Def a bit of a wayback Wednesday shot of Fiona Apple in the daylight studios in the Puck Building, downtown Manhattan. Flash assist, with white boards down on the floor. The armor was her idea, totally. She wanted to be a warrior woman, as at that point in her career she had been photographed in mostly a very genteel fashion. So we went for it. I had 3 dozen roses all plucked and two assistants on ladders dropping them gently on her Arthurian garb.
Tried some blood on the sword as well, but in the end her astonishing eyes, literally matching the blueish gun metal of the armor owned the day. No embellishment needed.
Medium format film, Mamiya Pro II with 150mm lens. The pictures I made of Fiona, who was lovely to work with, have been played endlessly on Twitter for reasons unapparent to me. I imagine she has a fan base out there that just keeps grabbing the pictures and running them. I remain a huge fan of her music and lyrics.
The portrait in the studio was planned, staged, lit, and propped. We had a crew, and her management. Usual celeb hubbub sort of stuff.
Her manager though, upon realizing the shoot had gone long, was exclaiming that he had to get her back on the bus, which was in midtown, for a gig in NJ, I believe. "The only way we'll make it is to take the subway!" he said. (He wasn't overwhelmingly happy with me.) I looked at Fiona, and said, "Wear the armor in the subway?" She was game. (Wonderful to work with, lovely to photograph.)
We threw a coat over the armor and sword and heading for the underground. The portrait, as I mentioned in the post, was shot on medium format. The subway shot was either an Nikon F5 or an FM2. Flash on camera, running through a Lumiquest 80-20 and bouncing off the subway ceiling.
I shot like mad at rush hour, banging through about 4 rolls of film over the course of about 5 subway stops. At the end, she made the bus, and the picture most prominently published was the subway shot. Wouldn't want to take a sword into the subway nowadays. As we parted company, she knighted me. All the prep for the studio shoot went to the side, and the off the cuff rush hour snap made for a better select.
