The minute my eyes opened up I knew it was going to be a crazy busy day. Testing is never easy, with no pull letter and not a lot of contacts, as I’m still working on building my name in this industry; I knew that I had to be on top of my game today. I had received the inspiration images from Paula, the hair stylist and the one coordinating the shoot, and wanted to make sure I gave them the best possible looks I can provide. A close friend of mine had been generous to let me pull some items from her the night before, and I had packed everything that came close to the inspiration that I had in my kit. My mission the day of the shoot was to pick up some last minute accessories, hit the fabric store, and drape a few dresses out of chiffon and see what I could come up with for the shoot. Head to the shoot then rock it out. Luckily call time wasn’t until 3pm.
My alarm clock went off around 9pm, I hopped in the shower and quickly through on some cool, comfortable YET cute clothes that I would be able to do my last minute prepping in. I had already pre-packed my personal shoot clothes in the car. I headed to Cerritos mall just to grab some spare accessories to cushion my kit with (yes, often with stylists who are still establishing their name and book, expenses come out of pocket). As I was at my check out at the store I was in I received a text from a stylist that I assist from time to time, he agreed to let me pull some items for my shoot out of his kit. Only one thing, he would only be at his place in Los Angeles for 1 hour. I still needed to go to the fabric store which was in the opposite direction and head back home to pack the rest of my car! I decided that it would be to my benefit to make the trip regardless.
I quickly ran out of the store, accessories and Starbucks in hand and got on the road towards Los Angeles. It took me 45 minutes to get there! And mind you, my lovely air conditioning in my car decided to not work, in the middle of summer! Once there, I showed him the inspiration images that I had received, and he was able to pick out a handful of items for me that I could pull. At this point it was 1 o’clock. I had two hours to make it to Jo Ann’s, head to the fabric store, pack my car and make it too Aliso Viejo, which is a good 20 something miles away from my house. I was in and out of LA in less than 20 minutes, and back on the road headed towards Orange County. I decided to go straight home, pack my car and then head to the fabric store as my last stop. From there I would go straight to the prep location. An hour or so later, I finally arrived at the prep shoot location, after picking up over 6 yards of fabric from the store. We had been informed that Make-up artist Au Mauricio (http://www.paulamauricio.com/) was on the way, so the photographer Jacqueline Grossbard (Jacqueline Harriet Photography), the MUA (make-up artist) Paula Peralta (Paula Peralta's Blog) and model Jessica Brittain (Jessica Brittain's Facebook) decided to have a fit session before we got started so we could get the looks on lock, since we would be shooting on location in Trabuco Canyon, there would be very little time (we were using natural lighting) and no changing room. Once we narrowed to the looks to top 5, I packed them up and headed to Target to pick up a last minute nude swimsuit she could wear under some of the sheer items. When I came back hair and make-up was all set. We then set out on our 20 minute drive to the canyon; we had to work quickly because we were losing light very fast. Once we got there it was non-stop, first look was a gorgeous fur vest and a skirt that I had fashioned out of a bolt of burgundy lace. Then one of the girls had an amazing idea to lift the lace up and have Jacqueline shoot through it, to create a print on Jessica, the models, face! It turned out beautifully! The next looks was a sheer orange chiffon wrap around dress that we fashioned into a top, with a plum patterned high wasted skirt, again, knocked that look out of the park. Last but certainly not least, we used a nude chiffon tunic with metal sequins, and a cropped chiffon bolero with orange faux fur attached to it. Just as the sun was setting the image was captured and it turned out beautifully. After we all had wrapped, and packed up from this exhausting day, we took a little trip to Café Rio in Lake Forest to have a celebratory dinner, which was super yummy! I could not have asked for a better team and a better shoot day. I loved every minute.
Check out how the shoot turned out below!
