'Voodoo Lady' Daiquiri Dusk

Evening All

Well, I finally seem to have a full set of working gear so I've managed to start catching up on my editing. These next few shoot blogs might be a little less detailed than usual as the shoots aren't as fresh in my head.

This week I have been mostly... 25th July Edition

Hello all,

Well a mixed bag of busyness this week, photo shoots, gigs and workshops. (Random fact I just learned whilst spell checking, a group of ferrets are called a busyness!)

Gayle, My Favourite Dutch Bitch

Hello Ladies and Gents

Well yesterday was a sad day, in addition it being my birthday and one that takes me to the bad end of twenty something, yesterday was the day one of my favourite friends, Gayle, moved back to Holland.

I met Gayle nearly four years ago, I was her freshers rep when she started uni. Now being an international fresher Gayle moved in a week before the UK freshers, and we had set up various special events to help settle them in. Over the course of these events me Gayle and I got to know each other, mainly through bitching sessions regarding other peoples fashion sense. My favourite exchange, and one that has become quite infamous in our circle, went something like this...

Gayle - (upon seeing a rather appallingly dressed fresher)
"Are there mirrors in the rooms in halls?"

Me - (being a freshers rep)
"Yeah, course they have love, is there not one in your room?"

Gayle - (smirking and pointing)
"Well yes, I have a mirror, but SHE obviously doesn't!"

Me - (rather impressed and peeing my pants laughing)
"I like you, you can be my friend"

and we've been friends ever since. I've taken a few sets of pictures of Gayle over the years so in honour of her leaving I thought I'd post some up here for you lovely people.

The first time we worked together was part of my 'Make my picture' project in 2007. I made collaborative portraits with a wide range of people, examining the difference between people's ideas of themselves and their ideas of how they wanted to present themselves to the world in portraits, for a variety of different uses and in a variety of different styles. It possibly warrants a blog of it's own sometime, as I'm still very proud of it as a piece. For her shoot, Gayle wanted a portrait that would be printed on a large canvas and displayed in her parents home in Holland. She wanted something simple with lots of light and shade. During this shoot I experimented with negative space, knowing that huge canvas that was just a close cropped face would be rather oppressive hung in a living room! The two shots below are the ones she chose, the landscape image for the large canvas and the portrait image printed for a table top frame.






The next set of images were again made to be displayed in her parents home, a gift for her mum's birthday. Gayle had already bought a lovely brushed silver frame, so we made bright high key happy portraits to fit with the style of the frame and the feel of the gift. I love this image, I think it looks like a 'Covergirl' makeup advert!




Last but not least, the final shoot we did together in the UK just last week. A couple of years ago I made Gayle a dress, fascinator and shoes for her birthday party. I realised I didn't have any pics of the outfit so we arranged to photograph it before she left. Sadly I couldn't photograph the dress full length as Gayle is far too tall and my home studio is far too small, but I think you get the idea. Although looking at it now I am shocked at how much my dressmaking skills have improved. For the record, the back of the dress does match up but we must have forgotten to close the hook when we made these pics! I've also included a pic of the customised shoes I made her, not strictly a picture of Gayle but they are beautiful beautiful things that the world must see!









So there you go, a retrospective of Gayle, my favourite Dutch Bitch. I'm gonna miss her so much, but Holland isn't so far away and she gave me a Dutch phrase book and guide to Amsterdam for my birthday, so I guess that means she wants me to visit. And then I'll have something else exciting to tell you guys about!
TTFN
CF
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All Images are (c) Cherryfox® Fine Photography and must not be published or reproduced in any medium without prior written permission from the photographer

Elven Princess, Emerald of The Ace

Morning All,

Well after an epic amount of editing this weekend, I am now ready to reveal the second set of pics I made with Emerald Ace last week. After our improv shoot in the church yard we toddled back to chez Fox for some lunch and for the studio shoot that was actually the reason for our weekend of fun!

I recently acquired a huge pile of celtic/gothic/belly dance jewellery. My first thought when looking at the elaborate dangly necklaces was of Bollywood stars and then of the princesses in 80's fantasy films I grew up watching. So my instant exclamation upon receiving said box of sparklys was "I'm gonna put ALL this on Emerald's head!" Got to love Emerald for her ever willing attitude to have random things piled on her head, last time it was tiny glittering birds and butterflies!

