Martjin, Jarom, and the scary Farmer

3.10.10
A few weeks ago, I put a post on my Facebook account asking for any senior age students who would be willing to be my model for the afternoon and receive free pictures in return. I have been taking pictures of children and families, but the closest I came to a "senior" photoshoot was with a 14 year old. So, I received a few responses, one of which was from a mom in our ward who has two boys in her home. One is her son, a 15 year old, and their exchange student from the Netherlands who is a senior this year. It was perfect, not only was I getting seniors, but I was getting male seniors. I also don't have much experience shooting male models, just the girly type! The night before our photoshoot, I scoped out the latest Abercrombie and Fitch ads to give me some inspiration.

I had a few places I wanted to take them. One of which was a property I pass nearly three times a week. We stopped at the property once to get a family picture and I loved it so much, I have been waiting 3 months to take someone back.

This property has everything you could wish for. It has multiple barns and sheds, an old desk in a barn which was perfect for the guys to sit on, like in this picture......

and hundreds and hundreds of tires. Hundreds! I wonder if the previous owner worked for a tire company.
I love how this old "barn" had windows and sage brush everywhere. First of all, Martjin, pictured below, didn't know what sage brush was. Secondly, I told him to sit on the desk so he could look "studious." Poor foreigner didn't know what studious was! He was one of the sweetest 18 year olds I have ever met. When we first met, he shook my hand. He also didn't like to get dirty, if you look closely, we found a small piece of cardboard for him to sit on while I took this picture.

Well, as I began taking pictures of Martjin next to the old house on the property, an old farming truck came roaring down the dirt driveway. My car was parked among all of the tires, away from the road and the home. The farm truck pulled up right behind my car and an old farmer jumped out of his car and went running to the back of my car. He started to inspect my car and then went back to his car to fish for something inside it. As the three of us watched this old man, I began to get scared. Have you ever gotten so scared you thought you might faint? Well, that is how I felt. Faint! I finally cleared my throat and somehow yelled to the old man. I told him that was my car and we were just finishing some senior pictures. (Like the old man knew what senior pictures were.) He told me over and over again that I was on private property (to clear the air, there was NO private property signs posted anywhere.) and that I needed to leave. I swear, I thought he was going to shoot us he was so blazing mad. I told him we were leaving, and that is exactly what we did. For the rest of the day, I kept looking over my shoulders for that old farmer and his nasty truck.

We resorted to taking pictures in downtown Nampa, at my favorite red door and alley way for the rest of the pictures.

This next picture screams Abercrombie in my book! Martjin, you just watch out my foreign friend. The girls will be knocking down your "adoptive" parents door soon enough.

Thank you Martjin and Jarom for the adventure, the experience, and the laughs. You two are the sweetest!