I got together again with Liz Ashley to finish what we had once started. She was my first model for the Versatile catalog shoots, and I just wasn’t thrilled with the results of the first shoot. This was merely because I had shot LaurenWK days later and was so in love with that shoot, I wanted something with a bit more “oomf” with Liz too. She kindly obliged me, and we tried it out one more time.

The girls arrived shortly after I was set up. Angel quickly finished up the hair, and Liz started to get into wardrobe.

*the full set can be viewed on flickr

Courtney Crave arrived quite tired from her journey. She stayed with me, and we began shooting bright and early the next morning. I did a Starbucks run while Angel began prepping her. This prep was a bit longer than Angel’s usual, but mainly because she was sculpting a hair masterpiece.

The whole look for the shoot made me think of cupcakes (of course, what *doesn’t* make me think of cupcakes?!), so I picked up a tray to use as a prop. The outcome had an awesome retro whimsy.

The following day we had our most rushed shoot with Kerri Taylor. She popped in after a morning shoot, and needed to be off to another city a few hours later. So, Angel threw her together, and we put her in one corset alone. This is what I shot.

The actual shooting was probably a mere 10 to 20 min. Although I think my record for shortest shoot was a 5 min shoot I did back in San Francisco.

Most recently I shot with Liz Ashley again. That blog story should be along briefly!

We started the day with the catalog shots.

Afterward, I saw the opportunity to shoot her in a robe I’ve wanted to shoot for a very long time. It matched the corset and background so well, and I thought it’d be great to shoot something *not* catalog. So I had her wear my vintage early 90s Victoria’s Secret robe, and took this shot, my favorite of what we shot that day:

After the shoot, a DJ friend of Sabrina’s joined our makeup artist Angel, she and I to dinner. We snickered over drinks as the waiter nearly dropped our orders in our laps while ogling Sabrina.

Some tips I learned on lighting pitch black enviornments

Last weekend was the annual Fetish Ball here in Houston. The day before the ball I shot Sabrina again, along with one of the headlining models for the ball, Athena Fatale. This shoot was fraught with a lot of difficult parameters. It was to be shot at a club that was doing a pre-Fetishball party. I had never been to the venue, and not long before the shoot date I was told we’d only have 3 hours to shoot. Truth-be-told I had 3 girls to shoot in 4 styles, add in hair and make-up, and you can see how this time limit would be a problem! The second big problem? The entire venue was either painted deepest black or darkest red. I learned quite a few things about this predicament.

It turns out, black paint does not light nearly the same as black seamless. I’ve been working with strobes for so many years, and know how powerful they are. I was under the impression they could light any area. Here’s where wattage plays a very important role: black seamless has a degree of bounce to it. It’s not really 100% black, it’s more 90% grey. Because of this, you can light it so it appears black, or appears to have a small amount of grey to it. Also, it does not swallow your subject. Black paint reacts very differently. It swallows and absorbs every ounce of light. In this situation, the paint was also shiny, so you’re going to get strong highlights. I recommend soft light when paint is glossy to reduce the sharpness of highlights. I also learned to up the wattage of your lights as much as possible! My wattage was not nearly high enough, had I used the next wattage head up the images would have been far more crisp.

In spite of that, I love the image we did get. In the short amount of time I was not able to set up a lighting situation to light the scene exactly how I liked it, but the small direction I gave the models took the image a long way.

The other issue was the red paint. Again, the paint does not shoot the same as it does the red paper. I found this red paint to bleed a great deal. Because there was no light in this location what-so-ever, the red needed to be lit. Opposite the issue with the black walls, the red needed to be lit on a very low setting, as the saturation of the color creates a bleeding effect.

I really love how nearly editorial this image looks though. I curse not using a higher wattage light on Athena, as I’d like it to be sharp enough for print. Alas, it’s not.

The kick-off shoot for Versatile was with LaurenWK. I have gotten comments that I shoot her a lot, so hopefully no one gets sick of my shots of her! I love working with Lauren, she’s my current muse, and friend. (My previous muse was a model named Isabel in San Francisco who sadly retired. Models you want to shoot over and over can be rare!) I was glad Lauren squished me in, as she had a sudden booking as a magician’s assistant and was on the road a lot. The shoot was long, and exhausting, and involved a second designer stepping in to steal her time (which you’ll see further down).

We started the second Lauren pulled up, having driven all morning from Austin. Angel Jagger did the primping to get Lauren looking just how I wanted.

First we shot her in a PVC waist cincher. This was my first time attempting this type of a glow effect on the backdrop (which I later used for half of the catalog shots), so poor Lauren had to deal with waiting for me to figure out the back light on it. I love the results however, and wish I could find the perfect publication for this shot.

After this we shot her in her “favorite outfit”. Lauren just drooled over this number, and it was definitely made for her! Then again, a picture is worth a thousand words, isn’t it?

