I dropped my Fujica GW690 a year ago it smacked to the ground and as a result the front lens element got all skewed. I was in quite a shock.
I still shoot with it though and it keeps producing excellent shots. I would have expected some kind of tilt effect happening but I see no faults in sharpness or anything like it. I shot a film of Kodak T-Max recently and all shots came out flawlessly. The film has been developed in Bellini Eco Developer and camera-scanned, edited in Adobe Lightroom. Thank you for watching!
With Sahri I always have a good time, she’s gained full confidence, we always have a good laugh during the sessions and most often the results are very good. We met again a couple of weeks ago (see my previous post) and did a couple of different things. This series made me remind of an earlier session we had done, titled ‘eros was in the studio’, hence the title of this post. Less slippery than the previous set, and in a slightly different light setup (just trying to work with different approaches every time) but still very intimate.
I hope you like them, I thought Wednesday was a good day for a mid-week pause 😉
it has been a while, the previous set of ‘Eros was in the studio’, you’ll need to scroll down quite a lot to find them, so under the images I’ll post a link to the original series.
Hope you liked them, if so, here’s the link to the previous set: eros was in the studio – NSFW please don’t hesitate to leave a comment below. Thanks!
I’m not really good at commercializing my art nude photo sessions and I’m not really sure I would want that either. I’m afraid I would quickly evolve into ‘what works well for every body’ (literally every body) poses and tricks and loose a bit of my creative freedom and explorations. Hence, I don’t do a lot of assigned sessions.
But once in a while people find my website and call me for a private session, as in this case, I’ll call them Mr and Mrs S. for privacy reasons.
For a couple of days, maybe weeks, we had an ongoing conversation via WhatsApp about the style and content this young couple was looking for and we agreed on a session date somewhere last summer. We looked together for some location options, and they chose a nice-looking place that included an exterior swimming pool and garden area.
They rented two consecutive nights in this beautiful B&B for the occasion, so in-between we had a full day available for the session. This left some room for additional session time if needed.
They also wanted professional make-up service and I looked for someone that was available and not too far from the shooting location.
Already some days before the shoot the weather announced ‘unstable’, with shattered showers and some sun. Prepare for the worst I thought, and I rented some extra light sources (led panels, color variable)
We met at 09:00 am, Mrs S’s make up was already ongoing and whilst I could move all my stuff into the house. I had a nice conversation with Mr S. He was about to leave to do some sports and have lunch with a friend, he wanted me to feel completely free and did not want to interfere in the session.
Mrs S. and I worked together all day, first started with some clothed shots to get warmed up and for her to understand my way of communicating for poses, then shifted to lingerie and nude shots, making full use of the entire place. The fact that we had an entire day available meant that we could develop a lot of different sets without running out of time. We had a bread lunch and coffee together and worked on afterwards within some new scenarios. At about 03:00pm Mr S. came back and then we worked on some duo shots, The session ended at about 05:00 pm. The weather had cleaned out and the swimming pool became very inviting, I left the couple to enjoy the rest of the evening in private.
After the session I came home with close to a thousand digital images, from which I selected about 150 really good images for them to choose from. Normally for a session of about 6 hours I provide 30 retouched images, with the option to choose more at an extra cost. They picked out 100(!) images. The session included a free ‘pillow book’ but on top of that they ordered a beautiful luxury ‘coffee table’ album containing the entire selection of 100 images.
I love this kind of assignments, the ability to tailor-make the entire session to the customers’ demands and delivering great products afterwards.
For privacy reasons I cannot show recognizable images, but these images already give you an idea of the results achieved. If you feel like having yourself photographed, please do contact me. I know it may seem daunting, but it’s a first for about everybody, and I don’t bite. I don’t even bark 😉
Men often have the wildest fantasies about photo sessions.
They see their partner as the next playboy centerfold model … (if that still exists?) which of course is good and proof of how attracted they are to their partner …
With the best intentions they order a gift voucher from me for a nude photo shoot to surprise their partner, already excited by the idea (fantasy goes wild)Â …
pwoaa, pwoaa, pwoaa … anticlimax (you know that sound from any TV quiz when a wrong answer is given)
Perhaps the lady is not at all ready for such a photo shoot, and certainly not if she has not chosen to do it herself, or if she has not been able to choose the photographer with whom she wants to collaborate. She feels forced, insecure, worried, even a little angry maybe …
Then as a photographer you get the difficult task of meeting the expectations of the man on one hand (he paid for the session and expects the best of results) and on the other hand guiding the lady in a photo session that she is not really ready for … no fun.
