{"id":1308,"date":"2012-02-14T07:00:51","date_gmt":"2012-02-14T12:00:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.siriuspress.com\/studio\/?p=1308"},"modified":"2012-02-18T21:16:31","modified_gmt":"2012-02-19T02:16:31","slug":"john-magnet-bell-photographer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.siriuspress.com\/studio\/2012\/02\/john-magnet-bell-photographer\/","title":{"rendered":"John Magnet Bell: Photographer"},"content":{"rendered":"

JMB on Twitter: @StartYourNovel<\/a><\/p>\n

\"suddenly\"<\/a>

suddenly (cropped) | Dec 5, 2006 | All images are \u00a9 John Magnet Bell. All rights reserved<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"John<\/a>

John Magnet Bell | @StartYourNovel<\/p><\/div>\n

John Magnet Bell<\/a> is a writer, translator and blogger, and many of you already frequent his blog, \u201cStart Your Novel<\/a>.\u201d This is the first writer-prompt site I ever discovered and I find his philosophy refreshing: \u201can adventure in open-source storytelling.\u201d John freely gives away his ideas and encourages writers to run with them.<\/p>\n

\u201cGo wild,\u201d he says. \u201cI have tons of ideas. Why keep them all to myself?\u201d<\/p>\n

You will be amazed at his terrific prompts.<\/p>\n

A few months ago, I had the pleasure of meeting John online and, carrying his generosity forward, he agreed to write a guest post for \u201cCreative Flux\u201d\u2014the intriguing \u201cYou Hate to Love Them, But You Can\u2019t Help Yourself<\/a>.\u201d Then, last month he honored me with a request to fill the opening spot in his new author interview series \u201c5 Questions.\u201d I extend my thanks to you, John, for your friendship and the opportunity to be a part of your community.\u00a0You can check out my interview here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Now, what some of you may not know is that John is also a published photographer.\u00a0His work on Flikr\u00a0<\/a>\u00a0demonstrates impressive talent and remarkable imagination.\u00a0A number of his fine works\u2014my favorites\u2014are included below, along with a brief Q&A of his creative process.<\/p>\n

Click here to view his entire portfolio.<\/a><\/p>\n

All images are \u00a9 John Magnet Bell. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n

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Q & A<\/strong><\/h2>\n

What are the roots of your images?<\/strong><\/p>\n

In a nutshell… Eastern Bloc and Canadian animation. I was brought up on that stuff. It was (and is) far richer, in visual terms, than most commercial western cartoons. So three cheers for NFB-funded shorts, I say.<\/p>\n

I didn’t fully realize it back then, but those short films, many of which did without any form of spoken language, were planting multiple seeds in me, the seeds of a visual vocabulary. As an adult, I came to enjoy the visually challenging work of the brothers Quay and their own idol, Jan Svankmajer. Thanks to YouTube you can now see plenty of their work online. I recommend Svankmajer’s tma\/svetlo\/tma<\/a> (Darkness\/Light\/Darkness), it’s a wonderful little piece.<\/p>\n