I think sometimes you have to celebrate your challenges and failures along side of your victories. This session was a challenging one across the board. Ruby and I may have locked in this shoot over a month ago, but a week ago she let me know that she just wasn’t feeling as energetic as usual and wanted to take things a bit more low-key than the costume shoot we had planned.
Cool. No problem. I’m here to do the work. I don’t care all that much what I’m doing, as long as I’m doing it. Also I prefer to test new equipment on more “low stakes” shoots anyway (not to brag, but most of the time I really do like being a photo industry secret agent and getting to play with pre-release toys…this will come back to bite me in just a few seconds).
I’m not sure what happened this time around, but I think I was fighting my equipment from the first frame. My first mistake was thinking I could use good quality lights with a poor quality modifier. I’m spoiled I guess with having access to better equipment, but I still can’t believe I can notice a difference with something I relied on not too many years ago. However, that was only the first battle. No matter what troubleshooting I did I kept having blank frames where my strobes just didn’t fire. I have some troubleshooting to do, and even though I’m happy with what we ended up getting, I’m still a little disappointed we had to cut things short (even if it did mean we did get more time mobbing around a new antique store and Target for the afternoon).
Tattoos
Lady Hephaestus - 2023.
While I was scheduling the previous post with Retrofatale, I was made aware that Lady Hephaestus was going to be coming along for both morale support and talent. Of course, I wasn’t going to complain at all.
It was nice to get them back in front of the lens after our debut shoot last year, and in such a short time see what new things we could create together.
I love how open and honest they are with themself (“We can banish this one to the void”) and the process of shooting photos that depending on the audience can be a little bit risqué (I don’t know too many other people who have said the phrase “I guess its time to pull my boobs out […] Blake doesn’t mind, he’s just doing his thing”).
I wish we weren’t so rushed this time around, but I still think we came out the other side with something fun.
And for a little extra uncensored content, get a sneak peek at some soon to be Onlyfans exclusive photos over at my NSFW blog.
Ruby - 2022.
(Damn that new photo setting can look pretty cool, going to have to play with that a little more on future posts)
I think the last time Ruby and I worked together it was for some graduation photos back in 2020, but certainly this is the first time she’s been in the new studio. She reached out to me a few weeks ago and asked if I wanted to shoot some content for a magazine submission and although I was slightly apprehensive because of some bad tastes in my mouth from years ago, I decided we should move forward and give it a go.
(Spoiler alert, we almost immediately got accepted for publication, and I hope to be able to share those images soon).
Although those images were the main goal, Ruby did bring along a couple of other looks that I can show you now.
Be sure to give Ruby a follow on Instagram, and if you are in the Atlanta area, find some time to see her live and in person.
Erin - 2022.
Even though we run in similar circles, I only met Erin for the first time at a gallery opening sometime late last year. And even then we only really talked for the first time at a Halloween party that was held by a mutual friend.
But when has basically being a stranger ever stopped me from wanting to shoot with someone?
I could barely hold my excitement when it came time to actually set a date to shoot with Erin, and I am still extremely happy with the work that we were able to make together. In just a short time we were able to create a few different looks together and had some great conversations doing so. We both share a love and affinity for certain perfect organisms which made things all the easier to work with her.
I hope you all enjoy what we were able to create together, and I hope this is the start of a long friendship full of great photos.
See more of Erin and her adventures over on her Instagram page.