Alternative images for editorial use

I recently had some work published in a local San Jose magazine.

I love shooting for them, because they typically will just hand over the reigns of creative control to you and let you do what you want, provided you capture their intended subject.
Above is the image that they published in their most recent issue. While I think it’s a fine portrait, it wasn’t my personal favorite.
And sometimes when you work with a magazine or any client in the publication/commercial business, that will happen. It’s ultimately their call, it’s their magazine after all.
I did several “safe” images, that is, images that weren’t too far out there or weird and covered my bases for a “portrait”, and then I captured several portraits which were my preferred images and submitted them both.
While some of my personal favorites were used for social media, which I was very happy with their use of, I was ultimately let down of their lack of use in the publication. That happens some times so the publication can match up the image with the style and theme of the rest of their images used in the magazine.
Take a look below at some of my favorite images, and let me know what you think.

You can check out the poetry and writing by Tshaka Campbell, the subject of these images, here.