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EXCLUSIVE E ither you have it or you don't. Tyler Shields has it. It? The eye of a veritable artist. The indescribable, inherent talent that differentiates him from the hundreds of thousands who click away on their cameras every day. Tyler's photos transcend the typical snapshot and educe words like: Brilliant! Amazing! To pinpoint exactly what it is that catapults his work into a realm that eclipses many of his peers is a futile task. Be it the way he poses his famous subjects before his poised lens or the compromising positions in which they contort themselves in or the unabashed starkness of his provocative images or perhaps it's that his photos procure art enthusiasts through a feeling of connectness to this luminary —whatever it is, it works. I sat down with the ingenious, self-taught 29-year-old photographer at The 101 Coffee Shop in Hollywood to pick his brain on his craft. Dressed in a black hooded sweatshirt, with the hood pulled over his hair, we settle into one of the diner's booths in the back. He shares that he has dislocated his shoulder – a regular occurrence – and that it's been irritating him. I cringe. He asks if I'd like to feel it. I do. I had never felt a shoulder out of its socket before. "I got my start directing music videos with the Wu-Tang guys…," he tells me. "There was a time I was living with a girl. I took one picture that became very big on the internet back in the start of Myspace. It was of two pairs of shoes in an empty closet. We broke up and I took all of her stuff and threw it out and I wanted to take a picture of the remains. It was my first relationship." The people from MAGIC, the fashion trade show, saw the photo and bought it to use for their international ad campaign. "From there, they hired me to do their ad campaign with big models and everything, but I didn't own a camera. I went and bought a camera and quickly taught myself how to shoot." This was the beginning of a redirected career path. "When I started doing the photos I didn't know you could make a living as a photographer. I didn't know anything about photography." During this time, Tyler had a roommate who was a photographer, but Tyler's new found talent didn't sit well with the veteran, whose work wasn't met with the same acclaim. Tyler was left to learn the craft on his own. "He was very mad at me for years. It never worked out for him. The first time anybody ever took my picture, when I was 12, he did it. He'd been doing it for a long time. We still keep in touch. We're much friendlier now, but there were a couple of years where…" he trails off. The Jacksonville, Florida transplant has yielded some truly remarkable work in the eight years he's been doing this. "I came here [Los Angeles] to direct videos and make movies, and then photography happened. I had the moment where I realized, Oh, this is actually like a real thing that could really affect people. I'm going to take it serious." This past May, Tyler presented his second gallery exhibition, Life Is Not A Fairytale, featuring an eclectic showcase: color, black and white, video, live and performance art. Among the guests in attendance were a few of his beautiful, known subjects: Lindsay Lohan, Emma Roberts, and Brittany Snow. (Tyler photographed Miami Living Magazine's Brittany Snow cover.) Simply stated, his work is captivating. His photos and videos engage the voyeur within. It's as though you're witness to a taboo scene, one that you shouldn't have intruded upon, but did and are amused. There is something very raw and magical about it all. Guns, knives, and blood are regular props that pop up. Where does the inspiration for these reoccurring fixtures come from? "I think with the guns and knives, cereal, milk… these things are all very recognizable pieces in society and so are some of the people. You put 'em together, you 38 MIAMI LIVING