I love my country. I really do. You don’t really hear Canadians talk about loving Canada as much as, say, Americans do about their country. Politics play a ridiculous role in that sentiment, but we’re here to talk photos.

I love my country.

Except that whole winter thing.

*sigh*

Most of my photos of pretty girls are shot on location, which means I travel a lot and shoot outdoors. I love natural light, and being from the “keep it simple, stupid” mindset means that I leave my studio strobes in the trunk whenever I can and adapt to whatever is naturally going on around me. This becomes an enormous challenge when the temperature dips below about 10°C or so, which has happened recently here in Toronto.

Two days ago the weather gods decided to antagonize us and we had our first snowfall of the season. Luckily it didn’t stick around long enough to accumulate on the ground, but it was a depressing sign of things to come. We had record-setting snowfall last winter, which led to the creation of the photo above. Despite the smile on her face, Brandi was freezing her balls off (so to speak) as we foolishly picked the coldest day in February to do an outdoor bikini shoot. The matching green hat and scarf were purely for show — they weren’t making an ounce of difference to Brandi, who ran back and forth between the field of snow and the house to keep warm. Hell, I was freezing too, despite being decked out in full winter regalia from head to toe. A -30°C windchill will do that to a person.

Besides weather, it’s a hell of a lot darker in the winter months. (As an aside, when I refer to “winter”, I pretty much mean any months that aren’t June, July, August, or September. And even September is a bit iffy some years.) The sun pretty much just taunts me for eight straight months: rising later, setting earlier, dipping behind clouds, and being a pain in the ass.

Brandi Latimer has been one of my more willing partners-in-crime over the last few years, as is obvious here. Check out her website and ModelMayhem profile.