Pictture of the Day: Soo Cool

The Soo Cool Forum Gathering
Playing with LED Lights
Sutro Baths, San Francisco
Canon 5D

Lady of the Elves

Just after a friend got married, I had asked her to do a photoshoot with me because she really reminded me of the elves of the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy-fame. Even her wedding gown was even of a Rivendell cut and nature.

After a bit of time due to scheduling issues, we finally managed to get some time together to do a shoot.

After getting to her house and setting up, I had shown her some of my concept drawings of the poses I'd like for her to do so that she had some idea of what to do in front of the camera. We went through her wardrobe, got her wedding dress, and another elven one she had made for another occasion, and we got to work.

I set up the backdrop in her living room and used only 2-3 strobes and one flash for most of the shots along with a reflector.

(TOP:I really wanted to make her look like a light source in this first photo, so I purposely made her white dress slightly overblown then softened it a bit in Photoshop. Added the sepia tone and burned the edges.)


(BOTTOM:For this one, I wanted to recreate a medieval look with a touch of the Romanticism era. She had another gown, in dark blue, so we took another sword, and lit only half of her face with a small reflector providing some fill for the other half.)

After some time with her wedding dress, she changed into the dark blue velvet gown, and we continued with the shoot.

Although she had never really posed infront of the camera before, she took to it well (with a little direction).

It also helped that we are good friends, so our comraderie put her at ease.

But, I have also noticed that when I do photoshoots with women, they have a tendency to relax a lot more around me and are more willing to work with me to get that "good" photo of themselves. Perhaps, it's because I'm a female photographer that they feel more relaxed, much like how some women much prefer having a female doctor or nurse.