Outtakes from around the world

The end of the year; a time to review oneself and one's work. In digging through my full-to-bursting hard drive I found a concerning number of photos of me messing about during lighting tests, so in a break from the traditional posting-meticulously-posed-and-Photoshopped professional images, I present to you some professional lighting tests and behind the scenes snaps.

Professional on the behalf of the photographers, that is.

Malta, January. It was absolutely freezing on the coast!


London, February. Multi-tasking with Binky: checking out the photos-so-far while holding the grey card for Adam Robertson

Switzerland, July. Shooting Joy Williams latex with The Beauty of Abyss and Cornelius Fischer

Singapore, November with Callan and Kevin of Cake Images LLP

Ireland, December. Me hiding in my new Burberry trench coat during the lighting test with Sean McCormack

Lille, December. Lighting test for a shoot for Peccatus Latex Couture with Maxime Avet

No doubt there will be more in 2011. Here's to another year of international immaturity!

Valkyrie Corsets and 'Lighting the Nude' 2010

I seem to have been doing an incredible number of latex shoots recently, which is always fun but it's nice to be able to post something a little different today :)

I recently went to Birmingham to shoot for two different designers with Julian M Kilsby, whose work I've been admiring for a while :) We got through both assignments at a frighteningly efficient pace so I ended up wrapped up and back at the station well early, reading A Christmas Carol and eating mushroom soup in the Camden Food Co while waiting for my train home :)

Here is the set we shot for Valkyrie Corsets, who I actually walked for at a show last year, I think! It's hard for me to pick favourites but I think maybe the first one :) It makes me think of an ad for cars or perfume or something!

Hair and makeup courtesy of yours truly, again, although I think my efforts have been somewhat neatened up in Photoshop ;)

My art nude work seems to have been really overshadowed by all the fashion work I've been doing recently, so I was especially pleased to discover that I'm on the back cover of the latest Lighting the Nude book (Top Photography Professionals Share Their Secrets, 2010 revised edition)!

Lighting the Nude is such a well-known text that even I've heard of it, so it's very cool to think I'm a part of the series now! Presumably there's a bit inside with diagrams explaining how to get the lighting on this shot of me by Gregory Brown :) I think this is at least the third time this photo has been published somewhere now!

You can buy a copy on Amazon here if you're interested

My friend Ivory Flame is on the cover, (shot by a photographer I've worked with many times myself, including for a week in Spain earlier this year, John Evans) which is extra cool as she is simply made of naked awesome!

I'm off to bed for some much-needed beauty sleep!! More shooting tomorrow! :D

Peccatus Latex Couture in Ireland!

Some photos from my most recent latex shoot in Ireland with Sean McCormack, who writes the Lightroom Blog and just opened the stunning Sky Water Land landscape photography exhibition in Galway. Is there anything this man can't do?! :D

Hair and makeup by moi. Lots of fun attempting to cover the signs that I was coming down with a cold :p Sean bought us kangaroo burgers for lunch though, which is always a good way to make me feel better!

The location was cool. I really want to go back and do a full-on cheesy steampunk shoot in front of that big bolted boiler thing with the full selection of brown/ bronze/ grey/ orange-ish leather/ canvas/ rubber wardrobe and antique gold Victorian clockwork themed accessories + mad professor hair and makeup :D

'Twas the night before Christmas...

I'm so behind on posting photos! I have loads of new ones piled up and really need to update my portfolio with them. Maybe I'll find time over my Christmas holiday :)

There's something about the rich, warm colours in this photo by Trevor Yerbury from The Boudoir Academy that makes me feel Christmassy, so I thought I'd post it today :) Hair styling by the ever-fabulous Faye Yerbury and corset from Drac-in-a-Box!

Merry Christmas, everyone! Thank you for supporting me in my dream career by reading my blog all year and I look forward to seeing you here again soon :)

Kuala Lumpur, 16th November 2010

I just found this photo set from a shoot I did with Kenny Yeoh in a beautiful 5* suite in Kuala Lumpur last month. It has a completely different feel to anything I've ever shot before, I think :)

I'm guessing that they won't be to everyone's taste as they are less glamorous and more candid than my usual style, but I really like how "real" they feel, especially the top middle one. The client was pleased, anyway, because I got to stay in the suite that night after the shoot instead of following my original plan of staying in a local hostel :)

A shot of me drinking tea is also a fair representation of what I actually do on a shoot, as people I've worked with will testify :p Tea is my fuel! You can take the girl out of England but not the England out of the girl- I had teabags with me and drank tea at nearly all my Asian shoots :p

Binkography Fashion

Here are the other photos from my shoot in Wilthsire with Binkography, prior to dunking myself in a bath full of hot milk :)

*sigh*

Today's allocated job: to prep myself up for tomorrow's snow shoot.

8 am: got up and booked a manicure and Brazilian wax for this afternoon. Worked out in the living room with the curtains closed so the neighbours couldn't see me clomping along to my aerobics DVD

8.30 am: shower. Exfoliated and moisturised everything. Shaved legs and pits. Pumiced heels. Waxed arms, plucked eyebrows then cleansed, toned and moisturised face, chest and shoulders. Applied eye cream. Got hair dying kit out.

9.30 am: made breakfast. Looked out of the window while the kettle was boiling. The snow had all melted.

This is typical.

On the plus side, the mushroom and spring onion omelette I made for breakfast was perfect!

Got milk?

Whoah, London is about 30 degrees colder than Singapore! I can't believe all the snow! <3 I think I'll take some pics of it and send them along with the "thank you" mails I'll be sending to the rest of my Asian clients today. Most of them said they had never seen real snow!

Now for more "drowning in the bath" shots, this time by my good friend Binkography! We had so much fun shooting these, and my skin felt amazing after having taken a hot milk bath! Maybe that thing about the woman who bathes in asses' milk isn't as weird as it sounds. Next up: virgins' blood ;)

 I think this should be a cosmetics ad :)

 All makeup by moi! This photo won MM's Pic of the Day

*Bumbum!*

I'll post our fashion photo set tomorrow, but please do let me know what you think of these ones by leaving a blog comment :) x