See Real Ten Eyck: Really See Ten Eyck

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I met Carla Ten Eyck this summer at my first and sadly to date, only PUG Meeting. We became fast friends, breaking balls, trading movie quotes, pop culture references and the like. She expressed an interest in doing a video about her for her wedding photography business. With my workload at the time, I wouldn't have been able to pull it off. She also had mentioned a project that immediately intrigued me. She had posed the question "How do you feel most beautiful?" to numerous women and then photographed them according to their response. The result is a beautiful book filled with powerful images and wonderful words and stories to accompany them. The idea of "beauty" is interesting to me and I was even more interested in someone as cool, and well, interesting as Carla had vaulted such a cool project. Personally I thought it was a perfect idea to be captured in a documentary style. Also, this was a much more managable project than a video based on her business- one day of shooting and then the editing- so Carla bravely agreed to hire me.

2 months ago I had the pleasure of interviewing, Carla and three of her subjects- Jean, Marsha, and Susannah. Then we attended and shot the official opening of the project at the Hartford Public Library, where her pictures are still hanging and will be until December 15th. I highly recommend getting up there and checking them out.
We had a great time shooting, at least I did, and then we capped the night off with some beers and food and a big group of great people who all turned out to support Carla and her fantastic project. Now Carla is not done yet- she wants to take this idea and project international- photographing women all over the world! If you've met her you have no question in your mind that she will accomplish this and then some! Here's to the person who's smart enough to fund it for her!

I want to thank Jean, Marsha and Susannah for their time and wonderfully candid remarks. You all are very natural and relaxed on camera and made job so much easier.

Big up yourself Bob 2.0! Can't thank Bob enough, once again for his hard work on and off the set, as well as being a good, super supportive friend and fellow collaborator. Bob is a utility guy in every sense of the word. He ran sound, operated second camera on the interviews and shot b-roll with me at the opening and he also does all the graphics and photos. Thanks Bob, I couldn't have done it without you!

I want to thank Carla for her kindness and patience with my busy schedule- allowing me to finish at my own pace and trusting my vision. She was trusting (or psychotic) enough to believe in our work and see what we came up with. Mostly I want to thank her for her beautiful project and I hope it inspires you as much as it inspired me.