A Session with Fern & L_ (Bridgewater, Nova Scotia)

Most of the time, photo sessions begin at my initiative, with me contacting models and arranging
for transportation etc, but for this session, it was a request from L_ that put things into motion. After
the session with R_ and Miranda, she'd asked me if I'd be interested in photographing her and her
sister together. I immediately said I'd love to and a week later a date was set.

6x7 cm film

I had never worked with sisters modeling together before, so I had no idea how the session would unfold. While most of my indoor images of multiple models have been of lovers, I have worked with pairs of models who are friends as well, which leads to a very different tone in the results (as shown in the Amicus folio), so I worked from the assumption this session would have a similar tone.

6x7 cm film

As with many of my indoor sessions, I began with both models lying down; this cast light across their bodies, and provided a beautiful rim light. Unfortunately, this approach didn't provide much in the way of lighting for portraits and, while this was a figure session, it was also focusing on the relationship between the sisters, so almost all the images were to be portraits. So, after making a few images of the models lying down, we shifted to working with sitting poses, and things just got better from there.

6x7 cm film

As I had hoped, what drove the session was the relationship between L_ and Fern; there was none of the hesitance or uncertainty that can mark the beginning of a session between friends, and yet a different tone to that of models who are also partners. A comfort and closeness between the sisters was evident, and easy to work off of. The similarity between their faces and bodies made it easy to work off one model to the other, and several times I made compositions that showed one sister in profile, and the other more directly, while other images used an overlapping or mirror effect to produce the final photograph.

8"x10" film

The session came to an end as the light dropped below usable levels. The last images of the
day were a series of 8"x10" portraits made right by the windows, and even these required a
two second exposure to get enough light onto the film. All in all, even with the low light, I
was very pleased with the session, and more importantly, after showing the work to Fern and
L_, know they are too!