PRETTY GIRLS / NORMAL THINGS

like every basic girl out there, i can sit and scroll thru my phone for hours looking at beautifully taken shots of attractive people. i'm pretty sure that's how pinterest came to life and it worked. and as an avid self timer user to get a cool "natural" shot, i appreciate an organic photo taken without heavy lights and a bunch of crazy editing. i like seeing lines on people's faces and a few hairs out of place. have you ever noticed those IG users that photoshop their faces? and i'm not talkin' blemish cover ups… i mean they have completely airbrushed their face and it reminds me of those creepy beauty pageant head shots (you know the ones…) so long story short- most of my favorite photographers have a certain way of capturing a shot that looks natural and unkept and gritty and it's my absolute favorite.

And because of this, i'm doing happy dances over here since finding Anthony. Some of the cutest girls running around Cincinnati have become a part of a beautiful project by one of my new favorite photographers that i just recently stumbled across. a few of the ladies posted their shots from him on their personal facebooks last week and once i noticed a reoccurring name of the photographer, i had to check him out and holy wow, is this guy doing something perfect. he has started a project called
Pretty Girls / Normal Things  (that was a link, in case you missed it) and it's exactly that. it's some of the most beautiful girls around this city being shot doing what they love to do in their day to day lives, from watering their gardens to making pieces of homemade jewelry. i recognized a few faces but most of the girls were strangers to me. but i can already tell that i could develop a total girl crush on any of them, ya know? just gorgeous girls in their cut off shorts and tangled hair and minimal makeup. totally my type of human. keep your contoured cheeks and give me a face full of freckles, please and thanks.

the creator of Pretty Girls / Normal Things, Anthony Reese Schneider, was cool enough to take some time out of his day to do a quick little interview with me. i wanted to make sure to jump in line now to get this interview because i can already tell this guy will be big and famous one day and i want to be able to say i knew him back when he had time to do an interview for this silly little blog. (throws back head and lets out an evil laugh)  so here ya go! 

\\ the interview //

1. you're a lucky guy to get to be surrounded by pretty ladies all the time for this project! how did you come up with this idea?
Ha! I have a friend that told me that I’ve “figured out how to have ‘babe time’ all the time” and that’s a slight exaggeration. Usually the shoots only last for 30 minutes to an hour, and I’m not necessarily good friends with all of the girls so I actually spend a lot of time by myself. I think it’s funny that some people might look at this project and get an image in their head that I’m constantly surrounded by beautiful women. I wish that was the case! Haha

I guess the idea sort of happened very naturally for me. I’m a filmmaker by trade, but I do Post Production so I never really spent too much time actually behind a camera. As I’ve grown older that has bothered me more and more, and I recently decided that I wanted to completely understand the process of exposing an image. In my mind it was just me sort of wanting to learn and understand as much as I can about my craft. So I decided I was going to explore still photography. I spend a lot of time on social media and I would regularly see friends/acquaintances posting images of “models” or “hot” girls and the majority of the images felt very empty to me. I couldn’t really connect with them and that really bothered me. I felt like I didn’t understand the motivation behind the photos, and my solution to that problem was to put the subjects in very simple situations doing things that would feel very natural to them. So instead of me just photographing a girl or a “model", I would be documenting something. This led me to the idea of Pretty Girls Normal Things. I feel like the title is pretty self-explanatory. Haha Basically, for me, this whole thing is just one big fun experiment.

2. what makes a girl pretty? (i think i threw him for a loop with that question haha)Man this is such a hard question. And I have definitely thought about it a lot. I think beauty is entirely subjective. This is a blog of curated beauty. So some people might like it, and some people might think all of these girls are ugly. I really don’t care what people think. All the girls that I shoot have something about them that I am attracted to, but a lot of the time it’s something that is pretty intangible. It’s more of a gut feeling. What do you think makes someone pretty?


(stay tuned for my answer because that question IS really hard to answer. whoa) 

 3. do you find the girls that you shoot or do they seek you out?
I find them. I haven’t had anyone reach out to me yet asking to be involved that I felt had the right look for the project.
(as i raise my hand slowly volunteering to be shot. reeeeal casual like) 

 4. how long have you been in the cincinnati area and how long have you been shooting? 
I was born in Cincinnati, lived in Villa Hills, KY until I was 13, and then moved to Price Hill. I left after high school for 7 years, but I’ve spent the overwhelming majority of my life within ten minutes of downtown Cincinnati. I’ve been making films since I was 12, and been shooting stills since about 4 months ago! Haha

5. whats your favorite camera to shoot with?
 Man. Another hard question. I haven’t had a ton of experience with many cameras so my answer is going to be highly biased. I just bought a Panasonic GX8 and so far I am super excited about it. I tend to like the mirrorless bodies over a DSLR because of the compact size. I like to be as discreet as possible. Haha

6. do you have any more series ideas in the works?
 Oh I always have tons of ideas but they are secrets :) haha

7. any advice for someone trying to break into photography?
GET A CAMERA, GO OUT AND SHOOT. You can read books all day. You’re never going to understand anything that you read until you go out and translate it to a real life scenario. Also, figure out what you’re good at and stick with it. I found out I’m good at taking portraits of pretty girls.
If people want more information they can check out my portfolio at www.anthonyrschneider.com or follow the blog on Tumblr Pretty Girls / Normal Things and Instagram @prettygirlsnormalthings! 

*i only posted a small fraction of the photos taken for the PG/NT project. be sure to hit up his blog and see all of the beautiful work that has been done so far. Thank you again, Anthony!