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Big Hair and B&W Film

ERWhittington 6 Comments

I’ve had three shoots recently with a wonderful hobbiest photographer called Tony Ornstien (no link, unfortunately) and his wife Jennifer. Tony contacted me via my website a while ago wanting to work on some images in which the women are portrayed as strong, powerful and glamorous; he and Jennifer are big fans of the likes of Helmut Newton (their house is covered in bold and intriguing art works), and make an incredibly enthusiastic team. Tony is always striving to improve on his last efforts, keen to perfect the lighting, and seems to really enjoy having me to practise on (I’ll be seeing him again soon for a fourth visit to work on a particular set which has a lot of potential!) and Jennifer, an ex-racing car driver, enjoys brushing my hair and making it ENORMOUS!! 🙂 Both are careful to check details (of both myself and the background) before a set is ready to be clicked; it’s important that the images convey a plausible context.

Because Tony works with film (Hasselblad) rather than a digital camera, there’s no checking the back of the camera to see what the results are like, so each visit begins with a table display of the last visit’s images (developed in the dark room), which is always fun and involves lots of analysis! I actually met them both last night in Oxford, for a quick dinner and perusal of the latest shots of my generally-naked self, before a dance troupe practise.

Here are a few of the shots so far. I was kindly given a print of the first!

Perspectives

ERWhittington 4 Comments

Well, Dubai was fun! Ridiculously hot and humid, a breeze was like an oasis in the desert. I stayed on the 44th floor in my friend’s apartment (ears popped each day on the way up and down! I hate lifts but am proud to say I remained calm at all times; even I didn’t fancy all those stairs…), managed to avoid tan lines (I’m not entirely sure how I did that; probably a mixture of paranoia and factor 40!), got a henna tattoo (slight infactuation with tattoos on feet – and yes, it’s pretty much faded now), went on a desert safari where we surfed around dunes by car at top speed (felt like a rollercoaster – totally unsafe – amazing!), saw a belly dancer (and indulged myself in some new costumes), went to a 12-hour beach party at Nasimi beach and saw Armen van Helden, Chicane, Zero 7 (MUST persuade them to let me join the group as a guest star one day…) and others, swam in a pool surrounded by sky-scrapers (I woke up on my lounger and briefly thought the sky was falling down on me; scary perspectives out there!), saw all the various superlatives (7 star hotel, tallest building in the world, biggest gold ring in the world – that’s a lot of bling!), floated in the beautiful warm sea and was shown around the textile, spice and gold souks by a guy who bought a jet ski but forgot to use it more than twice…. What a fascinating place Dubai is and full of interesting, ambitious people. Omnipresent, palpable sense of possibility. Really pleased I packed quite a lot into one week. Lots of inspiration for one of the characters in the book I’m starting to write and some other things I have in the pipeline at the back of my mind. Other interesting facts about Dubai: 51% of every single business over there is owned by a sheik, no one is allowed to be unemployed (i.e. they kick you out if you are, hence the many abandoned vehicles lying covered in layers of sand-dust!), you go to jail if you write a cheque and it bounces, and there is NO income tax.

(Sorry about all the brackets… It’s lazy of me but I like the fast pace.)

Anyway, I worked recently with Tim Pile, who has a bit of a thing for interesting perspectives and angles in his photography. I was very pleased to be shooting with him (and two other photographers he often works with, Mary and Dinah) as he’s produced some fantastic work so far, describing himself as an ‘improving amateur’ and shooting for a camera club and national/international competitions. The location was very unique and characterful – the Victoria Baths in Manchester, so we had about a million sets to play with.

Here are some of my favourites from the day. Tim likes to experiment with treatments to bring out the best in the shots, so I’m posting a variety. I call this first set my ‘floating down the shaft/falling down the rabbit-hole) look:

I also have these from Dinah:

The lighting conditions in the first shot were very challenging, but I think it came out really well and makes an interesting, quirky image. It was a tiny room full of a very eerie, green light. I’m sitting in a rocking chair, like a strange Miss Havisham; just me and the shadows…

The previous day, Tim came along for part of my shoot with Rebecca Parker (see previous blog entry) and got his own take on the fields of heather, again working with his interest in unusual perspectives:

Rebecca Parker

ERWhittington 2 Comments

I worked with Rebecca Parker at the end of August. If you haven’t seen her creations before, you really should go and look at her website. Her images are exquisite – a wonderful mixture of dreaminess, drama, strangeness and simplicity. Rebecca does all of her photography and digital manipulation/processing herself, and now also does the make up (including mine, below). I think she’s secretly a control freak… Only joking. The multi-talent definitely runs in the family: Moonmomma made the beautiful pearl and blue-green headdresses I’m wearing below and they combine efforts often on various things. What a crafty team!

