Take a peek behind the scenes of Emmerich’s Pride photoshoot.
The Pride flag is a designer’s dream. One glimpse at the six solid stripes of color convey joy, and the design — originally created by Gilbert Baker in 1978 — has come to represent social justice for LGBTQIA communities and allies. It challenges traditional, binary views of gender, and represents what “Pride” means beyond the designated holiday. It stands for the fight against discrimination based on sexuality and identity, and the things that make a community a true community.
The design’s simple beauty and rich symbolism were the inspiration behind a project that photographer Sophia Emmerich developed with the support of the Adobe Creative Residency Community Fund. This program — which is steered by the motto ”Create. Share. Activate. Empower.” — meant Emmerich had the ability to execute her biggest production yet. The final product features six people from LGBTQIA.
“It’s beauty photography, but with a twist,” explains the Berlin-based photographer, who incorporated Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom into her process to edit the six individual portraits into one large photo that mimics the Pride flag. “Lightroom really is easiest for me to click through and pick my favorites.” Then, when she edited in Photoshop, she did slight retouches with her favorite tool, the Clone Stamp tool. “I also used the Dodge and Burn tools because I didn’t want to destroy the texture of the skin. I know the photos don’t look super natural, but I still didn’t want them to look too unnatural.” Finally, she selected color ranges for each image to make she had good contrast when each color scene came together.
More than meets the eye.
No matter the project or the process, Emmerich’s goal is to strike people with a seemingly commercial image before they realize that it’s so much more than just a pretty picture — that it deserves lingering on a bit longer and perhaps sparking a conversation. “You can get people to look at a photo and think, ‘Oh, this is really pretty,’” Emmerich says. “They look at it a bit longer, and they might find the message for it. Beauty, for me, is a way to get people into the discussion. It’s the opener.”
Born and raised in a small town in southern Germany, Emmerich was encouraged to dabble in the arts throughout her childhood. She remembers the joy she felt ping-ponging between theater, painting, and film, each presenting her with a new group of people she wanted to know. “It was open-minded. And there were these actors, dancers, and musicians, and I was like, ‘Oh my god, you’re all so cool and great,’” Emmerich recalls.
“You can get people to look at a photo and think, ‘Oh, this is really pretty.’ They look at it a bit longer, and they might find the message for it. Beauty, for me, is a way to get people into the discussion. It’s the opener.”
Emmerich moved to Berlin at age 18 and began shooting films and videos. She describes falling in love with Berlin’s people and culture — and growing more and more eager to contribute her creative work. “I realized, at some point, that I wanted to do stuff where it was a bit more independent,” she says. Having little money or access to resources, she found that making films wasn’t easy in Berlin. Emmerich continues, “There were so many people I had to rely on to do videos…. I was like, ‘I’m going to do shit by myself. The next closest thing to videos is taking photos.’”
Faking it – and making it.
Only a few years ago, her musician friend was in a bind after a tour photographer had to cancel a shoot at the last minute. “I think she just assumed that I knew what I was doing, but I just fake it till I make it.” From that point on, Emmerich was in demand. She found herself garnering a reputation within the Berlin music scene. “And then being here and being so welcomed with open arms into this community made me feel like I want to give back to this community.”
While she’s grateful for the live music photos and album art she’s developed, at some point, Emmerich was ready to do “more stuff that has meaning behind it and is something that I stand behind.” She explains, “I really want to tell those messages through my photography, instead of more service photography.” Since she began pushing herself to deliver art with purpose, Emmerich has exhibited images of men with facial hair wearing red lipstick, beauty shots of women with body hair, and ballroom scenes of LGBTQIA people sashaying down a runway.
Emmerich’s Pride project for the Adobe Creative Residency Community Fund started with a similarly community-first mission, but it’s also her community that caused the technicolor treat to explode with popularity on social media. “I just posted it on Instagram. The six people shared it. Adobe shared it. Then so many other people started sharing it. Then it was on Behance and it developed its own life.” Whatever money from the fund she didn’t spend on the Pride production, Emmerich donated to a non-profit organization with a likeminded ethos, called the Center for Intersectional Social Justice.
As for what’s next? Emmerich wants to keep questioning the beauty industry’s gender binary with more and more brands. “I want a little boy that wants to wear makeup or nail polish to see these things and feel represented.”
See more of Sophia Emmerich’s work on Behance.
