Sunrises & Starry Night Delights - Meet Jealous by Nature
Meet Jack & Nicole from Jealous By Nature photography
Australia has had many great explorers – from Burke & Wills who were the first to travel from the bottom to the top of Australia, to an Englishman by the name of Matthew Flinders who was the first to circumnavigate and map most of the country’s coast.
Fast forward to our great southern land today, and here you will find another two Brits who have probably clocked up more kilometers than Flinders ever did! But what makes them extra special is that as they travel our stunning country, they capture us pole dancers and aerialists in it, making for the most spectacular photographs.
Let me introduce you to Jack and Nicole, the chillaxed team behind Jealous By Nature – a pole and aerials photography business taking us out of the studios and clubs, and putting us on show amongst some of the most incredible places our country has to offer. Jealous By Nature has photographed the likes of Felix Cane, Mel Grace, Andrea James Lui, Miss Filly, Amy Hazel, Bethany Finlay, Blue Phoenix, Carlie Hunter and Anastasia Skukhtorova. They are renowned for their sunrise and sunset shoots, as well as their under the stars, under water, forest and city landscape photography.
Nicole brings her expertise to the shoot being a pole dancer and instructor, while Jack makes magic happen behind the camera, and they both work on editing and producing the final images. Their easy-going, yet very professional approach will not only leave you with a positive and memorable shoot experience, but some phenomenal pole and aerial images to reflect back on for the years to come.
From onstage to outdoors - how it all began
As a pole dancer herself, Nicole had done various photo shoots over the years. However, she always found in-studio shoots a little unguided and uncomfortable. “It was just more the environment for me – I felt really intimidated, I wasn’t comfortable and relaxed and I didn’t really enjoy the whole process,” she tells me. “I didn’t have someone helping me into poses and things like that. I was a hobby photographer back then and Jack was like ‘why are you not doing anything with all of this photography equipment’?!”
After moving to Australia and absolutely falling in love with our sunburnt country, Jack and Nic couldn’t believe pole dancers weren’t taking advantage of shooting outside with our beautiful landscape.
“When we first started, not many people were doing it outside and I love Australia – I'm obsessed with this place!” says Nic. “I was like ‘why is no one taking pictures outside?!’. We’ve got the beaches we’ve got the best sunsets – everywhere is stunning! So I said to Jack, I really want to get people outside into nature and have the photo shoots there,” she reflects. “My main goal was to have people come and see Australia, so it wasn’t going to just be about Perth.”
Unsure if the idea would take off, the very first Jealous By Nature shoot actually took place without a pole, lyra or silks. “We spoke to Felix and did our first shoot without a pole because I ordered the pole and the shipment was stuck in England,” Nic tells me. “So we did splits on trees and things like that, and I think that’s what got everybody going ‘oh wow that’s cool!’ - everybody just wanted to come out to nature and hang off the trees and rocks, and get into little crevices!” she laughs. “That’s how it all started really, just getting everybody outside!”
Let’s hit the road!
Becoming a hit with the Western Australia pole dancers and aerialists, Jack and Nic thought it was time to pack up and venture to the east coast of Australia, to offer their photo shoots in Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne, Adelaide and even a stopover in Alice Springs!
“If you ever get the chance to go to Alice Springs when we’re doing stars, I would definitely recommend it! Even though there’s usually only 6 girls in Alice Springs, and most people would not go all the way for 6 people, but we just love the outback – red dirt and blue skies!” says Nic. “The girls in Alice Springs get the best starry nights for sure. If we could get everyone to come to Alice Springs for star shoots it would be the best!” she says. Jack agrees adding, “Alice Springs is one of my favourite locations!”
As Jealous By Nature specialises in, well nature of course, Jack and Nic plan their trips around the seasons, being forever at the mercy of the weather and tough Australian climate.
“We do follow the seasons. In June 2018, we went north from Perth to Exmouth. Then we carried on north into Darwin in July because it was dry season, then down to Alice Springs,” says Nicole. “Then to Cairns and from there we’d travel down [the east coast] for summer time. We’ll always try to be in Melbourne from December through to February. Queensland is pretty good, we can be there any time of year and then NSW is similar, depending if you’re in the north [of the state] or not. Follow the sun is what I always say!”
As much as Nic and Jack chase the sun, sometimes Mother Nature can be hard to predict and has other ideas in store for them...
Rain, rain go away... we want to shoot aerials today!
Of course, Jack and Nicole can’t always predict the weather - which can make for a very interesting photoshoot experience!
“As a rule of thumb, we get people to meet us at the location because even if it’s raining all day, sometimes we get an hour and a half where it goes cloudy and we can work around it,” Nicole explains. “You can get moody clouds which have lots of detail in them and can make a really, really good photo and actually can be some of our best photos! They think it’s not going to be that great until they see the photos and then they’re like ‘oh this is actually really cool – more unique!’” she says.
