BLOG #123   1/5/2015

In the dome, at night, preparing for the fashion shoot

I began my many years of underwater dance and fashion work when Beverly and I lived in a Northern California house, in the town of Fairfax, in Marin County, with an indoor pool. My first “mermodels” were mostly dancers with the San Francisco Ballet. Given mild winters and the interior setting, I could keep the water temperature constant and comfortable as well as shooting all year around and at any time of day.

Our pool in Connecticut, presents problems I didn’t have in California. The pool is outside, and therefore subject to the rigors of New England winter temperatures. Not wanting to be limited to underwater work only in the summer, I’ve made a protected environment to continue my long submerged experiments.

The Connecticut pool on a warm and rainy summer’s day. Note my two assistants under the tent preparing the camera equipment.

Our CT pool, built only for making photographs, is covered by a translucent plastic dome in the winter. It’s a warm and pleasing space.

This is the pool in the winter with no dome.

The dome covered by ice on a freezing cold winter’s day. It is wonderfully warm inside.

Inside the dome which is covered by ice:

For a night fashion editorial, I floated blocks of dry ice on the surface of the water to produce a lingering soft cloud of “smoke” over the pool with gelled, colored, lights off to each side.

With the mist surrounding her, I had the model, Olga Akhunova, stand on the edge of the spa which reached out into the pool.

These are some of the other images from the editorial “Mood Indigo”:

A mix of many diverse visual ingredients combined to produce unusual imagery.

Models:
Olga Akhunova
Christina Ionno
Laura Kading
Rebecca Chandler

Stylist: Mia Morgan
Hair Stylist: Algene Wong
Makeup: Yuko Mizuno
Stylist assistants: Christelle Mathon and Andrea Morrisette
Production intern: Genna Gershkow