Monday, June 1, 2009 - 18:02
I was listening to DTE in my car the whole last week. I admit I still love it too death. Was my first Ozzy CD and made me a fan.
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I absolutly adore the cover of this CD. I think its a fine peace of art.
I found this statement of the photographer (very funny ending, please read):
In the words of the photographer, Nitin Vadukul (interviewed Nov./Dec. 2007) –
“I was very pleased to get a call from Sharon Osbourne asking me to come up with ideas for Ozzy’s upcoming record, which was going to be called Down to Earth. I had never photographed Ozzy before, but was always a huge Black Sabbath fan. Sony Records had actually recommended me for the shoot, as I had worked with them many times. The ideas I was to develop would create an image that would possibly be used for the cover, but there was no guarantee. I would have 3 days to work with Ozzy and develop several ideas.
The label and arist management people who were involved with the project were truly amazing - they gave me total freedom to create , and then just picked the ideas they liked that I came up with. I feel that this is the best kind of working relationship because you get to use all of your creativity, and the input from the featured subjects will often go on to inspire your final designs and, ultimately, the final product. The only specific direction I got was from Sharon , who said, ‘think dark’.
The initial inspiration came from my first meeting with Ozzy, because I had never seen a human being with so many tattoos and amazing gothic jewelry in my entire life!! That introduction made me think of the person behind all that – I wanted to know what was inside him.
I submitted 5-6 different ideas before my clients chose the ‘X-rayed Ozzy’ one. One of the ideas was to make up Ozzy as Nosferatu, who was the first Dracula in the movies. As you can see on the accompanying photo, the make up by Screaming Mad George was amazing. We both liked this idea as it allowed Ozzy to play someone truly dark in broad daylight and get away with it. Another image we shot in New York’s Meatpacking district – we seemed to have found the stairway to Hell. Some of these shots were also used in the booklet as well.
The entire process - from project approval to the delivery of the final image - took about 8 weeks. I used only a 10×8 PLATE camera, sheet film and my own eyes to shoot the initial images. The only other equipment we used was an X-ray machine and then Photoshop. Sharon had really let me do my thing and suggested some tweaks in the final image - let’s not forget, she did OK the ideas to begin with.
I know that they were very happy with the results. I should say they were completely shocked in a good way, because no-one expected what they finally saw. They must have liked my work during this session as they came back to me to license another image for use on the cover of 2003’s Essential Ozzy Osbourne, which was part of Sony Music’s ‘Essential’ series of limited-edition two-disc compilations of major artists.
I have to tell you that Ozzy is an amazing professional. He was on time, did everything I asked of him and at the same time taught me a great deal about believing in yourself and being the best you can be. I also think that, in my life so far anyway, he is the only person that has managed to keep me laughing for 72 hours non-stop (yes, even in my sleep)!
On top of that, he’s ‘fit as a fiddle’. I know that because before anyone showed up for the second day of shooting, I found him doing 100 push ups in the studio. He was up for just about anything, but on the day we were going to use the X-ray machine he was in the x-ray room and as he started to take his clothes off I burst out laughing. He then asked me if the procedure was going to be harmful and I said ‘no’, but then told him that I needed to leave the room while they did the x-ray. He looked at me and smiled -’Not bloody dangerous, eh?!?!?’”