Diggy Lloyd
Who printed it?
I worked with Mary at Printing Center USA – super fast, responsive, and I like to print in the US when possible.
Who designed it?
Along with my commercial photography business, I also have a branding and design company called Ristra Studio, and /Ristra Studio I have designed most of my promos and printed matter, which I love!
Tell me about the images.
Free Association is a zine series I started producing in 2012. This series of images is influenced by a course I took from Charles Harbutt, an incredible documentary photographer. The course was called “Instinct and Metaphor”. He asked us to allow the camera to become an extension of ourselves, and to speak through its lens. Through his teachings I was able to understand my instinctive reflex, a millisecond decision to shoot an image. Then the next question came – well, why would I want to take that picture? We had to make the connection as to why instinctually we shot that image, and what metaphor we believed appeared in that image. We had to do this for every image we hung in critique. Ten years later, this is still an exercise I do regularly. Free Association, and each of its volumes are a direct result of this exercise. The story I compose through Free Association will be different from the story you compose. The metaphors I see will be different from what you see, and that is the magic of photography. The images in Volume IV were mostly shot in and around Taos, New Mexico and showcase my love for this sacred land. Juxtaposed next to these images are self-portraits, family portraits, and musings from everyday life.
How many did you make?
With Free Association each volume prints around 100 copies, which I leave as open editions. For my commercial photography promos – they run around 1500-2000 copies.
How many times a year do you send out promos?
Now, I do at least one volume of Free Association every year, and around 12-18 months I do a commercial photography promo.
Do you think printed promos are effective for marketing your work?
Absolutely! I think as a photographer, it is so important to create printed matter. Oftentimes we are working so much in the digital space, we forgot how impactful and powerful print can be. I enjoy sending this out to previous/potential clients and I also sell them in my print shop – ristrastudio.com/shop
