Three Models in Fredericton

The reason for the visit to Fredericton was to do a session on figure photography for the New Brunswick Craft College, as I have done for the past three years. In addition to presenting at the college, the trip gave me a chance to catch up with Kayla, and work with her and Jenn for a second time this fall (the first was during a similarly brief visit to Fredericton).

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The initial hope had been to work with Jenn and Kayla the previous evening, and with a new model, Paige, on this afternoon, but as things turned out, we couldn't find a location to work in on the previous evening, so I negotiated to work with all three models on this particular afternoon. Finding a space to work in was a concern as well, until we secured a room at the local arts centre. The location have beautiful large windows, and while the weather was poor and a little damp, that didn't really impact the light coming through the windows.

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I began the session working with each model individually, before working with first two, then all three of them together. When working away from home, where time is limited, and scheduling is of the essence, I frequently try to book photo sessions one after the other, to maximize my use of time. In this case, with three models to work with during the afternoon, I tried hard to be fair to each and make the contribution they were making in terms of time and enthusiasm as valued as I could.

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One interesting thing about this session was how much the room we were in influenced the images; with large windows on a second floor, it permitted me to work with a great deal of natural light, and even when I shifted to working with flash, the 5 meter ceiling let me light the models in a much for flexible manner. After setting up the black backdrop (as a strong contrast to the well lit room we'd worked in at the start of the session) because of the high ceiling, I could actually place a light coming directly over the backdrop, opposite the camera position. Usually I have to light from the side of the backdrop, in rooms with 3m ceilings, but in this case, I had the freedom to light in anyway way I wished!

Gothic Revival in Fredericton

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I have not worked with architectural subjects in any concentrated way since my trip to the USA in 2000. This is due to the strength of my interest in a specific period of architectural history (later 19th century military fortifications), and my lack of interest in most modern architecture (the fact that Halifax, where I live has little in the way of interesting modern architecture doesn't help this either). All this being said, I have a deep and unsatisfied love for architectural photography, so when I was driving through Fredericton in search of a source of breakfast foods, and passed by a beautiful stone chapel, I knew I'd have to return and photograph it before I left town to head back to Moncton.

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The chapel (St Anne's Chapel of Ease) turned out to be a 19th century Gothic revival church, based upon the older designs from Europe, as opposed to more contemporary designs of the era in which it was built. As such it had great resonance for me (I lived in England briefly as a child), and as soon as I could, I was back at the chapel, camera and tripod in hand, exploring the exterior, and making what images I could in the time I had. While I was photographing outside, Joy went and tried to gain permission to photograph the interior as well, but the chapel was in use for the day, and it would only be possible to photograph the interior on another day, which wasn't possible for us, given the schedule we were on.

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In retrospect, the most interesting thing about my photographs of the chapel is that they are all details. I had no interest in showing the building as a whole, set in modern day Fredericton. I was looking for the grace and beauty of old-world architecture, and found the juxtaposition of the "real" world around it, sidewalks, power lines, and single family dwellings, to be jarring and problematic. So I kept my eyes on the details for after twenty cold minutes or so of photographing, before heading off to make plans for the the rest of the day.

A Field Trip

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I find it fascinating that for all the time I spend photographing outdoors, working with the Nude in landscape, I still find a straight landscape hard to create. Every time I have a class field trip, I focus on working with the landscape, trying to make the most of the experience, but it usually ends up lacking something.

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I suspect much of this is rooted in two distinct and different aspects of the issue. First, while most successful landscape are created within a couple of hours of sunrise or sunset, my class field trips are usually conducted during the middle of the day, when the light is the least conducive to good photograph. If I developed a strong and focused interest in landscape photography, I could of course overcome this by simply getting up earlier, or staying out later to photograph. The second aspect is much more influential, I suspect, and that has to do with my connections to the subject. When I photograph the Nude, I am working with a subject that has been at the heart of my creative endeavors for almost two decades, and when I am photographing the landscape, I am simply making images because I happen to be in the space. The two subjects in no way share the same space in my heart, and I think, ultimately, this changes how I approach the subjects at the end of the day!

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A Final Pregnancy Session with Carol

While Carol and I had a full studio session ten days earlier, we still managed to fit in one final session before she delivered a healthy baby a week later.

