*ooof*: Baby, It’s Cold Outside

Was it about this time last year that Mr A skulked around New York, doing all these fabulous (fashion) photo shoots that have continuously kept our mouths in copious amounts of drool eh our pants in a perpetual twist eh our imagination in incessant over-drive eh (gettin’ there) our hearts persistently a-flutter (there we are!)? Paula Parrish for Fault. Anders Overgaard for Glamour. Robert Ascroft. And now we are looking at Ben Rayner, probably one year on. Just judging from the timeline when the first of these images started appearing in magazines, based on what is visible in the outdoor shots and keeping in mind Armitage’s general schedule between finishing up principal filming on his tornado thriller and the start of the Hobbit press junkets, we can pinpoint the time the images were shot – roughly in Autumn 2012: they must have been shot pre-December 2012 (when a couple of Ascrofts made it into magazines) and -January2013 (when the Fault and Glamour shoots turned up in the media) but post-tornado chasing (after August 2012) in the small window before the Hobbit world tour PR machine started (October 2012? my memory is like a sieve).

There is no “best season for outdoor shoots”, of course. All seasons provide their own stunning settings for location shoots. Lush summer vegetation vs. stark, reduced winter backgrounds, bright floral opulence of spring vs. autumnal melancholy or Indian summer colour. Autumn, in my opinion, however is a great time for outdoor shoots. The sun, in autumn, has fallen lower down on the horizon (in our latitudes), and the harsh glare of the sunlight has been reduced. The light often appears softer and possesses a warm glow, filtered as it often is through clouds. Plus – photographer (and model) do not have to get up at unholy early hours to catch what we call “The Golden Hour” – the first hour of daylight, beginning roughly half an hour before sunrise, ending about half an hour after. (And yes, when I first heard about Armitage’s previous work in The Golden Hour I thought he was playing the part of a landscape photographer on the prowl for sunrise shots… Admittedly, that would probably not have been quite as exciting as his medical genius persona in the homonymous medical drama. Although my imagination  can conjure up a few steamy foggy scenes, involving the photographer frolicking in front of rutting deer or cavorting cheerfully amongst swaying daffodils… weeeeeell…)

Amused, wistful, contemplative Armitage?
Photo by Ben Rayner, 2012
Image Sourced via RAnet

So here we have Mr A in a photograph by Ben Rayner (2012), frollicking in a sumptuous early-autumn setting. Well, some rather subdued frollicking. Or none at all, actually, but an image exuding calm despite a pose that is not entirely communicating staticism. The composition is fairly pedestrian (which fits a man who is kitted out in his nice between-the-seasons coat for a little stroll in the autumn sun): The subject is placed centrally in the composition. The symmetry of the image *yawns* is broken up *blinks* by the pose: Instead of shooting Armitage straight-on, Rayner has his subject pose with his body turned at a 45 degree angle to the camera but his head facing the camera. The subsequent asymmetry of the pose (with only part of the torso visible) creates a dynamic feel. The head turned to the right adds to the feeling of dynamicism – it communicates movement in that this position is not one that anyone would naturally choose to remain in for any length of time – unless you enjoy a stiff neck. Hence the impression is created that this is a fleeting moment in which the subject has turned his head to the right to look at something that has caught his attention.

He smiles – now he doesn’t.

The air of calm is emphasised by the small smile that graces Mr A’s face. I am struck again by the discrepancy of *my* interpretation of Armitage’s facial expressions as friendly smiles, with the reality: Armitage often evokes the impression of a smile despite not pulling up the corners of his mouth (as every other mortal would do.) His mouth does not yield a smile but a line. Armitage’s smile is in the eyes – they give him away. Test it.  Cover Armitage’s eyes with your finger and look at the lower half of his face. Then cover his mouth and look at his eyes – or check my handy little gif:

There is amusement in the eyes, particularly his left eye, probably something to do with the position of the eyebrows, the twinkle of light on the iris and the crunched up lachrymal sac. – The friendly surroundings may add to the overall friendly feel of the image. After all we see lots of greenery and some brilliant sunshine in the image – mood-boosters if ever there are any, with both sunshine and plants symbolising life and positive energy.

As a woman Armitage admirer my attention may be caught by the subject, but as a photographer, I am fascinated by the light and shadow in the background. The play of light through the leaves is always a compelling sight – but the sunshine filtered, obscured and in places unhindered by the leaves also proves a challenging condition for a photographer to shoot in. In harsh sunlight such as this, the photographer does well in placing his subject in the shade, i.e. in a spot where the light has been filtered and the subject is evenly lit. However, it also means that his subject is going to reflect less light as some of the other parts of the image (i.e. the patches of sunlit grass and leaves). Essentially, what you see in this image is a number of constituent parts that are both over- and underexposed, as well as correctly exposed: Bearing in mind that the subject is the centre of attention and therefore needs to be correctly exposed, this is the part of the scene that the light-reading has to be taken from. This means, the photographer sets his aperture and shutter speed to represent all (or at least the important parts) of his subject (i.e. his face, but in a fashion shoot also his clothes). As the spot he stands in is reached by less light than the sunny patches, the latter will appear brighter and overexposed, while other patches that are less reflective than the subject’s face will appear underexposed and dark (the shaded patches of grass). This is probably also emphasised by the use of some discreet fill-flash or soft reflected light thrown on the subject that makes sure his face is evenly lit. Shooting a subject dressed in a dark garment is challenging under these circumstances, but Rayner manages to pull it off. He may have also upped the ISO settings of his camera, judging by the grainyness of the image (unless my glasses need a bit of a clean *ahem*).

