Saz

Working on portraits, retouching an old print.

When I was first addicted to photography, in the early 1980's, one of my heroes was James Wedge. He shot monochrome prints which he then delicately hand-tinted with pastel-shaded colour-dyes. There was something dream-like and other-worldly about his work, a selective effect you simply couldn't get with colour film.

Mateus Rose wine used Wedge's photos for a long-running ad campaign. He also shot the famous Biba Nude.

As a teenager I tried hundreds of times to get the same effect, with washes of gouache, acrylic, and/or ink over my little b&w prints from the local chemist. Those were the days. Now I'm attempting the same thing in digital; it's a lot easier in pixels.

This is a shot of Saz.

Many moons have passed.