New shoes :D

Thank you to all the wonderful people who have bought or are planning on buying something from my blog sale! :* I'm re-investing the money in my modelling wardrobe and these two amazing pairs of shoes arrived today! *faints with joy*

Can't wait to shoot them xD

In the spirit of self-indulgence I've also booked myself a week's holiday in London 2nd - 8th October, during which I will be having an intensive re-charge of my batteries! I'll be getting a proper facial and some reflexology and generally lie flat out on my back with tongue hanging out the side of my mouth and my eyes half-closed while getting steamed, scrubbed, cleansed, waxed, wrapped, massaged, moisturised, pummeled and generally polished.

I'm sorry if that sounds ridiculously self-indulgent but trust me, at this point in the year I need it ;)

Today's blog was brought to you by Bizarre, Emma Delves-Broughton and a cubey

A nice new model on Facebook let me know that my photo is in the slideshow header of the Bizarre Ultra Vixens' homepage. I'm glad Bizarre like this shot as much as I do! It's my favourite of all the material I shot for Emma Delves-Broughton's Kinky Nature :)

I was shooting with Emma again just yesterday at a beautiful old house in Bath for Peccatus Latex Couture, so I'm looking forward to seeing our latest work! The sweet couple who owned the house turned out to be "fans" and had copies of Kinky Nature for me to sign, which was flattering and sweet. In the spirit of getting stuff signed I asked Emma to sign my copy, too!

I'm not working tomorrow for what feels like the first time in ages so I'm up drinking red wine and listening to music with Liam :) When I saw the Ultra Vixens homepage I said to him, "do you remember reading Bizarre together when we were 14? It's so weird that I'm 'one of those girls' now" and he said, "you were always 'one of those girls'!", which is very sweet as I actually looked terrible every single day when we were in high school (greasy hair home-dyed green, train-track braces top and bottom, vile glasses, acne, no bust of any description, baggy men's clothing in an attempt to hide said non-bust, etc etc etc) <3

In the spirit of mild tipsiness-induced overshare I now have to go and do an interview for a new photography website. This could be amusing/ wrong/ regrettable :p

Latex love in the Swiss Alps

So, I'm already running out of ideas for original blog titles :p My shoots with Adam Robertson and Binkography went well! I <3 their new house so much ^^ Now I'm at my mum's house in Somerset printing out various tickets for things and giving myself a facial. Shooting at Chilli Studio in Bristol for the first time tomorrow :)

Anyway, this blog is about my shoot in Switzerland. Slightly late, I know!

19th July found me waking up in sunny Switzerland with two top European fashion photographers and a suitcase full of designer latex.

We drove up to the Alps for a day of shooting for Favor and Joy Williams in the blazing alpine sunshine.

Favor by Darklight Fotografie

Favor by Darklight Fotografie. I got a criss-cross strap-mark sunburn on my back while shooting this one >.<  The cool mountain breeze fooled me into thinking that one thin layer of factor 30 would be enough. Wrong!

Favor by Darklight Fotografie

In the afternoon we found an empty chalet with nicely peeling wooden walls to shoot up against. This a snap Thomas took on his iPhone of us setting up (hence you can see someone's hand holding a light stand on the right!).

Joy Williams by Darklight Fotografie

Favor by Darklight Fotografie

Joy Williams by Darklight Fotografie

At lunchtime we ate in this sort of mountain lodge type place and I tried Swiss salami, which is called salamette or something :) I don't eat Euro pork usually because I feel sorry for the piggies but sometimes I let it pass if it comes under the heading of being a cultural experience :p

In the restaurant in Gotthard Pass: Cornelius (Darklight) shooting Thomas (The Beauty of Abyss) shooting me, looking at the morning's shots

Outside of the restaurant I was delighted to find people playing those giant Swiss didgeridoo thingies xD

After the shoot we headed into the local village for dinner. Cornelius told me some interesting facts including that the whole of Switzerland has the same population as London and that we were driving down the route that Hannibal and his elephants traversed! He also pointed out the spot where Switzerland was originally founded in the C13th- X (the Swiss flag) marks the spot!

After dinner at the Spaghetti House I checked out Cornelius' studio before heading back to Germany with Thomas for an early night, ready to head back to the airport first thing the next morning to get back to London in time for my next shoot! I listened to Alec Empire and KMFDM all the way home :)

I'm now trying to convince Thomas and Cornelius to come to London to shoot more cool fashion here. Hopefully I can persuade them :p

Latex love at Lichtwertstudios

Hurray for shooting "fetisch" fashion in Germany :D On 18th July I left my house in London at 4 am to meet The Beauty of Abyss (aka Thomas) at Frankfurt Airport at 8.30 am (local time) to shoot for two latex designers, Favor and Joy Williams :)

We began my trip by visiting Karlsruhe Palace for coffee :) It was really cool as I didn't think I was going to get time to actually see much of the local area!

Well actually, the very first place we stopped off at on the way from the airport was a German sex shop to buy lube for the latex! I was amused that it was right opposite a McDonald's, complete with Ronald McDonald playground.

Then after a lush lunch at an Italian restaurant, it was off to Lichtwertstudios to start shooting!

look at meh latex. look at dem

And here are the results :) My favourite pieces were the white Joy Williams dress and the black and silver Favor onesie. They were lovely to wear and really flattering, too.

My favourite Favor outfit ^^

We shot some other nice outfits for Favor, which I will post if I spot them anywhere :)

After the shoot I made Thomas take me to a typical German place for dinner rather than going out for Italian/ Chinese/ Japanese/ whatever :p We went to a place called Biergarten (I won't patronise anyone by translating) that had those uber-long picnic bench type things :) I had some savoury pancake parcels stuffed with herby veggie mulch, apparently a traditional dish of the region :)

Thomas also introduced me to this great drink, which is half lager and half grapefruit lemonade (and surprisingly strong for a lightweight like me when I'm sleepy from having got up at 3.30 am >.<)

After dinner we drove to Switzerland (well, Thomas drove, I slept the whole way!) to meet Darklight Fotografie (aka Cornelius) all ready for our location shoot in the Swiss Alps the next day, which I will post the pictures from soon................................

