I first photographed Lara McDonnell at the tender age of 2. She’s been back a few times over the years, for communion and family photos and then some headshots as she was getting into acting.
The last set of these her mum Hazel told me excitedly she'd just got a part in a Disney movie, with Judy Dench and directed by Kenneth Branagh.
The movie was Artemis Fowl and Lara plays Holly Short. Unfortunately it was due to premiere just as the first lockdown hit, so was released on Disney Plus. They needed new publicity shots of Lara and she kindly thought if me.
It was one of the most fun shoots I've done, all thanks to a amazing Hollywood photographer called Art Strieber, www.artstreiber.com who I became friends with after I met him a few years ago at a class he gave in Palm Springs. I contacted Art to get a few pointers for this kind of shoot and he was so generous with his knowledge. As he's talking to me, he's peppering the conversation with lines like, "when I did the shoot with Leo & Brad for Once Upon A Time In Hollywood..." like it was the most normal thing in the world hahaha.
We shot two half days on location and in my studio. I was nervous, Lara was nervous, it was fine, but tiring. I was a little deflated after the first day, although I got some good shots, I just felt there was something missing. I sent the images to Art to see what he thought and he gave me such a great pep talk, told me to just have fun, go for it, break the rules, play! and sent me a link to another amazing photographer's website who's intro alone is mind-blowing.
Which all had the affect of totally depressing me, how the hell am I going to do that! I went home and slept on it and when I woke up I knew what I was going to do.
I was going to treat this like a shoot I'd do with kids, mess around, blast out some music, just make it fun and it worked! Lara opened up, the energy was so positive and we just had a laugh. The time flew and we could have just kept going. It was a real lesson.
When I showed Art the results, he said "you nailed it!" Which made me so happy, I really didn't want to let him down. Originally they wanted 4 images and ended up buying 37. It pushed me out of my comfort zone and to my limits but you need that sometimes. I don't know how Art does it every week! Here are just a few images from the shoot and some from earlier times.
Images are Copyright Mark Nixon, all rights reserved.
