December 31, 2007

Macro with Glass

Digital original, 2 image stitch
A glass worker friend gave me some "failed experiments" of leaves fired in the centre of glass blocks. The results were less than desirable for him, but for me, they were a rich sea of potential. I think I could spend an eternity photographing small things - the revelation of minutia is completely engrossing.
Digital original, 2 image stitch
When I was working with this piece of broken glass, just moving the camera a little or the red fabric behind it into a new shape would completely change the image as seen through the lens - I spent a good length of time just enjoying this play of light and colour.
Digital original

December 28, 2007

Miles & Monique Model Together

Digital original
Two years earlier, Miles and Monique posed together in a river, but this was their first session working together indoors. Interestingly, one of the first successful images of the session was of Monique playing with Miles' hair...which is exactly what she did when working with him in the river!
Digital original, 7 frame stitch
I really like the flow of this image, from where Miles and Monique’s hands come together, to how their hair comes together to completes the image.

December 26, 2007

Victoria and I Celebrate a Decade Anniversary

Digital original, 6 frame stitch
Victoria‘s been overseas for several years, completing her education, but fortunately for me, every time she’s come home to visit, she’s made some time to work with me, continuing to build on the images we first made together in 1998. With the particular image, I just revel in the beauty of the colour, which overlays the already lovely lines of her outstretched body.
Digital infrared original
As has been such a strong theme over recent indoor sessions, the brilliant light that comes in through my windows played a strong role in this session. The strong back-lighting provided beautiful light  for Victoria's hip, and her pose, with the averted face, is really quite pleasing.
Digital infrared original
The end of the session saw me taking the sheets of of the windows, and working with the hard, direct sunshine. Victoria and I experiment with a number of different poses, but the above was the one that had the best mix of strength and beauty.

Miranda & Monique Model Together

Digital original, 4 frame stitch
This session was almost four years after Miranda and Monique first modeled together, but time has only strengthened the connection between the two models. Where that first session was heavily directed, and focused n images about line, shape and form, rather than personal connection, this session was all driven by the models - and that was a much more pleasing way to work.
Digital original
The greatest gift anyone has ever given me in their trust, and permission to explore their beauty - and with Miranda and Monique, this gift is magnified through their mutual enthusiasm.
Digital original
Sometimes, sometime as simple as a hug can be the most beautiful thing in the world.

December 23, 2007

Working with Direct Sunlight

Digital infrared original
After working so much with soft light lately (achieved by throwing sheets over windows) on this particularly sunny December day, I decided to embrace the light side, and work with direct sunlight. The greatest challenge of this of course is exposure, but with a careful eye on my histograms, it didn't present any real issues.
Digital infrared original
As much as I curse when I have to work with direct sunlight - late in the day it can be extremely beautiful, even indoors! Much of my attention was placed on the negative space in these images - both the shadows cast by the model, and the highlights case behind her by the sun. In the above image, it was these elements which guided the composition.
Digital infrared original, 3 frame stitch
The most interesting image to come out of this session was the above; I really like the bold shape of the window cast upon the wall, and being made in infrared, there was a lower contrast than it would have had in colour, providing a more "natural look" than the harsher look of a more traditional approach.

Christina & Miles Model Together (Halifx, Nova Scotia)

Digital infrared original
Though there are two models in this session, it's focus was not to be on intimacy or relationships (as Christina and Miles had never modeled together before, this only made sense). The first image, above, took full advantage of the light, and even incorporates the sheers I use over my windows to diffuse hard sunlight.
Digital infrared original
All through the session, I focused on compare/contrast between the two models. I think there is some unwritten tale behind the above image - the power of both figures is striking, but very different in tone from each other.
Digital infrared original
I have always had a real attraction to simple, clean compositions - which, when combined with large areas of negative space, can lead to some very pleasing results. Direct sunshine in an indoor space also makes this approach easier, given how deep and dark the shadows become.

