This little girl insisted on being painted in her mommy's clothing. What you cannot see is the clothespins and rubberbands behind her holding the clothing in place.
The bow in Jessie's hair is from an old Christmas present and stuffed with tissue paper so it is "puffy"...her hair ribbons were very small and uninteresting to paint.
The beloved "Bunny" was an important part of this portrait. I bought the yellow ribbon just for him in order to make this unattractive "lovey" look better in the portrait. I also planned in advance that "Bunny" would be partially covered by her hands or part of her clothing. During the shoot, I had to be careful not to insult "Bunny" by suggesting that he be hidden a bit
After a tough day at school, Jessie had ridden with her mom about 4 hours by car to get to my studio for this shoot. She was exhausted and "did not want to cooperate." This shot was the only decent one in about 10 rolls of film....and I nearly lost my sanity. (I think that a kazoo would have come in handy - I just didn't think of it, dang).
My rule of thumb is to expect that if something can go wrong during a shoot, it will.
But the days of planning time and aggravation during the shoot is well worth the effort. Without it, your chances of getting a "lucky shot" are about as good as winning a lottery.