Life & Work with Tony Blood of Los Angeles

Today we’d like to introduce you to Tony Blood

Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
This has always been the hardest question for me to answer. I came to realize about a decade or so ago that I have lived a very different life than most people. I just was too busy living it to look back and see it. So the conventional method of “my story” will not fit in the confines of what can be grasped given the length of a single article. But none the less I will attempt to summarize.

I guess what the people want to hear is that I am most known currently for my work in Photography, but the truth is I never thought of myself as just a photographer. Still it saves a lot of time and is effective enough to get through to people when networking. I’ve always been more of what people refer to as a renaissance man. This interview came at the cusp of a transition of evolution period for me or as the corporate types say a “rebranding”. Just in the realm of photography alone I will create concepts, do set design work, prop work, lighting design, style and modify wardrobe, edit and composite, make jewelry, and more for some of my shoots.

My journey in photography started when I was a teen and I got my first film camera for one of my birthdays, the non-disposable kind. Even then I knew I didn’t want to take the typical photos of people, I was always compelled to catch a moment in time, or an emotion in someone’s face, or interesting landscapes. When you shoot a subject who is making it a point to pose, it can often come off as inauthentic, tense and awkward, but when you catch them in a real moment where they are just being instead of trying to do, you can see the story and emotion in their eyes and in their face. That photo feels more alive and more real than your standard snap shot or your typical brand ad could ever be. You get transported to that moment in time.

Jump to my first year in college right out of high school, I got my first pro film camera. Took a photography class or two and learned how to even develop my own film. Shortly after though Digital photography became the new thing and I couldn’t afford a digital camera. I shot a few weddings, family style portraits, church events, recitals, my late best friend’s death metal band Gristle that he drummed for, but everyone started preferring pro digital photography. So I stopped shooting professionally. But I did buy a digital point and shooter and shot what I felt like. I shot for me and to preserve my memories.

I moved to Southern California in January of 2013 after getting out of the ARMY as a Specialist in rank and as an IT Specialist in Military Occupational Specialty (MOS). I went back to college to get my Bachelors degree in computer science, while simultaneously writing my first novel I self published, Vigil Vendetta under Tony Bloodworth (which is my full last name) and doing work in the Indie film industry with my director cousin, Xavier Y’barra. In 2016, my uncle musician and child entertainer, Oklin Bloodworth passed away. After his passing my mother told me that he told her to make sure his DSLR camera went to me. I guess he saw potential in the photos I had already been taking with what I had available to me. Once I got that DSLR I got right to work. The first thing I did was a self shoot at home dressed in a blue suit. It was my first learning experience shooting pro digital so I needed to get familiar with it.

I spent some time doing traveling and street photography continuing to build my skill and confidence, until I finally felt like I was ready to start shooting with models in 2018. I saw an event ad where a studio would let you shoot at their studio with models for free as a networking event. So I did and one of the models I shot with Alyssa Fogleman liked the photos I took of her, we found out we happened to live near each other and were both just starting out in a way. I had never shot with models really and she had never modeled before. So we started doing shoots practicing together, we became friends through that and would go to the same photo meets. Over time we both started leveling up our skills. And I would go on to shoot with many models, music artists, stage performers, actors, scare actors, events, painters and more internationally. Constantly challenging myself the whole time to do something different, to use more of my creativity, and to implement more of my outside skills into my photography.

Ultimately, I knew even after all that I was severely minimizing myself into the box that is the label of Photographer. So I just started referring to myself as an artist of many mediums, currently working primarily in photography and the digital arts. I feel like figuratively with my previous work you saw through my eyes, but you’ve never heard my voice. It was mainly shooting for clients, models, businesses, music artists, etc. and using my creativity to amplify their voices, but in doing so I kept mine silent.

So now I’m at a point in my life where I want my voice to be heard too. And I don’t want to just add to the noise, I want to expand minds and create change using my art. Previously I captured moments and now I want to manifest them. So that is where I find myself today working towards expansion and more aligned to where I want to go in life. I just formed my first LLC and have numerous projects in the works for the future. One of which is a music video by Music Artist Thug Muffin for her song Groupies Produced by ALX, that I co-Directed with her, and fully shot and edited by myself. It actually just released on her youtube this past weekend . I guess the lesson I have taken from this journey is that blazing your own path alone is never easy. And you’re going to have obstacles, forks in the road, random unexpected turns and you will find yourself stuck sometimes not knowing which way to go. But always remember when problems arise, solutions are born. Keep pushing forward in the trajectory of your goals.

