Nicola is a really great friend of mine, so when she asked me to model for her i was rather delighted. Her apparent reasoning for using me as the subject for her imagery was due to me being quite a sex based individual and the shots she wanted were lingerie themed. I was asked to bring the ‘sexiest underwear i owned’, therefore i obliged.
When i turned up, i was asked to pose in rather simple poses, which i found a little uncomfortable. However Nicola soon eased into the role of director, it was good to see from her as she isn’t an assertive person at all. She turned out to be fabulous at giving suggestions and direction, i really did enjoy working with her on set. The studio set-up was rather basic, being plain white. However this fit her concept of 60’s sex of course, taking inspiration from David Bailey i assume. The shoot was assisted by Abbie Hudson, whom, although i love her equally, is admittedly a lot more assertive. She was very helpful towards Nicola however in terms of pose ideas and the idea of using the fan.
The idea in regards to the fan was both brilliant and awful almost simultaneously. My hair was pushed back and the final images look great, however during the shooting i was in terrible paint. My eyes were watering like crazy and i was utterly freezing. Bearing in mind, it is the middle of winter and i am wearing lingerie in an unheated studio. It was ridiculously uncomfortable but i am really pleased that the images turned out the way Nicola wanted them to. I am really enjoying modelling as a whole, its sort of a side project in comparison to being behind the camera.
Nicola also used tethered shooting which i enjoyed. I found it is a lot easier to model when you can see what the shots actually look like, it helps with self direction and pose a lot more than usual. I also found that having a mirror behind the photographer aids in self direction. I will keep this in mind when modelling in the future.
(Shots shown below, all taken by Nicola Wiper).
ELL, FASHION PHOTOGRAPHY 