Meet Omri Suissa, 26 years old, from Raanana, Israel and creator of the series ”Wrong Pack of Cards”.
His aim is “to create as much as he can in many fields from software, photography, brewing, cooking, magic (illusionary) and more… he loves turning ”nothing” into “something”…
What is photography for you?
Creating something new, a photo that was never created even if millions of people walked by it, no one “frames” it the way i did.
When did you start taking pictures?
Since i was a child i love photography but only in the last few years i started making “pro” photography sets.
Which aspects of your pictures make them stand out as yours, what is your signature?
Well… it’s hard for me to say, i really don’t know
Click to view slideshow.
How did you have the “Wrong Pack of Cards” idea? And how did you realise it? Did you create the story and characters by yourself or with the help of other people?
I love creating these stories in my mind. One day when i was playing poker with my friends i had this idea about a “crazy” poker game with colorful characters, when i got back home i started writing done the “script” (i do this in every photo-shoot i do). it took about 10 months from the original idea until we start shooting, i wanted to be sure that everything is the way i wanted and here is the a great opportunity to thank all the people that was part of this great photo-shoot:
To Chen Elashvili, my girlfriend, who helped me in everything and has been there all the time
To Lahav Shemesh, my set manager that created all the sets that you see in the photo-shoot, almost all the props and more
To Julia Taits, my Photoshop Wizard, that really made magic with her post-processing abilities
To Ben Saar for helping with the photography and lights
To Eya Sigal Haham for the colorful and wonderful wardrobe styling
To Erez Alon & Nataya Malul for the great hair styling
To Xenia Brudko for the professional and precise makeup
To Nataly Hershkovitch for the Nails Styling
to all of the models - Alex Michal (Nora “The Lady” Monro), Kareen Hill (Arlene “The Trucker” Jones), Oran Reznik (Tom “The Hippie”), Why Jay Es (Carlos “The Pimp” Tihugama), Mai Sella (Leila “The Dealer” Timing), Efrat Kadar-Levi (Tiffany), Khen ‘Nanu’ Khamelis (Loretta) and Shelli Minsof (Anny “Sweet”).
Also i want to thank Shay Ifargan, Ron Friedman, Omri Shmulewitz, Eyal Robinson, Daniel Weinstein, Gil Sharon & Omri Dinur for the help in other fields.
as you can see there are a lot of people involved in this kind of project and since we are doing it all for the art and fun of it all these wonderful people work for free with great spirit and love for our art creating, for that i want to say “THANK YOU”
To realize the project we needed 4 days of shooting, first we shoot the “Meet the… X” photos so the models can get into the “heads” of the characters. Although its only 6 out for 20 photos in this frame story, shooting these photos took 3 out of the 4 shooting days. We had to change 6 different locations, 6 different sets, 9 different outfits and a lot of shooting. On the fourth day we shoot the game itself in a great local bar named “Norma Jean”.
After the shooting the best photos has been selected and Julia starts post-processing while Lahav and me wrote the texts for each photo and the result you can see here:
http://www.wrongpackofcards.com/
I also published the set in flicker where we got thousands of comments and support from all over the world.
Are the characters inspired by real people/people you know?
No, I wanted characters that would be different from each other in all aspects: looks, personality and game style.
Who is your favourite character and why?
Emmm… it’s a hard question; I love all of them
But if I have to select one character it would be Carlos “The Pimp” Tihugama, we had so much fun shooting this set and I really love the “personality” that Why Jay Es put in it.
In which character do you recognise Omri Suissa ?
None and all… I think that there is something from me in every character but none of them is “me”.
Are they models or friends?
Some of the “models” begin their way in the models world and some are friends but in the end we all become friends.
What’s the biggest challenge you’ve had to face to get a great picture?
Your imagination. Everything starts and ends in our mind, if you can imagine a great photo you can also shoot one.
What`s the message of your photos, what do you want to communicate or accomplish through your work?
This is a good question; I ask myself the same thing almost every time that I shoot. Its depends on the project, sometimes it’s just “make them smile” message, when I want people to look at my photos and just feel good, laugh and forget for a moment about their day to day troubles – like in this photo-shoot.
Sometime it’s more complex but I prefer that my viewers will find out what is it themselves.
What`s the question you wish I had asked? …and what is the answer?
Few months ago, one of my friends asked me “you don’t afraid to get bad feedback on your photos?”
I was thinking about this questing for a while and I answered “No, I’m afraid of getting no feedback at all” because I think that my purpose is to create a emotions in people, if it’s a good emotion great, if it’s a bad one, well it’s also great, but having no emotions it the worst thing you can get.
(More about the series at http://www.wrongpackofcards.com)
