Hi, and welcome.

Today I’m going to share with you the story of how I turned my cinematic dark fantasy project from rainy disaster to a snowy art piece! With moody styling, epic props, and a Bloodborne-inspired character.

The Beginning

Back in late November of last year (2024) me and my partner were sharing creative thoughts and ideas with each other, and we came up with this idea for a photoshoot which had both of us immediately very excited.
It revolved around this female character that we envisioned as some kind of a Bloodborne huntress.

At first, we didn’t completely agree on the styling, but we talked about it and decided very quickly on what would go on to become the final look. I went back a few times, second guessing some of our choices, but always decided to stick to them and I think the results show we actually had it right from the start.

I already knew a location that I felt would be perfect for the project, so I took a few days and prepared a moodboard and a shot list. Actually, the more I thought about this shoot, the more ideas would spring to mind, until I was pretty sure I wanted to make a short movie about the character too, and I had made a separate shot list for it which my partner then helped me turn into a storyboard.

At this point we had gone through a few names for the project, starting from the “Lady with the Crossbow”, to the “Witch-huntress”, and had decided for “Destiny”.
As the day approached, we also had to find and prepare all the pieces that would make the shoot come alive, and we were so lucky getting this amazing replica of a real medieval crossbow and the wide brimmed hat, the veil of which we made ourselves and pinned in place. I even took the chance and reached out to borrow a camera from a different brand just to try it.

The first shoot

Then the day comes – we’re around Christmas time – and it starts pouring like crazy.
From the get go we knew we wanted to shoot this in the woods (or even a forest), and in our area this meant we needed to get high into the mountains, where the roads are narrow, unkept and prone to collapsing. Our first choice for location was suddenly not an option.

I went to maps and quickly found a similar spot that looked a bit easier and safer to reach, and we set out hoping to get there.
We actually got pretty close when we reached a point where we had to stop. The road ahead was covered in snow for as far as our eyes could see, no snowplow had been there nor would be for the foreseeable future, and it was still raining too.

Now: I ride a small SUV, but even so, pushing further up that road felt like a really bad move to make, so we decided not to. I remember thinking: “we are close, if I can just find a place where to leave the car, maybe we can get there on foot!”

With this thought, we started making our way back down instead, and stopped as soon as we found a place the snow hadn’t reached. From there we took our gear and made an attempt at venturing up on foot, looking for a spot that could hopefully work for the shoot.
Thing is, even though we were not on top of a mountain, we still were on the side of one – and maybe this is going to sound strange or even dumb to some – but as high as this place was, there was still this super small town, and most of the lands and fields around it were private property and fenced off.

With no way of shooting there, struggling to get further on foot let alone by car, and the clock ticking, I was getting nervous, afraid we would be unable to shoot at all.
We were so close, but just not enough. But we had worked too hard to give up yet.

Getting up the mountain, we had passed by a couple of fields and small woods that, if not exactly matching the place we had envisioned, could still do a passable job. We went back to the SUV and resumed our way back down the mountain, looking for one of those places. It took us a while to reach one of them that was actually accessible and usable for our purpose.
I parked right next to the spot, we got out of the car and we started shooting straight away.
Needing to get something out of the borrowed camera, I only used that to snatch this quick couple of shots.

Then the wind grew so strong and cold it became actually impossible for us to keep shooting. We spent a few minutes basically just struggling to keep the hat from flying away and biding our time in hope it will calm down again, but after a while we had to face the truth: the Sun had basically gone down and the storm was reaching there too. There was nothing we could do but leave.

The Aftermath

When we get back home it’s evening, we’re more disappointed than tired and we have no other plans for the day. We take some time to eat and warm up again. Then I go: “why don’t we try it in studio?”
And I take this:

The setting being a key element of the shoot, and both of us being fascinated with painterly edited pictures, I decided to try and use a real painting as a background for this one.
I didn’t hate the result, but was mentally exhausted at this point and wanted to rest and think about it. In the following days, part of me just wanted to post this single picture, while another part of me intended to keep this for another project we were/are working on, but that’s just one of the reasons why I ultimately decided not to post it.

Note: I got the the painting from the Metropolitan Museum of Art (MET Museum)’s Open Access collection -> here <- and I borrowed the technique from Irene Rudnyk, video -> here <-

My thought process

We could’ve easily gone back to the studio to create more shots like this. We had the space, the lights, the shot list, and I had proven to us that such edit could work. But I decided not to.
At the same time, cool and all, the 5 shots that we already had were far from what I would deem satisfactory.

I guess we could say that the thought process for me was twofold:
On one side, as cool as merging our photography with real paintings was, I saw it as limiting to what I could do and achieve.
On the other side, I was sure the perfect shot was still out there waiting for us, and that I could achieve something much more nuanced and unique, something that was really and fully my own, going out and shooting on location.

No matter how much time it takes to achieve something: if it’s something you care about and that you can do, then you just should.
And yes, there are times when enough is enough, but my goal has never been to just be enough at photography, to make art that is good enough.
My good enough is when I’ve done everything I can to get the best shot possible. That’s enough to me.

The second shoot

Since we did the first shoot, the weather has been particularly bad here, forcing me to shoot elsewhere.
The camera I had tried had to go back just a couple of days after, and even though I liked it, coming into shoot two I was glad not to have it, as it meant one less thing to think about.

Fast forwarding to the end of March 2025, I had managed to find an alternative location that seemed more approachable than the one we had originally planned, but would still tick all the boxes for us, and that became the location. I also had had the time to go over all the shots and planning again, so much so that I rewrote the video, making changes and even scripting a second version of it, just in case some shot proved too difficult to achieve.

Some warm days seem to be coming back, we feel like we waited enough and are eager to try again, when actually another storm hits. But it appears to be smaller and faster this time, so we study the forecast and adjust our schedule to hit this small time window where we would find the place clear.

The trip is lovely, and we go from this

To this

When I saw this, I just started screaming. I could not believe it.
The roads where still usable, the light was perfect, the place looked even cooler than I had thought, and the weather was actually stable.

We get out and it takes very little for us to find a workable spot for the shoot. We start immediately.
A very small amount of rain was falling, and I think it added a lot to the atmosphere of the pictures.
We nail a shot, then another and another, until the electronic viewfinder fogs up due to the cold and I have to switch to the flippy screen, and I actually go back and forth to keep a clearer view of the shots.

I am not a burst shooter, especially if I can avoid it. I take the shots I see, follow the plan and my guts equally, and the rate of keepers here is through the roof.

When it comes to the video I scrap almost everything due to my partner unfortunately struggling too much with the cold, and only take a couple of clips with the idea of putting together a small teaser trailer for the project. I even fumble taking the last clip (and will only find out later), forgetting to adjust a setting as I hurry to get it done. But I think we got enough.
My camera is dripping, I can’t feel my hands anymore and my partner can’t feel her anything anymore. We stop and we call it good.

When we go back I’m so nervous, ’cause this time there are no excuses, either I got it perfect or I messed up, and I knew that with the rain dripping on the flippy screen and the fogging of the EVF I couldn’t necessarily trust what I saw. I felt like I got it, but I couldn’t be sure I got it.

When we looked at the files and saw this, there we knew we had got it.

Look at the full photoshoot and the teaser trailer HERE.
Buy signed prints HERE.