I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
I have had many obstacles in life probably more so than most I have had financial set backs. I was not born with a silver spoon in my mouth, so I had to grow up at a very young age in order to get money for myself and what I wanted. I had my first job at 12 years old working in the back of my father’s friend’s electronics shop taking apart electronic devices. In which I was already doing on my own before that because I wanted to know how everything worked, except now I was getting paid for it. I had a curiosity and deep interest in science before I even knew what science was. I wanted to know everything about this world. Growing up mixed in the 80’s to the 2000’s in Fresno I experienced a lot of racism from multiple races including some of my own. And to a certain extent I still deal with it today. There were times where it felt like it was me against the world. I think that is part of why I was mostly reluctant to release my creative voice to the world. When you have people both verbally and physically beating you down, telling you you’re not good enough, telling you you’re not like everyone else, telling you you’re too loud, telling you you’re stupid, telling you what you are and are not capable of doing, telling you you’re worthless and that is just in elementary. I’m sure you can imagine how reluctant that would make you want to share any of your creativity or art with a world like that. So a lot of my early projects I worked on never saw the light of day. For an artist art can be a very vulnerable experience because that art is a piece of you. So I rarely if ever felt comfortable enough to release most of it. But I still created because I am always compelled to. So through that I just learned to adapt and would often isolate myself to read, learn, and create.

I have also had numerous health issues in the past. I have a spinal injury from my time in service that most people don’t know about, but I have had to just get used to being in a constant level of pain. I still have to have a life so I cant allow it to stop me at least until it forces me to. It can be debilitating at its worst. I wasn’t able to sit up and was stuck in my apartment for 3 days at one point. If you can imagine how bad nerve pain can be. I have had other health scares that were potentially fatal, I spent about two weeks in the ICU in 2022 and it took months to recover after, but I have honestly lost count on how many near death experiences I have had and survived sometimes at the last possible minute. But despite that having to accept that you may die at a young age is kind of a relief. A relief from the fear of dying, so that’s an obstacle you’ve already faced. Not saying that I am in any rush though. You just learn to focus on living than living in fear of dying. I have always looked at fear itself as an obstacle that cages us and it is up to us to stand up to it. That’s growth. And once you pass it you’ll see that you were really just making a mountain out of an anthill. Then so many more opportunities and experiences are awaiting you on the other side of that. But I will say primarily my biggest obstacles to my projects have been time and money. Once I have an abundance of both it’ll be like gasoline to a fire when it comes to what I produce.

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
I would say I am an artist and a renaissance man who specializes in photography and the digital arts. I do artistic and creative shoots with models, music artists, actors, and way more. If you look at my Instagram account you’ll notice that all my shoots look different artistically, they are high impact, each one draws your eye and evokes an emotion. Creatively, I don’t like to limit myself. I am not a fan of repetition and prefer not to shoot something that has been done a hundred times before unless I feel it is necessary and even then I will make it a point to add to, improve or shoot it in a way that has never been done before, so it at least feels new. There’s too many people trying to do what everyone else is doing to try to go “viral.” I have never been about that. There’s too much inauthentic, disingenuous synthetic media that I personally have been sick of seeing. I want to do what no one else is doing like no one has ever done it before and that is what I intend to do.

Are there any apps, books, podcasts, blogs or other resources you think our readers should check out?
I mean there are countless resources at my disposal especially digitally when it comes to my work. Whether it’s using skill share or other websites for online courses, using Photoshop and Lightroom to edit photos, reading or researching specific information pertaining to the project I am working on. There’s a world of resources out there and I pick from it like an apple tree when I need it.

Pricing:

• N/A

Contact Info:

• Instagram: @tbloodarts
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@AnthonyBloodworthTheIntityAG
• Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@tonyblood38?_t=ZT-8uUnHQqB6FC&_r=1

Image Credits
Photographers: Tony Blood, Xavier Y’barra, Nana Starfield and Michelle Martinez. Models: Grace Rizzo, Alora Hand and Indigo Ford