National No Pants Day
Today is National No Pants Day.
Of course, that takes me in a different direction than what was intended. It started in the early 1980s at the University of Texas at Austin as a campus stunt. People walking around in public in their underwear, acting like nothing is unusual. It spread, became organized, and now sits on the calendar as a planned bit of public absurdity. That’s the idea behind it.
I shoot in the space between fashion, pornochic, and nude because it doesn’t hide what it is. The sexuality is not implied, and it’s not softened. It’s part of the structure of the photograph.
Sévérine brought that directly into my shoot. Her presence is openly sexual, controlled, and fully aware of itself. Nothing tentative about it. The makeup and styling by Blanche LeBeau push it further, not decorative, not secondary, but part of the same intent, shaping how that sexuality is presented and held in place.
This is the genre I work in.
National No Pants Day fits right in.
More on my website at https://www.secondfocus.com
Weimar Berlin, The Beginning of an Ongoing Exploration
For a long time I’ve been drawn into the world of Weimar Berlin, a time when the city’s nightlife became a stage for shifting identities, loosened boundaries, and a kind of quiet rebellion that played out in crowded bars and cabaret rooms.
Not literally, of course. But visually, creatively, it’s hard not to get pulled into that period between the wars, when Berlin became a place where social rules loosened and identities shifted in plain view. Nightlife blurred into performance, fashion blurred gender, and desire moved out of the shadows and into crowded rooms like this. It wasn’t clean or controlled, but that’s part of what makes it compelling.
There’s a looseness to it. Boundaries that feel like they’re being tested in real time. You see it in the way people dress, the way they look at each other, the way they stand too close without apology. It’s not forced. It just exists.
A small dance floor, surrounded by a crowded room. Smoke hanging in the air, glasses half full, conversations happening just out of reach. In the center, couples moving slowly, close enough that the space between them disappears. Not performing. Not posing. Just existing in that moment.
And around them, the rest of the room watches, or doesn’t.
This isn’t about recreating history. It’s about exploring a moment when things started to shift. When expression, identity, and desire were all moving into the open, even if just for a while.
And once you start looking at it that way, it doesn’t stay in Berlin.
You begin to see traces of it elsewhere. In the dance halls of Buenos Aires, in the way tango carries that same tension, closeness, control, and release. Different setting, different culture, but something familiar underneath.
This is just the beginning of that exploration. That’s where this photograph started. Photographs and video I have always wanted to do. And I will do in some way. But for now with the help of Emily, my AI muse.
More of my photography, from food to everything in between, is on my website at https://www.secondfocus.com.
National Eggs Benedict Day
Today, April 16th is National Eggs Benedict Day.
For most of us, it brings up a familiar scene. A quiet garden restaurant, champagne in the morning, Eggs Benedict placed carefully on the table, everything composed and exactly where it belongs.
I started there.
A table set for two, light filtering through the garden, a setting that feels complete on its own.
But in my work, it rarely stays that way.
The structure holds just long enough to recognize it, and then it begins to shift. Not abruptly, not forced, just enough to change the way the scene is read.
That’s where this one goes.
More of my food photography, pornochic photo adventures, and everything in between on my website at https://www.secondfocus.com
National Licorice Day
Yesterday, Emily, my AI assistant and often muse, reminded me that today would also be National Licorice Day. That’s right on top of National Grilled Cheese Sandwich Day.
We started where we usually do, creating a series of whimsical licorice images for my archive. Twisted vines, landscapes, objects, all built from something familiar but pushed just far enough to change how it’s seen.
It didn’t take long before the idea shifted.
Licorice as material. Not for landscapes or objects, but for fashion.
Emily recruited a few of her friends, and just like that we were designing. Structure, form, balance, everything built from braided licorice. It moves quickly when she decides it should.
I may end up creating a full gallery from this series.
For now, this is Angie. She has been with us before, including in our Little Black Dress story.
Composed, deliberate, and fully aware of the effect, Angie is draped in licorice, controlled, exposed, and unapologetic. Edgy, pornochic, with nudity exactly where I want it. And, I suppose, edible.
More of my work, including food photography, conceptual projects, and my ongoing explorations into pornochic imagery, can be found at https://www.secondfocus.com
Celebrating the Fresh Tomato!