December 21, 2007

Broken Glass (Halifax, Nova Scotia)

Digital original
The delight of macro photography lies in how it transforms the obvious into the magical - in this case, a broken piece of a television screen is turned into a wonderful landscape of delicate colour and striking contrast.
Digital original
I spent an hour or more just lost on the minute details of the fractured glass - changing the camera position, or the angle of the glass even slightly created entirely new compositions, and revealed completely different compositional features.
Digital original
The best discovery of this session was the magic that happened when I held the glass shard up against the sky, and everything changed from dark and dramatic to bright and luminous. Only an occasional dark line hinted at the landscape below the sky.

December 16, 2007

Micro Photography of Glass (Halifax, Nova Scotia)

Digital original
The joy of macro can really explode when combined with the right subject; a friend had given me some glass work experiments he'd recently "failed with". When held in the hand, these 5" glass disks were a nondescript mess of dull colours, but when viewed through a macro lens (with extension tubes, providing a larger-than-life-sized magnification) the real beauty was revealed.
Digital original
The hardest part of this set of images was getting enough of the subject in focus. I tried hard to keep the glass I was photographing parallel to the camera, but with such high magnifications, I was battling the opposite issues of depth of field, and diffraction; with f/8 providing an effective aperture of f/16 at life-sized, and my camera beginning to suffer diffraction at f/16, I was pretty much stuck using one aperture, which gave very limited depth of field.
Digital original

December 12, 2007

Fern Poses Indoors (Halifax, Nova Scotia)

Digital original
Apart from a couple of sessions with her sister, I have only worked with Fern indoors once; unlike that session, which was happen stance, this afternoon of photography was long in the planning, I had the space we were going to work in prepared in advance of Fern's arrival, and minutes after she came through the door, we were making our first photographs.
Digital original, 3 frame stitch
Whether we're working indoors or out, a surprising number of photographs of Fern revolve around portraiture - outdoors there tends to be more "environment" in the composition, but her face is more often than not a major part of the image. To some degree, I think this is just a symptom of my pleasure at working with a model comfortable being identified.
Digital infrared original
True to my above comment, fully 3/4 of the images of Fern were portrait based, including this portrait, from right at the end of the session, made in infrared, I really like how all the tones, Fern's hair and skin have the same luminous quality.

Surface Tension Session (2007) #9 (Halifax, Nova Scotia)

Digital infrared original
This was the last session in two days of working with the purpose-built water pool; by this session all the glitches had been worked out, and I was really focused on the images, as opposed to the techniques.
Digital infrared original, 8 frame stitch
The biggest challenge with the Surface Tension series was making full-body images; while I'd made the pool 8' (2.5m) long the custom soft box I used to light it didn't light the entire surface evenly. As a result, while I could make full-body compositions, the illumination fall-off in the resulting images was really frustrating.
Digital infrared original
Even with such a staged environment as the water pool, spontaneity and fleeting moments influence my work. Towards the end of the session, The model was sweeping water off her face, when I caught a glimpse of the motion, and the parallel lines of her arms. I asked her to stay that way until the water settled around her...and then made the image. So it is a posed-spontaneity.

Surface Tension Session (2007) #8 (Halifax, Nova Scotia)

Digital infrared original
I have always enjoyed working with multiple models, enjoying the added complexity that a second body can add to an image. When planning these session, I hoped to work with multiple models several times, but ended up with an embarrassment of riches.
Digital infrared original, 4 frame stitch

When working outdoors, the addition of a second model to a location is often a real challenge - fitting one body in to a setting can be hard enough, and inserting a second up the ante. Indoors however, is often the reverse, with a second model often leading to a more striking composition. The water set was more like the outdoor experience, with the second body presenting a real challenge in regards to the pose. In the end, it was more a factor of Ingrid and Miranda‘s ingenuity than any skill on my part that a pose like this came to pass. Once I saw the interweaving of their bodies, the final result was simple enough to realize.

This image was featured in the 2008 exhibition “Memory of Water”, at ViewPoint Gallery in Halifax, Nova Scotia
Digital infrared original, 2 frame stitch
All through the Surface Tension series, I made images of the models which focused as much on their faces as their bodies; the above image is one of my favourites, as the balance between the faces and the bodies is really pleasing - both work on different levels within the same image.

