Lady In Red: Interview With Vitaliy

My life has been trans­formed ever since I met, fell in love with, and mar­ried Vitaliy Prokopets. I used to be a nice Mid­west girl from Mis­souri until this crazy Ukrain­ian taught me that rules were meant to be bro­ken. Our lives col­lided and he was deter­mined to expose me to the finer things in life such as Korean kim­chi and the delec­table Thai curry. My Mid­west tastes buds have never been the same! All jok­ing aside, one of the things I admire most about Vitaliy is the way he demon­strates that life is not all about accom­plish­ments, but more about enjoy­ing the process.

I got to think­ing about him and then about our blog and I real­ized that you guys are really miss­ing out. To only let you hear from me and not from Vitaliy would be doing you guys a dis­ser­vice. I mar­ried Vitaliy for a rea­son — he is an incred­i­ble man. There is not another per­son on the face of this earth that I admire more than him. He’s got so much to share and I don’t want you guys to miss out on know­ing the other half of Prokopets Studio.

I am the voice of Prokopets Stu­dio, but Vitaliy is the eyes of Prokopets Stu­dio. I got to think­ing that I don’t want to be the only one who gets to learn from him. Since a large por­tion of this blog is about our pho­tog­ra­phy, I thought it’d be best to start there. Every­thing I’ve learned about pho­tog­ra­phy, I’ve learned from Vitaliy. I thought maybe some of you might be inter­ested in learn­ing some too. Vitaliy doesn’t claim to be a genius or a mas­ter of pho­tog­ra­phy, he just loves shar­ing about things he has learned.

I thought an inter­view would be fun. I asked Vitaliy to pick one image that he was proud of. I was so eager to see what he would choose. As a wife, I’m always seek­ing to know him more. Know­ing how pas­sion­ate he is about pho­tog­ra­phy, I knew this would be a glimpse into his heart. Here is what he chose. The inter­view is below.

.

I asked you to choose a pic­ture that you were proud of, did this image imme­di­ately stand out in your mind?

No, I had to think about it because I am a ter­ri­ble critic of my own work. That’s why I like that you pick the pic­tures for the blog. It takes the pres­sure off of me to pick “the best”. I would also say that I had to go through a num­ber of images before I remem­bered this one.

Why did you choose this image as being one you are proud of?

I actu­ally cap­tured this image while pho­tograph­ing with Teresa Hal­ton. This was a very unique wed­ding; the dress that the bride wore was not the kind of dress I typ­i­cally see. The first thing that grips me about this image is the com­po­si­tion. I like how the bride stands in between the two top­i­aries almost resem­bling an art piece in itself. The detail in the dress com­pli­ments the detail of the top­i­aries. I also love the way the red and green col­ors com­pli­ment each other. The bride really stands out because there is noth­ing in the back­ground to draw away your atten­tion. I took a few images hor­i­zon­tally, but it doesn’t have nearly as much impact as the ver­ti­cal shot you see above.

To be quite hon­est, not every per­son would see all of the things you just pointed out. I know I didn’t. Are there exer­cises you do to train your eye to see all of these kinds of ele­ments when you are tak­ing pictures?

Like with any other craft, the only way you mas­ter it is by study­ing and putting into prac­tice what you have learned. Let me just clar­ify that I have in no way mas­tered the craft of pho­tograph­ing. I have a long way to go and I am learn­ing some­thing new every day. I learn about pho­tog­ra­phy through read­ing books, mag­a­zines, photo exhibits, and fel­low pho­tog­ra­phers. When I was in col­lege, I used to go to Bor­ders and look through the best work of my favorite pho­tog­ra­phers. I would study the images and learn how to inter­pret and see things in them. Remem­ber, when I took you on our first date, I intro­duced you to one of my favorite pho­tog­ra­phers Eugene Smith? This is still one of the main avenues I use to bet­ter my pho­tog­ra­phy. One of the books that I’ve read, The Photographer’s Eye, has been most help­ful and insight­ful to me. I’d highly rec­om­mend it to any­one who is eager to learn about the var­i­ous ele­ments that make up a good photograph.

Did you pose the bride in a cer­tain way to enhance your image?

Besides posi­tion­ing her between the two top­i­aries, I asked her to tilt the umbrella to the right and put her left hand on her hip while turn­ing her head to the left. The rea­son I told her to turn her head is because I wanted to see her face. I didn’t just want it to be a mys­te­ri­ous won­der about who is the lady in the red dress. I wanted her face to be seen so she could own this moment and own that dress. To me, the way arms are posi­tioned in a pho­to­graph plays a huge role in the mood of an image. I wanted her to make a state­ment — to resem­ble a statue that exudes power, strength and beauty.

You men­tion that you are a ter­ri­ble critic of your own work, how do you deal with these insecurities?

Every day I look at images that are not my own and I feel like I am a hack. I ask myself, “Are my images good enough? How are they dif­fer­ent from bil­lions of other images out there? How can I com­pete with incred­i­bly tal­ented and vision­ary pho­tog­ra­phers that are out there?” I have to keep com­ing back to the truth that there is only one of me in this world. Only I have the eyes of Vitaliy Prokopets. Nobody can decide for me what story I’m going to tell with my images. And com­par­ing myself to oth­ers only pre­vents me from work­ing harder, always learn­ing, and tak­ing more pic­tures. I have learned to be con­tent with where I’m at. The pho­tog­ra­phers that I admire, they were all once where I’m at today. If I look back at my pho­tog­ra­phy from a year ago, I can already see growth. And that is what is impor­tant to me — to see myself evolv­ing. I am excited to see where we are at from a year ago and I am thank­ful that there are peo­ple who enjoy our work.