As per usual, the initial ideas we had for the styling of this shoot evolved as we began getting ready. I had in mind a Bollywood feel for the images, using patterned colourful sari fabric as a backdrop, but the minute Emerald got dressed I saw that she was far more 'Gypsy matriarch' than 'Bollywood star'. So first U turn there...

Second U turn, wig, we had planned to use Emerald's long green wavy wig that she wears in her octopus act, but stage wigs receive extra wear and tear from being transported and become bitty rather quickly. Unnoticeable on stage but the little frizzy aura that surrounds a well worn wig is an absolute nightmare to tidy up in photoshop, mainly because it's very time consuming. It's not technically difficult on a plain background but an absolute pain on a patterned one. So... rethink, I have a very similar style wig in red, that I wear when I am 'Boobie Soho' my sing and fling character, so we decided to use this one instead. Turns out Emerald looks AMAZING with bright red hair!

With the makeup styling we wanted to go for an Egyptian/Indian inspired heavy Kohl line look, but with much more colour and as always, added sparkle. Then we piled on the jewellery, a necklace and anklet on her forehead, and a necklace and bracelet where intended. All with green stones to tie into the green makeup.

As the styling came together it became apparent that she had now gone through 'Bollywood star' and 'Gypsy matriarch' and come out the other side as 'Elven Princess, Emerald of The Ace'. I set about a complete re-think of the lighting and backdrop. I selected a length of dark green/black two tone taffetta embroidered with gold and green leaves to use as a backdrop, to give the images a forest-y fantasy theme (although it then took me nearly an hour to iron all the folds out of it, where it had been crammed in my rather overfull bag of backdrops).

In a previous shoot, (see 'The Orinoco Bitch' blog) I had wanted to recreate moonlight but it wound up being inappropriate for that shoot, but now we were in a forest with a elven princess it seemed the perfect opportunity to resurrect this idea. I used one single Lastolite head with a snoot and wide honeycomb to the left, up high centered on Emerald's face. I pushed the lighting about half a stop over exposed to give high contrast and shining perfect pale skin. The light was angled so it just caught the gold embroidery on the backdrop, making the fabric almost invisible and turning the leaves into golden vines hanging in mid air. I would have liked to lift the light up slightly higher to widen the spot and catch the backdrop to the edges but in my small home studio this was impossible.

Soundtrack to this shoot was Laura Marling and Suzanne Vega, nothing like a bit of modern folk music to bring out your inner gypsy/elf queen, although I have discovered it makes you very uncool to admit you like folk music at all, modern or otherwise. Me, I'm a sucker for a fiddle and a bodhran.

Again this was a very swift shoot once we had done with the styling, which we always take our time over as we enjoy the process. First shot to last Emerald was in front of the camera just 23 minutes and every single shot we took was usable. As myself and Emerald have now done 5 shoots together I think we understand each other. I know her face and how it works with the light and she understands (or humours) my sometimes very odd direction, "stare at the moon like it's falling from the sky", "now look at it like it's asked you to do complicated sums in your head!".

Someone has already asked me if these images were actually lit this way or if they were photoshopped. All I did in editing was a little bit of airbrushing on the skin to even out the tone (harsh directional lighting will always accentuate any red tones or blemishes in the skin). I burnt into the makeup a touch to make it darker and more striking, something I always do, black never comes out truly black in pictures. In the previous shoot (see 'Mina' blog) I had lightened the center of Emerald's eyes a little, but I didn't do anything to them in this one, this is how they actually look when given allot of light.

I am so pleased with these images, she is totally how 'Titania' looked in my head when reading 'A midsummer nights dream' when I was little. There's a touch of the young Liz Taylor circa 'Cleopatra' as well I think, it's that beautiful strong jaw line. All the elements really came together to make this, Emerald's great face, the backdrop, the styling, the lighting. Sometimes things just go well, without the struggle, sadly never when you're on the clock though!

So here they are, let me know what you think

CF
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All Images are (c) Cherryfox® Fine Photography and must not be published or reproduced in any medium without prior written permission from the photographer