As part two of my Dragon Boat Festival photos, I bring to you the Desert Winds Bellydancers! This is a different troupe than I am in (I’m with Ammena), so I don’t always have a chance to see them perform. They debuted this circus routine at our big dance show in March, so I was only able to watch it from the side stage. It was so fantastic to sit in the audience for once and soak it all in!
It’s been a while, but here is my first zombie pinup of the year! Between the great locations, Starsha’s excellent modeling, and not having done one in a while, it was really hard to narrow these photos down!
Starsha has several pet cockroaches, and we made use of them for the last portion of the shoot. They are actually pretty laid back creepy crawlies, but when we would put them on her they would make a run for it. We ended up having to only use one so they didn’t get lost in the field (because that would just suck for EVERYONE), and I multiplied it afterward. If you are absolutely terrified of cockroaches, it is the last photo, so you are safe to scroll through the 16 that come before it.
When I first arranged this shoot with Starsha, Hope Litwin had recently done a little personal assignment, Project: Norma Jean, recreating Marilyn Monroe’s ballerina photo. I found out Starsha had an orange tu-tu, so Project: Zomba Jean was born…
I can’t believe Sophia is already two! I’ve had the fortune to photograph this little girl since she was only a baby bump. Actually, her maternity photos were done while I still worked at Sears! During that session I found out her mom Laura was from the Crowsnest Pass, where I am originally from, and though we had just missed each other in high school by about a year, we have been in touch ever since. I’ve been able to photograph little Sophia when she was teeny tiny, and last year when she turned one. You may have seen her feet throughout my website ;)
This last weekend while I was in the Pass to photograph some friends getting married (photos of that coming soon!), Laura brought Sophia out to the scenic Leitch Collieries for some photos to celebrate the momentous 2 year occasion. I wish Leitch Collieries was closer to Lethbridge… the best way I can describe the location for photos is EPIC! At least in the CNP, it’s only a five minute drive from my house :)
It took a lot of chasing to get most of these photos, but oh goodness she’s so cute!
Last Saturday Lethbridge was graced by the Kabuki Guns Burlesque (KGB) dancers from Calgary who put on a stellar show at Henotic. I was excited to see this as my only burlesque encounters up to that point had been seeing Big John Bates and the Voodoo Dollz, but I knew there was a whole other world of burlesque out there I had yet to experience!
Just after the girls arrived in Lethbridge, they took some time for an awesome photoshoot with myself, Michael (for a brief while before family matters called), and the lovely Starsha who assisted with lighting (and she has a fantastic eye for detail, so she doubled as our stylist!). We started with the girls’ solo outfits, and I loved their fun costumes. Every costume totally reflected each girl’s personality… and I was especially thrilled when Princess Leia walked out…
[No nudity follows, but burlesque costumes may not be the most "safe for work" ;)]
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On Sunday Michael and I did another collaborative shoot with the lovely Elaina, who you might remember from The Hotel Arts shoot last month. Elaina is always a dream to work with, so we called on her to model a few gorgeous pieces from a Mckenzie Couture line. Mckenzie is a brilliant Lethbridge fashion designer and lent us some really colorful and funky work she has done.
We took to the old brewery in Inglewood in Calgary for our photos, and couldn’t have asked for a better day, or a richer location. Aside from the dirtiness and scary pigeons flying out of holes, the one location had such a good variety of backgrounds and textures that we never changed locations the whole afternoon. Usually Michael and I end up with really different frames when we share a shoot, but this time we were both feeling the brewery the same way, and came up with some really similar shots even though we didn’t look at each other’s cameras and reposed Elaina whenever we switched. The lone tree you see at the end of this post just had to be framed that way!
We were assisted by Michael’s friend Satnam, as well as Elaina’s crew, all of whom were good sports as we tiptoed admist the pigeon poop :)
Okay, I think I am cursed when I work with Kelsie, because it snows every time! January, I can understand, but within an hour of when we started what we thought would be a warm April shoot, Lethbridge got a ridiculous amount of snow! Luckily we were able to finish our shoot inside, but were not too thrilled going back outside in our summery clothes and shoes :P
Kelsie’s hair stylist friend Courtney did an amazing cut and dye on her, and we did this shoot for Courtney’s portfolio. Courtney also doubled as an excellent lighting assistant throughout the evening! I don’t need to explain how great Kelsie is because you can see for yourself :)