I personally prefer to get the lady on the phone: “I would like to surprise my partner with a spicy photo shoot of myself, is that possible with you?”
“Yes, ma’am, of course it is, shall I go over the options with you?” and off we go, with a guarantee of success, a happy, excited lady and most certainly a surprised, happy and exited partner.
So go on ladies, be brave, get that phone and call me now, you’ll be surprised how good you look on photo’s, your partner will be going wild you came up with the idea and you decided to do this for him (or her).
For the privacy of my client I made the images below ‘private’ 😉
I admit, I am attracted to women more than men, that’s nature I suppose.
On the other hand, I rarely had the request for doing male nudes, until now. For me this was a premiere and an interesting experiment. Although I felt a little lost in what to photograph, and in the poses to work on, still I think we did a good session together. My model wanted to stay anonymous in the images, so that was a limitation to take into account.
I worked mainly with a low-key approach, but it was a continuous search for angles and light settings. We also experimented with some body lotion, and although I found it too greasy it did give different results.
Happy viewing, pls leave me your thoughts and comments below.
I’m pleased to be able to show you some results from the individual ‘available light – art nudes’ workshops I gave last summer. It seems a long time ago already. …
The location proved very well suited for a range of light situations and with some creativity we managed to turn a ‘standard’ bed and breakfast location into a perfect photo location.
Model of the day, the always beautiful and elegant Riona Neve (http://rionaneve.com/)
Remember you can be part of this too, If you want upgrade your ‘available light’ portrait skills, please drop me a line trough this pageÂ
In the coming weeks I’ll post some images from the second individual workshop day, with Violaine as my model.
Some of you may or may not know the series of children’s illustrated books about the life of tiny (no caps), a little girl going trough all kinds of adventures, domestic or somewhere in a near/far garden.
It was very popular at the time I was a kid, and very beautifully illustrated. Titles were very varied but always started with the name tiny, check out the titles below on the www and you’ll see what I’m talking about. They were largely translated and distributed worldwide.
tiny op de boerderij (tiny on the farm)
tiny vindt een poes (tiny finds a kitty)
tiny doet aan sport (tiny does sports)
tiny viert feest (tiny has a party)
and that inspired me to do my own series of images, with a girl named Lily (Lilith actually, but to make the story complete I call her Lily) In my stories Lily is not the overly enthusiast girl from the original series but a ‘nothing ever happens here’ version of her, sometimes showing boredom or unhappiness. I made this series during the summer workshop week in August 2019, Lilith stayed overnight and we had an hour left before the participants would show up. I used the Rolleiflex TLR to make these shots. Enjoy!
• Lily cleans the workshop •
• Lily goes cycling •
• Lily feeds the chickens •
• Lily gets firewood •
• Lily plays ping-pong •
• Lily makes firewood •
• Lily helps the plasterers •
• Lily gives water to the vegetables •
hope you enjoyed viewing this little fun series as much as we did making it, and sorry for not cleaning the dust speckles.
thanks to Lilith Etch for being my ‘stand-in tiny’
I had bought this mannequin on a flea market in my hometown and it seemed an ideal partner to make some sort of a love story. E. was very happy to participate in this session. We had a lot of fun imagining what was to come next.
Same as last week, you’re getting spoiled, aren’t you 🙂
Some results I managed to capture during my own workshop Model/lingerie photography with available light. Models during this workshop: Riona Neve and Sahri Nimi – behind the scenes video at the bottom of this post.
All images are available as a fine art print, inquiries please send me an email.
Hidden gems 2019, workshop Lingerie with available light
I have been rather busy at school lately and this will probably continue for some more time, since we are working on a project for distant learning that starts September 2020.
I still managed to make a short behind the scene’s movie from some clay sessions I did last summer. I had taken some footage on one of the shoots, and have made a short intro and wrapup video last Friday, to make it a complete movie.
You can see the movie here or on Youtube, where you can immediately subscribe to my channel:
Some final images of the sessions I did here below:
Really fun to do, it makes models ageless at the spot, and also quite anonymous, and sometimes even Facebook accepts this kind of nudity.
As a registered 18+ Youtube user you can see the video on my Youtube channel, but for your convenience I’ll put it here trough Vimeo:
It was a fun day, I didn’t really adapt my shooting to the cameraman, but still, there was some influence at least. I’m quite pleased with the results of this day, look for yourself, you’ll probably recognise some of the scenes from the video. The film shots are black framed.
Shot on film: (Rolleiflex Tlr 3.5 Planar on Ilford Film)
and then one more, as a tribute to the cameraman Franswa. You can see me make this shot at 4.52 in the film!!
thanks for looking, If you want to make sure to see everything I publish, you might consider subscribing to my blog. You can do this on the bottom of the welcome page, click the + sign.
