mellylee-movies

It’s no secret that I’m addicted to documentaries –Especially those that are related to the creative field. Films provide different perspectives, knowledge, are visually appealing, and can-be-a-great-way-to-productivity-procastinate. For me and my ADHD mind, I usually have one monitor set up for retouching while the other plays some film or tv show. I chose to have a documentary program running in the background because it’s simply impossible to work on files while having anything else running. Anything that slightly deviates from being an “nonfictional motion pictures intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record. Wikipedia” will suck away all my attention and my mountain of files will never be completed. Documentaries function beautifully to give me the white noise I need to stay focused, feed me outside information, require little visual attention, and can be seen repeatedly. Here are a few of my favorite films I’ve watched while editing (most of which you can find on Netflix, YouTube, or Hulu.)

Photography

Perhaps one of the best ways to learn is via osmosis! Particularly osmosis from a master –or the next best thing a long dead master!

* Note: Not everyone listed below is dead, but a good number of them are.

Helmet Newton – Frames from the Edge

Bill Cunningham New York

Richard Avedon: Darkness and Light

Henri Cartier-Bresson: Pen, Brush and Camera

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-GnAFO3ZDM

Imagine | The Colorful Mr. Eggleston

Ansel Adams: A Documentary Film

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wWxmv4iT3TI

Portrait of a Photographer: David LaChapelle

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9POG6wBtyds

Black White + Gray: A Portrait of Sam Wagstaff and Robert Mapplethorpe

Gregory Crewdson: Brief Encounters

War Photographer

Annie Leibovitz: Life Through A Lens

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=56aUNncGeT8

Gursky World

Going Where I’ve Never Been The Photography of Diane Arbus

Robert Capa In Love and War

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkDpxuKXFpQ

DUFFY: The Man Who Shot the Sixties

Rock ‘N’ Roll Exposed: The Photography of Bob Gruen

Underdogs on the rise!

“Making it” is harddddddddddddddd. Good thing the journey there isn’t a lonely one. I find both company and encouragement through other individuals pushing themselves to be better at their craft. Most of the individuals featured in these films have happy endings, so I can hope that I’ll have one too?

Fame High

Bones Brigade: An Autobiography

First Position

Indie Game: The Movie

Other Art Films

The fantastic thing about art, culture, and long dire journey to achieve utter zen with your craft is that you can let you hyper active mind run wild and devour as many interest you’d like. And you can take part in other interests and bring it back to your own work, which will make your work stronger in the long run. To be honest I’ve always found photographers that were solely interested in photography boring and one-dimensional. For a photograph to be considered great it needs to bring some extra to the table. Generally that means the author of the photograph needs to have a perspective and opinion. And to have either of those you need to be both educated and open-minded. Personally I’m very interested in the way visual cues communicate stories and that gravitates me towards towards films like: