The Idea of a Perfect Imperfection

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what's going on youtube it's matt here
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again
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and today i'm going to be going over
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something a little bit different
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rather than going over um my photos
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and going through like a photo walk or
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something like that or showing you how
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to
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i'm just going to sit here and talk to
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you about um
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kind of my creative process and my
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artistic theory if you will and just
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kind of go over
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how i create um the artwork that i
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create
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uh for me i know when
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artists are going after whatever they're
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trying to create
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a lot of the time they're striving to be
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perfect and they're striving for
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um really something that they can't
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create
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with this um perfect quality and
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for me when i started photographing um
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it was probably around 2015 2016 when i
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was finishing up high school
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and i was just using a nikon d3300 like
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a simple
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digital dslr camera and i was using my
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iphone to take a lot of
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photos for like instagram stuff like
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that and
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what i realized was that um
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i didn't necessarily like the way that
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these photos were coming out because
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that they were
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they were not necessarily perfect but in
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terms of
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uh quality of the image there were too
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many
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like perfect qualities so what i mean by
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that was it it was
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i felt that digital photos were usually
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too flat
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um back then i didn't know how to edit
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photos as much so i used to just like
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assume that digital photos were like
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always going to look a certain way and
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that you couldn't really manipulate it
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and create it how you wanted to
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and so fast forward about
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a year or two now it's like 2017
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i just finished high school and i picked
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up my first
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point and shoot film camera this was
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after
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i had
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had learned about this kid in worcester
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a town near me
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named curtis karayuki he's actually the
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owner of this brand tonight approval
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go check them out i'll link them in the
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description but
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he started shooting with some local
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rappers around worcester
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and eventually got picked up by
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joyner lucas to help him you know shoot
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some videos and stuff like that
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and then he ended up going on tour with
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uh ray strummer and
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ray swemmer and um lil yachty i think
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too afterwards so
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uh one of the things that he inspired me
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with the most was
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the fact that he always had a
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point-and-shoot camera i saw one of his
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stories on instagram one day
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he was in california or something like
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that with lily audi and
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he went to you know one of the local
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like film labs with like
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30 different point-and-shoots and just
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drop them off to get them developed and
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stuff
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and to me that was just crazy because
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i was so used to like this idea of if
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you want to be a good photographer
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you have to have like you know a super
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good dslr camera with you
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you need to have like a professional
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attitude you need to be serious you need
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to go
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get these clients do all this work this
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side or the other
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and for me seeing this kid who is like
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only a few years older than me
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go on tour and photograph these like
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famous people
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with just like a point-and-shoot camera
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i'm sure he had you know
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a video camera or something with him as
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well but to see all these photos that he
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was making with just a point-and-shoot
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that he could literally fit in his
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pocket
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just it made my photos it made me and
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yeah it made me feel like
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i'm not doing enough i'm not
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working hard enough you know
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if he's doing all this with a little
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camera like why am i
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struggling so much so i ended up
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going out getting a disposable camera
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just like the one he had you know the
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ones you could pick up from cvs or
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anything like that
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and i just shot it just to see what
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would happen
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and i ended up getting it developed at
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like the cvs or whatever that i bought
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it at and i love the photos
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i'll put some up on the screen now it
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was my first kind of experience with
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film
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and for me it was like
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i it it wasn't my first time seeing
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these like imperfect qualities in a
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photo
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but it was the first time seeing those
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imperfect qualities in my own work
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and i had realized how you know you can
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create different photos not only is it
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in post-production
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it's also during production so changing
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up what what gear you're using what
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lenses
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what flashes you know microphones
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anything that can be
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involved with your production of the the
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actual final product
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and so once i got them developed i
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realized oh
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i need to start you know taking
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more photos like this i like this a lot
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it has more of this imperfect quality
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there's you know a texture to it
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there's a feel to it it doesn't just
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feel like something that you know
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you stumbled across took a photo of and
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then put it out there
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um there's more work to it there's more
