Honorable Mention Underwater Fashion
Vanessa Torres Macho
“Black & White Muse“
The Story:
I’m lucky to have a couple great freediving friends who I can call for any of my photoshoot ideas. In this picture, Virginia, who is an incredible freediver, was tasked to deal with fabrics and high heel shoes in a very shallow pool. I decided to use two large (and hand sewn) pieces of fabric to hide the beaten walls of the pool but these fabrics turned out to be two unruly beasts so I decided to just embrace it and paired with a great model, the shoot was a success.
Virginia is holding another 3-meter piece of fabric around her and it took a few takes to get the effortless look and whimsical atmosphere. There was no lead/weight on her and the sitting position was achieved by relaxing and exhaling a great portion of her breath.
When I have an idea for a shoot, I usually resort to my usual models, because they have already been briefed on hand, leg and body positioning and we can get straight to shooting.
I generally shoot in color but the clothing and the shoes spoke to me of old-time film noir, so the editing consisted of making the image black and white, highlighting the contrasts and softening the background to make the model the star of the image.
Location:
Mona Vale, Sydney, Australia
Equipment Used:
- Camera: Olympus OM-D E-M1 Mark II
- Housing:
- Lens: Olympus 12-40mm 2.8 Pro Lens
- Lights/Strobes: Dual Inon Z240 Strobes with a Remote Inon Z240 Strobe
Camera Settings:
- Aperture: F5
- Shutter Speed: 1/250 sec
- ISO: 64
