The one that got away – Yadushika Radhakrishnan
A.S.H. Smyth interviews the neophyte fashion photographer and jewellery designer on the shot she never got... and one she did
Yadushika Radhakrishnan got into photography this time last year... by accident. She was managing social media campaigns, and had organised a shoot – models at the location, everything ready – when the photographer didn’t materialise. So Radhakrishnan shot the entire thing on her phone (at this point she did not yet own a camera) and she began to get some calls.
She had always had an eye for photography (her grandfather and uncle had owned a photo studio in Colombo), and when organising shoots for her own jewellery line, she would automatically find herself playing director. So at this point she saw the opportunity to bring that creativity into the photographic field.
A friend helped her investigate the purchase of equipment, and she self-taught through experimentation and YouTube videos. ‘With every shoot, to date, I’ve learned something new.’ She even directed several FaceTime shoots during the lockdown.
She has since worked with RUMPUNCH Resortwear, Mimosa, and Shay int., as well as with a range of local start-ups. ‘The fact that I was a female photographer got me a lot of opportunities.’ But she’s taking things one project at a time – ‘though I would love to do a magazine cover shoot anytime soon!’
The one that got away
‘My being a photographer almost didn’t happen at all, of course. But the thing with fashion photography is that you pre-plan the shots you need, and stay there ‘til you’ve got them. It’s sort of hard to ‘miss’ a shot.
When I started out I wanted to focus on an editorial style of photography. Make sure there’s always a storyline behind my campaigns. But in Sri Lanka people don’t like to take any chances with their concepts. And perhaps I was too new to be breaking through.
I’m a bit of a perfectionist, and I want people to hire me based on my style of photography, rather than just a service. But there was a clothing brand, promoting a line of ‘modest wear’ – abayas and things like that – and the colour palette of the whole collection was plain black. If it had been just one outfit that might have been fine; but there were about 15, and they wanted the same shot for each outfit.
I like a brand that approaches me with a broad vision, but also want me to inject my style into it. I would have taken it to the beach, with that minimal background of blues and browns and whites, because the black would have really stood out there. Got the model to be a bit more imaginative with the poses, and I could have shot at different angles, played around with the colours, the light, the shadows. Made the clothing stand out, especially against the less ‘modest’ outfits in that environment.
You can’t expect everyone to understand these things; but there has to be something going on, to bring a little more attention to the brand. If there’s some creativity to the image people stop and look, rather than simply scroll past. All of that plays a role in building a commercial image.
I suggested this to the client, but they didn’t seem to want to do any of that ‘crazy stuff.’ All they wanted was a standard look-book shoot. The model might as well have been a mannequin: she’s doing nothing, just standing against a wall, arms down at her sides, interior lighting: that’s it. Practically two-dimensional. Like, “we don’t need to get creative.”
I wouldn’t say it was a bad experience, exactly; but that framework did not inspire me at all, and didn’t reflect my style of photography. I’d never put my name to the results in public. So those photos kind of got away creatively.’
The shot that she got
‘I did almost miss a shot, once, though. This was from one of my first shoots, that I did in collaboration with a model friend of mine called Theji. Both of us were starting out in our fields, and needed pictures to build up our portfolios.
We had this whole ‘summer vibe’ planned out, where the girls are on the beach, soaking in the sun, and all of that. We’ve got the make-up done, we’re at the location – and then it starts to rain. It’s heavily raining: there’s no ‘summer’ here! But we decided we’re here, so we might as well just shoot.
We got on one of the rocks out in the water, and starting shooting. It was pretty risky, because the waves were really harsh, and the rocks were slippery. And this was at Mount Lavinia (still people assume I went down South for the shoot)! The waves kept knocking her over, her boyfriend was right there saying “you all need to stop now,”, and I was saying “OK, let’s just do one more shot. Hold still right there for one more wave – let it hit you, but don’t flinch!”
This was the picture that I’d had in my mind. We tried it at least five times, and by this point I had nearly given up. Theji almost fell off the rock. I almost dropped my camera in the ocean. But we got the shot. And then she slipped off the rock.
It’s one of my most shared photos, and it was like the pick-up point in our careers. Theji signed up with an agency, I started getting commissions – it was a big success for both of us.’