
The man is insane, but if I ace this class, I’ll have a 4.0 by graduation.
That’s worth any arrest.
Candid photography isn’t easy. It’s one thing to take random pictures of random people, but it’s another to get anything meaningful out of them. Plus, having the camera on the perfect setting while trying to remain inconspicuous is a battle by itself.
So far, I’ve taken fifty-one pictures, barely half worth printing. I’ve visited three art festivals, a dance studio, and a construction area, where I sat in my car and snapped photos of men in hardhats. It’s not intellectually stimulating, but it gets the grade. (The crew chief asked me to leave ten minutes later.)
When dusk begins to fall, I find a place in the park. I want to finish up the roll, so I shoot a couple of skateboarders and an elderly couple walking down the sidewalk. Just as I’m about to leave (planning a late-night in the development lab and a dinner of Snickers bars and Diet Cokes from the vending machine), I hear a conversation by two men sitting on the grass and leaning against a tree, shoulders brushing. One mentions an ocean, and the other talks of a city, and I figure maybe it’s about Florida and the Keys, or some magical place in Europe. I guess the conversation isn’t important, or not nearly as important as the picture they make.
Especially when one of them (dark, wild hair) leans over to give the other man a kiss.
Shocked, I take the shot.
And I think, really, every stressful assignment and skipped meal and ruined shirt-all the angst and frustration-is worth this one honest image.
Later, during the critique, my classmates are unimpressed, and one of them says they have no desire whatsoever to see two guys "doing that", but afterwards, Doctor Williams hands me my final grade for the semester.
It's an A.
…
I sometimes think of those two men, so fond of one another.
And I hope they reached their city, wherever it is, and they’re happy.
FIN.
Rating: G
Fandom: SGA
Prompt: Write about an hour of the day.
Summary: An outside look at John and Rodney. (McShep.)
My name’s Melissa Grier, and I’m a photography student. (This isn’t my choice. It’s a required course for all Multimedia majors, and it’s been the bane of my existence since classes started in August.) I’ve spent all semester sacrificing things like food and electricity to afford the required film and paper, and I only have one more assignment before I can quit forever. That means I’ll never have to take another picture, or lose another roll of film, or worry about aperture versus shutter speed, or stain a perfectly good shirt with development chemicals.
Only one more assignment, and then I graduate. I’ll be able to eat again.
Of course, Doctor Williams saves the hardest assignment for last. I’ve been hoping (praying) that it would be posed people, because I can buy costumes for cheap at Goodwill and ask (demand) my friends act as models. A controlled environment is considered paradise in the photo world.
But no, we don’t get to shoot models in my living room. We get to shoot candid people, and it’s bad enough that you get about three worthwhile shots per roll, but Doctor Williams actually sits down with us and says, “Now, candid photography has more legal issues these days. When you go out to get your pictures, make sure you have your college ID with you, and if an officer or security guard asks you to leave the premises…”
I lose him at “legal issues”. I’m risking arrest for the sake of my GPA. In times of terrorism, who wants their picture taken by a weird girl on the park bench? What parent wants a stranger taking photos of their children on the swings?
The man is insane, but if I ace this class, I’ll have a 4.0 by graduation.
That’s worth any arrest.
Candid photography isn’t easy. It’s one thing to take random pictures of random people, but it’s another to get anything meaningful out of them. Plus, having the camera on the perfect setting while trying to remain inconspicuous is a battle by itself.
So far, I’ve taken fifty-one pictures, barely half worth printing. I’ve visited three art festivals, a dance studio, and a construction area, where I sat in my car and snapped photos of men in hardhats. It’s not intellectually stimulating, but it gets the grade. (The crew chief asked me to leave ten minutes later.)
When dusk begins to fall, I find a place in the park. I want to finish up the roll, so I shoot a couple of skateboarders and an elderly couple walking down the sidewalk. Just as I’m about to leave (planning a late-night in the development lab and a dinner of Snickers bars and Diet Cokes from the vending machine), I hear a conversation by two men sitting on the grass and leaning against a tree, shoulders brushing. One mentions an ocean, and the other talks of a city, and I figure maybe it’s about Florida and the Keys, or some magical place in Europe. I guess the conversation isn’t important, or not nearly as important as the picture they make.
Especially when one of them (dark, wild hair) leans over to give the other man a kiss.
Shocked, I take the shot.
And I think, really, every stressful assignment and skipped meal and ruined shirt-all the angst and frustration-is worth this one honest image.
Later, during the critique, my classmates are unimpressed, and one of them says they have no desire whatsoever to see two guys "doing that", but afterwards, Doctor Williams hands me my final grade for the semester.
It's an A.
…
I sometimes think of those two men, so fond of one another.
And I hope they reached their city, wherever it is, and they’re happy.
FIN.