What I find interesting in this context is the ability of our brain to correct our vision: We are constantly confronted with settings in which the distribution of light on the objects and subjects we see is uneven. Had we been present at this shoot and boy, would we have enjoyed that…, chances are that we would not have found anything challenging in the scene. Strictly speaking, our eye would have recorded the light conditions exactly as they are. Depending on what we focussed on, our in-built aperture would have contracted or expanded to discern the subject in its/his fully illuminated glory. Subsequently, the less important background and accessories would have been over- and underexposed in our vision, just like the camera recorded them, as well. But the magical computer that is our brain draws upon its world-knowledge and automatically corrects the actual image to an approximation of the reflected ideal. While our eye can’t discern all parts of the image in their proper colour values, our brain can. Just because we *know* that grass is green and not white. Selective correction. Fully automatic and subconscious. Amazing, really.

The photographer and the woman Armitage admirer tussle over what is important to look at. Ultimately, the fangirl wins: Who cares about correctly exposed backgrounds, as long as the subject’s attractive attributes are visible. And yes, I would like *them* exposed, too, but altogether in a different sense of the word… Not that much luck here, as we are looking at some designer’s autumn/winter collection – demurely covering all the bits. The longer I look, the more my attention is caught by the details – the snazzy zip that can turn the coat into a jacket; the jumper’s sleeves peeking under the cuffs of the coat, and the sneaky little shirt-tail lurking under the jumper. It’s the latter that finally gets my imagination going.

“We are leaving in ten minutes, dear. Are you up yet?” The soft but insistent tones of the female voice roused him from a deep sleep. He was momentarily disoriented. Where was he? Why was the light so bright? Why was he being woken by a woman’s voice? And why was he being roused in broad daylight and not the usual crack-of-dawn dimness of his filming work-days? Oh, yes, the weekend. He yawned and rested his head back on the pillow. He was allowed to sleep in. Scratching his unruly mop of black hair, he threw a quick glance at the alarm clock on his nightstand. He blinked and yawned, attempting to shake off the remnants of sleep from his fuzzy mind. A  moderate morning hour. In fact – he drew a sharp gasp – it was half past 10, and he suddenly remembered that he had agreed to accompany her. “Darling??? We have to go in five minutes!!! Come down. You won’t even have time for your porridge!!!” The voice from downstairs carried the weight of a thousand question-marks. And the promise of a million exclamation marks if he didn’t get a move on. 

He jumped out of his bed. Sugar. No time for his morning routine. He surveyed the room. Underpants. Socks. A quick splash of water under his arms. Yesterday’s denims. She’d left a shirt out for him and the new grey jumper. She had said it was getting colder and he ought to wear a nice woolly jumper in the autumn chill. “I’ll be waiting outside, Richard!!!” The voice had taken on a decidedly chilly tone, to match the seasonal weather. Blast. He hastened downstairs, cursorily brushing his mop of hair into place with his fingers. Hopping on one leg, he pulled his boots from where he had left them at the bottom of the stairs, putting them on. No time to tie the laces. He grabbed the black coat from the rack, pushing his arms through the sleeves and tugging on the woollen cuffs, as he hurried out the front door.

She was already waiting, impeccably dressed and coiffed, as usual, arms impatiently crossed over her bosom, neat little handbag dangling from her wrist. He came to a stop in front of her. “Oh, look at you!”, she sighed exasperatedly. “Really Richard, I have no idea how you get any jobs in that business of yours. Or why all those lovely ladies consider you a handsome catch. You can’t go out like that!” She moved towards him, her arms already outstretched towards his sleeves. “Now, pull down your trousers properly, Richard.” She busied and herself at his cuffs, pulling the coat sleeves over the cuffs of the jumper. “And for God’s sake, tuck in your shirt!!!” He rolled his eyes with an amused grin. “And now let’s go.” “Yes, mum!”, he demurely and obediently mumbled, as she turned on her heels and marched off, expecting him to follow. “Once a baby, always a baby”, he smiled to himself, as he glanced after her.

All text © Guylty at me + richard armitage, 2013. Please credit when using excerpts and links. Images and video copyrights accrue to their owners.

~ by Guylty on September 10, 2013.