Reconstructing Grimm

A Grimm Collaboration

2012-02-22T17:18:00.000-08:00

So last weekend on Sunday I did a little side project. I worked with a new photographer; Ritesh P. Keskar to create something a little different. Instead of doing a fairy tale shoot as you are all used to we did a high concept shoot.

I'm calling it The Scarlett Intimacy, and the idea behind it is that there is a couple at a costume party and the camera captures the moments they're alone together. Like a said a bit different, but all in all an amazing shoot and we had a lot of fun.

We cast actor Jake Lesh as my romantic interest. If you haven't figured it out yet, I basically use photo shoots to roll around with really good looking men for a few hours. If you haven't tried it you really should. It's a great stress reliever.

Isn't he swarthy? Oh, I like a swarthy man and ladies Jake Lesh most definitely delivers. In fact he and I have had a bit of a tryst before in our Romance Novel days. Actually this was a shot taken on a cell phone at a party about two months ago that was edited with in an inch of it's life, but still it's pretty fun.

Although I will share a big no-no that I did on this shoot. It's mostly a cautionary tale. See I am a whiskey drinker. I like it a lot, I like it without a chaser and without mixer and the night before I drank a good deal of Jack Daniels. It was the most unprofessional thing I have ever done and I am ashamed. I am sharing on the blog so that I will now have public shame and never, ever do that again. I held it together for the shoot, but it was super unfair of me, if not funny to everyone else. Anyway, the shoot went really well anyway and here is the first shot:

Let me know what you think!

And check out more of Ritesh P. Keskar's work at his website RpKeskar Photography

Reconstructing Grimm Hits Newsstands!

2012-02-17T17:14:00.000-08:00

After a long delay Reconstructing Grimm will finally be available in issue #23 of Faerie Magazine. They're doing a pretty sizable spread of the Wizard of Oz series. As far as I know you can pick it up at most Barnes and Noble stores, so if you're looking for more information on us, that a great place to look.

Also here's a link to their webpage you can get our issue straight off their website. We're not mentioned in the table of contents, but I know we are in there.
Faerie Magazine Website

Also it's been a while since our last shoot. Unfortunately I think that Arabian Nights is going to go on the back burner for a bit. I'm just having so much trouble with locations and costumes, plus inspiration isn't coming as easily as I would have hoped.

Instead we're pressing forward, I have some great ideas for the new year, so keep checking back to see what we have up our sleeves.

One of the ideas we've been tossing around is a Reconstructing Grimm calendar. Mother Shipe got the first unofficial one for Christmas this year, it turned out so well we were thinking about producing them on a larger scale. Would there be any interest in that? I mean it's hard for me to judge, as they're mostly photos of me so I think they're all amazing. Let me know what you think. If there seems to be a demand for such a thing we'll see what we can do.

Thanks dear readers! Be back soon. In the new year I'm going to try posting more often than once every two months. In fact the goal is once a week. Let's see how I do.

-Lady Grimm

The Little Match Girl

2011-12-27T08:14:00.000-08:00

Two weeks ago I made a decision. I felt it had been too long since we'd done a shoot. So I wanted to through something together to get back in the swing of things. With the winter season in full I thought Hans Christian Andersons The Little Match Girl was more than appropriate.

If you're unfamiliar The Little Match Girl is a fairly simple story:

Provided by wikipedia:

On a cold New Year’s Eve, a poor girl tries to sell matches in the street. She is freezing badly, but she is afraid to go home because her father will beat her for not selling any matches. She takes shelter in a nook and lights the matches to warm herself. In their glow, she sees several lovely visions including a Christmas tree and a holiday feast. The girl looks skyward, sees a shooting star, and remembers her deceased grandmother saying that such a falling star means someone died and is going into Heaven. As she lights her next match, she sees a vision of her grandmother, the only person to have treated her with love and kindness. She strikes one match after another to keep the vision of her grandmother nearby for as long as she can. The child dies and her grandmother carries her soul to Heaven. The next morning, passers-by find the dead child in the nook.

