Hello, photography lovers!

To another episode of the fashion photography podcast with me, Virginia. 

I’m super excited for today’s episode and I find it very funny because you asked us to have a photographer in the show from Africa.
And the faith brought Justin on board. When I saw his work, I knew that I wanted him to be a guest in the show.
And I had no idea back then where he was coming from. 

But I guess it’s true that life brings you everything that he asked for. So today, we have Justin, and he’s been on many sets of his own.
And also, from the time that he was an assistant in Cape Town.
What I’m trying to see here is that there are lots of stories and experience that he’s able to share with us.
And I cannot wait wait for you to find out about his tremendous journey, and all of the lessons that you’ve learned on the go.
In this episode, he’ll share with us some tips on when to go to Cape Town. And also what’s the perfect time to shoot there,
where to go to to make friends, and how to start your career there. By maybe even following his steps.
We talk about editorial work and the connection to to the creative agencies and artists agencies, and he’s giving us details about his very personal and exciting project, the interview project.

Justin Polkey
Hi, my name is Justin Polkey . I’m a photographer from South Africa, Cape Town. now living in London.

Virginia Y
Why didn’t you stay in Cape Town?

Justin Polkey
Cape Town is a small city in summertime, it expands in terms of the photographic industry because it’s a southern hemisphere location. So that means that it’s summertime when it’s wintertime in the north and everyone migrates there to shoot the fashion. But in the wintertime it’s pretty quiet. And it turns into quite a small city and I kind of find myself migrating back and forth. Anyway, so what I’ve really done is I’ve switched my base to London, and I still keep a place in Cape Town and you know, kind of escape there to do some work and catch some sun in the winter months. Is the industry very different in Cape Town and London. Interestingly enough, I started my career in Cape Town in the 1990s in the late 1990s. When Cape Town it just opened up to the world and was a very, very popular location globally. I started as an assistant think the first job that I got put on as a driver was rich with Mario Testino. No. And then after that, it was just everybody was there shooting and almost like the world came to me if you like, and then sister there for many years and traveled from there with photographers that I’ve met from mostly Europe, but some from America and some from even the east. Through that started to develop a career met a lot of people from all over the world who were coming to Cape Town to shoot. And slowly as the industry they developed clients would start to look for photographers as well and then started to shoot internationally. It’s kind of a strange question, because the actual industry in Cape Town itself would be my news. If it wasn’t for the fact that it has so much attention in the summer months from the film and fashion industry’s Do you have any tips for people that are going to Cape Town just for the season, Cape town’s a lovely place to visit. probably the number one tip is to try and go after the high season. So I think after December, January, it remains quite busy, but It empties out a little bit. And then also this is a good tip is that the wind starts to back down after January and the weather starts to get really more and more present as the summer kind of gets into the later parts. But other than that it’s such an easy city to read. The literary arrived the one or two coffee shops, one or two bars, and you’ve made friends already and f1 it’s very easy to handle, you know, it’s kind of like all centered around a mountain and a bear.

Virginia Y
He had the opportunity to system awesome names as you already mentioned. I was wondering, did you started your story career like that assisting.

