Winter Editing

Joey Darke at Fairy Creek

Since I retired from my full time job a few years ago, I was able to concentrate on shooting more projects with various local and traveling models. So, for about 4 years I was shooting about about 50 sessions a year with many different models. Of course, many of these sessions were repeat shoots with the same models in different settings and shooting different concepts and themes. Nevertheless, as you can imagine, I have built up quite the inventory or images, very many of which have been edited and published, but a majority are untouched except for some preliminary global editing for white balance and exposure as they were imported into my Lightroom catalog. This winter, I've been working on editing some of this backlog, and even re-editing previously published images with new techniques that I've learned in recent years.

These days, besides picking up a few shooting gigs here and there to help out local models with their various endeavors, I'm primarily spending time taking care of my family and grandchildren, which leaves me little time for shooting. Though I do plan do shoot this year with several of my favorite models, I'm sure my yearly average of sessions is going to drop significantly. So, you're likely to see fewer new shoots with new faces on the sites where I usually publish my images, and more images from past shoots and concepts.

Nikko at Sauvie Island

Island Girl

A couple of summers ago, I had the delightful experience of shooting with the friend of a friend at our local nude beach. Cy is a lovely and accomplished model whose company I thoroughly enjoyed.

We had a wide-ranging conversation during our 3 hour afternoon shoot and had a wonderful time wandering around the beach shooting and talking.

 For those unfamiliar with it, Sauvie Island lies west of Portland along the Columbia and Willamette rivers. It is an island of farms, wildlife refuges, and lovely woodlands. Along with the farms it boasts a number of nature trails and river beaches.  Collins Beach is a clothing optional area and is a grand place for photography due to is varied terrain and ease of access. 

There are drawbacks such as mosquitos on hot humid days, crowds on the weekends, and the occasional creep in the bushes (Brennan Hill know how to deal with those), but all in all, it's a nice place to relax in the sun or do some small amount of photography as long as you're discrete and photography only your model.

Model: Cy
Project: Barefoot Glamour
Location: Sauvie Island, Oregon

Pearls in the Woods

Woodland's Edge

Along the Shore

Between Forest and Shore

At the Spaceship

Joey is almost the perfect pinup model. Long, red, locks; fair skin with a sprinkling of freckles; a long torso, and a voluptuous shape. I've shot quite a bit with her over the last couple of years, and she never fails to delight. This, however, was her first motorcycle pinup shoot and I think we did an admirable job despite struggles with the changing lighting conditions (natural light with on-camera fill flash set at about -2/3 EC.
 Model: Joey D.
Project: Motorcycle Pinup
Location: Portland, Oregon - Mac-Studios
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