When they plan their trips, Jack and Nicole leave a week available in each place for the rare times they may have to reschedule their shoots. While it means they might end up with a week to spare, they would rather leave gaps just incase (especially with Melbourne’s uncertain climate!).
“It’s hard if people have their hair and makeup booked and things like that,” says Jack. “But at the same time, we can’t take all of our camera equipment out into the rain and they can’t pole in the rain – we wouldn’t want anyone to hurt themselves.”
In saying that, Jack and Nicole will do absolutely everything they can to get a Jealous By Nature photoshoot rolling! As Jack tells me, “If there’s a way around it, we’ll try and think of it!”
“We’ve done a lyra shoot in the rain,” says Nic. “At this location the lyra was hanging from a tree and the girls were coming all the way from Orange and we were in Sydney. That’s a 4 hour drive, they had already left and it wasn’t meant to be raining that day in Sydney but for some reason, the 10% chance of rain decided to happen!” she laughs. “I was like hmm what can we do? The lyra was in a tree and we thought hey we can actually put a tarp in this tree! We popped a tarp in the tree, put the lyra up and made sure the girls were very dry! I held my umbrella over Jack while he took the photos and we covered up the light with my raincoat. That turned out to be a really good shoot and the girls loved their photos – they turned out really different! So sometimes rain won’t stop you!”
Now if that’s not dedication I don’t know what is! Jack will go to great lengths to get that perfect photo – he will lay in puddles, rivers, roll around in poo or get bitten by sandflies just to capture the best angle of the dancer!
“Wind is a massive challenge because a lot of people want to wear their hair down for the shoot,” says Nic. “They’ve maybe gone and had their hair done beforehand and a lot of the time the beach is windy, especially the Eastern coast. I have to explain that their photo is going to look better with hair up rather than having hair all in your face. That’s one of the biggest challenges!”
“And the public!” adds Jack. “Yes the public who love to stand right in front of the photo and take their own photo, of us, taking a photo!” agrees Nic, laughing at the madness of it. “They’re normally standing right where the sun is setting – the public can be hard work!”
Being on the road so often, I wondered how they manage to also edit and produce the images. Jack and Nic tell me finding places to stop and edit was once a challenge, however it was surprisingly solved with the addition of their dog, Bindi.
“Before we had Bindi, we used to go to a local pub and cart all of our stuff in, buy a couple of drinks and do our work,” says Nic. She tells me they would have to get everything done in the middle of the day, as their photoshoots are usually early in the morning and late in the afternoon or at night. “But now it’s hard because most places you can’t take the dog,” she explains. “So we set up a second battery in the car and ran wires so we could go and sit in our tent and do work whenever we wanted – that was a game changer for us!”
Now with the luxury of having their own, self-installed car electricity, Jack and Nicole do a lot of the photo editing at night. Incredibly innovative, it seems Jack and Nic will always find a way turn life’s lemons into lemonade!
A day in the life
Forget the old 9-5, chasing the sun and taking fantastic pole and aerials photos makes for an exciting yet unusual work day for the Jealous By Nature pair.
For a busy shoot week, such as Melbourne, Jack and Nicole are awake well before the crack of dawn and up until all hours of the night. A Melbourne day usually starts with the Yarra Valley lyra forest photoshoot in the morning which is one of Nicole’s favourite areas. “It’s beautiful up there! It’s my favourite spot for taking pictures of lyra, because it’s over the water and there’s a big bridge so we’ve got the height” she says.
"The day before, we have to make sure we have the lyra nicely taped up, make sure the cars packed with everything we need, everything is charged, we have spare batteries for the camera and lots of memory cards because we don’t want one to corrupt – that's the worst thing ever!” says Nicole. “In the morning, the alarm goes off and I feel like I’m going to die because it’s so early and we have to drive an hour out to the location!” she says laughing.
Once they arrive at the location, Jack will rig up the lyra and the dancers begin to arrive. After 3-4 hours of photoshoots, they might explore or check out other potential locations which may have been recommended to them. “We’d probably spend 90% of our time driving around looking for spots to shoot,” says Jack. Nicole adds, “Our car’s massive as well – we have like an outback car and it can take a whole day to find any sort of location, especially in Sydney and Melbourne and being stuck in traffic.”
After lunch they head off to the beach for the pole photoshoots, and stay there until the sun sets. While each location is different, the days in Melbourne can be very long says Jack. “The difference between sunrise and sunset in Melbourne in summer is so long – it’s 8pm at night for the sunset!” he laughs.
Besides their home in Western Australia, Jack and Nicole love to visit and shoot in many other parts of Australia. “We love NSW and 2 hours south of Sydney is an area called the Shoal Haven and they have very, very beautiful white beaches,” explains Nicole. “The beaches are beautiful and they’ve got a lot of lovely forest around there as well so you’ve got both options.”
