Today was the day of shooting. We woke up early (for us), and got out of the hotel by 8am. We met out first model Anne at the hotel and traveled 1.5 hours out to the Yunque rainforest to the abandoned house in the middle of the rainforest that seemed to be custom made for a photo shoot. While driving there it rained on and off very heavily. We got to the house and set up for the shoot. The shots below are taken by Michael...and the one in particular of me at the house is a shot that Michael got while I was showing the model what I wanted her to do.
While shooting it started to rain very heavy and we were able to grab some great shots of the model with the rain and the house. Two hours and 20gb later we left the house and thanked Anne for doing such a fantastic job. There are many more shots from the shoot but I will have to post them later. I truly enjoyed the lines and lighting of the house which were just perfect for a photo shoot.
We left the house and traveled back to the city to the heart of old San Juan. We got stuck in the traffic that was just horrible. Trying to get through the old streets of San Juan with all the other traffic, especially on a Saturday was an absolute nightmare. We were trying to get to what the locals call the "Totem Pole," which is a monument in the city near the famous castle of El Morro. After 2 hours we found a parking spot, and met up with the lovely Ilka Tamar for her shoot.
The shoot was planned for El Morro which is a castle that was built by the Spaniards back in the 1500's. The castle is one of the primary locations for the new upcoming movie, "Pirates of the Caribbean 4." We entered the castle and have access to the entire place....and let me tell you it was nothing short of AMAZING! The castle was so large and offered so many options that it turned me into a kid in a candy store. I have never shot at one location for 4 straight hours, but this place was truly remarkable. It was so windy up there that the veil kept flying off of Ilka. Michael was kind enough to retrieve it which got him the nickname of "Veil Boy," by Ilka...and the name stuck. The most awesome thing about shooting there was that there were no regulations...we were able to climb anywhere we wanted and to shoot what we wanted which was something we don't find very often.
The most awesome part was shooting on the side of the edge of the castle which you can see on the shots below. You wouldn't know it but the edge was only 5 feet away, and was about a 300 foot drop. Michael and I grabbed shots of each other shooting which was really fun....We ended the shoot outside of the castle using HDR on the massive lawn in front of the castle. Sometimes I swear I am shooting and I can't believe what I'm shooting. That was exactly what this experience was for us today. We planned on meeting Ilka for dinner after the shoot but honestly we got lust in the traffic and never got hooked up again. We ended up back at the hotel and grabbed dinner in the restaurant. I shot a total of about 55 gb today...and all of them were so much fun I can't even describe how much I enjoyed it.
