Sunday marked another great outing at the Preston Castle this was the first of three photo days this year. This one took full advantage of early morning light which is always spectacular.

For this session, I was joined by model Julianna Steel. She and I have been friends for many years, and she’s always wonderful to work with, she also provides a vast collection of vintage outfits. For this outing I had two goals, one was to take full advantage of the existing light in the morning and the second was to make images at midday which is the hardest time to photograph.

Another challenge was one that Julianna brought forth. She said she could provide three different outfits for under $25. Sure enough, she came up with fantastic looks that came in at about $24.50.

All of the interior shots I used my Nikon D810 and switched between my Sigma 35 mm and my Sigma 85 mm. These lenses are so sharp and have such excellent color rendition.

Here are some of the sample images from the morning.

After we finished, we went across the street from the castle and photographed in an old abandoned house. It proved to be a perfect setting for the looks that Julianna made. For my lights I used my Phottix Indra 500 with the wide angle diffuser. These lights operate on a battery pack and take advantage of high-speed sync. Most of the time the light was at full power or just under that. I’m so pleased with how he’s like to perform. We shot for about an hour, and I still had full power on the battery pack. Average setting: ISO 100, f3.2 and 1/4000 sec

I’m looking forward to getting out and making more images this spring with a similar style.

More of the natural light images below