Most of my portfolio are images from my personal art projects, collaborations and workshops. But I also do privately commissioned photoshoots from time to time. I try to work with people who have the same vision and sense of beauty. The best results can be achieved if the client fully trusts your taste. But I always take all requests into consideration and we agree on all the details together. Sometimes I come to everything already set up, sometimes I create and develop the idea entirely from scratch.
This was one of those times. The girl’s name is Jenny O'Connell. She is an actress from New York. I met her this spring and she wanted to do something mystic and beautiful like out of a fairy tale. She wanted me to take care of the whole process because she trusted my judgment and loved my work. And that’s when I knew we would do a great job together. She had two options in her mind: a light flower theme and a dark mysterious one. After some consideration we decided to stick to the first one. There was a lot of discussion about the outfit, makeup and color scheme. We definitely wanted to do a flower headpiece or a crown.
We decided to wait for the summer and search for a location. And that was a tricky one. New Yorkers are usually car-less people and most of the beautiful locations are out of the city. We already set the photoshoot date, booked a makeup artist and a hairstyle person, but the location was still a problem. Literally a couple of weeks before the shoot I came up with a great idea to do huge paper flowers as a set. Everybody loved it. The location didn’t matter anymore, we could shoot in any city park.
To help me with making flowers I asked my friend Yana. We have quite an interesting story. She is from Ukraine as well. She is a photographer, stylist, decorator and just a very talented girl. She moved to the US with her family just 4 days before I did. I’m so lucky we now live in the same city and can work, collaborate and create together. In 2 weeks we picked up materials and she made those huge paper flowers and a crown.
The photoshoot took place in Prospect Park. It was pretty dark there because of the trees but some bright sunlight was still shining through. That’s where my loyal companion, the Move 1200 kit, came to the rescue. I used one MobiLed flash head with a silver umbrella to soften harsh shadows from the sun. When it became darker, I used it as a continuous light because it’s less intense.
It was quite an interesting and fun experience to work with clients on location and use professional lighting equipment. Move 1200 is just designed to shoot outdoors.
Flower props: Yana Bobrikova
MUA: Paige Campbell
Hair: Priscilla Jay
Dress and Jewelry: Aurora Morticia
