The Fairy of Photos?

One of the concepts I forgot to mention in my last post was that of the Photo Fairy. The concept statement for this series of images goes something like this: "The photo fairy is one of the fae muses. She inspires creativity and new perspectives, and oddly enough, she likes to get into lots of contorted positions while using her cameras." Keeping that concept in mind, and knowing the long lives of the fae, I extended to concept to conclude that this fairy would have quite a variety of cameras with which she could shoot. Fortunately, I have quite a number of camera bodies and lenses, some of them quite old, which can be used a props to support that particular theory. Above, you can see a photo of one a Polaroid Land Camera 100 - one of the first cameras with an electronic shutter and the first Polaroid utilizes pack-film. It was produced and sold in the early 1960's.

The camera you see to the right is a folding Medium Format Camera from Kodak. Based on my research, I believe it's a Kodak Vigilant Six-20 made in the years 1939-49. The Vigilant Six-20 has a folding frame finder incorporated into its top housing, and another optical finder near the shutter.

I've had both these cameras for over twenty years, as they were a gift from my mother-in-law. They've been part of the decor in my office for as long as I had an area to call my own. It's nice to be able to put them to use in one of my photographic endeavors. I'll need to clean them up a bit before the shoot, but both of them are in pretty good shape for their age.

Of course, I'll be using some more modern cameras as props in the shoot, but on Tuesday I found a camera that was quite affordable and was perfect for the shoot. It's a Kodak SpeedGraphic 4x5 view camera and it's in working condition. There's a small chip broken off the ground glass focusing plate, but the bellows is tight and the controls work quite well. The shutter works and though it took me a minute to figure out how to set the shutter speed and aperture.I think it's the perfect prop for the shoot.

The model wants the final images to be B&W and infrared, which I think is an excellent idea, though I'm thinking of editing the images to make them appear consistent with the images that would have been taken with the type of camera she would be using for the shoot. So, if we start with the older cameras and move to the more modern ones, the images would be come cleaner, clearer, and the final images would be in color.

The model for this shoot? Well, I think I've talked my lovely wife into participating with this one. She used to be my primary model for all my shoots, but since she's become a grandmother, she's much less inclined to model for me. But, this image was taken just a couple of years ago, and I still think she's good model material. :)