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Project Trivia
By: Robyn Barnette
NOTE: THIS PROJECT IS BEING OVERHAULED IN SPRING 2009.
- Originally scheduled to be completed in four weeks, "Too Funky For Kumi" took approximately two and a half months to complete. This was mostly due to bad weather and due to lack of photo ideas.
- Because of the lack of photo ideas, the idea emerged to include animated renderings of Kumi in the project.
- Three photos were shot in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, a city that passed an ordinance in January 2005 prohibiting all outdoor photography within the city and surrounding communities — this as a result of the previous project that I did, "Queen Nevra." Fortunately, I was not caught by any law enforcement officials while doing "Too Funky For Kumi"; however, there was a huge emphasis for this project on researching and choosing locations where law enforcement was unlikely to capture me while shooting the photography.
- It took four tries and over 300 shots to correctly capture the photo of Kumi standing on the wooden bridge with the Italian water garden in the background.
- The jasmin flowers in the final photo of the project were chosen as a reference to Jasmin Larian, the daughter of the president and CEO of MGA Entertainment, Isaac Larian. Furthermore, there are eight jasmine flowers in the photo, in tribute to the original eight members of the Bratz Pack (i.e., Cloe, Dana, Fianna, Jade, Meygan, Nevra, Sasha, Yasmin).
- When I purchased Bratz Ooh La La Kumi in June 2005, it was inevitable that I would do a Bratz Photography Project devoted to her. However, almost immediately there were problems with the project when the first five photos shot two weeks before the Independence Day holiday weekend were instantly rejected, since the weather ruined all five shots (and mostly due to my insistence on absolute perfectionism). This included the shot of Kumi standing on the wooden bridge with the Italian water garden in the background. And instead of this project taking four weeks to complete, it would take me four weeks to capture the first photo of the project, which was the first photo overall: The headshot of Kumi with the pink flowers in the background.
- Because of the type of digital camera that I was using at the time, I captured over 2,500 shots of my Bratz Ooh La La Kumi doll to compile the twelve photos in "Too Funky For Kumi." It was the largest ever for any Bratz Photography Project, and over 90% of the shots were deleted.
- A total of 20 photos of my Bratz Ooh La La Kumi doll were rejected from this project. Most of the photos were rejected because of problems posing Kumi in the correct manner and styling her hair properly.
- The Japanese robe and kimono in two of the photos are from the Special Collector's Edition Bratz World Kumi doll.
- One of the two photos of Kumi dressed in the Japanese robe and kimono was shot at an arborteum located five miles from my house. And during the photography, I suffered at least 20 insect bites on my arms and ankles.
- The photo of Kumi with the steel bridge in the background was originally a test shot. However, the photo came out so good and Kumi's pose in the photo was so perfect that I eventually decided to include the photo in the project, thus the photo was captured on the first take.
- This project was originally titled "Run Away With Kumi," since the track used for the project's accompanying video slideshow was "Run Away" by Deee Lite and since the project implied that Kumi was a runaway model from Paris, France. As the project progressed, the track grew stale and was eventually replaced by the track "Too Funky" by music artist George Michael. The project was then retitled "Too Funky For Kumi."
- MGA Entertainment loved the photography in this project.
- This project represents the final Bratz Photography Project where my Kodak EasyShare CX6230 Digital Camera was used. The camera was retired shortly after this project's completion and replaced with the Kodak EasyShare V550 Digital Camera, which would be used in the Bratz Photography Project "Kool Kat Jade."
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