- Are you ready to model? (laughs)
- Yeah, I was born ready for that.
Put the camera on me, babe.
(Nazarin laughs)
- The kid likes the lens.
- We're gonna jump right into it.
Hi, I'm Nazarin Denan,
and this is a peek in my life as a celebrity photographer.
This is VIPeek
(upbeat music)
(camera snaps repeatedly)
Little lean back.
Amazing.
That's like the angle that I needed.
- Yeah, yeah, yeah,
- Yeah.
Today I'm shooting with G-Eazy who is an amazing rapper.
I'm sure you know who he is.
(upbeat music continues)
And also a friend of mine.
How are you?
(light upbeat music)
Right now we're dropping off film at Gold one-hour Photo,
aka my favorite place to get film developed.
(synthesized music plays)
I'm here every week, usually Monday mornings
because I shoot a lot of film over the weekend.
On a Monday morning, the line here,
I'm not even kidding,
it's like around the block.
It's like going to the club
except it's 10:00 AM and it's just photographers.
I never shoot work on film.
I feel like that's what separates it
and keeps it like fun for me.
I just take photos of my friends when we go out.
I started this series called Friends on Film
as soon as Instagram introduced the carousel option
like years ago, to post multiple photos,
I would just post 10 film photos at once.
Currently I'm using my dad's old Kodak film camera
from like the late eighties, early nineties.
This retail's for like $8
on eBay and I get so many compliments.
It reminded me of these film albums
that my parents had of me and my sister like growing up.
And so for me this is like okay
the digitized version of that.
Some of them are like really crazy.
They'll be like, "How were you
at a barbecue with Michael B. Jordan?"
That one people did lose their minds.
This was like a pool party that I had
with some of my friends a couple weeks ago.
There's G-Eazy at an event.
So today is not that busy of a day for me.
I do have a shoot later though.
I'm gonna shoot with G-Eazy.
He's someone I have known like basically
my entire photo career.
And other than that I think I'm just hanging out with MTV.
All right, so this is where we're shooting today.
We're not doing a lot of lights and equipment.
Really simple, easy camera setup
and this is what I like bring
with me on just an everyday photo shoot.
I shoot with a Cannon 5D Mark 4
and my two like go-to lenses
especially for natural light stuff and something
like what we're shooting today, Cannon 24 to 70 and
I have a Moment CineBloom Filter that I'm gonna put on this.
And then my other favorite lens is the Sigma Art 35.
If you're a portrait photographer
and you don't have this lens, I don't know what to tell you.
I am convinced that it's not your gear
it's your eye and it's what you're doing with your gear.
So I've taken some of the most amazing photos
on like the stupidest little setups.
Everyone's like, "Oh my God, what camera are you using?"
I was like, "Girl,
the same one I use for literally everything."
(soft music plays)
Okay, yeah.
I'm gonna have you back up a little bit
and kind of tilt your face towards the window
towards the light.
Perfect. Right there.
I would describe my photography style.
I always say it's like "You were there, but better."
I don't do a lot of extra lighting
and post production and like all sorts of stuff.
I really do color correcting and I play with presets
and color and stuff, but in a very lifelike way.
I just like to keep the moments
as I saw them but a little more vivid and like interesting.
Some very like..
- Oh wow like, these are fire.
- Classic like studio vibes, you know?
- Yeah. These are fire!
- Oh this is cool.
I'm from Corvallis, Oregon.
I didn't love it when I was growing up
but now I'm very thankful that I'm from there
and got to like run around in the woods and all that.
I was always really creative growing up.
I loved drawing, I loved painting
and that was kind of like my thing
before I decided I really wanted to do photography.
I also used to love bugs when I was a kid.
My parents really wanted me to be an entomologist.
They still push it all the time.
Yeah, and look at me.
You're gonna like these.
- (exclaims)
- Like, that's so good!
- Yeah. That's so fire!
- That's fire.
I was lucky enough to go
to a high school that had a dark room and I feel
like that's where I really got into taking film photos
developing my own negatives and prints.
Maybe do the green sweater next?
- All right.
Shoulda brought my camera.
- I know you should have.
- We could reverse roles and then
I could do a photo shoot of you.
- Okay, so we're playing with this light.