I’m so glad we were able to do these while I was in Birmingham on the way to a shoot in Manchester. Rebecca was exactly how I hoped she would be, after emailing each other for quite a long time, and I think we have such similar tastes that I totally trust her creative vision. The location was ‘Gentleshaw’, and we rocked some heather for some portraits, some lazy lavender fashion and then some mean gypsy styles indoors. Here is the evidence so far (there will be more images to come):

I also want to show this image I’ve recently seen. I flippin’ love it and keep going back to stare at it. Wow:

 

Rebecca will soon be organising some workshops/classes, to share her knowledge and techniques with other photographers and creative types. Definitely contact her for more info if you’re interested, and do feel free to hint heavily that I should be the model she demonstrates on… 😉

Gregory Brown and John Evans

ERWhittington 2 Comments

I’d admired both of their portfolios pretty much since I’d started modelling. We’d all spoken plenty of times before about potential bookings and finally managed to get the diaries together recently, which I was really excited about! I love their quirky props, the twisted shapes, the counterpoint in their work at which classicism meets weirdness… and the way the light wraps so beautifully around the models they photograph (I should probably mention that while I’m talking about both of them, they do shoot separately, one-on-one; for this shoot, I shot with Gregory while John shot with another model, then we swapped half way). I couldn’t wait to see what location was in store for me; I’d originally been booked for a studio shoot, but things were changed at the last minute and it turned out to be an enormous, half derelict house, bought by a friend of Gregory and in the gradual process of being restored… So, huge scope for interesting shots!

Here are some of me by Gregory Brown (there are a couple of shots which appear in colour and in b&w, as I’m struggling to choose in these cases… Please comment if you are more decisive than me and have a favourite!):

Stairs:

Strings:

Pointes:

Bongos in the window:

John Evans also sent me some photos. We couldn’t resist the purple wall:

More pointe shoes:

And some doorways:

And THEN…. It turned out that the guy whose house we were shooting in was in fact a British champion helicopter pilot. When he offered me a quick spin in his purple helicopter, I could hardly say no, could I? England drives me mad sometimes, but seeing it from the sky is a beautiful reminder of how wonderful the land is. Such an amazing experience!!! These are from my camera:

 My hand – I’m flying the thing!!

 
The location (and my little brum brum):

 Helicopter!

I didn’t actually realise Russell was quite the pro he was until afterwards… Bit scary when at the end of the flight around Warwickshire he claimed not to be very good at landing on grass, and seemed quite worried, telling me to brace myself for a skiddy landing, etc…. Eeek! What a tease. I didn’t even feel the touchdown. Ha!


Glamoureuse

ERWhittington 4 Comments

One of the things that attracted me to working with Iain was his ability to create beautiful, light-filled, ‘airy’, soft glamour images, which are very fresh and romantic. These are more seductive than I usually do, granted, but they’re still pretty tame and relatively innocent, and I’ll never go beyond this limit.

First, some retro/vintage/pretty-style lingerie:

 And:

The following are from the final set we did. A bit raunchier than anything I usually do! I love the fiery set up.

Diamante and Pearls, Ribbon and Ruching, Beads and Blushes

ERWhittington 2 Comments

I know, I know, it’s been ages since I’ve updated! I’ve had a lot of exciting shoots recently but am reluctant to post without the images – hopefully I’ll be able to remedy this soon!

Anyway, I was lucky enough to be asked recently to model for the new 2011 collection of Chanticleer wedding dresses, each made by the extremely talented bridal designer Tracey Salt in Cheltenham. One look at the Chanticleer website and I knew this would be a wonderful day; the dresses are exquisite.

We shot at Badger Farm, having stayed over the night before in the cottage. It was such a varied, beautiful location; the views all around were amazing (as you can see in one of the images below). It was a brilliant case of everyone pulling their weight and doing their bit; 2 models and 18 dresses to get through in one day (11 hours!), all with different hair and make up, and each needing help to get into and out of each dress, trains carried for walking outside between locations, beautiful shoes carried until the last moment for minimal mud-sinking, fluffy robes held to be thrown on between sets (there was a very cold wind on the day!)… We were well looked after! All in all, the shots below are due to the brilliant teamwork of the following:

Designer: Tracey Salt (Chanticleer)
Assistant: Natalie Russell (Chanticleer)
Photography team: Chris and Claire Hanley
Make up: Hannah Raison
Hair: James
Beautiful and lovely other model: Rachel Hetherington
Thanks also to Liz Parker, Tracey’s mum, and for the gorgeous jewellery and shoes (which I don’t have a link for but may be found via the Chanticleer website).

The theme of the collection is ‘Back to Nature’. Each of the 18 dresses is named after a fairy. Cute or what! Here are the 9 dresses I modelled…

Jocasta:

Oriana:

Aphrodite:

Cassandra:

Paloma:

Arabella:

Carmel:

Minerva:

If you like what you see and are feeling bridally inclined, you can visit visit both Chanticleer and Chris Hanley Photography at this year’s National wedding Show at the NEC, from October 8-10th October.

* * * * * * * *

Behind the scenes… 🙂

 The Eeyore robe I fell in love with. WARM:
 
My mug:
 The princess dress, Oriana (Hhm, earring still with its tag on):

Tracey (designer) getting rather hands-on with my underskirt… I love my face in this. I don’t think I’m totally sure what’s happening to me.

‘Get me to the location on time!’

Some results!

ERWhittington

I did promise one commentator some results from my day at the Victorian Pub event in Oxford, and as I’m on a bit of an admin roll (I’ve just updated my availability on my website, having recently decided to make some time available for September bookings. Last minute I know, but maybe you’ll have read my previous post…) I thought I would post some of the images. Many thanks to the kind photographers who have offered me the chance to show them off! It was a great day, lots of fun and I think the photographers enjoyed the unusual location and potential it gave for some funky images. Here are my favourites:

From Martyn Davis (who took one look at this penguin and agreed we had to use it):

 From the lovely Karen Jones, who I’ve managed to work with about a million times now: