Of shades and shadows – Underwater nudes

Photography, pool photography, underwater

“When I began to photograph nudes, I let myself be guided by this camera, and instead of photographing what I saw, I photographed what the camera was seeing. I interfered very little, and the lens produced anatomical images and shapes which my eyes had never observed.” (Bill Brandt, photographer)

Shooting nudes underwater is new to me. I always wanted to try it out but in the first place I needed a model willing to perform. It was important to me to have a good connection to the model. I wanted this to be a team work. It was essential that she/he had to feel comfortable. After having seen a lot of underwater nudes I still didn’t know what I wanted but I was sure of what I didn’t want. I personally love colours but I can’t imagine nudes other than in black &white with the occasional hint of colour. They should be a mystery where the watcher can let his imagination wander…

Underwater Concerto

diving, Photography, pool photography, underwater

“Life is like a trumpet – if you don’t put anything into it, you don’t get anything out of it.”
William Christopher Handy

A couple of days ago I spent the afternoon in the swimming pool for a very special shoot-out. Young Matteo wanted underwater pics of himself playing his trumpet. I personally never put such a beautiful instrument underwater so I was quite relieved that Matteo’s teacher gave his ok for the trumpet’s maiden dive:-)

Matteo performed fantastically even producing music bubbles underwater!

Watch by yourself!

Lady in Black

Photo of the day, Photography, pool photography, underwater

“Lady in Black” is a special underwater series. All images ARE taken underwater! I mention this only because some people asked me about it. The images were all post processed with an infra-red filter.

“When you photograph people in color, you photograph their clothes. But when you photograph people in Black and white, you photograph their souls!”
― Ted Grant

There are special infra-red filters to use directly on-camera while shooting but this is hardly possible while model shooting. The IR filters are very dark and hence light consuming which needs you to use very long shutter times. Underwater even if I’d use a tripod, my model wouldn’t be able to stay still that long to get sharp pictures 🙂

I hope you enjoy!

Lady in Black, a set on Flickr.