Sjoukje & daughter Battice 056

Glasses Sjoukje: Monb, late 1980's (not used in any of my previous photo shoots)
[L=R: 0; c+0.25 h / bif add 1.75]

Glasses Battice: Flair (Jet Set), probably late 1980's
[L: +1.25 / R: +1.00]

This fine portrait of mother Sjoukje and daughter Battice concludes their photo shoot in the peat area called "Aamsveen / Ambtsvenn" at the Dutch-German border. Sjoukje and Battice are the 58th and 59th ladies behind crystal veil.

About a year ago, I invited Sjoukje and Battice to do a mother / daughter photo shoot, featuring prescription glasses from my vast collection. They both accepted my invitation and subsequently tried out a few dozen glasses. But alas, due to our busy time schedules, nothing came of the actual photo shoot until quite recently.

Ladies, it was a great pleasure to do a photo shoot with you! The atmosphere was as good as ever and the location slightly more adventurous than expected but nice anyway. It's always interesting to witness the reactions of new models on the glasses selected for the photo shoot. Some reactions are rather predictable but every model has her individual likes and dislikes. I think that both of you made an excellent selection from the glasses. It took me quite some time to choose the best spot given the light circumstances but once this was found, it really went all by itself. I almost forgot about my injured left hand and that in itself is a big compliment to both of you.

Sjoukje, I remember your initial reaction on my invitation - you warned me that you were "anything but photogenic". My answer was simply, "Don't worry about that. Several of my previous models had exactly the same doubts when I invited them. But eventually it all worked out fine and they were pleased with the results". Once we got started, the flow came in and it resulted in a number of great portraits, including the launch of half a dozen glasses that were not used in any of my previous photo shoots. We agreed beforehand about concentrating on glasses with very mild prescriptions. In the final section, you posed in some glasses with a strong prescription and this yielded some of the best portraits. It was quite awarding to hear your positive reaction on the samples of our team work and I hope that the photo shoot will remain a slightly eccentric but nice memory to you. And thanks for the coffee during the short breaks!

Battice, your proud mother told me in advance that you would definitely be a good, photogenic model with an ideal face for glasses. High expectations can be a risk but in retrospect, your mother was absolutely right. You delivered a number of marvelous portraits. Sorry about the inconvenience caused by the midges - the good thing is that photos survive much longer than midges do. There will be another glasses selection session soon and I trust that both of you will find a pair to your liking. 

Once again, thank you very much for an enjoyable afternoon that yielded a highly personal but fine contribution to my project. Really appreciated!