In many fairy tales and even in Classical mythology, Death is often personified as a person or a thing. Grimms’ Death’s Messengers is an example of this. A brief synopsis of the story is as follows: Death is personified as a man who gets beaten down by a giant in ancient times. However, a young man finds Death along the road and takes compassion on him and helps him. In return for this kindness, Death promises to send “messengers” to the man so he will be forewarned before he dies. For Death says, “I am Death…I spare no one, and can make no exceptions…” And so, the young man goes about his life, fully expecting to receive a grand sign before he is to die. However, it does not happen that way. “Then one day someone tapped him on the shoulder.” It was Death, he had come to take him away. The man was surprised that he had received no “messages.” But Death merely explains the messages where the sicknesses that came upon him and that his brother, Sleep, had been reminding him. “The man could make no answer; he yielded to his fate, and went away with Death.”
For my interpretation of the story, I latched on to the idea that Death has a “messenger” or some sort of warning system that will alert one to their fate. I asked myself, if there are such things as these “messages,” what are they and what do they look like? Ultimately, I came up with the idea of “Death’s Messenger” as a young maiden bearing a white rose, who haunts one through dreams and Sleep, sending “messages” of fate.
Below are a few outtakes from the shoot.
I had this idea for a shot with the model between the gates, standing as if “welcoming” one to Death. It did not quite turn out the way I wanted it. I used one umbrella camera left, but kept on getting flare. One strobe was placed behind the model and zoomed with a blue gel. I shot with a Nikon D80 and a 50mm lens at f/1.8. I marked the changes I would like to make if I get a chance to re-shoot on the below photo. In addition to the marked changes, I’m also going to get A-clamps and some black matte board so I can start gobo-ing (I think I just made up a word) my lens to avoid lens flare!
Oh and just for fun… I had one of my “crazy but just might work ideas”… the idea? Stick lights in the model’s hair like a halo! Well, needless to say that was one of my just “crazy” ideas, but I had a good laugh seeing the result.
Source: Grimm’s Complete Fairy Tales
Your photos are fantastic! I really like your idea of writing down desired changes on an attempted shot. That way you can’t forget what you wanted to do! I think it’s great that you act on all of your ideas, no matter how likely they are to turn out. You can’t miss anything good that way
[...] a previous post, I explained how I wanted to redo the “Death’s Messenger” shot by the cemetery [...]