In the spirit of last week’s hitherto unreleased “ghosts” images with actor Sarah Scanlon, this week’s image is another previously unreleased image from 2019’s Hauntings from a Distant Era series and features actors Mary-Kate Arnold, Lauren Fields, Elizabeth MacDougald, Juliana Brecher, and (in miniature) Scott Longpre.
This image came to be on a day when six different actors were shooting for the series. This series moved beyond portraits into scenes (not to mention animated gifs). In this scene, the women consult a book of spells as part of a seance. The focus in this image is on the woman on far left, who seems to consider a course of action while the others seem to urge her to action, one resting her hand upon the leftmost woman’s shoulder, another leaning forward over the table, eyes wide, enthusiastic, while the third gazes at the image within the crystal ball. The woman at the center of the table holds open a small book upon whose pages are copied spells from the Egyptian Book of the Dead. To the right of the candle, a crystal ball rests on a three-legged stand; close inspection of the crystal ball reveals a man’s face, distorted within the sphere, his eyes white, his mouth open in a scream. Wallpaper decorated in Victorian patterns (visible in the image at the bottom of the page) covers the back wall of the chamber in which the women conduct their ritual.
Documenting the Process
Thanks to the number of edits required and a busy, packed schedule, this image languished among the discarded Hauntings files for a few months before it was edited. Suffice it to say, I would have shot and edited it differently today than in 2019. Let’s take a look at the original image, which appears here as shot, with the exposure raised to see the details.
A tall black background stretches almost to the ceiling and the black sides of V-flats flank the scene, blocking outside light. In 2019, I shot with wider lenses and was often at risk of shooting off the background. As a result, my subjects in 2019 were often very close to the background, and the background was extended as far in either direction as it could go. Later during Hauntings, I learned to shoot with longer lenses, which compress subject and background together, fixing some problems with shooting off the background while introducing the other problem of having to back way up to shoot.
A giant umbrella looms over the scene. This was important for shooting against black. The light falls along the contours of the subjects’ bodies, separating them from the darkness.
The streak of light on the left side of the frame comes from a skylight and is a constant bother. Since Hauntings I have taken to covering the skylight with Cinefoil (black aluminum foil) when shooting.
The small flash on a light stand is gridded and equipped with an amber gel and pointed at the center of the image above the candle in order to shed some warm candlelight on the subjects and the table. It is held by Gary Henderson (who recently created his second Distant Era portrait—watch this space!).
Obviously the spellbook is blank, there’s no Victorian wallpaper, and there’s no distorted man lurking within the crystal ball. These are all effects that had to be learned and added later.
The more one learns, the greater the compulsion to do more, revise more, create more. Add bookshelves, for instance, a cat, more implements on the table, cobwebs, a whole environment… but this would be dwelling too much on the past. In the end, I’m happy to have resurrected this old image from our 2019 session for Halloween 2021 and relived the memories from one of our last pre-pandemic photo sessions. Happy Halloween.
Follow Me