Long Story Short

STEPHEN WILKES COMPRESSES TIME TO CREATE STARTLINGLY ORIGINAL IMAGES

- Barry Tanenbaum

STEPHEN WILKES CARRIED THE IDEA of day-to-night images for a long time. The seed was planted when he photographed the cast and crew of Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet for Life magazine. “They wanted everyone in one panoramic photo,” Wilkes says. “Problem was, the film set was square.” With David Hockney’s collages in mind, Wilkes solved the problem by shooting 250 images across the scene, then spending a week gluing prints together. “I thought, So cool, multiple moments in one picture.” Years later, with Photoshop, the idea was even cooler: seamless stitching, no glue needed.