Eight Years

This photo is the first time I saw an image in my head and was able to create just as I imagined it.

I saw it in a dream one night, just this clear image, blood and feathers. When I woke up, I knew I wanted to make this image. It’s not the first image I saw in a dream, but it was the first I was able to faithfully recreate.

I took it in 2011. I started taking photos in 2003. It took me eight years and about a hundred thousand photos to figure out how to translate what I saw in my head to the screen. The only way I got here was because I never stopped trying to create what I saw.

Mars Awaits Photo by J.R. Blackwell

Gimme Shelter Photo by J.R. Blackwell

Winter in the Rose Garden Photo by J.R. Blackwell

Photo by J.R. Blackwell

Court/Ship is an RPG setting about intrigue, romance and an alien invasion in the court of Louis XV Photo by J.R. Blackwell

MLA Fest

Jared Axelrod and Chris Morse, photographed in Vegas on the morning of Chris’s wedding.

Strip, Strip, Hooray Photo by J.R. Blackwell

Natalie at Laurel Hill Cemetery Photo by J.R. Blackwell

Pink Sunrise Photo by J.R. Blackwell

This is not a documentary image. Photography is often used to make people look “better” but I’ve found that there is so much more that can be done. Beauty is just the beginning.

Water and food coloring. Photographed in a metal bowl. Photo by J.R. Blackwell

Hearts Blood

Empire State

Self Portrait

Equis Photo by J.R. Blackwell

J.R. Blackwell, Self Portrait, Photographer, Fantasy

Reach Self Portrait by J.R. Blackwell

This is from a series of photos I took called “Blood and Sand” I wanted to give the feeling of an entire story behind one image, the implication of a story, as if you are looking at a movie still from a film that was never made.