Rosa Guerra | Art for Art | San Francisco

Since the beginning of 2014, I have been working on my year-long personal project, Art for Art. Once a month, I find a fellow photographer whose work I admire, and I photograph them; they photograph me. View the full set of previous shoots in the series here: Art for Art.

In June, I met up with Rosa for a lovely San Francisco beach shoot. Rosa was my intern in 2013 and has since become my wonderful associate photographer and videographer. See our collaboration below:

Our Styles:

Anna: I love that Rosa used this shoot as an opportunity to practice shooting film. She loves a clean, pretty image just as much as I do, and it’s been fun to see her style develop over the last year since we first started working together.

Rosa: My style tends to be candid and intimate. I always lean towards romantic, simple and timeless images. I love Anna’s style, and see some resemblence with my own. Her style is clean, creative and captures moments in a photojournalistic way that really tells a story. She also manages to capture light beautifully.

The Shoot

Anna: I felt very comfortable working with Rosa and was surprised to hear this was her first-ever portrait session in front of the camera. I love the small beach location we chose, and the overcast skies provided a lovely mood to the images. It was fun to shoot in mixed media as I shot digital-only, and Rosa shot film-only.

Rosa: The shoot was fun and I enjoyed the experience very much. I was also a bit nervous! Not only because I was also the one behind the lens, but because I was also the one shooting a professional photographer. I’ve worked with Anna before, and I always enjoy it because she has a very calm approach. I felt nervous but comfortable taking turns photographing each other, even in front of others, which to be honest, I’m still a bit shy about.

Favorite shot below. Thanks for climbing up a rock in your flip flops, Rosa!

Lessons Learned

Anna: I love the black and white film portraits that Rosa was able to capture (see a few below!). I’m still learning lessons about posing and helping subjects feel comfortable in front of the camera, but I think this monthly commitment has been such a worthwhile and rich experience so far!

Rosa: This experience helped me remember the importance of moving and shooting various angles while in the same location. Anna is very calm while shooting, and does such a good job at directing. At times I tend to shoot my subjects with very little direction, but I learned from Anna that even a little directing can make a big difference.

Art for Art is a monthly personal project in which Anna and a fellow photographer photograph each other. See the full series here. View Rosa Guerra’s blog here.

Anna Wu is a San Francisco wedding photographer often around the world. Follow her Art for Art series and professional work at annawu.com and on Facebook.

Art for Art

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