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effort and even this was before i was
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developing my own film
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and i still you know had more pride in
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those photos than any of my other photos
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so
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um fast forward a little bit more and i
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learned how to develop film on my own
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because i had bought my own point and
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shoot and
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i i i wanted to keep shooting it but i
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couldn't afford
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you know to spend the money on the lab
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every week or
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every day like i wanted to so i ended up
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going on youtube
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um i would just watch hours of videos of
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like how to develop
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film just to figure out how to do it uh
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for the first like week or two maybe
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even month of watching those videos
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i never even bought any of the equipment
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or anything like that
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personally i just really didn't think
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that i had like the skill set to
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actually develop the film
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and so that kind of just deterred me i
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would watch videos over and over and be
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like
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damn this is so cool like i wish i could
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do that i bet you it's so hard i bet it
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cost so much money all this out of the
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other
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so i ended up watching the this one
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video i think it was a video for black
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and white developing by ted forbes
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he runs a channel called the art of
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photography i'll link that below as well
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make sure you check him out he's really
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really smart and talented knows a lot of
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about photography and videography
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so
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make sure you check him out if you're
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interested he's taught me
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a lot a lot and i've never even met him
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so definitely check his channel out
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um so yeah i watched this video about
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him developing black and white
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film at home i think it was like in his
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bathroom sink or something and
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he listed out all the equipment you
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needed all you know
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the timing that it would take everything
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that was going
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going on with the developing and i
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hadn't really seen it before
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like in that depth and with that much
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instruction
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and so once i saw that i was like okay i
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could definitely do this i'm gonna
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i'm gonna save up the money and you know
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purchase all the equipment
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do all this stuff and try and try and
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figure it out
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eventually it came in um this was when i
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was still living in my parents house so
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i went i went down into the storage
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room in their basement and they had like
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one of those big
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like laundry sinks and i i think the
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water i remember the water didn't even
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get hot enough
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for the chemicals um to get the right
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temperature
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but at that point after spending all the
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money and all that time like waiting for
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the stuff to come in i was just like all
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right we need to uh
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we need to we need to just make this
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happen so i just tried it out i think i
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was like 5 or 10 degrees off
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from what the actual temperature was
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supposed to be but i was like
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what's it what at that time i was like
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what what
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what difference would it make if you're
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5 or 10 degrees off it's still the
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chemicals
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so i just went for it it was like a
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basic c41
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kit that i picked up off picked up off
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of
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amazon i ended up doing the steps it
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worked out
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and i scanned the photos and this was
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like the first time i was using that
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scanner that i had bought it's like the
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epson v550
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and it was it took me so long and i was
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like
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i got so discouraged because i thought
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like okay
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is it always gonna take this long to
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scan my photos i assume that developing
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was the long part
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and scanning was like just you know put
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them through the scanner and they're on
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your computer
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that wasn't the case at all i did find
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out later on that my settings were wrong
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with the scanner
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and that's what ended up taking it so
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long to scan when i first started out
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so now it doesn't take me as long but
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scanning definitely is a big part of the
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process and that
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kind of lengthy process at the beginning
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really taught me a lot which is
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which is good but
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moving forward after after i started
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shooting film i started
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realizing this these imperfect qualities
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in my photos and
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i started to realize like this is what
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i'm this is what i'm looking for i'm not
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looking for
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a flat image even when i'm shooting film
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i know there's some photographers out
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there that
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shoot film with the purpose of making it
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like almost digital like where it's
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super contrasty super you know crisp and
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sharp
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really good lighting everything like
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that all the components that make up a
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good you know digital image
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but for me it wasn't about that it was
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more so about
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how am i gonna make these photos that
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are kind of
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perfect because they're imperfect you
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know so
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those messed up double exposures or you
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know a photo where you develop it wrong
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and it's got a huge
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film flare burned through the middle
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things like that you know those those
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happy mistakes
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that was why i wanted to start shooting
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more film and
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it's probably 2018 now and