I had a few choices to make that made this shoot different than most of the others we've done. First off, who was going to play the Grandmother? I do have some actress friends that could be believable in that age rage, however I would never ever ask them for fear of offending them. So I had this idea that when you die you become the age you liked yourself best as. So I brought in my friend Joey Lynn.

Yeah, that's the version of myself that I like best and it's not me. Joey has a few distinctions that make her different from other Reconstructing Grimm models. First of all she's a girl! Second of all she is the only model whose known me since I was ten years old. Yep Joey and I have been friends a long time, but what with living in different cities and growing up a bit we don't get a chance to hang out all that often, so this was a nice little excuse to get together and hang out for a day. Plus on the video blog you'll see that I revert to my ten year old self pretty quick when we get around each other. That should be fun.

One of the other choices I had to make was whether or not to make the outfits. With deciding to to do the shoot on a Tuesday and planning it for that Saturday there was just no time. I pulled together the outfits from some new and vintage pieces. One of my favorites being the coat I wore in the shoot.

That coat belonged to my mother about thirty years ago. So I guess what I'm saying is that Mother Shipe has always had awesome style as well. The scarf you might recognize from The Wizard of Oz Shoot. It was the Cowardly Lion's Mane:

I like that I had the opportunity to reuse some old pieces that people might recognize.

Here are a few shots from the day. There are more coming soon!

UPDATES!!!! Fairy Tales and Favors

2011-11-13T15:46:00.001-08:00

Hi there everyone:
I know it's been a while. I have been so preoccupied with other things that I have been lax lately, but trust me, we're gonna start cooking again soon. Arabian Nights will be finished by December, then we're moving on to... wait for it... Sleeping Beauty.

We have some really great guest stars for the Aladdin section of Arabian Nights that you'll meet shortly. Our Aladdin will be played by everyone's favorite pirate Matt Kemple!!!!!!

I am so sorry for taking so long to this. Reconstructing Grimm just took a back seat for a bit. I love this project, I love all the support I get from you lovely people, but sometimes life just gets in the way.

Also, just hang on for Sleeping Beauty, I have some really amazing surprises in store for that shoot.

Finally I need a favor from anyone out there who would like to support me further in the acting thing that I love to do. I am currently in a show called Who Killed Santa.

If you are so inclined and can donate anything to the cause I urge you to head over to the kickstarter campaign and throw whatever you can.

Here's a link: Who Killed Santa Kickstarter

Thanks! I will back soon. I promise.

Ali Baba and the... one thief.

2011-10-15T20:58:00.000-07:00

This last Sunday we did the Ali Baba portion of Arabian Nights. Now this is one of our more high concept shoots. High concept meaning that I didn't have a big budget or a whole lot of resources so we did the best with what we had to capture the idea of Ali Baba, without actually following the story all that closely.

This was also one of those Murphy Law shoots, in that everything that could've gone wrong did. First of all, no one was on time. For a 7:30am call no one showed up until about 8:00 or so. then things kept going south for a bit. Our Ali Baba: Zach Zembrowski was the first to arrive (besides James Clark who is freakishly punctual.) Then the first of our thieves arrived, and by first I mean only. The five other models (who will remain nameless so don't even ask) didn't show. They also did not pick up our phones. Then I couldn't get a hold of Perry. The day was not going great. But as soon as Perry showed up I regrouped and started collecting my thoughts to create a new shot list in my head. Then we got to work.

I started to get the boys in "make-up" or covering them in dirt. I am constantly surprised at how little people question the things I tell them to do. Like, "pretend to love me for a few hours" or "let me cover you in mud" and there is no fight. Either I know the best men on the planet who are so gentlemanly that they don't question it, or I am really really bossy. Maybe it's a bit of both.

We did two locations as it was a smaller shoot for the larger faction of the Arabian Nights shoot. The other two stories are coming soon, I promise. But the first was the lovely Lake Michigan beach front of Milwaukee. We got some awesome stuff here.

Then we moved to this super cool bridge over on the east side of Milwaukee to play on this Indiana Jones idea that I had.

That's all for now. More Ali Baba and Arabian Nights to come!

