Christine at the Coast

This session, Christine's third posing nude, was our first to follow my preferred mode of working; we met in the late afternoon and had the freedom to work until the light, energy, or ideas ran out.

Digital original, 2 frame stitch

We decided to work at Prospect as it is one of the few coastal areas near Halifax which permits a good view of the sun setting over water. The evening had a near featureless blue sky which kept the contrast high and while we had come to Prospect in hopes of working with the sunset, my natural aversion to high-contrast kept Christine and I working in the shade for much of the session.

Christine's colouring is so fair that I'd expected much of the session's work to be in colour, but it was only the small series of images I made in the beginning of the evening that were made that way. Focusing on her reflection in a tidal pool, the contrast between Christine's skin and hair, and the rocks around her works much better in colour than monochrome.

Digital infrared original

Almost all the other images created during the session were created with my infrared camera. We made a series of portraits in a crevasse-like corner and even when we moved out into the direct evening sunlight, I kept working in infrared - the sunset light was so contrasty that I felt it would be better to accentuate that through using the already high-contrast infrared, rather than try to tame the contrast in colour images. In retrospect, I think I might have made some strong colour images if I had decided to work with colour at this point, but Christine and I planned to work in colour at the actual sunset, so more than anything, we were just waiting for the sun to set.

Digital infrared original

As it turned out, well before the sun set, the air temperature dropped, and Christine and I had to abandon our plans. With some reluctance, we packed up and headed back towards the car, only to be pulled to a stop less than five minutes later. A lone tree was growing on top of an exposed rock, and both Christine and I agreed that while it was still cool, away from the water it was warm enough to follow through with a final set of images. After exploring the possibilities for about ten minutes, Christine was beginning to get seriously chilled, so we called it quits for a second time, and headed for Halifax.