Some unashamedly blissful, classical, romantic and girly images today, from my latest (lucky 13th!!) shoot with J H. J recently wrote a ‘retrospective’ feature about our history of shooting here, which was such a pleasure for me to read through. It’s really nice to shoot over and over again with the same people (and J is an absolute stellar fella), which is something that tends to happen a lot; I take it as a compliment that I must be doing something right, to be so frequently re-booked for various projects.

Our very first shoot, several million years ago, involved bluebells and so we thought it would be nice to shoot some again, in the exact same place (the woodland near where I live in Oxfordshire), but not before first seeing what we could do in one of the beautiful Oxford parks J had scouted the day before, having a boat ride along the river and stopping for hot chocolates/teas in between… I’m always very bossy (as anyone who’s shot with me will know; but only because I care!!), and demanded we also put a metaphorical middle finger up to those photographic gurus who think that rape fields are too cliched to be done well; and as I wrote on facebook around the time, if you’re bored of bluebells, you’re bored of life!!

J pointed out on the day that in this one shoot we pretty much covered a whole rainbow of colours, and what I love particularly about these images is how vibrant and sweet those colours are! It’s interesting to see J’s style changing, too, and I love the bokeh in these and some of the other shoots we’ve done recently (and the left hand side of the frame in the second image here is just beautiful in itself!!).

Without further ado:

(My favourite is the one under the willow tree.)

I had a brilliant time in Kent recently with friends; 17 girls in a huge house by the sea – what could go wrong? The weather was ridiculously beautiful and I am now completely in love with Margate (we went sea kayaking, had massages and danced until 4am in a funny little gay bar, having followed the sound of Michael Jackson and crashed what appeared to be, unreasonably given the music, a jive dance class). I’m keen to see more of Kent. I keep meaning to go there for a few photographers who’ve expressed interest in shooting me there, my only problem is finding the time. (Ah, the usual whinge!!). Seriously though, I had to smile at a recent spam message offering me opportunities to ‘work and travel!!!![sic]’ If there’s anything this job doesn’t lack, it’s travel – I’m going to Norway, Cornwall, Wales, Germany, Ireland, Portugal and Scotland all between now and September. 🙂

I’m back from a very busy and productive week of shoots in the Netherlands, highlights of which included getting absolutely filthy in a metal factory in Rotterdam, balancing on windowsills in an old sugar factory in Groningen, celebrating Kings Day in orange, with candyfloss and stick-on jewels at Loveland (with beautiful model Zoi), a relaxing brunch on the beach at Den Haag, and some frolics around a huge national park (amongst other studio shoots and workshops) too.

I’ll post some results soon, but in the meantime, here are some photographs of a bronze sculpture artist Andrew Freidin made of me! It’s being exhibited as part of 7 new sculptures at Art in Ardington, which is part of Oxford Artweeks. The exhibition runs for a week from Sat 3rd May, and is described as ‘one of the largest and most exciting exhibitions of sculpture, paintings, jewellery and other visual arts to be staged in 2014’.

It’s been an extremely busy few weeks, with photoshoots galore and also a stint of filming (you may have seen me whinging about the 3.45am alarms and 14 hour days of standing non-stop in a corset, if you’ve got me as a friend on facebook). I ended up being quite featured (i.e. right next to the main actress in one of the most heart-stoppingly dramatic and heart-breakingly shocking scenes of the film (and of history, on which the film is based)) and my acting skills were substantially tested; it was a bit of a thrill! It’s out in 2015 and features Helena Bonham Carter, Meryl Streep and Carey Mulligan, among others. I have a feeling it will be an incredible film. I’ll make the appropriate fuss about it when it’s out, I’m sure.

Some other things:

I’ll soon be in Holland, and there’s a place left at this workshop I’ll be modelling at, hosted by the very-excellent Eric Kellerman.

I’ll also soon be in France, and there’s a place left at this workshop I’ll be modelling at, and if you need me to sell ‘France’ to you in general (aahh, the locations! And check out the amazing facilities!), you need to take a long hard look at yourself. 😉

Just explore the links to get involved!

… So, the slideshow.

It’s like looking through another person’s holiday album isn’t it – a mixture of interesting and tiring, you want to be polite but you’re falling asleep… but hopefully you’ll enjoy this one. It’s something I put together in September last year, showing lots of my favourite images I’ve been involved in up until that point in time (I submitted it for an art festival I went to, where watching each other’s work like this is an absolute highlight for me, not to mention inspirational… and I won a prize for it!). I meant to show it here ages ago, so here I am catching up.

Music by the amazing British singer Natalie Duncan. (Seriously, even if you can’t be bothered to look at my images, just hit the link below for an amazing soundtrack to your day.) The song is called ‘Sky is Falling’ and it’s grippingly beautiful. All photographers whose work is featured are credited at the end, and underneath the relevant individual images you’ll see floating about on my website and elsewhere.

….Over and out, wishing everyone a joyful Easter! 🙂

A weekend update…

https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/X294h3dl2_I&source=uds

…Three images taken at the light-stricken wonderwall of Dagmar Falls in New South Wales, by the lovely Brian Connor.