Justin Polkey
When I look back at it now I realized that I actually started my photography career, so to speak, maybe when I was 11 years old. Wow, I found a leather bag this little kind of hand stitched bag in my grandfather’s cupboard, opened it with one dimension. And inside of it was this kind of like a red velvet inlaid beautiful camera. I don’t think I even knew it was a camera when I found it. But it was you know, the camera body and the lenses all in their own little compartments and German precision made glass. And I you know, I don’t even know if I understood what it was. But I was like, This is fantastic. Whatever this is, I’m very interested in this. And I think I told my grandfather and I think maybe the next year when he upgraded his camera, and he handed that camera over to me, I think it was an old 35 mil Pentax 1000, I was so in love with the mechanics and the feel of what this was that I kind of wanted to find out more about it and then got into the photography, and started to teach myself what it meant slowly through my teens was one of those very simple analog cameras that had a little dial in the middle. And you just had to make the dial kind of sit in the middle, and then you knew that your exposure was right. And then I kind of started to teach myself the relationship between you know, the film stock and the exposure and the shutter speed and all that new, it really kind of dawned on me that that was going to be my career, I went to film school and I studied film, directing and camerawork, and editing and all that kind of stuff and started out in Cape Town as a clapper loader, actually, in the film industry, which was interesting, because it’s a very, very responsible job. And you really, you know, kind of have to understand all elements of photography, I think it gave me like almost over the top education in film, if you like, because it’s a very strict environment, the film set, and I don’t think I was enjoying it very much. It was a little bit like being in the army, it was, you know, like three o’clock call times and day and down grinding. And it was big set 60 people on set and viewer anonymous and there wasn’t much creativity. And in those days in South Africa, people were bringing their crew with them. So they would bring their gear up with them. And they would maybe even bring a focus puller. The confidence wasn’t very high in the crews in South Africa yet. These days, some of the best crews in the world come from Cape Town. And so I wasn’t enjoying it until highly at the time I was dating a girl who was a model, I showed some portfolio pictures for her kind of not stolen thinking about becoming a photographer professionally. And the phone rang and it was her agency and they were like, Listen, we really love these pictures, would you be interested in shooting, the rest of the agency will pay you for it? I was like, Well, okay, well, time for a career change. And I kind of jumped over and I started testing models, and then realized that I had a lot to learn in terms of how to run a skill sets effectively. I was still very young. So I decided, you know, this is a great opportunity to start assisting in the stalls arena. And then was very lucky I ended up assisting some really strong photographers both locally and internationally. And then got an early break in that I think I shot my first GQ cover 24 years old. Nice. Yeah, it just kind of fit like a glove. As soon as I found stalls, camera, it was an absolute fit.

Virginia Y
You are practicing a lot, but you also have lots of relationships. In the beginning and throughout your career. 

Justin Polkey
I think that everything really hinges on good relationships. Relationships are quite material. I mean, they start in the strangest places, and you’re trying to form relationships with certain people. And while you’re trying to form those relationships, other relationships come up. And absolutely, I think your entire career gets molded quite substantially by relationships. 

Virginia Y
Do you have any tips on that?

Justin Polkey
I think it’s really tough these days, you know, when I started being a photographer was like being a magician, there were so few people who could expose form correctly and do all the technical aspects that were required to produce analog film, there was a lot less imagery, and there was a lot less competition and there was a lot less noise. It was quite natural, you know, forming relationships and where these days, it’s quite tough to spring new relationships, especially digitally. Like I think that sending off emails and damning people on Instagram and all those kind of things, I think it can be helpful, but you can easily get despondent and lost in the noise. It’s not difficult to do that. In terms of that, the best thing that you can do is literal work, introduce you, if you shooting good imagery, and you don’t have great models yet, and you don’t have great stylist yet, that’s your first port of call is like you’re shooting your good imagery, and use that as an introduction to try and access all the ingredients that you need to create fashion photography. So use that to introduce yourself to model agencies and junior stylist, kind of once you kind of graduate into that, you can start sharing your imagery through various publications online. And I think that when people find you that really the nicest way to naturally introduce yourself and start to work with people, they see something in your work. And they’re interested because of that. And I feel like those meetings of mine, it’s kind of birthed out of your style, I guess,

Virginia Y
I definitely agree with you, I’ve always preferred to be introduced and recommended instead of me seeking someone else’s attention.

Justin Polkey
It’s really hard, especially when you’re moving into a new environment. I’ve just recently changed my base from Cape Town to London. And although I already have established some clients in London, and kind of trying to reintroduce myself at an editorial level, I like to shoot a lot of editorial. I think that’s joyful part of my job. I think it’s also how you promote yourself as a photographer. It is quite a task to introduce yourself. And I think if people can find you in a 10 minutes before they start working in the morning on those blogs, and magazines, and wherever that where they’re digesting a fashion and they keep bumping into you. Eventually, they’re going to connect in some way.

Virginia Y
Absolutely. As you mentioned, agencies, I thought about the artists agencies. Right now you’re not with an agency, right?

Justin Polkey
In London, I’m not with an agency. And in Cape Town, I am with an agency called infidels. The London move is quite new. And I think it’s going to take me some time to kind of get to know what relationships are best suited and shooting for quite a while now. So I’m fairly established in terms of working the kind of agency fit that I would be looking for, I would prefer to take my time to look for that then rather jump right away.

Virginia Y
That’s interesting, because he said that the editorials are very interesting part for you. But at the same time, you know that the agencies are not very interested in editorials because there is almost no budget. So maybe when you’re doing editorials, you are doing some sort of personal project connected to this. Am I right?

Justin Polkey
Yes, there’s a kind of myriad of editorial work that I do. I still am shooting some print editorial, the magazine industry has been marginalized, which I feel there’s a downside to that. But there’s also a benefit to that. I feel like there’s almost like a purging, it’s like, the strongest magazines are surviving, which is great, too. But also, it’s very important that us shoot personal work, particularly in this environment now where the world is full of imagery, people becoming very visually articulate, it’s becoming more challenging to impress, I don’t know if it’s impress or if it’s just becoming more challenging, not, you know, to stand out and to do something that’s unique, especially within fashion. I think that looking into it, and shooting a lot of personal work is an important part of the relationship between you as a photographer, and the commercial world. When I first started as a photographer, it was almost enough to be technically proficient to have a career just because it was quite scientific to take a picture. Now I think you have to be a blend of photographer, creative director, director, multi talented, creative source, in terms of bridging that into the commercial world, I think people are very interested in the artistic side of photography, what you think what your point of view is, and how that comes across. For me, I’ve have an ongoing project that I’ve started shooting and called the interview project where I interview models that I’ve either met on shoots or costings or that have stalked and find who are interesting. And I can interview them to find out who they are, what they like to do with their spare time and what their aspirations are, and what their talents or skills are. And then I try and build the fashion story, or portrait fashion documentary story around that, hopefully kind of land somewhere between the insincerity of advertising and the narcissism of social media. So it’s been so satisfying and very interesting. And it really has been remarkable how, when you start speaking to people going a bit deeper, how interesting people are. And once they are interested, how enjoyable it is to take photographs, with a little bit of research, you creating a kind of a documentary element to the fashion, and there’s something relatable there.

Virginia Y
Every story is worth spreading.

Justin Polkey
I think I was quite shocked at how consistently find something to tell a story about in terms of everybody being so unique, you know, the combinations that make up a human being that in itself is unique and uniqueness is interesting. And I really thought the casting process of this would be much more challenging. And I thought that it would be quite hard to find people that receive it interesting. And what’s starting to happen now is that I’m starting to realize that the moment you ask people kind of blossom, I had to go see just before I broke a Christmas with the interview project in mind, and first of all that said Don was she’s a cannon, she whips out a phone, and she shows me a little video of her playing the piano and she’s brilliant. And then she’s like, yes. And also by the way, I used to be a gymnast, and then she’d like moves over to video of her doing somersaults, and cross gym floor. These are things that would never have known if I had to ask, and I would have just assumed I would have gotten in line with everybody else to take a fashion picture and potentially missed some great inspiration. So yeah, it’s been a real joy to me that project.

Virginia Y
Actually, we can trying to protect on your website, right?

Justin Polkey
Yes, http://www.justinpolkey.com
And it’s under the section, the interview project.

Virginia Y
Do you want to tell us how exactly that this idea came?

Justin Polkey
I’ve always really been more focused on the portrait element of photography. Although my career has been very much a fashion career. And I’m very drawn to style. I feel like my first instinct is to take portraits of people and not to think about the fashion first, it’s more the person first and then how the fashion works on that person. So everybody has their own reason for entering the industry, the only point of interest and I think mine was literally kind of a portrait documentary point of view. I think I was yearning to go back to a more pure version of that. And I was asking myself the questions. And I mean, that’s a very important question that you asked, because it means a lot to me that particular project because it suits me suits what I’m interested in. For people out there looking to find their own personal projects. I think that that’s the kind of journey to finding out what your personal project should be is you should look into it first and try and discover what it is that you’re interested in. Would you go out with your camera and and happily look for? Given that there’s no client, no one’s paying, it’s your free time? What is it that you would be drawn to what elements of fashion Do you like, try and build something that’s interesting to you. And that’s unique to that changes for everybody?

Virginia Y
I think what’s extraordinary for me in this project is that we can actually see how it unfolds when we look at the website that you mentioned. Because I know from your first project that you also started with a video. Yes. Also, you were showing the photos in a very different format. But it’s somehow evolving at the last interview, I think it was you were also having five particular very short questions.

