Warrior Queen

Amira Chain and Mithroden Sword

I haven't shot the Sword & Chains concept for several years. I love the concept. It combines fantasy art, eroticism, pinup, and glamour with the idea of a strong, warrior woman. Inspired by the art of Boris Vallejo, Frank Franzetta, Luis Royo, Julie Bell, and others, I conceived the concept when I found beautiful chainmaille jewelry for sale by a company located in New England. The concept further gelled when I purchased several Kit Rae designer swords from an online company that specializes in the sale of swords and knives. Chainmaille & More provides the fantastical jewelry in my images, while BUDK.com provides the designer swords and other weapons flourished by my models.

Nicole V. inspired me to recreate the concept. A well-known model from my area, Nicole has a body well able to convey the idea of a strong, beautiful warrior.  Besides, when I approached her with the concept, she took to it immediately. A fan of fantasy art and writing like me, we both found the collaboration intriguing. 

Dewdrop Chains with Dual Swords

We had great weather for our shoot, and a great location too. We used Nicole and her partner's property which contained a large field, a wooded area abutting a creek, and a a couple of small groups of trees that provided excellent backdrops for our shots.

Nicole helped me greatly by conveying the heavy swords across the slippery rocks of the creek, leaving me free to carefully make my way without falling on my ass. I pre-staged the remaining chainmaille outfits and swords in the other areas where I planned to shoot (I had previously mapped out the shoot location), so we wouldn't have to go back and forth for props and outfits.

Ice Flame Blue Chains

We began our four-hour shoot in the wooded area starting with the Amira chains then worked our way through the Dewdrop, Raven, and Ice-Flame Blue sets. We shot the Ice-Flame Blue set and the accompanying blue sword with Nicole standing then kneeling in the shimmering blue waters of the creek. Each chainmaille outfit had a corresponding sword to go with it, and I think Nicole had great fun posing in each outfit.

We took a break after the woodland area shoot (mainly for me to rest) to hydrate, and then started shooting around a group of trees set near the west end of the field.  The remaining hours passed quickly. Nicole did an outstanding job with each set of chains and sword, and we rapidly completed shooting chainmaille sets. Nicole was in her element with the battle axe and Valkyrie chainmaille, but she also enjoyed all the chains with little bells that jingled.

Valkyrie Chains with Battle Axe

We had time left to shoot a couple of barefoot glamour and pinup concepts I had hoped to shoot and Nicole provided wonderful poses for those concepts as well.  During the entire 4 hours of shooting, Nicole made great suggestions and we had a wonderfully collaborative process. The images have turned out beautifully, and the shoot was one of the best so far this year.