Cosplay by Elemental - to let her know how sinfully gorgeous she looks head over to her entry for this photo.

Okay, this was taken closer to fall 2007, but this photo has now been reworked with a calibrated LCD monitor, unlike my old CRT which had a much greater colour range but didn't always render properly on other monitors, especially LCDs.

This was one of the trickiest and most deliberate shots I've set up - getting a long enough exposure for the candle to show up, plus getting the flash (an external softbox) right to expose Elemental but not overexpose the candle. It also meant shooting in the dark to prevent motion blur from the long shutter drag. I think it was worth it.

Thanks to Elemental for taking part in the shoot - you were a real trooper maneuvering in that dress and beads and putting up with my endless fiddling to make the lights do what I wanted them to do. I'm really happy with how it all turned out.