The First Session with Hailey, Accompanied by Carol & Ingrid (Prospect, Nova Scotia)

This session was several weeks in the planning; Carol has been trying to introduce me to Hailey, a potential model, but plans kept falling through. Finally, on this day, the stars aligned, and Hailey and I, along with Carol and Ingrid (because one can never have enough company!), headed out onto the rocks and shoreline of Prospect, to make some images. I started the session with a couple of composition of Carol, and Carol and Ingrid, to give Hailey some insight into how I work, but very quickly jumped in with two feet, and we made some compositions of her along the rocky shoreline, taking advantage of the angular evening light.

Digital infrared original

As first sessions go, the evening was less than ideal; it was quite windy, which mixed with the evening air to create quite a cool ambient temperature. Hailey insisted it was fine (she grew up in the Canadian arctic), and continued, enthusiastically, to work with me. One of the best images of her was set against a small glacial erratic; the initial composition had her arching towards the ground, but the light on her back was not very descriptive...then I asked her to arch back, pushing her shoulders back, and the angular light provided beautiful description of her back, placing a delicate line running down her spine!

Digital infrared original

As Haley and I continued to work, the evening light shaped the session - low, angular sun provided rich shadows, and a small section of bare rock among the shore grasses provided the ideal place to work.

Digital infrared original

Though the intent of the session was to give Hailey an introduction to working with me, the presence of Carol and Ingrid made the temptation of creating multi-model images too hard to resist. Quite rapidly, each location turned into a multi-model exploration, with me frequently finding more possibilities than I could reasonably realize, given the chill in the air. Time and time again, the models would finish a particular location, and I'd suggest that it might be getting too cool to continue, and time and time again the three would agree I was crazy, the evening was beautiful, and one more would be possible.