I haven’t been doing a very good job of blogging. Here is one photo from each of my shoots in 2018.
In March I photographed Abigail and her aerial hoop. She’s an amazing athlete.
In April, India was next as part of my food series, covered in modified corn starch. Look at how it wrinkles the skin when it dries.
August was a busy month. I got a new lens, the Zeiss Batis 85mm f1.8, and asked Melissa to shoot so I could try it out. We spent 4 hours walking around downtown Madison and the UW campus.
My trip to New York City in mid-August worked with three different models.
Anna Russel is a professional ballet dancer. We had an amazing morning in Central Park.
Dane Halo is a Canadian model who was visiting New York, we spent the afternoon in the Meatpacking District.
Jo Patrice was able to secure this amazing rooftop location in Brooklyn.
In September just before classes started Maria was the next in my food series, with a new product from Wilton called Color Mist Food Coloring Spray.
Angie Marie, a model and photographer stopped by in August and was covered with Lemon Pie filling.
And in December, Natalie was back in Madison visiting family and we got in a quick shoot.
I was in the Auxvasse Cemetery, in Auxvasse, Missouri. My experience today was quite literally colored by the clouds. As the eclipse approached so did a storm.
The first 50 or even 75% of the eclipse I don’t feel that the amount of light really changed. If I didn’t know it was happening I don’t think I would have noticed. Part of that may be because of the clouds that were coming in and we’re used to clouds causing less light.
As the eclipse approached 85-90% it did start to darken noticeably and very quickly. There are stories of battles in the ancient world that are stopped by eclipses. I can really see how that could happen now. As the eclipse begins everything seems normal, but you reach that point where it’s just too dark and you can see the sun is just a sliver of light in the sky.
For me, totality wasn’t the part that was most thought provoking. Maybe it was because of the clouds, where I couldn’t see the full effect of the black disc where the sun should be. I mean, I saw the moon blot out the sun, I saw the corona, I saw the edges of the sun just before and after totality. But it all had this fuzz of cloud over it. You know how on some days it’s overcast but at the perfect thickness where you can look directly at the sun and see that it’s round? It felt sort of like that. I wasn’t looking into black nothingness like I would have been if the sky were clear.
But, I think that gave me something that I wouldn’t have seen with clear skies. Right at the end of totality I didn’t see the white light of the sun. I saw reds, and blues, and purples as the sun re-emerged. Normally I’d think these colors in a photo would be the result of chromatic aberration, the limits of physics and the way camera lenses bend light. But I saw these colors with my own eyes. I think it was the clouds. The clouds, the little water droplets, were bending the light. I didn’t get a clear view of the sun, but I still saw something amazing.
There was one aspect that was very otherworldly. As totality approached it got dark, twilight is how everyone describes it. I could still see everything around me, still able to see across the cemetery, my phone, the controls on my camera. It wasn’t the amount of light that was weird, it was the direction. You see every other day that I’ve been alive, when it gets that dark the light is always coming from the side. Twilight, sunrise and sunset. But today the light was from overhead. It’s not an earth shattering, change my life revelation, but it is a very strange feeling to have a physical experience that contradicts every other experience you’ve had up to that point.
I saw the sun disappear and it was amazing.
The image is a composite combining a shot from today with one I shot 2 weeks ago.
I’ve known Alicia for about five years. (You can see more of Alicia here) We’ve worked together a number of times and the photos always turn out amazing. So when she contacted me about doing some pinup type photos I was eager.
One of the things we did is shown above. I have a lofted area that looks over my living room. It’s one of the reasons I bought this unit. Particularly because it lets me lean over and shoot at people laying on the ground. The problem is that I usually forget about it when I’m shooting. So it was nice to actually get to use it.
I am very impressed with the two images above. I think they both look very retro, very much in the pinup style.
Since the begining of the year I’ve been trying to do this series of photos with models covered with various foods. Flour, cocoa, sugar, and others.
The problem was, I’d have tons of people interested, but after a few messages they’d disappear, stop responding. Or maybe some would respond, we’d actually set up a shoot, then at the last minute they’d cancel. Both of these scenario’s happened MANY times. I was begining to think the series was cursed. So I stopped looking for a few months.
Then Elena contacted me, and we actually got to set up something and shoot it! These are the results of that. Elena is covered with flour in this set.
Keesh Lorraine is an amazing model in the Madison area. You can see some of her other work on her Model Mayhem site. I first contacted her about working with gold leaf, such as the ones I’ve done with Rebecca. We ended up going a slightly different direction doing outdoor nudes at Devil’s Lake State Park. While not the first time I’ve visited the park (many times as a boy scout), it was the first time I’d photographed there. And I hadn’t been there in quite a few years.
After stopping at the Visitor’s center for a vehicle sticker, we went to the south side of the lake to climb the east bluff.
In the far left distance you can see the lake, about a third of a mile away. At this point we’re about 200’ above the lake, though we’d only gone 75’ horizontally. I’d wanted to go higher, but, um, I’m not in that good a shape. So we stopped here and got quite a few pictures.
As you can see we’re above the tops of most of the trees. The colors of the rocks, and the lichen really match well with her skin.
This next pictures is my favorite. The diagonals of the rocks, the matching angles of her arms and legs, the straining of her muscles.
On the way back down, we took a little side trail, and found a boulder field much closer to the ground.