Just as we wrapped shooting her in the purple/black halter underbust the SINched crew arrived with a garment they especially made for Lauren. As I was shooting their piece on short notice, I only had time to quickly modify the set-up we were using for Versatile. SINched has a much more dark aesthetic, and I tried to capture that. Lauren also did a fantastic job altering her poses to fit the mood.

After the SINched crew left, we wrapped. Angel bounced away, and poor Lauren collapsed on my couch for some Z’s before her next shoot.

A few days later, Angela Ryan arrived to shoot some more of Versatile’s corsets. This is the first time I’ve met and worked with Angela, though I’ve followed her modeling career from the very beginning. It was lovely to finally get the chance to meet, and I hope that I’ll be able to work with her in even more creative circumstances in the future.

Angela is actually the catalyst for my current MUA partner Angel, as Angela had specifically requested Angel do all of her styling for the shoot. To keep the looks consistent, this meant I’d need to work with Angel for all of the Versatile shoots. (Which was fortuitous as she’s an amazing make-up artist, and a refreshing new friend) While Angel styled Angela for the shoots they gossiped about passed lives, and caught up.

My shots with Angela had the same set-up as Lauren, this is because it is catalog work. I absolutely adore the shot of Angela in the PVC overbust however. I think it’s so striking, and has such a strong and powerful pose. I love the overall stature that Angela carries.

I recently shot Sabrina Sin in Versatile for the catalog, but am still in the process of retouching those images. I hope to blog them, and the remaining shoots soon!

A few months ago I was hired by Versatile Corsets (back in LA) to shoot some catalog work for them. I was eager to oblige. At the same time I had been booking some editorial work, and found that my entire month of April was booked solid. Life had other plans for me however.

My first shoot, with the amazing Liz Ashley went quite well, but didn’t give me the results I had in mind. I ended up sticking with a behind the scenes shot of her, and put the catalog shots of her aside. We’ve set another date to re-do her catalog. This is actually my first time ever requesting a re-shoot! I think it’ll be worth it though, and I do love this image of her talking to me between looks.

After Liz, I did another catalog set with one of my few muses, LaurenWK. I’ll share more about this, and the images, in my next entry.

A few days later I was to embark on 4 back to back shoots. It wasn’t meant to be however. On a Saturday morning I fought through the rain on the freeway to get to a location that was a backup location for that days shoot. I was supposed to work with model Deanna Marie, of Virginia for an editorial spread. We had intended outdoor shots first, so already the day wasn’t going as planned. I exited the freeway, and was stopped at a traffic light two blocks from the location when I was rear-ended by a very large commercial truck towing landscaping equipment. I received a rather nasty case of whiplash that sent me to the ER. I mused over the neck brace I was told to wear. Though I didn’t make that days shoot, I kept my shoot with another girl for the catalog, Angela Ryan (more on this in the next post as well). Afterward, I kept Angel Jagger, the MUA to help me create a self portrait with the neckbrace.

I was upset over having to cancel on the shoot the day of the accident. I thought I felt better the next day, which is why I kept that booking, but found shortly after that, that I was in too much pain to keep shooting throughout the month. The majority of my shoots for the month were postponed.

I’m doing much better now. I still have a nasty “crick”. My neck likes to freeze up about 6 or so times a day and be immobile, but it’s workable. I’m still in the process of my shoots for Versatile, and will begin blogging features of those photographs very soon!

Leigh and I managed to do both in our rather short photo session. (She was on her way to Austin immediately after) Initially, we had agreed to do a more cute and kitsch idea. I had pitched a kitchen concept to her. I really wanted to make a little commentary on how we sometimes treat our pets as our children, (I’m guilty of it too!) and I knew the perfect little 20s kitchen to shoot it in.

I still had the corsets from Electra that I had shot on Eidolona, and wanted to try them in a totally pinup style. Leigh was game, so we did the classic colored backdrop. I think the corsets really pop in these images.

Per usual, the rest of the set can be seen on my flickr.

As a side note, I also met photographer Dangerous Dolly. The girls were traveling together, shooting much of Texas. I love meeting other photographers, so it was a pleasure.

This month a new issue of Pin Up Perfection Magazine was published. In it there is a full page spread of one of my older shots of Rebecca Ryan. I’m very excited about this issue! It’s kitchen centric, and includes recipes and an interview with Jenny Cross!

If you’d like a copy, they can be found here.

In the beginning I had doubts this would work. I was so excited for another collaboration with Electra Designs, and had booked two models to each wear a corset. The corsets are both similar, and the models were to look similar. I set out and bought props, and accessories, and was ready to go when one of the models backed out. I know this isn’t true of some places I’ve lived (like LA), but I’ve found that here, there are a large number of local models that claim to be models, but don’t really take it seriously. This leaves you sans a model at a very inopportune time! (yes, models even cancel on people like me!) Frustrated, as I had had a string of these incidences from Texas models, I decided to wait and see how this shoot would pan out.

