Carmilla

Lore & Design Concept

This costume was created out of my comic-con depression. You can read my depressing progress HERE

It has been 5 years since my sister, Mary and I have done a photo shoot together. Both of us have grown in our fields of expertise, Mary as a photographer and myself as a costume designer. It was exciting to plan another shoot like the ones we did when we first started years ago. Only this time around we are bringing years of experience to our collaborative effort. Although both of us have developed a different style, working together came effortlessly. Our thought processes are very similar so we hardly needed to communicate to bring our ideas to light. Mary found the perfect graveyard with tombstones and mausoleums dating around early 1800's. She asked her friends; Stylist, Myra Truong, Lighting Technician Samuel Mongeon, and Scientist Matt Kardash to assist with the photoshoot.

For this shoot we went for two different styles. The day shoot being a classical rococo graveyard scene then transforming at night into a surreal nightmare. In order to achieve these two looks we switched up both the costume styling and photographic methods. The necklace is by the amazing jewelry designer Bionic Unicorn!

Working with Mary was a breath of fresh air and a bit nostalgic. We have both come a long ways from taking photos in our parents back yard.

If you'd like to see more photos for this set visit Mary's Flickr Account.

Photoshoot Location

Mount Royal Cemetery - Montreal - Canada

Photographer
Mary Elam


Lighting
Sam Mongeon

Assistants
Matt Kardash
Myra Truong

Model
Lillyxandra