Eos Shoot Planning

Eos is the Titaness of the dawn in Greek mythology. She is the sister of Helios, god of the sun. As previously discussed, I think Eos will fit in perfectly with my selection of Goddesses, who all seem to have a role beyond just human appreciation - bringing the days and night to us, and therefore feeling even more removed from our modern-day world.

For this shoot, I will be using Evelyn De Morgan's Eos (1895) as my main source of influence and inspiration.

The painting, to me, is beautiful in its depth colour tone, cleanliness and flow, and so these aspects I will be looking to bring into my own image.

Physical Appearances

One of the biggest issues I will face with trying to take a photograph of myself similar to this is, of course, the wings. Eos here is depicted with incredible copper tones feathered wings, much like an angel, but warm-toned. You can buy wings online, usually from Etsy sellers who hand-make them, and so while they are well priced due to the work that's gone into them, they are out of my budget.

One option would be to get a cheaper looking pair, and then adding to them myself;

However, with money being tight right now during the COVID-19 lockdown, this would also put pressure on my budget. I won't rule it out, however, as I think this could work well.

I could attempt to photoshop some wings in, but my skill, as previously discussed, isn't at a standard where I think it would look good enough.

The last option is just to forego the wings completely. This wouldn't be terrible, as it would link with the other images being slightly more modern. However, most depictions of Eos show her with her wings, and they also help frame her within the photograph.

In terms of her dress, I think that this would be somewhat easy to recreate to a degree where they look similar. an oversized white dress bunched up and sewed in place could work, which I could find from a charity shop and do up myself. Of course, with current circumstances, such shops are not open and that's where my difficulties lie. However, I hope that once lockdown is over, these shops will start to reopen and I will be able to work again to make this image everything it can be.

The vase is another easy aspect with the help of second-hand shops, however, I'm sure that I already have something that would work. The flow of the water coming out would be less painterly as it will reflect light and have much more dimension, naturally, but again this ties between real life and the myth, and the world of the painting.

The flowers at the bottom are significant to the painting, as they represent different things. Daisies in pre-raphaelite paintings are a symbol of innocence and purity. The rose is a symbol of love, something that is fitting for such a Goddess as Aphrodite cursed her for sleeping with Ares, and so Eos fell in love with Orion, Phaethon, Kephalos (Cephalus) and Tithonos. In order to get these into my image, I can either take a shot of them and mask them in in photoshop, or pluck the heads off the flowers and scatter them by my feet on location. At the moment, masking seems like an option that would end up looking more natural.

The seagulls are not of great importance to me, however, if I decide I wish to include them, I will also use photoshop to mask these in.

Location and Time

As Eos is the Goddess of the dawn, this must, of course, be taken at dawn. This time changes from day to day, so the night before I will check online to see what time would be adequate for that specific day. In De Morgan's painting, Eos is stood behind gorgeous sky where the sun is just about to peek over the horizon. A gradient of yellow and blue is produced, and so this is what I must recreate. Every dawn will appear different, so if the colours aren't as saturated, or the gradient isn't quite so even, I can help this in pot production with a gradient filter masked for just the sky.  I think this gradient in the sky helps pull everything together in the image, and is important for her backstory, and therefore necessary. As for location, the goddess is clearly depicted at the beach. There are marshes and dunes that lead down to the water. I have picked out some beaches around my home that could work for this;

1. Sizewell.

Sizewell is a beach that is more known for its nuclear power plant. It has multiple structures in the sea to help this power plant function, which could actually be an interesting thing to subtly have in the background of my images. There is a lot of stony beach in proportion to the grassy areas, however I think with the right angle, and maybe a bit of editing, this could work just fine. another benefit of this beach is that it's relatively quiet and so I wouldn't see as many people, or have to edit as many people out of the frame.

2. Southwold

Southwold is a sandy beach, which is rather long. While in the painting the beach is clearly sandy, it's not a huge importance to the image. Southwold has a lot more small hills within their grass, which is what drew me to consider this beach. While a more stereotypically idealistic the issue with this is 1. the distance between the grass areas and the water is even further than sizewell, meaning you may barely be able to see the sea. 2. Most of the grass is behind the beach huge, which I don't think I want in my photo as they're far less subtle than the Sizewell structure, and will throw the colour theory in the image off. There are a few parts that have grass closer to the beach which could be used and will be considered. Here, there arent as many hills that would show the height variety as within the painting, but it could work.

I think I will probably try both of these options. I can do one on one day, and the other the next. Then I will have a slight more variety of images to choose from for the final piece.


Lighting

Despite the sun being behind her, Eos clearly has a source of light in front of her that illuminates her slightly. It's not a huge, powerful source of light but appears more subtle. For this, I think I would choose to use the Nikon speedlights as per normal, however this time with a diffuser and a low setting. This will help create some contrast, and make her stand out against the background. In order to expose for both the sky and myself as Eos, I will a separate exposure of the sky that I can mask in if necessary, creating a more balanced image.
De Morgan's painting as a fair amount of contrast, especially within the dress. I will achieve this by using the dodge and burn tool within photoshop to darken the shadows and brighten certain areas of the highlights, creating that more dramatic look.

Overall, I'm really happy with how this planning has come along and I feel confident in my ideas. I'm willing to experiment with different options for different elements of the image in order to create a photograph that produces a sense of awe through the use of beauty, sentimentality, nostalgia and the mix of the known and unknown.