The Model: Sora Ashwood, a professional mermaid who wanted to update her portfolio in-costume with an outdoor winter shoot.

The Challenge: Shooting on location, which meant finding a waterfront location with enough snow to make clear that it was actually winter. We'd had several really nice days leading up to the shoot, so we were concerned we wouldn't even have snow.

The Location: The bridge in the beginning of the shoot is the same bowstring arch bridge at Catoctin Furnace where I shot with Vanity Kills. The river location is at the opposite end of the Catoctin Furnace Interpretive Trail, just inside the edge of the woods from the picnic grove.

The Shoot: February 15th, 2011. We met up at noon and did a quick scout of the bridge so Sora could get a sense of the area. Her mermaid tail was extremely delicate, so she had to sit on blankets for this part of the shoot, which meant SERIOUS editing for me. We did a couple of test shots, two of which I included here. 30 minutes later, we were ready to move to the second location. Here, Sora again had to sit on blankets and yoga mats, because the snow was very real. It's a good thing the sun was out, because she spent 2 hours nearly naked in the snow in 45 degree weather. On more than one occasion I also found myself belly down in the snow, and I had a coat on, so Sora gets ALL the credit in the world for not only surviving, but embracing, this particularly challenging shoot.

Check out her current portfolio here: http://www.modelmayhem.com/portfolio/2013542/viewall