Monique in a Waterfall

The second day with Monique had a lot in common with the first - the forecast called for rain, and the precipitation simply never arrived. We headed out mid morning, hoping to get in as many photos as possible before the rain finally started. By the end of the session, the sun was threatening to come out, and not a single drop was felt.

8"x10" film

Where the previous day was spent working in a place I had scouted out beforehand, this session saw us venturing into the unknown; I had visited Gordon Falls previously with friends, and was suitably impressed by the grandeur of the falls, but given they were directly below the road, they didn't suit my work with the Nude very well. That being said, I suspected that little perseverance and exploration would likely reveal a perfect spot in which to work. I couldn't have been more right!

Not since I first worked at Dawson Brook in 1990 have I seen a space as beautiful as the Upper Falls (I don't know their real name, so that will do for now) - a beautiful upper river with rocks and moss, and then a 7 metre fall with a deep pool at its base, and then shallow water until the second set of falls. The space was rich with spaces to pose upon, and while the sides of the forest around it were steep, with care and effort, it was possible to work on them with the view camera with only a few problems.

Digital original, 2 image shutter speed blend

The light was perfect for the space, overcast and diffused enough to permit some longer exposures - in several cases, as long as four seconds. Because it was still early in the year, the water was too cold for Monique to actually work with water nudes, but we made a variety of images along side the water, with the longer exposures blurring the water as it moved past her.

Digital original

By the end of the afternoon, we had worked from one end of the waterfall to the other, where it dropped down another waterfall to the main river. I had worked through all the film and digital memory I had with me (the digital wallet which I usually use to download my digital images to was out for repair), and was feeling pretty imaged-out. The space was fabulous - overflowing with possibilities, and both Monique and I agreed we could have used twice the time, film and digital memory, and still not exhausted the space's potential.