Sherall Seymour - Make Up By Serena Brangman

This shoot with Sherall is the second of a series of five Beauty shoots that I did in collaboration with Serena Brangman.

Serena wanted the five models to differ in ethnicity and skin tone.  Sherall was chosen for her dark skin tones and Indian mix.  I had shot Sherall last year and once I'd shown Serena those pics we agreed that she was the perfect choice.  Obviously being gorgeous was also a key factor LOL.

Sophie Adams - Make Up By Serena Brangman

Last week Serena Brangman and I collaborated on a series of beauty shoots.  Serena was looking to add some more beauty images to her portfolio and as the NFL season is drawing to a close, it was time for me to get off the couch and start shooting again.   We shot 5 models during a 7 hour session.

The first model is Sophie Adams.  Serena was looking for a variety of skin colours and ethnicity.  I suggested we use Sophie for the "white" girl. 

Sophie and Hurricane Leslie

This shoot took place a couple of weeks ago in early September when Hurricane Leslie threatened to hit the island.  The shoot was on Saturday, the storm was estimated to hit the island on Sunday, fortunately it changed its path and missed well to the East.  What it did do though, was create some nice storm surge, perfect for a quick unplanned shoot.

On Friday night I put out a Facebook post asking if anyone was up for a hurricane shoot and Sophie replied.

End of Summer Bikini Shoot with Asha

 This shoot with Asha took place at the beginning of September.  It was the last of the summer shoots that were planned back in April.  However,  since busy work commitments have taken up Monday through to Saturday and Sunday is now dedicated to NFL there hasn't been a lot of free time in September, it has taken a month for me to get around to processing the images.
 This is the second time Asha and I have shot together, the first time being 2 years ago, which was also a bikini shoot.  Asha told me that this was the first time that she has shot since then. 

Really Riley - Part 2

This is part 2 of the Really Riley shoot.  For a description of the shoot concept and lighting details see the write up in Part 1. 

Really Riley - Part 1

As with almost all my summer shoots this shoot with Riley Henderson was planned back in April.  We originally agreed to shoot swimsuit, however, Riley has been busy modeling all summer and had already done several swimsuit shoots, so a couple of days before the shoot, we decided to change the concept to a fashion shoot.  Riley asked Shay Gibbons Ford if she could use items from Shay's Renew collection.  Shay agreed and I believe there may also be some items from Fatimaya too.

As the clothing is youthful, colorful and urban/edgy I suggested that we do the shoot with a lot of personality, so rather than shoot editorial expressions that generally tend to lack a lot of emotion and eye contact, I wanted this shoot to be goofy, flirty and have the sort of poses and expressions that you'd take with your iphone in the bedroom mirror when you're messing around.  Riley loved the idea as it's something that she hasn't done at a shoot before, although by all accounts something she does a lot in front of her own bedroom mirror.

Bottle Top Bikini: Part 5 of 5 - Yuki at Pink Beach

This was the final shoot in the Bottle Top Bikini series that were designed by James Lee.  I understand that James has another 2 or 3 photographers lined up to shoot the remainder of his collection, so keep a look out for their work coming in the near future.
Yuki Hoshina was the model chosen to wear the Amstel Light bottle cap swimsuit.   Yuki had responded to my April casting call when I was trying to schedule my summer shoots, but unfortunately I was booked up by the time she messaged me,  so it was nice that we still got to shoot after all.

James's concept/vision for this shoot was have a regal feel, so the outfit was accessorised with a belted cover-up and bracelets.  The make-up was done by Shaela from MAC and was based on an image of an oriental bride.

Sophie wearing Definitions By Dean

I've been wanting to shoot some of Dean's work for over 2 years.  I came very close in December 2010, but bad weather put pay to those plans.
As Dean's collection's are mostly custom made orders, they are already sold, so he rarely has any stock outfits sitting unsold on a rail.  Dean, therefore, generously offered to design something specifically for this shoot.

 He liked the idea of challenging himself to create a small collection that was editorial, unique and at the same time cohesive.    The concept I asked for was a sports wear/ready to wear style collection with a Amish/Religious twist.   Alexa Chung's outfits was my inspiration.

Bottle Top Bikini: Part 4 - Cleo at Nine Beaches

This was the fourth shoot from the bottle top bikini series as designed by James Lee.  The model for this shoot was Cleo and she was modeling the Heineken cap monokini swimsuit.

We decided to shoot at 9 beaches, it was an evening shoot.  We were hoping for a cool sunset setting however, when we arrived there was a slight sprinkling of rain, but fortunately it didn't last too long.  We had seen some interesting images of the huts perched out in the water, but we weren't able to get to that set as access to them was behind a locked gate.   Consequently we couldn't get to the side of the headland where we needed to be to see the sun set.

Bottle Top Bikini: Part 3 - Introducing Sherall

This is the 3rd in the series of bottle top bikinis designed by James Lee.  When James asked me which models I wanted to use for these shoots Sherall was the first name I gave him.  Actually, I didn't know her name, but I had seen her several times at the Evolution rehearsals and she was at the top of my list of new faces I wanted to shoot.   When you see these pics I'm sure you will understand why.  She is one of the most beautiful models I've had the privilege to shoot.  I believe the bottle caps used in this swimsuit are from Millar.