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The session was short, as I'd really headed over to Carol's house just to keep her company for the afternoon, but when she said she'd be up for a short photo session, who was I to say no? I quickly put up my white sheets and had Carol sit on some cushions in the middle of them. Fortunately the weather was cooperating, and the sun came through a window onto the sheets, providing a brilliant highlight, and some wonderful contrast to the scene.

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It is a very different way of photographing, when all you seek is a single, archetypal image.For the past six months or so, Carol and I have been following a series of poses through her pregnancy, working towards a final image compositing the six months of photographs into a single frame (like this image of Carol's first pregnancy). This session was totally different, with us simply making new images for the celebration of light, beauty and the fruition of Carol's second pregnancy.

After half an hour of photographing, I strongly felt like I'd made a couple of very striking images, and packed up the equipment, and headed off with Carol for a walk (which was actually the original idea behind the visit).

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This afternoon's photographs marked my final session of Carol's second pregnancy; as a couple of days later, she went into labor, and delivered her second healthy child!

Kayla & Jenn in Fredericton

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In the fall of this year, Kayla moved to Fredericton for school; in early October, I had to head up to Fredericton (about two hours from where I was living, in Moncton, NB) for a meeting, so I got in touch with Kayla, to see if it would be possible to spend some time working together when I was in town. As it turned out, in addition to being keen to get in a session, Kayla offered to put me up for the night, taking some of the rushed quality out of the visit and giving us even more time to work together.

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In addition to setting aside some time to work with me, Kayla mentioned my visit to several friends, and let them know I am always interested in working with new models. Several expressed interest, and one, Jenn, ended up modeling, first on her own, and then with Kayla, during the session. The session was in the evening, so I set up my flash equipment in Kayla's small dorm room, bouncing the light off the ceiling to give a soft, diffused light to the entire room.

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In the end, as much as this was first session for Jenn, the biggest influence in the session was the small space. I had to work hard to make compositions that worked in the location, and in the end, the best images of the session were the ones of the two models posing together, and those images tended to use closer compositions that focused more on details and the overall view. I am always impressed by how well first sessions often go with new models, but in this case, I was even more impressed, as I was so distracted from the session by location issues (all of which were overcome during the session) that I couldn't provide all the attention, encouragement and support which I usually try to provide to someone working with me for the first time.

A Studio Pregnancy Session with Carol

With Carol's due date becoming more and more immanent, we decided to shift gears a little for this session, and actually focus on the pregnancy itself. For almost all the sessions we've had together since we began working on the project, we have been working on a series of images following the evolving pregnancy, but have actually spent almost no time photographing the pregnancy beyond those three sets of images

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I set up my flash lighting and a black backdrop to work again, and we began working. As with almost all my photo sessions, we began with a series of portrait, balancing the beautiful curves of Carol's belly against her serene face. Once these were finished, we moved onto more body centric images, working our way from some standing pose to a series with Carol lying on the floor. It was important to work in this order (standing, then lying down) to ensure that Carol didn't tire out. The session was taking place at the end of the day, and while Carol was vibrant and full of energy, I didn't want to tire her our any more than necessary, regardless of how keen she was to model.

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By the end of the session, I was very pleased with what I had seen through he viewfinder. Though the room we were in was small, I'd been able to control the lighting enough to get the effect I was looking for, with smooth, luminous highlights and a deep black background.

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I am not sure if this will be our last pregnancy session or not (Carol's due date in in less than two weeks), but as I was packing equipment up to head for home, I knew that we'd made some beautiful images of the peak of the pregnancy, singular photographs to work alongside the documentary series we'd been working on for so many months!

Victoria on Maugher's beach

While R_'s arrival in Nova Scotia was unexpected, Victoria's visit at the end of September was long anticipated, and while I didn't know if we'd get the chance to work together, I was very much looking forward to seeing her for the first time in over a year.

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As it turned out, Victoria did have time to head out for an afternoon, and, while it wasn't certain we'd have the chance to make some photos, I brought my camera and tripod along just in case. It turned out to be a good decision, as once we were on McNab's Island (we'd gone out sailing for the afternoon, to enjoy the early fall day), Victoria offered to pose for a while, as much to continue building the images we've worked on to date as to make new ones.