Justin Polkey
Yes, yeah. It is, is a very new project for me. And it’s very loose, it’s not something that I’ve kind of given a lot of structure, I’ve let it develop on and on its own. In some ways, it’s part of the way that I ensure that I enjoy photography, it’s less chore for me, it’s less work. For me, it’s more about in sheer enjoyment. For that reason, I haven’t given it a lot of structure. But what you pointed out is very true. I have definitely started to develop it more and more. Also, it becomes inspired by interviewing and it kind of takes shape from that. And the first school that you mentioned that I interviewed, she was on stage in Cape Town. And I kind of scrapped booked her pictures together, like pasted them into a scrapbook because she was young 18 year old girl traveling for the first time as a model. She arrives in Cape Town, I interviewed her she was very unsure, she wasn’t sure she was going to stay, she wasn’t sure she was going to enjoy it met her again to reflect it to the shoot. And she was in love with the place and having the best time of your life kind of living out of a model apartment and just hanging out in the beach at every opportunity that you could get. And that’s kind of how it developed. It turned into a story of her hanging out on the beach. She was quite a shy girl. And she she kept telling me that she also likes to sing. But then she kind of didn’t go further into that. And then at the end of the shoots, I was like Why don’t you sing Sing something for us? There’s a video and then she sings the cup song.

Virginia Y
She does quite a good job of it. Do you plan to shoot on the girls for this project?

Justin Polkey
No, absolutely not. It’s really just the way that it’s happened so far. But I don’t even think I’m going to be able to contain it. Two models, I think I’m just gonna have to be brave is interesting. Here I’m meet that’s kind of inspiring me to pick up the camera. And that’s really the only rule I have is it’s got to be inspiration. It’s gonna be fun. and enjoyable. I don’t think I’m going to limit it to female models. And I’m not even sure I’m going to limit it to models.

Virginia Y
Awesome. That sounds very exciting. Actually, the you’re doing this project. Now, I wanted to ask you the thing that many times, photographers are usually trying to stay only behind the camera. Because sometimes, for example, it’s hard to find information for some photographers when I’m doing the interview, and I want to be prepared before him. But it’s really kind of hard to find in

Justin Polkey
the personality of somebody who is attracted to photography, there’s a sense of the one way mirror there, I think it best you would be invisible. Can you imagine the pictures you could take if you were entirely invisible, you know? So maybe there’s a personality trait there that is this ah, maybe you finding it’s not entirely that way for everyone. Oh, absolutely. Photography, you enjoy the limelight and you enjoy being in front of the camera as well as being behind the camera. I’m actually quite surprised that there’s not a lot more. I mean, given the popularity of photography in general, I’m surprised there’s not more forum for people to learn about photography, photographers, it’s been like that forever. I mean, I remember when I first started, on one hand, you have these coffee table books that are filled with beautiful, beautiful images, and then you move over to how to take pictures. And then suddenly you find these books by photography, pre tutorial, pre website, and you open them and all the pictures of rubbish, but the information is good. So there’s definitely a lot of room for more for him to open for people to talk about photography and to discuss it and to share it. I think you’ll see more and more that I’m feeling that photography is changing and shape quite rapidly now post digital, and you know, with the advent of social media, almost kind of draw a parallel between the invention of the camera. And what that meant to the art world. Before the popular camera, it was up to the artists to technically recreate the world. For the longest time, art was accurate. Yeah, people would put up an easel and accurate paint a portrait or accurately paint a landscape. And then with the invention of photography had kind of stole that job away from the painters. And then suddenly, you started to move into Impressionism and post Impressionism and then expressionism and then abstract art. And we launched into modern art. And we went into the mind of the artist rather than just being responsible for relaying an accurate exactness of moment or person. So it kind of liberated and I can imagine at the time, artists must have been a little bit disgruntled and feeling like it was the end of art, and may have been the end of it. They knew it. But I feel like it liberated art. And I feel like the same thing is happening in photography. Now. Because everybody has a camera, everybody can take a picture, the responsibility of documenting in photography has been lost to photographers, professional photographers, it’s not really the job, you don’t need a photographer to come in and snap still lives of products anymore, because you can do it yourself. This is just a shift in the whole attitude of photography, and I think it will liberate photography. And I think a similar thing will happen I think that will go more into the minds of photographers and photography will split itself into practical application and into a very creative, artful application in a similar way that painting did when the camera was developed.

Virginia Y
That’s very interesting prediction actually. And the most important part is that we can even see some of it coming into reality right now. Yes, and their realities hitting us hard because I will continue with this interview next Wednesday. Take a look at our website photography podcast.net to see some of Justin’s work. And if you’re a fan of the show, maybe you would like to support us. You can do that by a simple donation of $1 to on our Patreon page, www dot Patreon slash photography podcast.com. Again, patriots slash photography podcast calm as I promise next week we’ll continue with part two of the interview with Justin. Until then don’t forget to come back on Friday for another short episode of the fashion photography podcast.