I would again revisit the Surface Tension project eight years later, in 2015.

Surface Tension Session (2007) #7 (Halifax, Nova Scotia)

Digital infrared original, 6 frame stitch
Ingrid has no great love for studio photography, but with the water-pool project, she was completely within her element! Between modeling on her own and with Miranda, she ended up posing in the pool four times over two days. I am always tempted to show this image a s a vertical, like the model is coming out of a wall of mercury, as opposed to emerging from water.
Digital infrared original
As I continue to push the water-pool images forward, I am realizing that much like working with the Nude outdoors, there are only so many way to position the body so it works at the surface of the water; the strength of the images lies in the happenstance of the water motion as opposed to the success of the pose.
Digital infrared original, 2 frame stitch

Surface Tension Session (2007) #6 (Halifax, Nova Scotia)

Digital infrared original
The first session of the second day of working with the water pool saw Andree arrive bright an early. We'd worked together for the first time a month before, but when I described the pool project, she immediately wished to participate. With the experience of the previous day's sessions guiding me, we began with a series of portraits, and then moved onto bodyscapes.
Digital infrared original
Some of my favourite images of Andree are of the water slowly drawing back off of her body; I'd ask her to submerge, and then very slowly bring her body to the surface - the results were really magical.
Digital infrared original, 18 frame stitch
Towards the end of the session, Andree moved into a pose which placed her head just out of the water, below an arched arm, and on direct axis with the rest of her body; it flows directly from some of the images of the previous day, but has a simplicity and clarity which was missing in the earlier versions.

The image was featured as a 15"x54" print in my 2008 exhibition "Memory of Water".

December 11, 2007

Surface Tension Session (2007) #5 (Halifax, Nova Scotia)

Digital infrared original, 8 image stitch
The final session of the first day working with the water pool in Halifax was spent working with B_; she'd posed for me before both indoors and out, but this was our first time working together in a studio setting.
Digital infrared original
The image above I particularly like, even though the water pool is only a minor part of the composition; the curve of the shoulder and hip, the wet hair, and fine water drops on B_'s skin are beautiful.
Digital infrared original
All through the three days of working with the waterpool set, I continually returned to archetypal images - in this case, portraits of each model with their head emerging from the water. The great pleasure of working with so many models in the same set was that each approached the same basic directions in their own unique ways!

Surface Tension Session (2007) #4 (Halifax, Nova Scotia)


Digital infrared original
The fourth session was kind of a continuation of the third; Miranda's roommate Nicole came to model with her (though we did some images of Nicole on her own at the start of the session).
Digital infrared original
Working with two women was a different than a couple; much of what I created with Miranda and Nicole was about contrast; one model's hip contrasted with the other's back, the lines of a stomach echoing the curves in a breast.
Digital infrared original
When Miranda and Nicolle offered to pose together in the waterpool, I wasn’t aware at how closely their bodies mirrored each other. Only when we began working together did I quickly realize that as soon as the session was done, I wouldn’t be able to tell one from the other.

Surface Tension Session (2007) #3 (Halifax, Nova Scotia)

The third session with the new water pool was with Miranda, who's been one of my most constant models over the past eight years. Her comfort with modeling gave me the freedom to experiment with motion, something that didn't work well in the smaller pool I used in Moncton.
Digital infrared original
One advantage of using studio flash with the water pool images was its ability to freeze motion. In this case, I asked Miranda to repeat a motion that produced interesting ripples in the water around her. The success rate was incredibly low (perhaps 80-100 images for each success, but when it worked, the results were quite striking.

This image was featured in the 2008 exhibition “Memory of Water”.
Digital infrared original, 8 image stitch
The more I work with the pools, the more focused I am on the beauty of still water; the beautiful reflection of Miranda's leg, hip and torso couldn't be more beautiful.
Digital infrared original
The best thing about this session with Miranda was that her partner was also posing with her; the added model made the photos a little more challenging to make (two bodies are harder to pose than one, at times), but the results were really pleasing.
Digital infrared original