Healthy Living Cover

I was contracted by the American magazine Healthy Living for a cover-shoot story of an organic ginger and turmeric farm in Costa Rica run by New Chapter, a supplement company in the States. New Chapter has an amazing farm in The Children’s Rainforest near San Ramon where they grow quality ginger for export, preserve native plant species through their “sacred seeds” project, and teach biodynamic farming to international students. The core of the project is run by a Tom Newmark and Steve Farrell, a couple of like minded geniuses that combine cutting edge biodynamic farming methods with folk farming, Costa Rica style. Their farm is a beautiful expanse of primary rainforest with a view of Arenal volcano with boilogical corredors for native puma, and sweeping expanses of pristine jungle with pure rivers, and a food farm that feeds everyone on the compound very well.

I was beyond impressed with everyone involved with this project. These guys are down to earth, and we had conversations ranging from world politics, to what is the most sexy fruit (mangostine is the winner).

We wanted to find a location where we could link these guys with the natural beauty of the rainforest. The jungle is an amazing place, but it is brutal for portraiture. There is just so much visual noise with the density of millions of plants that I suggested that we go in the river for the cover. I stood in the torrent of water waist deep with my camera and a monolight on a partially submerged lightstand and began shooting. Somehow, I always manage to find myself in the unholy combination of water and cameras despite my better judgement, and this shot was a slippery rock away from dunking thousands of dollars of gear in the bitter cold creek. I used a long exposure to blur the water and add action, and the flashes kept the scientists tack sharp.

When the shoot was over, we drank several beers and retired to our rooms and the nighttime cacophony of the insects or the rainforest. It was great fun.

This entry was posted on Monday, November 30th, 2009 at 11:11 am and is filed under Advertising, Editorial and tagged with costa rica, cover shot, editorial photographer, healthy living magazine, native plant species, new chapter, Photography, steve farrell, travel photographer. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.