When Eidolona arrived in town my fears subsided. She had an extra day in Houston, and I took her around Montrose for fun, and we picked up some last minute wardrobe pieces. The day of the shoot became hectic when I fell ill, and on a whim we managed to get MUA Summer Koonce. Summer did a fantastic job, and Eidolona did not disappoint! Eidolona gave me such a huge range of poses in these outfits, I was ecstatic with her work. She set a record: I pulled 95 shots from our shoot that were totally usable. I had such difficulty editing down the set, I summoned the help of 2 people to get me to my final choices. Honestly, there are some I wish I had included instead of others…and I hope to (at some point, given time) make contact sheets of the remaining images.

Here is the whole set as chosen for your viewing pleasure:

I’m very much hoping I get the chance to work with Eidolona again in the future!

I shot one of these corsets once more with model Leigh James. Those images will be making an appearance quite soon. Stay tuned!

Electra Designs contacted me about shooting their corsets. The first ones I was asked to shoot were a group of 3 that had been designed to fit model io. She had originally had them photographed on io by Stuntkid. The designer and I went back and forth about models, but she decided she wanted Lily DeVille, a somewhat new model from Colorado. As for fitting the corsets, Lily was an excellent choice, she fit them as if they were made for her.

The morning started with styling. Hair stylist Jessica Watkins collaborated with me for the first time. I met her when I first moved to Houston, and her portfolio of hair styles from previous shoots really wow’d me. I’m hoping we can work more together in the future!

After hair, Lily was carefully poured into the first corset by the designer.

We shot this corset first. It’s actually an orange color. For some reason it shoots very peach. The brown accents give it a very earthy quality in person. I love the blushing quality it has in photographs.

The second corset we shot was one the designer actually did not get previous shots of. It’s an underbust, but she also designed a matching bra for it that is quite unique. I felt the colors matched my couch quite well, so we shot the model in this number on the couch.

The last corset we shot was my favorite of the series. I’m mostly enamored with the matching floral neck corset. I think the neck corset really sets it apart. I was very inspired by the candid photo that I took of Lily being laced by the mirror, so I had her pose near the mirror for me.

There were a great many more shots taken during this shoot. Blogging is not the best format for so many photos. So, if you’d like to view all 10 shots, please visit my flickr!

Headshots are something I found myself doing a lot in CA for needy young actors and entertainers. I was surprised when I found someone in need of them in Houston, but people in the industry can be found anywhere. This particular person is an MUA (photo lingo for Make Up Artist) who was updating her site. She was an excellent example of what you should do in front of the camera in a session like this. So, I thought I would use these images to go along with some tips.

The easiest thing, that shouldn’t even be worth mentioning, is that if there will be no stylist, come camera ready. (makeup, hair, the outfit you want to be shot in, etc.) Avoid bra straps, lucite shoes, and ill fitting clothes. Ladies, lotion up! Well moisturized skin will reflect the light more flatteringly. Probably the most important thing to note is to do everything you can to be relaxed, try to have fun with it (regardless of what personality your photographer is), expect to move, and make as many expressions as possible! A dull lifeless expression, like you think you’ve seen in a magazine, will only translate well in one or two shots. So, yes, give us a dead on pout, but not in every shot!

Don’t refrain from smiling! Some of my best headshots and portraits and even model shots are of smiles. Laugh if you have to, it can be helpful. Don’t forget that you have limbs either! Soft movements with your hands around your face, and playing with your hair will create more interesting images.

It’s also not bad to know what you want. If you aren’t a model, and don’t get to work with a pro much, then this should be a treat for you. If you’ve seen photos in magazines, email them or bring them with you to your shoot. A real pro should be able to replicate the lighting. This shot was based off of a half lit editorial image she liked. We replicated the composition, lighting, and some of the pose.

My last memo is something that very few people know I’m sure. Avoid tanning! At all costs. I know Playboy loves to encourage the orange look, but most photographers don’t enjoy it. From a photo standpoint, it’s very hard to shoot and edit. Most spray tans LOOK fake, they’ll shoot too orange, as will those lovely tanning beds. Anything you do to alter your natural color will make you look unnatural in our shots! So, why waist that session you’re paying money for? If you want to look your best, go as naturally as possible. Darker skin looks amazing in a photo, but only if it’s your natural skin. (of course this mention is not in relation to these shots, as the subject is tan)

I hope these tips will help some of you out there before you get in front of the lens!

I was quite happy to see her when she arrived. I hadn’t seen her since our last shoot in LA. And when I moved away, I did lament not seeing some of my old friends. She was quite busy with shoots around Texas at the time, and only had an evening to spend. We opted to take just a few shots for fun.

The first shot was an homage to an old self portrait I had done awhile back. I did the same set-up, with a wallpapered background, and a glass table top in front. We had done reflective portraits before, so we joked that this would become a thing…showing Lauren as vain. (which she actually couldn’t be further from!)

I had also wanted a bit of a “film noir” esque shot in the bedroom. So, we set off to do that task.

Although that shot embodied my original idea, my favorite shot ended up being a beauty portrait we took during this set up.

I was sad to see her go, but she had plenty more shoots in her schedule. I’m hoping I’ll see her again in TX…she is one of my favorite shopping buddies after all