Facing this new challenge, I channeled my inner Ansel Adams, armed with the wisdom from his holy trinity of photography books—The Camera, The Negative, The Print. Still, nerves gnawed at me, so I packed every piece of gear I owned: lenses, bodies, tripods, flags—the whole shebang.

Woods was precise about what he wanted—artists, right? No pressure at all. As we lounged, sipping mojitos with a meticulous splash of passion, we waited for the sun to slink to that perfect South Floridian summer hue. Meanwhile, I crammed a crash course on sculptures, a subject that had always baffled me beyond the likes of classical Greek and Roman statues. Abstract art? Might as well be alien hieroglyphs to me. And Woods’ piece? Peak abstraction.

The mission, per Woods’ exacting directions, was to capture the sculpture as a hero while letting the scenery breathe. To nail this, I shot from a low angle, using landscaping floodlights to give the piece that dramatic, cinematic separation from its backdrop.