Michelle Schwartz

Recently I received a Holga camera as a gift. I had grown so accustomed to shooting digital photos that it was almost disorienting to return to film. The photographs of sheep were on the very first roll of film I shot with the Holga. I accidentally advanced the film too far, leading to the strange dividing lines on the photos. The second set of photos were shot from my balcony at night, using a tripod.

Photos taken on 120mm film using a Holga.

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During the summer of 2007, my friend and I took a road trip across North America. She was going to be going to the University of British Columbia in the Fall and needed to move her stuff to Canada. I volunteered to help her drive there. We left Brooklyn, drove across the States on I-80, put her stuff into storage in Vancouver, and then drove down the West Coast, ending in Oakland, California.

I shot a huge number of videos and photographs on our trip. This was my first attempt to pare that massive amount of material down into one short movie. It was shot using a Canon Powershot SD-800, edited in iMovie HD 6, and compressed for YouTube using Final Cut Studio’s Compressor.

A selection of photographs I took in the Annex, Toronto. A friend was working on a proposal for a movie about the gentrification of the neighborhood. He wanted to focus on an old church that was being converted into condominiums and asked me to accompany him on a walk around the neighborhood, taking photos to use as visual aids in his presentation. These are some of the photos I took of the condo showroom inside the church. All photos were shot with a Canon Digital Rebel XT.

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This is a movie I made of saints, angels, and various lawn ornamentation that can be found on lawns in Marine Park, Brooklyn. I love religious iconography and so I always found the Catholic lawn statues that litter the grass in yards all across New York City to be wonderful. I grew quite spoiled by New York and thus am always a bit surprised when I arrive in a city where everyone hasn’t bought their own personal Virgin Mary and built increasingly ornate shrines for her. I took these photos with my Digital Rebel and made them into a slide show with iMovie ‘08.

A selection of photographs I’ve taken in Europe. I studied abroad in Florence during a semester of my Junior year at NYU. After the semester was over, I spent an additional three weeks backpacking across Eastern Europe with a friend. It was during this time in Europe that I first became passionate about photography. My parents had gotten me a 4 megapixel point and shoot that came with a copy of Photoshop Elements, and I ended up shooting thousands of photos. Now I wish I had been in Europe with a better camera and more experience, but there are still some photos from the trip that I love to this day.

All photos shot with a Konica Digital Revio KD-400Z.

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A selection of photographs I’ve taken at Coney Island, Brooklyn. Coney Island is one of my favorite places in the world. I have so many memories from there - working at the New York Aquarium, riding the Cyclone, trying to grab a ring from the carousel playing “Shoot the Freak.” Ever since I heard the redevelopment plans for the amusement area, I’ve tried to make as many trips there to document my memories of Coney Island as well as I can.

All photos shot with a Digital Rebel XT and edited in Photoshop. “Sideshows by the Seashore” and “Eric and MIchael” were captured using a LensBaby 2.0.

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This was the very first movie I made. I had just gotten a new camera that I planned to use to document my upcoming road trip. I wanted to practice making a movie to get the idea of the kinds of shots I would need and how it would come together in iMovie. My friends were planning a trip to Coney Island as a birthday party, and I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to make a short movie.

The footage was shot with a Canon Powershot SD-800 and edited with iMovie HD 6. Unfortunately, the master was lost in a hard drive crash, so the compressed version for YouTube is less than fantastic.

Music: “Cumbia En Do Menor” by Lito Barrientos y Su Orquesta

This is a selection of photographs I’ve taken in Manhattan. I took “Union Square at Night” as part of an introductory photography class at Cooper Union. It was the first photo of mine that I ever wanted to get framed. I shot “Chumley’s Bar” in the afternoon, while the bar was deserted. A friend had a plan to take photos in old bars across New York, and I joined her on this particular expedition. The “NYPD Officer” was taken across the street from Carnegie Hall. There was a fire in one of the buildings and everyone was standing around, looking up, trying to see what was going on.

All photos shot with a Digital Rebel XT. The first two were long exposure shots, and the third was shot using a Lensbaby 2.0.

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