Photoshoots unlike any other!
Along with the sunrise and sunset beach pole photoshoots and aerials forest photoshoots, Jealous By Nature offer other types of photography including pole under the stars at night, pole with a city landscape, even underwater pole!
Creating a weighted pole to submerge underwater, Jack and Nicole offer photoshoots where the pole dancer can be photographed on the pole underwater – a totally different experience, but well worth it – if you can hold your breath long enough!
Nicole explains that some pole tricks are actually easier because you are weightless underwater, so an iron X – no worries! But it’s the breathing technique which can be tricky. “Normally we’ll get the girls to breathe above water, they’ll slowly lower themselves down and they’ll get into position, which is a completely different way to get into position on the pole than when you’re outside,” she tells me. “They go down, hold the pose, try to open their eyes and then they go back up.”
“It’s up until how long I can hold my breath, some people can hold their breath longer than me!” pipes up Jack laughing. Nic agrees adding, “A lot of Australian’s are water babies and can hold their breath a lot longer than us English people who haven’t grown up near the ocean!” she says with a giggle.
“It’s not for everyone so when people book, I do explain it might not be for everyone,” Nicole explains. “Also, it’s a bit more expensive than a normal shoot because we have to put everything underwater – our cameras are going underwater, and depending on how many people are booked in, Jack’s going underwater for a long time – one time he was underwater for 9 hours! We were bringing him cups of tea – he didn’t get out of the pool. But everyone loved their photos,” smiles Nic, always ensuring we’re happy with our photos, while poor Jack wrinkles up like a raisin in the pool!
Recently, Jealous By Nature have introduced fabrics into some of their shoots and the end result is stunning. They have also captured city skylines and sunsets so perfectly that many people started to ask for ‘that sunset’.
“Our response is that we prefer to do everything naturally. I won’t take a sky and edit it in – then there’s no point in them going to the beach! It’s the whole experience of getting outside and getting sand in your face!” says Nic. “With us it’s meant to be about the experience, about being outside and enjoying the nature at that moment. Obviously, we edit the photos and enhance colours because they're taken in a raw image, but I’m not going to put in a different sky. Everyone would end up with the exact same sky! And I think all sunsets are beautiful in my eyes.”
Top tips for a photoshoot
Photoshoots can be super tiring as you hold tricks to get the most flattering angle and try to whip out every one of your best moves in 30min – it's exhausting! So what are Jack and Nicole’s top tips for anyone who books a Jealous By Nature photoshoot?
“Don’t find a move on Instagram and say you’re going try it without even doing it once before,” says Jack straight off the bat. “You will waste 10-15min of your shoot trying to do a move that you’ll probably look at the photo and think ‘if I had of practiced that for an hour it would have come out a lot better.’”
To help with this, Nicole says to come prepared with a list of moves that you would like to do. “Come prepared with a list of moves or photos. Photos are better because around the country everyone calls moves different names, so having pictures is a really good idea. Having outfits prepared before is a good idea and knowing what move to do in each outfit – I just think you will get more out of the shoot that way,” she explains.
While they both don’t want to rush you during a shoot, Jack and Nicole would like you to be able to get the most out of the time spent with them.
“The sun is going to go eventually!” laughs Nicole. “So I’m like hold it hold it hold it! And then at the end they’re absolutely knackered! It’s harder than a class! If you need to have a break in class you can take a break because the teacher might be talking to someone else. But with photography, especially with a sunset, you know the sun is going to set soon!”
Being a teacher at Felix Cane's pole studio, Nicole is incredibly helpful throughout the shoot. “The best poses I find in a photoshoot are the lower grade ones. Obviously if we can do a bird of paradise and it’s amazing then definitely go for it, but if people ask my advice about what looks best in photoshoots, it’s always the simpler moves than you can do well - making sure your lines are perfect, your feet are pointed and you can hold that move for a lot longer,” she says.
Nicole offers pre-photoshoot workshops in some cities, which are super handy. They run in studios so that mirrors can be used and the group setting is easier to manage, and are definitely worth considering. “If you are nervous, maybe book a pre-photoshoot workshop with me. Anyone who has ever done my workshop Jack can tell straight away, because they have a lot more ideas, they’re a lot more prepared and they’ve practiced a lot more. They understand that not the hardest move they know is going to be the best for the photoshoot.”
Jack agrees, “There are certain moves that look good spinning or in a combo and they look really impressive, but there’s not one angle of the move where you’re like ‘wow’ for a photo. Also understanding that moves you can do in the studio, you might find hard outside because it is different.”
