Behind the scenes of a cold, wet, doll photo shoot on Cypress Mountain. For the last year I’ve been scouting around for a perfect location to recreate the haunting John Bauer painting of Tuvstarr by the Fishpond.

My plan to shoot during dry season was delayed by unprecedented summer-long drought that completely dried out this creek.

Because it’s located at an altitude of a thousand meters, we had a small window of optimal water level in the creek before the freezing conditions and snow pack set it.

Last week we had a massive rainfall and decided to go for it, as the temperature in the mountains began dropping below freezing and our window was closing.

We geared up for a cold hike, got a dry change of clothes to stay warm during the shoot, packed our gum boots for wading in water, brewed a thermos of hot tea, and of course brought some of our dog assistants with us, to help.

My fingers and toes froze from working in a freezing mountain stream, but the shots we got were well worth the pain.

Our little assistants got very cold too, and we had to give them some of our own clothes to keep them warm. We actually had to cut the photo shoot a bit short to get their shivering, furry butts off the mountain, before they succumbed to hypothermia.

Oh, and you may have noticed my new little dog ‘assistant’ in training. His name is Tiny Tooba, and he is a meat trade survivor from China, who just joined our family and is in training to become an art dog. You can find out more about my dog ‘assistants’ and their ‘work’ on their Instagram page @all_my_snouts

We got off the mountain just as the downpour began again. These are the stills from our cold, wet adventure. The doll photos we got there are coming up next.