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The only model with whom I've consistently worked with longer than Victoria is Ingrid, and that is only by a matter of an extra week. The strength of our work has only increased over the years, a combination of my evolving photographic abilities, and what both Victoria and I have learned from the results of our sessions.

For a variety of reasons, this was a very brief photo session; the day was sunny and bright, but there was a cool snap in the air which would have eventually become uncomfortable. I started the session with a series of standing portraits, setting Victoria behind a screen of high dune grass with the sun behind her. With the wind blowing the grass all over the place, the successful images were more luck and happenstance than skill, but we still made several striking images.

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From here we moved onto a few bodyscapes on the beach itself, backing the composition with the dune grass and dark sky (it was actually bright blue, but rendered as almost black with the infrared camera). After these, we finished off the session with another series of portraits, this time with the sun cascading across her torso, and her sun turned towards it, eyes closed. A beautiful way to end the session.

R_ Indoors (with a Snake!)

The last session with R_ before she went back to Europe was to be spent working indoors; R_ had asked about modeling with our snake, Slytherin, and as our work has begun five years before indoors, I thought it would be a good way to close her visit to Nova Scotia.

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I have only worked a couple of times in my new apartment, and also welcomed the chance to work again with the new space. Often it takes several sessions before I become really comfortable with the light in a space, and am really able to make the most of its potential. With this apartment facing east, it isn't the best for afternoon or evening light, but what light there is tends to be lovely and even, so that at least is in my favour.

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Though I did work some with my infrared camera, this session was unusual in that the majority of the images I made were produced with my colour DSLR. With Slytherin playing a major part in the session, much of my focus was on colour (his orange and yellow colouring worked very well against R_'s rich skin tone), and while many of the images were eventually converted into black and white, Having the option of keeping them in colour was a definite benefit.

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Overall, the session was a great close to R_'s visit. As we both knew it would be the last session, it ended with an emphasis on portraits, something that I feel is quite important, given that I don't know when we'll next have a chance to work together again. R_ has extended an invitation to work with her in Europe, and while I don't know when I'd be able to take her up on that offer, it is certainly something I'd love to be able to avail myself of someday.

Alexandra & Liam at the Coast

Alexandra and Liam had blocked out their whole day to work with me, so after the river session in the morning, we took a break for lunch, and then drove to the coast, to spend the rest of the afternoon working along the shoreline.

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An unexpected element of this session was Liam's willingness (and indeed, enthusiasm) for working in the ocean. While the Atlantic Ocean is actually at its warmest in October, by mid-September, the air temperature is low enough to make it seem quite the opposite, so when Liam first volunteered to pose in the ocean proper, I tried to discourage him. Forty minutes later, he was still in the ocean. I finally had to consider his claims that it wasn't that cold had to have some validity.

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Over the four or so hours that the three of us worked along the shoreline, we made a wide variety of images, working between photographs focusing on each model individually, and images of them together as a couple. Usually when I work with two models outdoors, even if they are in a relationship, I tend to use the second model as a resource to add to an image if it looks like a second figure would add to the composition, but with Alexandra and Liam, I just as frequently would make images that were mirrors to their relationship. Time and time again, the addition of the second figure would spontaneously evolve into a change of pose and position, until it became, quite naturally, an image focusing on intimacy and tenderness, for all that is set in the great outdoors.

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The day spent with Alexandra and Liam was fabulous, with the perfect mix of a late summer day, great company, food and photos. Since this session, the two models have moved overseas for a time (six months or more), so it will be my last chance to work with them for some period of time, but it was a rich and variety filled session that led to some really striking results, perfect for my final session of the year with them.

Alexandra in the Woods

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After we had a break for lunch, Alexandra, Liam and I discussed our options. Behind the house where we had lunch were some thick woodlands, with a number of really lovely treed; Alexandra agreed it would be interesting to see what would could do with such a simple space.

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As I suspect, the silver-white wood of the old trees was beautiful in infrared, complimenting perfectly the luminous smoothness of Alexandra's skin. Towards the end of the ten minutes we spent working with the trees, I shifted to working in colour, and made a number of really pleasing portraits.

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