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i've got a pretty good process going
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with my photos
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my developing and everything like that
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but i kind of wanted a little bit more
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that's when i started making my own
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artwork as well like outside of
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photography
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started painting a little bit drawing
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doing screen printing things like that
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i'll go ahead and put some of my work up
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here my first my like early works were
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screen printing um i really just wanted
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to
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get some of my photos or get some of my
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drawings or you know whatever it was
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get them on to fabric and materials
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just not not to sell or anything like
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that i just really wanted
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wanted it for myself i wanted to see if
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if i could do it
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the same way i had learned about how to
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develop film
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i wanted to go out look on youtube how
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to screen print you know
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what are the materials i need what are
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the skills that i need
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and you know what do i actually
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need to have you know for my location or
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my setup like the studio setup wise
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to make sure that i could get this going
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so i went on
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on youtube again like i said and figured
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out how to do it it wasn't
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it was the same as uh developing film it
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wasn't that hard
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wasn't too terribly expensive it was
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probably a little bit more expensive
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than developing film
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but like i said you you're doing it you
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know a different process and i just
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wanted to learn it
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so i ended up going on trying to figure
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that out and
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it actually worked out pretty well i was
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able to screen print some of my photos
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on the t-shirts and stuff
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and put those up here now as well i was
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able to
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even kind of make some art like screen
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printed artwork on
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paper and canvas that i could later on
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you know
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keep and put into my portfolio and stuff
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like that so it was all kind of just a
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learning experience and how to create
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like my own version of these things
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obviously i could go to a store
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and have them screen print you know um
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20 to 25 you know 20 whatever x amount
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of t-shirts that i want
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with a certain logo but having myself
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do it and you know actually manually
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wiping the screen every time you're
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making a shirt you get those
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imperfections and that's
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the same way with my photos that's the
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same thing that i was striving for
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in screen printing i would you know wipe
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the
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wipe the ink a certain way or pull the
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screen off a certain way to try and
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create different
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different looks so that not one is the
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same as the other
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for me that was always a huge
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i guess like selling point like if i
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were to sell these one day or
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if i were to get these out there one day
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you know
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um the fact that they're not the same
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is the how do i say this is the
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is the quality of it that's the value of
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it you know every each one
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is its own everyone that you know would
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purchase it
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would get their own so for me
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that was always more intriguing as like
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looking at it from a consumer's
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perspective it was always more
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intriguing to see
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the differences in in all of the same
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body of work or the same set
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than having like all of them be the same
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with the same little signature and
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you know number and title and like
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they're all the same like you could get
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the same one as somebody else goes out
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and buy so
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that was you know that's cool and i
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respect artists that do that but
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for me um when creating my own style
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that's kind of what i was looking for
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and so let me i'm gonna pull our book
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this is one of the
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the books that i had started reading
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around like 2016 and 17.
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um it's by an artist called cytumly it's
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kind of
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uh i don't know if it's a specific book
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of his work i think it's kind of just
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you know an
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all-around like portfolio review and
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thing like that with tons of different
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speeches about his artwork and
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discourses and
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um things like that so definitely go
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check this book out because it's really
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insightful cytome is just an incredible
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artist
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and when i first started um
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looking through his work it really made
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me you know
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realize like the the perfection
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of imperfection um i'll show you this
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work right now
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you know super it might be a little dark
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i'll try and brighten it but
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it's uh a lot of cytome's work is
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is i don't even know how to describe it
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it's very
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people like to to say his work is very
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like child like
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like as if you know some kid just
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grabbed
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a crayon one up to the wall and started
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scribbling or something
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but actually when you look at his work
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you realize there's a lot more to it
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there's a lot more
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meaning behind it and thought behind it
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and
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for me um after seeing this book i would
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go and
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you know not try and recreate his work
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but i would be inspired by it and try
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and make work like it
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um i would go into the studio and just
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try and draw just sit at paper
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look at it just try and scribble and see
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what i can create
