I recently met Paul Barr and a pair of married friends of his for lunch, and we ended up taking the opportunity to visit the Haradanien Garden (原谷苑) in north-west Kyoto for a quick couple photoshoot.

It's still on my list to do a proper blog post about the place (update: it's here), from my visit last week from which so far I've posted only one wigglegram, but it's a daunting prospect because the site is incomparably wonderful. Anyway, you'll see a bit of the site in these pictures today.

It was John and Ai's first visit, so initially we had them walk around to enjoy the place on their own, with Paul and I following to take candids. This didn't work out well because most of the shots were from the back, and without the ability to control position and pose, it was difficult to get a clean shot among the heavy (but not unpleasant) crowds.

But it was good in the sense that it left me with a number of specific ideas for location to return to later.

But it was also bad in the sense that without a constant interaction with them, it was too easy to get distracted by a pretty scene (such as these subtle pastel blossoms), and we eventually lost track of them.

The bench they were sitting on when I found them seemed nice, so I had them turn their back to the park and started some posed shots. Though I've been practicing portraiture lately, I still have little clue what to actually do. But I pretend I know what I'm doing (that is, I try to exude confidence) and try to be a bit silly to loosen them up, and the ball gets rolling.

I'd just met them that morning, so they were understandably not yet comfortable around me, nor did they have any idea what kind of pictures I could take, but they're really photogenic so I knew I just had to get them to forget the camera, even if for a moment at a time, and the pictures would take themselves.

One simple technique was to keep them laughing (“okay, now look into each other's eyes and pretend you're in love” works when you know they are indeed actually in love), combined by periods of quiet where they can “be alone” so to speak.

I reposed them on the bench and tried something more intimate, with the 85mm f/1.4...

I don't really like to show photos on the back of the camera because it's so small (and outside, so bright), but I wanted to let them know that we were getting good stuff of the likes they'd probably not seen before of themselves. This helps break the ice as well.

A quick Ai-only shot from the bench...

We then moved about the park to try the places I'd noted before. Here's Paul shooting at a lovely area normally packed with folks that, for a few moments here and there, was inexplicably (and most welcomly) empty...

We then moved to the bush with the aforementioned delicate pastel blossoms and Paul shot through it to them....

I tried the same shots, but Paul's result was better:

Then off to the next location...

By now they were pretty loosened up and comfortable with us pointing our big cameras at them, so I tried some simple straight-up portraits...

They both expressed a desire to do a kimono photoshoot sometime, so here's hoping that comes to pass!

Continued here...