Colouroids

It was so nice to be asked to work with Steven Billups again recently, while he was over from the US visiting family in Germany. I got to explore the Black Forest amongst other locations, which was just the kind of location where every frame would have been beautiful - streams, waterfalls, rock formations, mossy stones... it had the lot - my kind of shooting paradise! (I did get bitten by a chihuahua during a break, though, which was a bit of a shock - we'd had to stop for a while as the chihuaua and two human friends decided to set up a picnic right by where we shooting -  until then we'd managed to avoid the troops of German school children frolicking around on nature trips - so obviously I attempted to befriend the little cutie like a mad (dogsick) lady... BAD idea. Lesson learnt. Do not approach strangers' dogs, however fluffy.)

Anyway, one of the highlights of the trip was spotting a field full of luscious tall, yellow, happy sunflowers just off the side of a road... so we had to shoot there. I've been sent some colour polaroids already from what we did there (they've had no tone or contrast adjustments), and also a few from an old castle ruin we worked at on the first day and from the Black Forest on the second day, with the processed film shots to come soon. Colour polaroid is so magical. It works so well for a 70s hippie sunflower feel particularly in the first two shots, I reckon, and looks kinda mystical and pretty by the castle, with the pink orbs of light! The ones in the Black Forest came out really strange and dreamy... Watching these develop was very exciting!

We thought we'd drop a poloroid into the 50-cent honesty box by the sunflower field (you can chop off a flower to keep, with the yellow knives which are provided), and maybe make the local German paper, guerilla flower-flasher style... but we had a bit of trouble choosing one we'd be happy to lose, so it remained just an amusing idea...

Hope you like these!! I love them!

P.S. Here is a chihuahua apologetic; never-bitten-anyone-in-her-life, little darling Lulu Lambambi. She comes for runs with me.

Clouds and Poppies

Ah, isn't naming post titles one of the most fun parts of writing a blog? A bit like having children is mainly so that you can call your offspring fun names? Yes? (Ezra - current middle-name fave for male child numero one, thereby necessitating the creation of a second child in order to put into use the middle name 'Inigo', since I don't think I want children with more than one middle name each). Hhm.

Hellooo! It's been soo beautiful today!! And I am extra happy for having had my hair lightened again today, although I thought it was a bit of a shame to be sitting inside under a hairdresser gown for the best part of the afternoon... My hairdresser is incredibly patient, putting foil after foil through my mane. Even though I WISH I was a sultry brunette, and of course my natural hair colour is brunette (but not really the sultry kind, I suppose), I just love being blonde. I might be going to south america (possibly Colombia and Ecuador) for a bit as part of my travels later this year, in which case being blonde will be a mistake, but hey, the worst that happened to me in Mexico City was a butt-grab in the metro (the male-female station divide was 'out of order' that day - I imagine it makes a good difference. The friend I'd made that morning swore at him for me in Spanish), and a bit of occasional attention doesn't scare me so long as I'm careful and don't actively seek it out.

...So anyway, this is all getting to a big hint that I will be donning my backpack again from October for some west-ward gallavants, and that I am welcoming bookings here in England for August (I'm currently free for just a few days at the beginning and the end) and September (Scotland trip pending, depending on confirmed interest from a few photographers and some specific date-setting); so UK photographers, please do get in touch and fill up my diary for the rest of the year!

***

When I went down to Sussex recently (a trip which started with the beach pebble shoot in Brighton with Jeremy Howitt) I also got to work for a second time with Rayment Kirby (previous shoot here), and he and his wife very kindly put me up for the night in their house. I've been lucky enough to have been chosen as one of the models to be in another one of his books, which is going to have the theme 'mystery and contrasts'. Looking forward to seeing it completed! He wanted to achieve a good range of images with me, hence the very mixed bag below!

As with the last time, there are both 'straight' shots and a few which get 'transformed' and arrive in my inbox bit by bit, which is always fun (most of these were done in camera though, using clever equipment for effects)!

 (I love my sari!)

Bedroom Glamour

Sorry for letting that last post run a while, but in between a brilliant trip to Germany's Black Forest as well as a great little trip to the Manchester/Stockport area, I wanted to allow the news of the new book to take precedence for a while here in my little online space. :-) However, my desktop is BURSTING with new images from various people which I can't wait to show on here, so... onwards!

It was lovely to hear from Tony Ornstien, a photographer I have worked with quite a few times but hadn't seen in a while, a few weeks ago and recently I went over to his and his wife Jennifer's wonderful, mad house (it is crammed with enormous, intriguing art, and built like a 'train carriage', which means you walk through a seemingly endless stream of differently-styled rooms all in one direction). I was booked for another dose of photography, since Jennifer requested some new art for their walls. It's always fun to work with this duo, and Tony wanted to create some natural, intimate, relaxed, elegant bedroom ('boudoir', maybe) scenes. This style is intimate, and somehow classical and retro at once, and the atmostphere is vaguely similar to the image I have down the side of my blog here, 'Bis' by Pamela Hanson, which I (obviously) love. Liberated and friendly and natural. We found that the trick was to act, move and actually perform the particular movements or mini-narratives, rather than pose stiffly in a scene, and there was a lot of silliness involved.

The final set was the ultimate in multi-tasking at the end of a shoot; clearing up my things and modelling at the same time... :-) I am pleased with many of these (and there are a lot of shots - trying to decide on one or two favourites for my website!) and I hope to visit Tony and Jennifer again sometime soon!

P.S. To the person/bot who keeps trying to spam my old posts with vacuous automated comments about how 'informative' and 'well put together' my content is, and then suggesting I take a look at their loans website, please kindly fuck off. If you knew how strongly I felt about people who make money through interest, you'd understand how liberally I am deleting your ridiculous attempts to advertise your probably-virus-filled evil website through my ART blog.