I did some shots of daughter Melanie (then in her late-ish teens) after she’d had her hair done and started messing around in PS adding some more curls… and as it was around Christmas time, I thought maybe some holly would look cool, so I went out and bought some and shot it with the same flash set-up as the portrait. I added the holly in PS, but thought it was missing something to finish it off… so came the idea of the candle, which I also shot with the same setup and thought it fit nicely into the curls.

I decided to add a "Merry Christmas" text and put the picture on our Christmas cards to friends and relatives that year and was totally blown away to find out how many of them thought I’d actually put a burning candle in her hair. I guess that was a sort of compliment that it looked so real? Anyway, I can confirm that no daughters lost their hairdo during the making of this picture...

Canon EOS 100 + EF 100 mm fixed focal on Fuji Reala 100 ISO color print film.

Two Elinchrom 250 Watt studio flashes, each with 60 x 60 cm softbox.