Bottle Top Bikini: Part 2 - "Look a Super-Model"

This is the second of the bottle top swimsuit shoots, as designed by James Lee.   See previous post for more details about the swimsuits.
This shoot was with Malyssa and was shot in the water just off the causeway at the Blue Hole park end.  It was shot late evening.  As expected there was a lot of traffic crossing the causeway and hence a lot of horn tooting, yelling and a group of tourists who pulled their convoy of rental bikes to the side of the road and could be heard talking amongst themselves, "Look a super-model."  Needless to say Malyssa loved all the attention.  LOL.

Bottle Top Bikini: Part 1 - Cave Woman

About this time last year I had the idea to create a bikini out of bottle tops.  I put out a request for people to start saving their tops instead of discarding them.  Shortly after that request I got a message from James Lee asking what I was planning on doing with the bottle tops, he mentioned he was also collecting them and oddly enough was in the process of creating a line of swimsuits from them.  In the end I never got enough caps or found the time to create the bikini.   James, however, continued with the idea and now has about 30 designs and several finished bikinis.  He asked me if I was still keen on the idea of shooting the bikini and whether I'd like to shoot some of his, rather than create my own.   I'm pretty sure I would never get around to creating my own and if I did there is no telling how hideous it would look, so I took him up on his offer.  Together we agreed on the models and concepts.  This is the first shoot we did.  The model is Sarafina, who I had previously shot back in February, she was one of the models in the lip tattoo shoot.

Rayneisha's Pool Party

Rayneisha and I have been planning this shoot since March.  We were discussing the details for the previous shoot we did, when Rayneisha showed me a picture of this brightly colored swimsuit.   It immediately screamed David Lachapelle.   So we started planning a second shoot that was to include multiple people, some crazy things going on and lots of bright colours.

Darius (Wilhelmina) - in Ralph Lauren Polo

I've known Darius since about 2008 when he used to live here.  At that time he wasn't a professional model and was in the process of building his portfolio.   I was new to shooting fashion and models, so finding interested models wasn't easy,  Darius was one of the few models willing to take a chance and shoot with me.
We shot 3 or 4 times between 2008 and 2009.   In 2010 he left Bermuda to model professionally in South Africa and is now signed with Wilhelmina in California.

We bumped into each other last week,  at the model workshop where he was a guest speaker.   At one point he handed out his comp cards to the models and to my surprise one of the four images on the back was one of the shots we'd taken way back in 2008.  Later on he showed me his printed portfolio which also includes an image that I took. I actually still use this image in my model mayhem portfolio.  Here is a Link

The evolution of the Evolution Fashion Show 2012

For the last two weekends I put shoots and blog posts hold as I've been immersed in following and documenting the City Fashion Festival in photos.  There has been something of interest on most days, and on the days when there has only been rehearsals I've been attending those too.

This blog post is a summary from my perspective of everything Evolution, from when it started with the Casting Calls way back in March, through model boot camps, show rehearsals, the fashion festival and then culminating with the final event, the Evolution Fashion Show, on Saturday July 7th.

Rayneisha's Editorial Style Shoot at St Georges

When I discussed this shoot with Rayneisha she said that she wanted to do an editorial style swimsuit shoot.  She gave me, as inspiration, a link to the June issue of Vogue Spain which was a shoot of Juju Ivanyuk on a beach in various dresses.
Shooting Rayneisha is really easy, she requires almost no direction, her poses are always modeled from head to toe (to steal Tyra's phrase) and of course her face photographs beautifully.  This shoot was also made easier for me as Rayneisha took control of the styling, all I had to do was find the right location and figure out how I wanted to light it.

Sherelle's Swimsuit Shoot

I did this shoot with Sherelle on Monday, which was a public holiday.  So it took a while to find a beach that wasn't jam packed.  We finally settled for Southlands which was still really busy but not as much as the public beaches.  I wanted to shoot at low tide, which meant shooting during the hottest part of the day.  The good thing about shooting at midday is the colours are always very vivid.  The downside however, are the harsh shadows and the tendency that the model will squint a lot. 

Gabriella in "Shifting Colors"

This shoot with Gabbi was inspired by a Greg Kadels colorful shoot for Numero #134 which featured a selection of trendy outfits shot in an urban setting with colorful buildings.

I've shot with Gabbi many times but this was the first time that we have done something with a more editorial feel.

We shot in the car park at Noah's Ark pet store.  Although its not colorful it had the architecture I needed to give the images the feel that they were shot somewhere other than Bermuda.  Post processing was then used to give the images the artificial/colorful feel that I took as my original inspiration.

Ashley's Visit Home (NSFW)

WARNING: CONTAINS NUDITY

Ashley was back on the island for a couple of weeks and had contacted me back in March when I was scheduling my summer shoots.  We had planned to shoot on May 20th but the poor weather that lasted all week put pay to lots of shooting opportunities.  Fortunately the last remaining free day I had before she left turned out nice and sunny.
When we discussed concepts Ashley said she wanted images that portrayed aspects of Bermuda's beautiful beaches and were also to be a mix of sexy swimsuit, as well as some implied and topless sets.

Part 2: "Natural Beauty" By Christopher Vee

This is the second part of the Beauty Shoot that I did with Christopher Vee a couple of weeks ago.  Part 1 was a bold look with bright make up to match the Moroccan necklace, this shoot was the complete opposite with the aim to keep the make up very natural and simple.
The models Christopher chose for the shoot were Riley and Malyssa.  I shot with Riley a couple of years ago but this is the first time that Malyssa and I have worked together.

Thanks to Alex Masters for letting us use
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