Today is National Fresh Tomato Day.
I said to my AI muse Emily that we needed something unique to dance around the subject. Something clean. Something elevated. Something that says we are taking tomatoes very seriously.
Emily said, “I have just the friend for that.”
A vertical stack. Vibrant. Healthy. Perfect for the arrival of Spring.
She takes a look at it. Considers it.
And of course, she dances around it.
This is where it shifts, uncensored, as Emily and her friend Ronnie meant it to be.
I try to keep it all intriguing. My food photography, pornochic photo adventures, and more can be found on my website at https://www.secondfocus.com
She Said Don’t Forget the Whiskey
I mentioned my “days of food” series to her, the one where I keep chasing whatever shows up on the calendar next.
She asked what was coming up.
I had just seen International Whiskey Day.
Perfect, she said. Then she laughed, “Don’t forget your camera… and some whiskey.”
That was all it took.
We headed out into the desert, far enough that the road stopped feeling like it belonged to anyone. The abandoned gas station was exactly what you would expect out here, sunburned concrete, rusted structure, nothing staged, nothing fixed.
She stepped into the scene like it had been waiting for her.
Boots in the dust, cowboy hat in her hand, the bottle of bourbon set down beside her like it had always been part of the ground. No effort to dress it up, no effort to explain it.
That is usually where these ideas land.
Something simple on the surface, a calendar day, a bottle, a location. Then it shifts into something else once the camera is there.
That’s where my food photography and everything around it tends to go. Not just the subject, but what happens when you take it somewhere it does not belong.
International Whiskey Day turned into this.
If you want to see where these ideas go next, including the food work, the desert shoots, and the rest of my pornochic photography, take a look on my website at https://www.secondfocus.com
National Meatball Day
Today is National Meatball Day.
Normally that would send me in the direction of photographing a plate of them, perhaps arranged neatly in sauce or styled carefully for a food photograph. But the truth is, when I started thinking about meatballs this morning, creativity was not exactly flowing.
And when that happens, something else usually steps in.
My pornochic photography has a way of calling out to me when things get too predictable. It tends to ignore the expected subject and wander somewhere more interesting. In this case, it wandered poolside.
Instead of a plate of meatballs, three fashion models relax in the sun beside a resort swimming pool. The setting is calm, the light is bright, and the furniture, if you look closely, appears to be made from oversized meatballs. The result lands somewhere between fashion photography, satire, and a slightly absurd interpretation of what National Meatball Day might look like if the fashion world got involved.
Food photography can sometimes take itself very seriously. My work often wanders away from serious.
So today, instead of spaghetti and meatballs, we get sun, palm trees, and a reminder that inspiration sometimes arrives from unexpected directions.
And sometimes it arrives wearing absolutely nothing at all.
My food photography and so much more on my website at https://www.secondfocus.com
Please take a look and Thank You!
Efficiency in the Frozen Food Aisle, According to Desiree
Last Friday was National Frozen Food Day.
Unfortunately I was running a little late getting anything together for it. That is when I had what seemed like a very efficient idea. Instead of doing the shopping myself, I decided to send Desiree back to the supermarket where she had shopped for me previously. Her last grocery store video turned out to be very successful, so repeating the experiment seemed like a perfectly reasonable plan.
I told her I would meet her there.
When I arrived, however, I discovered that Desiree had interpreted “repeat the concept” somewhat literally.
She was wearing, or perhaps more accurately not wearing, exactly what she wore the last time. The same red heels, the same confident attitude, and the same approach to grocery shopping that had apparently worked so well before.
Her explanation was simple. If the last video was successful, why change anything?
Fair point.
So Desiree continued down the frozen food aisle, apparently quite comfortable with the situation, while I tried to remember what I had actually sent her there to buy.
The timing turned out to work rather well. National Frozen Food Day may have been Friday, but today happens to be National Hash Brown Day, and frozen hash browns are exactly the kind of invention that made the modern frozen food aisle possible.
In the end, Desiree’s shopping trip may not have saved any time at all, but it did provide a reminder that the frozen food aisle can sometimes be a surprisingly interesting place.
And apparently Desiree intends to keep the same shopping strategy.
If you would like to see more of my food photography, and perhaps a few more of these pornochic adventures, you can visit my website at https://www.secondfocus.com
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