lilly
Lily is a fun person. One thing I remember about this shoot is that everyone dropped out the day before. Makeup, Styling, Model. So this crew was pulled together overnight, and somehow I got lucky.
Emmelie on makeup came through for this one, she really helped level this shoot up from a little test, into something resembling an actual shoot. It really is worth working with other talented people whenever you can. It only takes a bit of well applied makeup by one person to make the shoot look like it was put together by a team of 10. That’s kinda what happened in this one.
The main idea I wanted to play around with was shooting into black. I hadn’t really done a lot of shots like that before and was trying to show some range I guess. But the main thing bugging me was how I would make the “darkness” interesting, which is when a trip to Aldi gave me all the inspiration I needed. Those familiar with Aldi (or Lidl’s) “middle aisle” understands what I’m about to say, for those who don’t the middle aisle is a treasure trove of items you both need, and definitely don’t need. Just imagine being in the middle of a supermarket and finding yourself weighing up with you need a 150 piece tool set, or a car battery charger when you just popped in for milk and eggs.
Inspiration can strike anywhere, so there I was staring at a pile of 1kg bags of confetti. Thats a lot of confetti if you didn’t realise. Next to it was a promotional shipper of Prosecco. You’ve seen the images so you know where this is going. Girl, flash, confetti, prosecco. How can it fail? I thought that was all I needed, but as I said before, this is where working with other creatives helps. Makeup Artist Emmelie decided to give Lily some glittery gold eye makeup. Something I wouldn’t have thought of, but it made the shoot.
We only had a few goes at shooting the main shot I had in mind, which was Lily holding the glass out as someone off camera poured drink into her glass whilst she’s surrounded by falling confetti. I think we got it. The depth that the confetti provided from super soft in the foreground to pin sharp ones near her chest leaving shadows over her chest. Lily has beautiful definition in her jawline which leave subtle dimples each side. I think the angle and lighting did a really good job of highlighting these. After a successful play with the drink, we decided to use our last few minutes just shooting some cutesy fashion of her in my vintage France ’98 football shirt. Her hair was slightly wet from the Prosecco we’d be throwing around which added to the look of someone who’d got home from a great party and was sitting around in their comfy clothes.
This was a fun one.
