Fall Foliage (Halifax, Nova Scotia)

Digital original, 2 frame focus blend

On the way back to my car from a Photo 101 field trip, I saw this leaf, either fallen or placed in the fence around the Public Gardens; the colours wewre just lovely, so I paused a photographed it. To ensure the background would be as soft as possible, I blended two images, one with the 150mm lens's maximum aperture (f/2.8) and one at f/8.

A Dartmouth Waterfront Field Trip (Dartmouth, Nova Scotia)

Digital original

Though I have no real affection for modern architecture, there is something quite beautiful about a sky reflected in a glass building.

Digital infrared, three frame stitch

One reason I am seldom without my infrared converted DSLR body is skies; there is not comparison between an infrared image of a dramatic sky, and one made with a colour camera, and converted to black and white.

Digital original, two frame stitch

The most magical part of this field trip was just after twilight, when the ambient light started to mix well with the man-made light of the ferry terminal. I particularly like the coloured reflections on the tires.

Jenn and K_ Model by a Fall River (Dawson Brook, Nova Scotia)

Digital original, 6 frame stitch

K_ had accompanied Jenn on her previous session, to get a sense of what it was like to model Nude; at this session, she decided to take the plunge, so the first set of images were made of her reclining by the river.

Digital infrared original, 2 frame stitch

The reason for choosing to work at Dawson's Brook was the water, but given the time of year (late fall), actually posing in the water was not an option, so as many of the poses as possible worked along the edge of the water, mixing the static poses of the models with fluid, motion-blurred water.

Digital original, 2 frame stitch

The final image set of the day was made at the foot of the water fall, working with the small waterfalls that flowed out of the pool there. Using an ultra-wide angle of view (accomplished by stitching together 17 images made with a 40mm lens) I was able to balance Jenn's figure against the foot-high water fall directly in front of me, something that would have been impossible with a narrower angle of view.

Digital original, 17 frame stitch

A Fall Session with Jenn (Dartmouth, Nova Scotia)

Digital original

One of the rewards of how I work is the long term relationships that can develop with models; I first worked with Jenn in New Brunswick in 2006, and photographed her four times between then and 2008. I hadn't heard from here for five years, when out of the blue, she got in touch, revealed she now lived near Halifax, and asked if I'd be interested in doing some more photos. There is no doubt what the answer was, and though it was early October, the weather smiled upon us, and on the next weekend, we went out and began our 5th session working together in  seven years.

Digital original

In some ways, this session was more of an exercise talk than a photo session; as neither of us was familiar with the setting, we spent easily half our time walking around and looking for spaces for Jenn to pose in. Ironically, for all that we spent 90 minutes working together, most of the successful images (two of the three shown here) were made less than five minutes from where we parked).

Digital infrared original

One of the most surprising images from this session was of Jenn posing on the base of a transmission tower. Initially I was dubious about the possibilities the space offered - it seemed a little unrelated to place a body against such a frail, angular form, but as Jenn explored the possibilities, so really striking compositions emerged, including this, my favorite.