Photographing model Alice Bryan

Do you ever do things in life and reflect on them afterwards and wonder how you managed to pull it off thinking "How did I manage that?". I did recently, having arranged and conducted a shoot with the highly wonderful UK model Alice Bryan. Something I wasn't sure I'd ever be able to do.

Alice is a model I'd hoped to photograph throughout 2024 since I started on my model photography adventures, but I wasn't sure my weird and wonderful style would suit her ambitions. She has done shoots for lots of big names such as L'Oreal, Rolls Royce and more - so really exclusive work. So as you might imagine, I was delighted when she agreed to pop along to the studio to work with me.

We arranged a 4 hour block at my favourite local studio, that being The Boardroom Studio in Derby (yes, I do have a home studio, but for professional models like Alice, I think The Boardroom is more fitting for the task) and exchanged a few mood board ideas via PInterest.

The day of the shoot went well from start to end. Alice brought a great array of clothing that suits my own vibe of photography, and she was also happy to have a go at sporting some of the chiffon fabrics I had bought specially for this shoot with her.

She has what some would call a very traditional striking beauty. She typifies that Hollywood star kind of look and reminds me of a couple of actresses from the movies. And so I knew she would shine like a bright star under my style of lighting, which included my super powerful national-grid disabling Fresnel light!

I shot through 12 rolls of Kodak Tri-X 400 for this shoot. Usually, I shoot 8, give or take. So 12 was in part thanks to the 4 hour time block, but also due to my eagerness to make sure I bagged as many great shots of this wonderful lady as I could during my time working with her.

Below are a selection of some of my many favourites. Amazingly, from all the rolls I shot, I think I only binned (discarded\deleted) 5 or 6. And they were just due to either my focus error, or the fact that they replicated almost exactly the proceeding frame. That is quite an astonishing hit rate. There's at least 6 or 7 that I'd happily print and display in frames in my studio, and in fact, I very likely will do just that!