You’ve seen the first image with Julia a couple of weeks ago. The process of selecting and fine-tuning the images often is slow, but in this case, it took me even longer, since I had to finish all evaluations for my evening class students. All is done now, and vacation has officially started. A good moment to show you the first series from this collaboration.
• In bed with Julia •
What I often seek in models, is the ability to give me a natural, relaxed look. Julia is perfectly able to do so. And of course, she is stunningly beautiful! I’ve enjoyed this afternoon in Brussels a lot, and I hope the images give you an idea of the atmosphere and get you in a similar mood.
thanks for passing by, I hope to see you soon again!
still working on my workshop program for this summer, and I have the honor to announce an exclusive Art-Nude 4 day workshop on a unique location:
Art-Nude Week
Together with 2 professional models, I will guide you through the entire process of doing art-nude photography. From the location scouting, over measuring light, viewing your composition, working with and guiding models up to images selection and post-processing. A condensed all-in-one workshop for the enthusiast photographer.
Who is this workshop meant for: You are an enthusiast hobbyist and you are looking to upgrade your skills. You like to work with people in your photography, and you enjoy the female subject. You always wanted to try sensual art-nude in your photography but never found a way to get started. You want to taste the privilege of working with professional models, under controlled and safe circumstances. You fancy a nice castle and park as a shooting environment and you prefer the looks of natural light. If your answer is yes to the majority of these allegations, then this is meant for YOU!
What will be the setting? The setting will be a splendid privately owned castle near Tournai (Belgium) with surrounding green areas and annex buildings. The entire location (except a small private area in the castle) is available for shooting. An ideal place to work at ease and enjoy a vast amount of photography possibilities. Study the light and work with models. Talking about models, I will have 2 professional art-nude models present for three days. (one extra model may be added if the number of participants exceeds 5. They are easy to work with and know a lot about posing, if you are not so familiar with that part, they will guide you. The number of photographers is kept very limited, to allow every photographer individual time with the models.
The location for the workshop
If you are interested in this workshop or one of the other workshops:Â CLICK HERE
… because when I think about all the costs I have been making – for photography gear, for exhibition prints, for locations, models, make-up artists – then I must realize that it does not generate any money, quite the contrary.
Then I sit down, try gathering all my courage for the next shoot, try to find a good location, a model, a make up artist, find a moment that fits for everybody involved, phone calls, emails, messenger … and then after the shoot I get home, more or less exhausted. But then when scrolling trough hundreds of images from that day, I see that again we could make some beautiful shots and I think, ‘come on, just hang on a little longer, things will turn out ok one day’ …
thanks to Sahri Nimi Modelpage for being my model once again, thanks Isabelle Eeckhout for making her look gorgeous again, thank you Vergucht Franswa for joining us for making a reportage about me during this shoot, and a big thank you to the family that opened their fabulous house for me as if it were my house. And last but not least, thank you to my wife, who has even more patience with me than I have myself, that even pushes me harder than I could do so myself, and that still believes 200% in what I do.
• Bath with a view •
Available in a very limited edition of 7,
sizes 50×50 cm, 75x75cm, 100x100cm.
Epson archival print on fine art cotton-based paper. Price on request.
We had a nice little snow cover yesterday in Belgium, and there was almost no wind, so the snow beautifully draped itself on every little twig. I had a day off yesterday, so I decided to go for a walk with the Rolleiflex. I had two rolls of Ilford FP4 125.
I also wanted to explore the possibilities of over- and underexposing, and adapting the development to compensate. I did not really have high contrast, as the sun was hidden, but still I thought the time good to experiment. I exposed on roll of film at 30 ISO, so two stops over box speed, the other one at 500 ISO, two stops under.
It is not because the process is so tedious and slow, that I choose to work on film, but because it makes me think differently about photography. You cannot be in a hurry, things will go wrong, you have to rethink your process not twice, but 4 times, or things will go wrong, you need to be respectful to your film and your camera, or things will go wrong, you need to stay alert when developing, or things will go wrong … (I’m happy not to have switched to darkroom printing, or this list would be at least double this length)
It is similar to slow food, lessons in yoga, a classic concert, a visit to the sauna, a massage or a poetry evening, it makes you completely zen.
Enjoy watching the winter in Belgium, I’ve put a lot of love in it!
www.ludwigdesmet.com
all images available as fine art print, starting at 99€
it smacked to the ground and as a result the front lens element got all skewed. I was in quite a shock.
