Elena Shumilova

Elena Shumilova was my biggest inspiration for the relationship brief. To provide some background she is a russian mother of a young child whom loves to get outside and adores playing with their pets. The images Elena produces are some of the most aesthetic portraits iv'e ever seen with incredibly soft and creative lighting she almost tells the story without the model and props. The depth of field plays a huge part in some of her photos as she creates the balance between isolating her subjects and capturing the surrounding environment in order to capture the full narrative around the relationships in the images.With her main focus on the relationship between animals and children the images played a big part in the way i shot with Freja and Bella. However one thing that Elena has utilized that i failed to do so was shooting within the golden hour. The ambient lighting in Elena's images is warm and the shadows are soft which is key to producing that aesthetic however when i shot my photos i just missed golden hour and so the lighting was a little more harsh.