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You might have noticed it’s been a few days since I posted. Thanksgiving happened, and then deadlines happened, and then…well more holidays are happening. I’m sure you can relate. Since I’m sure everyone is on a bit of overload, I’ll keep the posts short until after the new year.

Over the Thanksgiving holiday, I did a photo shoot with three gorgeous women. Bet you wish you were me! I hope to use images from these shoots in future book covers, either mine or someone else’s. It’ll be a long road, though. It starts with a flicker of inspiration. Sort of like writing a novel…a vague thought of an idea that plants and germinates and hopefully grows into something that represents a story.

In this case, how can it fail to become something very cool, with faces like these? I thought you’d like to see the process, so I’ll take this step by step over the coming weeks. Step 1 is of course shooting the model. With a camera. No guns were involved, though a machete was. See:

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Notice the horrible background? Sheets. It’s an impromptu poor-man’s background, because I didn’t have time to get a proper one. I did, however, have amazing assistants. There’s three people behind the scenes for these photos. One is holding a light off camera. Another is holding a hair dryer so we can have that blown-in-the-wind look. I am of course behind the camera, giving directions. “Squint. No, not that much. Channel Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” I have a lot to learn in the directions department.

Overall it was a good time and a huge learning experience for me. I’m thrilled with some of the raw shots, because I can see potential for some very cool covers. I’m forever grateful to my models. This whole thing doesn’t work without them, and they applied themselves to the task with grace and good humor.

 

In January I’ll have some exciting news to share. Plans are brewing, things are percolating, and stories are happening. I probably won’t post during the holiday week, because we’re all too busy for that. But I’m wishing all of you very happy holidays. Eat, drink your beverage of choice, be merry, and come back to see me!