Another one of Nic’s top tips for a photoshoot day is to bring a hair band or hair tie. “No one listens so I always have hair bands with me - no one wants to put their hair up it’s so funny!” she laughs, as Jack adds, “You’ve gotta work with nature, you can’t try to work against it!”
Their most important tip? Chill out and enjoy the experience!
“Some people come and they’re so nervous and wound up,” says Jack. “But no one is ever going to see the photos if you don’t like them. Not every photo is going to look good but we’re trying to get that one that looks perfect.”
Nicole thinks being surrounded by nature can actually make you feel more at ease. “We try to show a lot of the location, with the pole dancer. In a studio shoot, you’ll find the main focus is on the dancer and they’ll be bigger in the image. Whereas in our images, they are in the image but they’re amongst the nature as well,” she tells me. “I find some people, even though they’re outside and they’re nervous about people watching, they find that because the focus is not completely on them, because the nature is there as well or the city is in the background, they feel more relaxed.”
Swinging the stigma one sunset at a time
Immersing pole and aerials in nature has paved the way for a whole new perspective of the industry, especially by muggles (aka non-polers or aerialists). Nicole tells me about a time in the Gold Coast where they were shooting, and an older lady watched the pole beach shoot from afar. “We were worried she was going to be upset but she came over and said ‘oh wow I just think it’s amazing what everyone can do! And doing it outside – how cool!’”
Jealous By Nature showcase pole and aerials as the incredibly unique and skilled artform we already know it is. With so many fantastic tricks, splits and shapes on display, in an ever-changing environment, Jack tells me it never gets to a point where he feels like he’s seen it all.
“It’s really cool because I can't pole dance to save my life, it’s way too hard for me!” he laughs. "But it’s never got to a point where I feel like I’ve seen it all. There’s always a new variation of a trick or a new trick or pose. Then we’ll add in some other elements, like a new location, we’ll add in fabrics or fire or smoke. Or really cool locations like on a clifftop or at night under the stars – there are so many variables!” he tells me excitedly. “We could shoot in one spot and it could be cloudy the first time we use it, then it could be sunny the next time and it’s like a whole new place. We try to make every shoot as unique as we can.”
As you can tell, Jack and Nicole are truly passionate about the Jealous By Nature experience that they have created. Rather than move a photoshoot indoors into a studio due to unexpected bad weather, they tell me that they would rather stick around in one location longer and rearrange their whole schedule, just to make sure that people get the real deal.
“If they were going to book a white or black background, which is still amazing, they would have booked that. But they didn’t, they booked a nature shoot,” explains Nicole. “We know how to do a [studio shoot] but we don’t get excited over it; it’s not our thing. I feel like the Jealous By Nature logo would look silly on the white background anyway!” she says bursting into a laugh.
Even for those of us who aren’t the “outdoors-y” type, these photoshoots are a must-do pole and aerials experience. Because while you battle bugs or the gust of hair-ruining wind (don’t worry, Nic has your back with hair ties and hairspray remember!), it all comes together resulting in some breath-taking photos! Jack and Nicole work behind the scenes on a shoot day like magical photography pixies, to help capture some of the most spectacular and unique images you will ever have of yourself as a dancer, plus you are likely to walk away with a great story to tell about your day with them!
Future photoshoots & travels with the JBN gang!
Jack and Nicole have big plans for the year to come, should there be no more disastrous bush fires or global health pandemics (they were stranded in QLD for 10 weeks at the beginning of the year).
“We have to make sure that the borders are going to be good before we set off again, because if we set off and they start shutting everything down we become literally lost, like ‘where can we go?!’” says Nicole, as Jack pleads, “Don’t take travelling away from us it’s all we have!”
With domestic travel in Australia starting to open up again, Jack and Nic are keen to hit the road with their dog Bindi and a new little soul born into the Jealous By Nature family – baby Otis! They are looking forward to being able to team up with studios again and offer photoshoot retreats and weekends away, and in the meantime are getting ready for a busy summer in Perth – “Everyone's like they’re going to leave soon!” laughs Nicole.
Whether it’s a sensational sunset shoot on the beach, lovely lyra in the forest, or dancing under the stars at night, Jealous By Nature are always trying new ideas on the side (fire, anyone?!) – although capturing a bolt of lightning will forever be Jack’s white whale!
It's clear that this dedicated duo absolutely love pole and aerial photography, and giving us the opportunity to get outside to experience something extremely unique! Friendly, professional and passionate, a shoot with Jack and Nicole is not to be missed, as you are guaranteed to walk away with a big smile on your face and perhaps a little sand in your wind-swept hair.
Keep an eye out of the 2021 photoshoot dates with Jealous By Nature by following them on Instagram at @jealousbynature and liking ‘Jealous By Nature’ on Facebook. For bookings or enquiries, you can contact Nicole and Jack via their socials or the website www.jealousbynature.com.