Yeah, it's a slay, it's a serve.
Love.
We had first connected over Twitter.
He had posted that he wanted to shoot with photographers
or something and someone who had followed me
on Tumblr had been like, "Oh my God
like I would love to see you shoot with G-Eazy."
And we were just talking in, I think like Twitter comments.
Then a couple weeks later I was in LA
and I was shooting a party somewhere and I saw him
and he was like, "Oh my God, you're the girl from Twitter."
And I was like, "That is me. Hey."
The first ever photo I took of him, it was like him
like looking at me across the room and then from there
every time he was in Portland I would just shoot with him.
We would like go out, get food, go vintage shopping.
It was super fun.
That's the other thing I like about shooting
with you is I don't have to tell you what to do really.
You just have fun with it.
Do that again where you're kind of like this.
(camera snaps)
Look at him carrying his own gear.
- I've been in front of lenses
in front of cameras since I was a baby.
My mom was a photographer and to me, you know, it's
I mean it's just, it comes down to the eye.
Yeah, that angle?
- Yeah.
(soulful music)
- You know how to capture somebody
from what angle and what expression and what emotion
that you're really like finding
and how finding the light
and what you're trying to tell
about that person through a photograph.
I've been working with Desmond
for about 10 years and you know
from the jump it was her drive and her dedication.
You know, reaching out and just
and just being brave especially as a female photographer
and you know, wanting to shoot in music and get
in these concerts and get in these spaces and get
around these artists and
her bravery and her boldness and then her eye
but also her her kind of like sense of color.
That's what always stood out to me.
The way she would compose a photo and you know
the other things that she would find within it
to balance the color out and I mean
one of the greatest things
about I think creativity and getting to work
in the arts professionally and making a career out
of it is like you get to do what you love.
And then when you get to collaborate
like for me collaborating with a photographer
it's like two people that both love what they do
and have fun at it and it's just a genuine vibe.
You know what's better in life than to love what you do?
And get to do with people that you care about?
- Oh my God!
- [Nazarin] That was hot! (laughs)
That was so nice! (laughs)
He was one of the first artists to really give me
behind the scenes like backstage access and
that was something that I really appreciated and cherished.
I love music photography, I love touring.
Just being able to travel, wake up somewhere new every day
and have like a subject that I'm excited to shoot every day.
That's like what's fun for me.
I think growing up in like a smaller town
we literally had one concert every year and it was
at Oregon State University and it was like free
and it was like the one thing of the year.
So when I was in college I was
like living in the middle of Portland in the city
I would just hit up literally anyone and everyone
that I could and every time artists would come
through town I was kind of the only photographer
like doing that in my area and that gave me like a leg up.
I think that's another thing that people are always like,
"Oh you have to like live in LA or New York to like make it
and like music photography."
No you don't.
Wait, do kind of one more like this.
So body facing the window but face over your shoulder
towards me.
Yeah, just like that.
Oh, imposter syndrome is huge.
Being a black woman in like a primarily white male
dominated space?
Every single day I'm like, "Oh my God,
like I didn't get that job but this mediocre white man did."
And it's a lot of self doubt and I feel like it's inevitable
kind of in any artistic industry that you're in,
there's always gonna be someone doing it better
or there's always gonna be someone getting those jobs
that you were really excited about.
But you know, I like to work with people who are
excited to work with me and appreciate me and like put me
in those spaces where I feel like valued.
I've kind of learned to seek out those places and I'm like
if I'm feeling any type of way about it, I think it's not
for me.
Oh my good money.
We love it.
Okay. We're doing a Polaroid, we're doing a Polaroid.
Leading up against the wall.
- I'm feeling moody.
- Feel like, shooting with G is so easy.
And again, him being someone I've known for 10 years
I know how he likes to look in photos.
I know his angles, he knows his angles
he knows how I shoot.
I feel like it's a great like symbiotic relationship.
Wait, these are cute.
- No smiles.
- Oh, I love the smile. (giggles)
Amazing.
(upbeat tune plays)
I think it's so valuable to shoot
as many things as you can.
Take every opportunity that you possibly can kind of
like find your niche and find like what you're actually good
at shooting what you actually like to do.
Don't box yourself in too fast. (laughs)
That's the one! (laughs)