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and after doing that for a little while
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i realized how
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he created this process that evolved
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over time and it
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it allowed him to make something you
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know that's as good as he is able to
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make
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um and when i saw these works that were
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like
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in museums and people were calling them
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like childlike and
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you know it's too easy it shouldn't be
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in a museum
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why you know what is this just blob of
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scribbles doing
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on like a 10 foot wide canvas just you
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know in a really nice gallery like
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to me that just was like you can't do
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that and
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when i when i read more about this book
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and more about scituate i realized
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like all of this stuff is kind of coming
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full circle i'm realizing like
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the imperfections that i'm creating are
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what i'm striving for so when i go
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into the studio i'm not looking to
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create like a flat
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you know super perfect image i'm looking
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to create something with grit
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something with texture something with
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you know a feel to it even when you put
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it on a computer
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you can still see the depth of it see
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the density and like
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what it actually is whereas
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before when i had started it was all
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like
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i started to realize these things but i
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never was able to like piece them
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together
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um but now you know um
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um this was when i was about probably 19
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i started realizing that i was like
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looking for these
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imperfections because i was always just
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like trying different things with film
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and with screen printing and that's when
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i realized like
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there's this idea that i had about a
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perfect imperfection and like
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imperfections are to me what make
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something
16:42
high quality or professional or really
16:44
good um
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well i i take that with like a grain of
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salt like imperfections aren't what
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makes something professional but if it's
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if it's the right imperfection then i
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believe that it makes
16:55
you know something with
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more it makes it more valuable that's
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that's what i think so
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once i started realizing like that
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i was going for these imperfect
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qualities and that it's
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this idea of like a perfect imperfection
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is what i was striving for
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when i started experimenting a bunch
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because
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um i just wanted to see what i could
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create see what you know
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what could come out of it and i really i
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was doing nothing at the time
17:24
other than working with filter grade in
17:26
school so i was like why not what else
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do i have to lose
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um so i would you know i started a bunch
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of film
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uh trying to like experiment with colors
17:35
and things like that
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i've started um playing around with
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expired film
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you know anything that'll that'll be
17:43
able to make
17:43
my work more like
17:46
imperfect with these you know unique
17:50
traits to them things that other people
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can't create and
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you can always tell when it's you know
17:54
created in in post-production or
17:56
something else so
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for me it's always really um
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it's really important to have like a
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good foundation with the production
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aspect of it
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i don't i think like for me i believe
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that if you're like half-assing the
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production value
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you're gonna half-ass the
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post-production and like the the final
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output of it as well
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i i kind of think that you need to like
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be full circle with everything like if
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i'm gonna spend the time to
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take film photos and like
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deliberately make them to be a certain
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way i'm going to spend the time as well
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on the post-production side you know
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with the developing and scanning and
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just processing in general
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so that they come out exactly how i want
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them to come out i'm
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rather than you know letting somebody
18:43
else handle it and things like that so
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and that's not a bash to anybody that
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you know gets their film developed at a
18:50
lab because that is
18:51
a perfectly good way of developing it
18:53
for me it's more so about
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the scanning and you know the
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the process after i scan making it my
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own image
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so that i'm not doing what you know
19:04
production is more heavy than
19:06
post-corruption or post-russians more
19:07
heavy than production
19:08
if i'm going to spend the time shooting
19:11
film and making it look the way i want
19:12
to then i'm going to spend the time you
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know on the
19:15
post-production side as well so
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um that kind of brings a full circle for
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me right now
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uh i'm at this place in my
19:26
photography and like artistic career
19:28
where i've realized now
19:30
that i'm looking for these imperfect
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qualities and for me
19:33
that's what makes my work perfect that's
19:36
my whole idea about
19:38
um the perfect imperfection
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like people can scratch can strive to be
19:44
perfect and
19:46
you're never gonna be perfect perfect
19:49
and for me i can strive to be
19:52
perfect in with these imperfections and
19:55
at that same rate i could
19:57
it's never possible as well perfection
19:59
is never possible but
20:01
that that like drive for the and
20:04
the drive and the journey um along the
20:07
way
20:07
for the imperfect like perfect
20:10
whether it's in my artwork my paintings
20:12
my screen printing or
20:14
my photography no matter what it is i'm
20:15
always going to be looking for that
20:18
that that imperfection that sets my work
20:20
apart
20:21
and that's one of the main the main
20:24
things that i try and
20:25
you know put out with my work and try
20:27
and convey
20:28
and i you know i've been i've been
20:31
trying
20:32
new things for quite a while now and
20:35
if there's any you know questions you
20:37
have that i could help out with
20:39
just feel free to reach out in the
20:41
comments or reach out to me on instagram
20:44
at matt underscore maloney m-o-l-o-n-ey
20:49
but yeah that's that's pretty much my my
20:51
thoughts on
20:52
this whole idea of the perfect
20:54
imperfection i kind of want to just get
20:56
it out there put it on video
20:58
because i've had these thoughts in my
20:59
mind for a while now and
21:01
i realize i don't you know put my
21:03
thoughts on youtube enough
21:05
enough it's more so like i'll go and do
21:07
a how-to video
21:08
or or me shooting around town or
21:11
something like that and
21:12
i want to kind of make it so that i have
21:14
more of a dialogue and more of a
21:16
connection
21:17
with you and everybody else watching
21:20
so if you have any questions or any um
21:24
any comments or ideas about this idea of
21:26
a perfect imperfection
21:28
let me know what you think let me know
21:29
how you shoot and how you create your
21:32
your artwork but other than that thanks
21:34
so much thanks so much for watching
21:35
peace out
21:57
you

The Idea of a Perfect Imperfection

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The Idea of a Perfect Imperfection

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