Ok, so its September and I have been pretty slack on keeping to my schedule with making things happen on the blog front. This can be attributed to a few reasons which I shall now list in non-chronological order.
-I bought an apartment. A very, very nice apartment. Ok, very nice doesn't quite cut it here, Its fucking amazing!
-I tore the tendons in two fingers during an over-psyched climbing session which meant I couldn't hold my camera and was in excruciating pain for 3 days.
-As soon as the fingers were capable of taking a bit of strain, I made up for lost time by shooting at a furious rate.
-I have been getting all my ducks in a row regarding the financial side of things with Two Shoes Photo. This is a tedious process., made even more fun by the fact all the documents are in Norwegian.
-I have been making lists of things in non-chronological order in my spare time to procrastinate the actual effective use of my time. Its sad.
But more to the point here, the remainder of my pictures from my trip to Iceland are finished and have been delivered! This is a milestone for me as this has been the Achilles heel in my life for me for the last few weeks. Finally I can start planning the next move for the fashion side. Its going to be especially interesting was now I have free access to my own studio! Before I run away with plans on what will be happening here, and there will be ALOT happening, let me take you through what you're about to see.
Apart from the head shots which are pretty straight forward and don't really require a written explanation, I would like to just do a quick run down of the stuff we shot on location. The previous days shooting was fantastic right until I got the rental car submerged up to the chassis in fine Icelandic beach sand. Admittedly this was one of the most shameful moments in my history as a human being. I felt a part of my "South African-ness" get sucked down with the underpowered Chevrolet into the sand that would become known as the "vibe-killer" on set. For those of you that are unaware, I will explain, South African men, the endangered species that we are would never admit to getting any car stuck anywhere. Its the kind of statement that will usually demote you in the pecking order with the boys. We are the kind of people that would rather bludgeon our meal to death, cook it over an open fire than "pay" for anything another male might have prepared. I use inverted comma's on pay because this is a concept that has also been a bit foggy to us. We have learned the most efficient way to get something is to "take". My testosterone level was already sinking rapidly, this was now made even worse by the fact I was surrounded by a female make up and hair stylist, a female fashion stylist, and two female models. Better start digging Nic. Eventually, a coarse and bloody fingered two hours later, and with the help of a passer-by his 1400nM truck, we freed the fucking useless piece of shit 2WD Chevrolet poor defenceless Chevrolet. The time was now 1:30AM and we still had three more setups to shoot. The shoot finished at 6:00AM.
The next was looking challenging already. Luckily, and if it weren't for this, I probably would have had a wobbly out on location, my model was an absolute dream to work with. What a massive difference this makes. My team was for lack of a better word, perfect. It just gelled. Everything ran like clockwork. I have never had things work that efficiently on a shoot before. We shot a bunch of different outfits in the field of flowers and herbs, basically just trying out different looks, lighting setups, lighting modifiers, moods and ideas. I was initially struggling to find my footing with the Profoto system and balance out the ambient and strobe lighting, not because of the math, but it wasn't really doing anything for me. In the end, i ditched the strobes as I felt and could clearly see the beautiful natural light was doing a lot more for the look I wanted. I flipped the motor drive on and just did a series of natural light bursts which logistically is way easier. You will see in the images that follow what I'm talking about. As much of a treat it was to work with US$ 30000 lighting rig, turning it off and unplugging it was probably the best decision I made that day. I think the concept that we had planned out initially real came to life in that day shooting. I would love to share the images that we used for inspiration, but due to laws and professional courtesy, I can't. I will say though, that natural beauty, playfulness, intrigue, mystique, Lord of the Rings, movement, flow, balanced, Arwin, wind, and dynamic were some of the words that we threw around the table the first time we all met up. I was ecstatic when I first brought the images into Lightroom, as I could immediately tell that this was going to be killer. What a difference it makes to work with like minded people, chilled, open minded, and creative people. A sense of humour goes a really long way on a shoot like this. Its fun, it's about playing, being uninhibited and doing something different. As much of a technical nerd I am when it comes to taking pictures, every now and then when there are these moments that you just can't plan out, you can't prep for the small details. I will tell you that having a model as animated, extroverted and wild as Una from Elite will make things sooooo much easier. I really remember that day as one of the best days I have had to date shooting pictures. I thank all of you that I worked with for your amazing skill, creativity and sense of humour.
Im off to work for a short while on Tuesday, and when I get back I will moving out of the desolate wank pit into my new abode AKA Two Shoes castle of coitus. But I have PLENTY of stuff that will go up in the next couple of days. Stay tuned for something fresh and energetic over the next week or so. Possibly even a video appearance! Here are the pictures featuring the stunning and undoubtedly talented Una Rikey from Elite Model Iceland. Have a great week and stay classy. N.
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