Klyment.com - Journal

Merran was so perfect for the images in our minds and I believe that Nikolas finally achieved something with this shoot that we had continually sought to realize for years. But in spite of how satisfied everyone seemed to be with these images, as the photographer I feel as though I left a lot of creative potential untapped and, in a sense, let down the team. Had this been a commercial shoot, achieving the original vision would have been enough justification to wrap the day. But this was to be an explorative and experimental shoot where we were to push ourselves beyond our familiar limitations. And perhaps here is where Nikolas and Merran had succeeded and I merely achieved what was satisfactory.

Originally I had intended to use the fog as a medium through which to project and "fake" many more natural light sources as if our locations had a wall perforated with rotted holes allowing the passage of direct sunlight. But upon proofing with a Fuji Instax frame I became comfortable with the composition, posing, and the found lighting that I had only conservatively enhanced with a single artificial light source even though I had brought a total of four Dedolight tungsten heads, two Arri Locaster LED arrays and two bi-color LED panels. I had become so pre-occupied with meeting a cut off time that early in the shoot I had subconsciously eliminated what I believed were non-essential elements that could jeopardize meeting this deadline. I had a few ideas that would have leant more depth to the concept and I could have used a stronger hand in directing our model but I had become distracted by the camera work.

Regardless of these personal disappointments I had discovered something through this shoot that wasn't directly related to these photographs. But that's for an offline discussion.

Two of the three deliverable images shot in the originally-intended format and medium. Ilford HP5+ pushed to ISO 1600 in Ilford Ilfosol S after being exposed through a Schneider Symmar 135mm F/5.6 (above) or 210/5.6 (below) mounted on a jade green Toyo VX125, and drum scanned with an Aztek Digital Photo Lab Pro-driven Howtek Scanmaster 4500. Lighting provided by a custom 9x9" bi-color LED panel running on a Sony V-mount battery. Fog by a Martin Magnum 800 and Martin fluid.

I guess this image serves as a setup shot.

Some of the [2minute] instant proofs from the Toyo.