Gaille Gray – Fine Art Flower Photography
Many of the club members had already seen some of Gaille’s remarkable work via her instagram site https://www.instagram.com/gaillegray but we knew little of her story as a photographer. So it was with great interest that we gathered to hear her presentation on that journey.
Gaille kicked by off explaining how she had more or less stumbled into taking photographs. She had met Cameron Scott (see my previous blog) over ten years ago. As their relationship blossomed, she tried to show interest in his other great passion - photography. Not very enthusiastic at first, she agreed to go along to meetings of Carluke Camera Club with him and was impressed by some of the work she saw there, though never expecting photography to become her own hobby. That is until one day Cameron handed her a “wee present” which turned out to be a proper camera. He went out to work and left her to study the manual. So it continued for a few days - at the end of each day when the couple got together, Gaille would demonstrate what she had learned. Suffice it to say, she did well enough and was soon able to join Cameron on photography outings.
In these early days Gaille was very much finding her way as a photographer but would head out regularly to see what she could find. She captured images of all sorts of things - butterflies and dragonflies near her home, the Kelpies near Falkirk, the Blackhouses on the Isle of Lewis and Buachaille Etive Mòr in the Highlands, amongst many others. There were a lot of unwelcome early starts and long drives. These outings could be considered as “training days”, but also just a lot of fun. Cameron would help if needed with the technical aspects so that Gaille was free to explore her creative side, and it wasn’t long before she began entering club competitions.
During this period, Gaille attended a workshop by digital artist and photographer Joan Blease, where she first became hooked on using textures in her work. The textures are taken as separate photographs then digitally merged into the main image. Finding out how to do this required Gaille to learn a whole lot of new photo editing skills. One result of her interaction with Joan was a highly memorable image of a deer, but in place of its antlers was a bare tree, complete with a flock of birds.
Just as this photography journey was really gaining momentum, the couple were hit by a spate of health problems. Two mini strokes left Gaille with hand tremors, and her confidence about going about with a camera took a bad hit. After a period of recovery, the couple set about building a studio in their garage.
These were some tough years, but the garage studio provided a retreat of calm and focus which helped to keep the couple mentally balanced. Ironically, they also sent Gaille in a new direction which was to become her métier - fine art flower photography.
Cameron had taken charge of the technical aspects of creating the studio, which he briefly interjected to explain. A trestle table forms the base on which the subject of the photograph stands. Two softboxes stand either side of the table. Two umbrella lights shine down from the top and there are a further two at the bottom. A reflector runs right across the ceiling, so that the scene is completely awash with light. A full-frame camera sits on a tripod and is fitted with a 50mm f1.4 lens. When the studio was first equipped, a laser pointer was used to establish the hyperfocal distance so that the tripod could be positioned optimally relative to the table top. Photographs are typically overexposed by two stops so that the background is completely bleached out. This makes it easier to work with the main subject later.
With health issues starting to recede, the couple both joined the Guild of Photographers. The Guild runs a competition every month, January to October, and won’t accept work more than two years old. This encourages its members to be more productive, and it was just the sort of incentivisation that Gaille needed. She started entering her flower pictures and got positive feedback, though as time went on she realised that the judges, having seen her work before, were not so easily impressed. She was competing with herself!
The judging at the Guild is very strict and a two-pixel error can be enough to get an image disqualified. Rules about any visible sign of editing are rigorously enforced, but this all suits Gaille’s meticulous approach to image making. She explained how she zooms in to the image at 400% or more, creating masks a few pixels at a time, a process which might take three days. Once that’s finished she will go back over the border of the flower, softening it so that it blends smoothly with the background. Gaille uses many other techniques in Photoshop too, some of which she explained to the audience.
These are images of shape, colour, texture, grace and beauty that are genuinely impressive, so that one can get lost for ages looking deeply at the intricate structures and subtle tones that each composition presents. Gaille is an artist who has truly found her voice in photography.