As it is now December and I’m in full festive mode, it seems only right that I share what I’ve been up to at my photography studio with you all.
For the longest time I’ve been trying to get my hands on a vintage wooden sled for the studio and this year was the year it finally happened! After a trip to my favourite flea market in Malvern, back in August. Just as we were near the end of the hundreds upon hundreds of stalls, there she was! The sled I had been looking for! I gave the seller every last penny I had in my purse, after begging him to knock the price down by £10 as I just didn’t have enough left at the end of a good days shopping for studio props.
He very kindly agreed and finally I could create the Christmas photography set I had waited 8 long years to make.
I made too small trees using an artificial Christmas garland, added some snow matting and sprinkles, plus a tonne of cotton snowballs. Set against my blue paper backdrop, this set was ready to go.
As always I tend to use myself to test out my brand new sets. It saves a lot of time on arranging models to come in, plus it means I get to enjoy the full Betty Noir photoshoot experience for myself!
Yeah it can take a little bit of patience when shooting yourself, setting up the camera on a tripod and firing remotely. Tethered my Sony Alpha A7iii to my phone, so I was able to see exactly what I was shooting whilst getting my position and pose perfected. It’s the first time I’ve done it this way and not shot blindly and had to keep running back and forth to the camera to check my progress. What a timesaver it was, and I’m so pleased with the results.
To save even more time I decided to just pop on one of my wigs from my burlesque performing days, rather than spend the time styling my own hair. The outfit I am wearing is also from an old burlesque act of mine, including some old ice-skates which I removed the blades from, added some fur and blue ribbon for laces, and they are now the cutest vintage winter boots!
I post production all I had to do was tidy up the backdrop. The paper backdrops tend to have more marks and creases than my vinyl ones, so take a little longer to Photoshop to perfection. I then added a snow overlay and voila! Christmas has arrived!
I don’t usually photography children and families, but every Christmas I make and exception and invite families in to the studio to get their Christmas photos to print on to Christmas cards. This gorgeous little family are good friends of mine, who for the past three years I have asked to come in and be my family models. The first year it was with their gorgeous dog, but know they have a beautiful little boy.
It took a lot of singing and dancing to get him to smile and look in the right direction -hence why I don’t usually work with kids 😂
But we got there in the end and got some beautiful family shots.
Unfortunately I cannot share anymore photos from my other Christmas photo shoots as they shall be a nice surprise for everyone’s family and friends. But I’m so happy with the results and so happy that I finally got to bring my little Christmas sledding dream to life.