The afternoon she stopped looking at the camera

In the morning I finished the film on strong, posed pictures. That afternoon I turned around the one line that had been in every shot. Of the 64 images made after that, not one looks into the lens.

LATITUDE is a series of fictional days filmed as if documented. Each issue is one day in one city, told in chapters by the clock. The crew is AI. I decide what is filmed and what stays.

In Milan, a woman lands at Malpensa at 06:50 and ends the day under the glass roof of the Galleria at 21:30. In between: a coffee standing in Brera, the pool at Villa Necchi, an old wooden tram, a risotto, an art foundation, the roof of the Duomo, Torre Velasca at dusk. Three outfits: an ivory wool dress with a small stand collar; a charcoal sweater over a black pleated skirt; a navy wool blouse with wide navy satin trousers. A small half-moon bag with two short handles.

WHY THIS DAY

Milan began on 19 October as a short fashion film of nine cuts. Four days later, on the 23rd, I decided to build up a body of work first, and rebuilt that material into a day. The shape of a day — arriving that morning, closing on a night scene — was also decided on the 23rd, while I was putting Milan together. And the one first-hand thing in this issue is my own memory: the Duomo, one winter, as a student.

A FASHION SHOOT

Milan was made as a fashion shoot. Every prompt carried one line about attitude: she belongs here and nothing here impresses her. Weight in one hip, hands quiet — and she never bends toward anything. The camera sat at knee height, so the buildings converged on her. Standing at the edge of the pool, she looked down into the lens. They were strong pictures.

The film was finished on the morning of 24 October. 28 seconds.

THE AFTERNOON

That afternoon, with the magazine pages laid out, I wrote down what LATITUDE is: a magazine of the beauty in small, passing moments of a life — and the clothes are there. Not poses that show the clothes. Someone absorbed in something.

Then I turned the attitude line into its opposite. "She never bends toward anything" became: she is absorbed in what she is doing and unaware of the camera; her body leans, bends or turns toward it. "Fashion photography" became a documentary photograph by someone a few metres away whom she has forgotten. The camera came up to her eye level, and one rule was added to the list of things never to show: looking into the lens.

Each page got something real to do, taken from the place: stamping a paper ticket on the airport platform; a small film camera at the pool; pinball in the foundation's bar; a hand on carved marble on the Duomo roof; a small dish turned over under Torre Velasca; a Negroni poured in front of her.

Eight scenes, eight frames each: 64 images, saved between 16:10 and 16:31. In none of them does she look into the lens. Six pages were replaced; the tram and the Galleria stayed.

The film kept its poses; the pages took the turn. The caption said so: not a day of posing — the small things she stopped for.

WHAT IT TOOK

440 still images. 40 video clips. 34 versions of the edit, the last 22 between 06:23 and 10:00 on 24 October. 29 of the 440 stills are in the film and the 20 pages.

WHAT WENT WRONG

The same dress two days running. The first plan opened the evening before at Centrale, in the dress she wore the next morning. She would have slept in it. The day now starts that morning, at the airport.

A bag on the wrong part of the body. I wrote "on her shoulder", and the airport, the station and the tram all came back that way — which its two short handles cannot do. Now handle length is checked against the product photo before the prompt is written.

A seam that became a slit. The dress has one closed seam down the front. In a walking clip, the video model turned it into a slit, and her legs showed. Now it is written: closed seam, no slit.

WHAT I CHANGED LATER

The next day, 25 October, I set a balance: the pages about seven parts documentary to three, the film about half and half, because quiet moments alone lose people in the first seconds. Since 31 October each issue is decided at the start as documentary or fashion shoot; Milan is a fashion shoot.

And she has a name now: Hélène, a perfumer from Lyon, travelling south in search of where scents come from.

WHAT THIS DAY TAUGHT ME

1. Write the action, not the pose. Given something real from the place to be busy with — a ticket, a camera, a small dish — the clothes went from shown to worn.
2. There is one sentence that decides posture. In Milan a single line about attitude shaped every frame; changing it changed all 64 at once.
3. How things are carried has to be checked against the product. Short handles do not reach a shoulder, and a seam is not a slit. Still, they came back the way I had written them — even when the object could not do it.

WHAT I DIRECTED

I decided the route, from the airport at dawn to the Galleria at night; what each page would be absorbed in; which six pages to replace, and that the tram and the Galleria would stay. On three of the six, I took a different frame from the one the AI had marked. And on the Duomo page I put my own memory: as a student I climbed to the top one cold winter; the hotel was dark and the rain kept us in, but from the roof the whole city was there.

A pose shows what the clothes look like. Milan is where I wrote down that LATITUDE is about the moment someone forgets the camera.

— SACHIO KAWASAKI / FOUNDING EDITOR