On June 2, I did a photo shoot with Coralinx Cosplay at Meadowlark Gardens for her Taylor Swift inspired Folklore fairy cosplay. The cosplay was inspired by Taylor Swift fan art by Alef Vernon. I choose to do an on location shoot for this cosplay session, because Meadowlark has several little places that work perfectly for cosplay and allowed for more variety in the photos.
For this session, I used:
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Photography Equipment |
Props/Miscellaneous |
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Cannon R6 24-105 mm Lens Transmitter/Trigger Small ocatbox. Speedlight Painter’s pole assistant |
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The set up
Since this session was done on location, there wasn’t a lot of set up for the session. The main thing was getting the speed light mounted on the painter’s pole with a small ocatbox, so I could add that pop of light to the model’s face. Natural light is great, and reflectors work well but you can’t match the control of a flash. The other benefit here is my assistant (my husband) was holding the painter’s pole with the light so could maneuver it to the place the light needed to be.
Camera Settings
For this session, I used ISO 100 because it was bright and sunny out. My aperture varied from F4 to F9 depending on the look I was going for. My most common aperture was F4 to get that background blur and separation. My shutter speed ranged from 1/80s to 1/250s. There were some heavily shaded spots in the garden but most of my images were shot using a shutter of 1/250s which is also my flash sync speed. My focal length ranged from 24mm to 105mm with most images being shot at 24mm as I like the ability to crop and straighten images without cutting anything off. I have the hardest time shooting a level image.
The Photos
I have a lot of favorite images from this session, most of them being in the hanging branches of a weeping willow. I like this first image because it is light and airy, and the light is hitting her perfectly. I also didn’t have to do a lot in post. The first thing I did was remove the green color cast from the skin tone. All of the green from the tree leaves reflected in the skin, so I had to color correct. I then cleaned up the hair slightly to get rid of some flyaways, softened the skin just a touch to give the image a soft dreamy feel, and then added a very subtle blue(shadow)/orange(highlight) color grade, then finished the image with a slight vignette.
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| Aperture F5.6, Shutter 1/250s, Focal Length 105mm |
I like this next image is a full-length version in the willow branches. I went with a more of a golden and yellow tone in this image instead of a strong green. This helps make the image feel airy and a bit dreamier and gives it a nice overall warmth. When editing I removed the green cast on the skin. Sidenote, the green cast is why I hate shoot in parks and gardens in the summertime sometimes, fall is better for the skin with warm orange and red tones. I then removed some flyaways, softened the skin just a touch and added very subtle blue(shadow)/orange(highlight) color grade which helped bring color back to the skin and deepen the shadows. I ended by adding a very slight vignette to the image.
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| Aperture F5.6, Shutter 1/250s, Focal Length 65mm |
This next image relied on the flash to balance the lighting on the model and the brightness of the sky as the sky was at least a stop brighter than the model without the flash. Sadly, you can tell I used the flash by nice definition between the model and the background, but I like this image. In post I applied a mask to the sky to bring out the blue color. I then removed the green cast and removed flyaways. I also added a very subtle blue(shadow)/orange(highlight) color grade to the image to make it pop. I finished with a medium vignette.
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| Aperture F5.6, Shutter 1/250s, Focal Length 39mm |
This last location and pose were suggested by the model’s boyfriend, since the garden had a tiny fairy garden. (Yes, I allow models to bring their significant others to the shoot. They can be very helpful for holding things for the model, fixing wardrobe, and even providing encouragement. In this case providing a shot suggestion.) So, we did an image where the model was looking over the tiny fairy village and giving it her blessing. This was the last shot of the day and a good way to end the session.
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| Aperture F7.1, Shutter 1/250s, Focal Length 24mm |
Final Thoughts:
This was a lovely session, though several of the kids in the garden wanted to take pictures with the fairy. I tried to keep us away from the areas full of children to reduce interruptions. I’m very happy with how these images turned out. I was considering a studio session for the cosplay but realized I did not have enough greenery, thus the garden worked well. Maybe I’ll redo this shoot as some point in studio as I have a couple ideas in mind and have the time to get all the flowers and greenery. You can see the all the images from the session here: Folklore Fairy.
Model: Coralinx Cosplay (IG: @coralinx_cosplay)
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