Now I'm off to Wiltshire to start my sold-out Westcountry Tooh-arr! Looking forward to this afternoon, when I'll be shooting with Adam Robertson again and with Binkography for the first time!

Scottish Highlands!

Carrying on from my previous two blogs about my Scottish tour...

Next stop was the fantastically, mind-blowingly, breathtakingly, unbelievably, stunningly beautiful Scottish Highlands. Watching the landscape go by from the window of the train was mesmerising. When it got to its wildest point it was time for me to alight at a tiny little station in the middle of nowhere...

I met Alex Ingram and he took me on a tour of Lochcarron ^^ This was the view of a loch in front of a mountain, from my room's window:

I saw the original Tartan weaver's, which had a poster of someone I recognised on the wall!

It'sh a Bink-eh :D

Then we visited the remains of Strome Castle, which had some amazing views. I can't really describe it except to say the landscape felt wilder than anywhere else I've ever been in my whole life.

Best of all, Alex had been keeping up with my plans to stuff myself silly with Scottish food by reading my blog before I arrived and had bought an award-winning haggis for our dinner! Except in Scotland they say they "caught" a haggis xD Apparently this is the best haggis in the world! And it's made by someone called "Cockburn". Perfection.

It was sooo good! It was actually spicy, which I wasn't expecting. Delicious!

The next day we actually started shooting ;) I've been wanting to shoot in the Scottish Highlands for about 2 years, so it was one of those "personal goals achieved" moments :) We did lots of art nudes but also this Wuthering Heights-inspired shot for Drac-in-a-Box:

There was actually a 70 mph gale going on for most of the shoot! I wanted to get the cloak-fluttering-romantically-in-the-breeze effect but in 90% of the images it was completely horizontal and flat, like Superman's cape! This shot was taken in between gusts of wind so strong they actually knocked me flat a couple of times ;p On the plus side, all the midges apparently got blown away as I only got half a dozen or so bites!

I had to take some snaps myself while I was up there, and a little video of our progress back down the mountain to Lochcarron!

Next stop was back down in the village, which was much less windy!

When we were driving home at the end of the day, we got a flat tyre right out on the arse-end of nowhere with no phone signal. I'm proud to say that I changed my first tyre (with the help of Alex and the car's instruction manual. As if I'd know how to do it, otherwise)!

Photographers get their money's worth with Anita De Bauch :p

Alex made a lush pasta thing for dinner and invited Liam and I to come back for a little holiday ^^ I can't wait, it's going to be so much fun! My one regret while seeing this beautiful place was that Liam couldn't be there to share it with me. It happens a lot when I'm away from home working and seeing all these life-changingly incredible places. But hopefully Liam and I will be able to go back in June when I'm touring Scotland again and he's finished with uni for the summer :D I'm sure I must owe Alex a restaurant wining & dining session by now! :)

And to bring my Scottish tour blogging to a close... my next stop was to get a bus to Glasgow (the trains weren't running... "because it's Sunday." Eh?!) where I was doing a shoot for Drac-in-a-Box with Artpunk, which you can read about here :)

I'll finish by saying that even the view from the bus stop at Lochcarron was gorgeous!

Bunny Girl!

It occurred to me at this shoot in Elgin Studio, Scotland that I have never dressed up in a bunny girl outfit before this. How I managed to avoid such a classic, I don't know. Tbh the idea of it never really appealed, but I really like the way these ones came out! It's been a while since I did the whole cutesy-cutesy thing :D

Photographer and wardrobe stylist: Ful-O-Face

Corset: Corsets UK

Shooting with Jan Full-O-Face and David Porter was so much fun that we seemed to spend most of our shoot in fits of giggles ^^ Here's an outtake of me doing a rabbit impression:

Photographer: David Porter

I've never worn anything by Corsets UK before, and although this corset was too big for me it seemed well-made and flatteringly designed so I may be treating myself to something from their site soon :)

The studio owners Geoff and Helen Matthews kindly looked after me, put me up overnight and took me out for dinner! I had fish and chips ^^ They are just SUCH lovely people and I can't wait to visit them again :)

My next point on the Scottish tour was the Highlands, which I'd really been looking forward to as I'd been wanting to visit and shoot there for about 2 years! I'll go on an extended blag about how beautiful it was tomorrow ;)

Scottish Tour 2010

I did my first Scottish tour last month and have lots of pics to show off :)

First stop was Aberdeenshire, where I shot on location with John Hughes at a tower called the Prop of Ythsie in the morning and on some beautiful beaches in the afternoon.

It was a bit damp in the morning but by lunchtime the sun was blazing. I couldn't believe I was eating my lunch on a hot sand dune and basking in the sun in SCOTLAND! :D

The next leg of the tour was in a little fishing village called Banff to meet Carmilla of Drac-in-a-Box and her lovely family :) I had a great time staying with them- they're hospitality was awesome and they are just such nice people- and I got to be a tourist as well! Banff is really picturesque :)

Pebbles on the beach. Pebbles are pretty

That little tower on the hill is apparently a temple dedicated to Venus! How cool!

Stately home Carmilla took me to visit

Secret little church/ mortuary thingy in the woods :D (That's Carmilla's little daughter on the step. She looks like a ghost!)

Pagan-looking statue of a dead knight at the back of the little church/ mortuary thingy

Next stop: Elgin Studio, which I will blog about tomorrow :) I have some bunny girl photos to share!