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Makeup and hair are the things that take a really long time. You can be expected to sit for one or two hours. It's a great time for me to meditate actually and to think new ideas and thoughts. I find i get my best ideas in the makeup chair. I need a pen and paper near by to write down ideas while they beautify me.
The ponytail look with 60's soft makeup.
The makeup for today was very 60's style. I liked the eyes and wish i could do it like that every day. When will people invent the portable makeup artist you can take with you every day and who will do your style perfectly?
Sometimes you've got to grin and bear it through the pain. There is nothing that can take the hair pin pain away. The weight of this hair piece is so heavy that it felt like needles pushing into my head. Nothing could be done so you just got to grin and bear it.
Shooting with the top men's magazine around is really exciting. Normally they don't take women so when you get four pages it's major. I'll use this photo in my book cuz i don't have a lot of smiles! That water was so gross and dirty you can not imagine. But when a top photographer says he wants to take the photo there, you just don't argue. It was also green with moss and slippery! I almost zipped out several times making that water splash up! You never know the real stories behind the photos. Sometimes it's quite an adventure. The difference between a model and a top model is that the top will do whatever is necessary within safely to get the photo.
It is to be expected that if you did the campaign of a company the season before, you may not do it again. So going to the casting can be wierd cuz the client already knows you. At the same time some clients book you year after year because your face sells their clothing so well. It's a gamble but in either case you get the photos from the client and it's great to see your work finished. I really love this campaign! I love my hair like that. It's awesome. What do you think?
A lot of times you think, this makeup looks wierd, but then later in the photo it starts to make sense. So much of how a model feels is based on what happens with the makeup artist's table, especially with language problems you can really start to feel strange. It's always good to suspend disbelief and check "the polaroid" before making judgements. Today they made my face super white and matt with big eyebrows. I'm not an eyebrow fan so when i see them so dark on me i start equating that in my mind with all sorts of things i don't like and feeling not pretty (a very detrimental feeling to the photo). In the west, the makeup person will see that and explain it to you, they often build up the model's confidence and act as the go between to explain things to you. In this case i had no clue what the photos would be till i got on the set and saw the polaroid first digital shot. Then i understood that i'm supposed to be an old painting made modern with eve eating the apple and the last supper and all that. You should have seen the apple they found-it was huge. Bigger than the assistant and i could ever take a bite out of for the photo!
Before, they tell me, you'd have to wait two minutes to see the polaroid. Now, you have to wait two minutes to watch the photographer photo shop the first image to show to the client. Funny, things change, and things stay the same.
Relax and look natural they say, as i'm standing with twenty people around me staring at my every minor move, "The feeling is too cold, think about your boyfriend." Easy to say but i don't have a boyfriend. So what to do to get that warm far away look on my face. Try thinking of the michigan sky, nope that's not working, try thinking of friends, nope that's not working, try make something up about your roommate, no not working at all- the models job is to feel and then the pose will follow and also the look on your face will be real. The trick just like in acting is to make it all happen in a totally faux ambience with a ton of people around. How to do that? You have to know yourself pretty well and know how to feel whatever it is they need you to feel so that the photo is real. You can not fake out the camera as much as you'd like sometimes. I hold to the native american indian's point of view that the camera takes a photo of your soul. I know though that these days most models don't have enough experience to be able to do that, so the task falls a lot to the photographer many times and to the photo shop after. But i also know that when you finally figure out your stuff in modelling that then you start to book the big jobs cuz word gets around that a model can actually model. That's when you get repeat clients and loyal studio's that want to work with you over and over. You make their job easier and their client happy.
I picked up a copy of newsweek in Tokyo, with the cover saying "name one chinese top brand. You can't? Here's why." great read about the brand building going on in china right now and why china's got the business but not the power to make you remember their name brand. I think it's not true in fashion. Today the client really busted a unique move beyond the normal catalog, which i think is why they choose me as a model to help them get that unique look and feel. I was really impressed with the results, and it made me think about how these huge manufacturing companies with 4 lines to produce are really making efforts to stand out (few of them). When i started to wear my hair long to castings my agency really tried to convince me to keep wearing my hair short and red. In the end i listened and started booking jobs again quickly. It was different than in the west where change is good- and necessary for a model to stay fresh and have them use you again. My agency kept saying, "clients want girls who are unique and special in Beijing. We think Anina is best with short hair. . ." i finally listened, and today is the result- this client waited a month for me to come back cuz they only wanted me. They said, "we looked at so many other girls, but in the end we thought Anina is the best one for us." rock on. Now what to think of to make my face and body relax. . . In the end i just got lost in the photo, pretending to be the character on the page. It worked! A round of applause from everyone.
No wifi for free but i say that art is so entertaining!
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