beauty4This picture is the first image of my work that was ever published to print. For that reason it holds a very special place in my portfolio.

It was printed in Issue 1 Volume 3 of Parlour  Magazine back in Spring 2010. Emily Haines, lead singer of Metric, was gracing that issue’s cover. This was not my first shoot for this magazine, my first beauty shoot got axed (learning to grow a tough skin in this industry). This one however did get printed and was shot while the snow was still on the ground so it would be ready for the Spring edition.

We were on location at Le Marchand Mansion here in Edmonton. At a salon called Venus Hair Artisans. The Editor in Chief was on set art directing, and we were shooting an ad for Bamboo Ballroom at the same time.

The photographer, Clayton Didier, was very direct with me on the look he was envisioning for this model and so I built her makeup around his direction. I remember being really nervous.

Pam Poch is the owner at Venus and she did the beautiful ballerina bun on the model. When our model was ready to shoot we took her out to a common area in the Mansion and set her up in front of this beautiful ornate glass window pane which was back lit with the photographers light.
About 10 minutes into shooting the photographer turned to me and said something along the lines of, ‘I need to blur this out, do you have any sort of sticky clear product that I could use?’ I run back to my kit looking everywhere for my Clear MAC lip glass …. nothing. Can’t find it anywhere.

I start to feel panic stricken, I so desperately want this shoot to be a success I can’t believe I don’t have the most common lip product (of my generation) in my kit.
What an amateur move I say to myself. Then I remember that I recently loaded up on samples of products I wanted to play with.

In a MAC stackable container I had Matte Texture and Gloss Texture (2 mixing mediums used for an array of different things) and I almost squealed with joy. I grabbed the sample container and ran back to join the team.

The photographer proceeded to dunk his finger into my Gloss Texture, sullying the chances of keeping it sanitary, again rookie mistake. I should have brought my spatula. Anyway…he takes the gloss texture on his finger and smears the lens of his camera just around the edges, which is how he got that blurred effect in the photo.

When I think back to that now I think there are programs you can use to have the same effect (Photoshop, Instagram) so I wouldn’t try that at home. Camera lenses are not cheap!

Parlour Magazine was a local magazine here in Edmonton, Alberta, which featured work from many different Edmonton Makeup Artists throughout it’s pages. The magazines most acclaimed Issue was Issue 1 Volume 2 2009 when Lady Gaga was the cover model. My work was seen in this edition on the Editor in Chief in the editors letter. Unfortunately the magazine in no longer in publication.