Deconstructing Reconstructing Grimm

2011-09-23T14:45:00.000-07:00

It occurred to me the other day that in a vlog update ages ago I promised to to a video on how to create the Tinkerbell dress for yourself... and as you can see... I forgot... sorry. But anyway I thought I would take a rare day off and share a few tips on how to get similar looks for your own wardrobe. Some will be cheaper, some will be more expensive, but either way it'll be a nice way to add a little fairy tale to your everyday life, which I truly believe people need every once and a while.

First off, because I promised here's a breakdown on the Tinkerbell dress:

To be honest this is not my favorite dress on me. That being said, on someone taller and less hourglass like it would look much better. This dress is a super simple pattern that can be found on Simplicity or you can just follow this link: TINKERBELL DRESS ON SIMPLICITY. The pattern is really cheap, under $3 and the instructions are included in the pattern.

I did make a few modifications to the pattern that I will share with you so that you're not confused if you follow the directions to a T and it doesn't look the same.

1.) Instead of sewing together fabric for the neckline I used ribbon, much easier and faster. Plus it gives the dress an extra pop of color.

2.) I cut about seven inches off the bottom of the pattern. I am short, it's my gift, it's my curse. So figure out a good length for yourself.

3.) The Belt: I made the ribbon belt myself and you can too. It's really easy trust me.

-First off use the same ribbon you use for the neckline of your dress.

- Then cut a long enough section so that you can tie it in a bow around your waist.

-Find the middle of the ribbon by folding the material in half and lightly marking the inside with a pencil.

-Buy any flat backed beads or items in the "hair accessories" section of your local fabric store. Then grab your glue gun. I will say though, that before you start randomly gluing layout your beads or jewels on the ribbon so you have a good idea of what you're going for.

See easy! Now and there's the Tinkerbell dress.

Now to a more expensive version of the Cinderella Work Dress:

Now this one is going to get pricey, just because I wanted to show you what an outfit you could create for yourself for under thirty dollars can end up costing. I guess what I'm really saying is, don't pay retail people, if I can make it, it shouldn't cost that much.

The Dress:

Here are some similar versions:

MINT TEA DRESS

This is a great dress from ModCloth; however it is also 187.99. Now for me that breaks the bank. Plus after you spent that on the dress would you really spend more money on the scarf, belt, boots, gloves, and tights?

Here's a more affordable version:

SILK FLORAL SHIFT DRESS

At 32.80 this is a much more affordable option provided by Forever21, plus now you might have some extra cash left over for accessories.

Speaking of accessories, my favorite place to shot for those is, drumroll please. Goodwill. It's true, everything is more affordable and granted it is pretty hit and miss but that is a reasonable risk. Also, lots of pieces like belts and boots are already distress from prior use as opposed to buying something new made to look old. Give it a shot people.

Those are your two looks for today. If this is a post you enjoyed tell me so and I'll do a few more. Write in the comments which outfits you'd like a deconstruction of and I'll be happy to oblige. Shipe out!

Arabian Nights... Nights... Nights

2011-09-01T04:04:00.000-07:00

The past few week have been a whirlwind. I opened a show every weekend in August, and still somehow found time to do the Hamlet photo shoot. I'm on empty at the moment, but I really want to push to do the Arabian nights shoot soon. But there are several issues....

Join me as a share them with you.

1.) Time. I have almost no time. I am working two jobs and a show starting next week. That means that sewing has to be done in the wee hours of the morning like I'm some wee elf that cobbles shoes. I don't mind it all that much, but this does make me a sleepy kitty most of the time and then my work ethic for the rest of my jobs a little tricky.

(As a subnote to the "Time" heading I have thought about just finding the clothes for this shoot as opposed to sewing them. But I fear that I may jump the shark, or maybe then I'll do a blog post about where you can buy the clothes after the shoot? I don't know what do you think?)

2.) Complexity. This shoot requires at least three different locations, maybe more, none of them in the same area. A HUGE cast. Massive, and people schedules are never friendly for such things.

Lastly
3.) Inspiration. Normally I at this point after I pick locations and people I have a super clear idea of the shots I want to get. Not the case this time. Just having trouble visualizing specifically what I want. It's just for this shoot though. I can see the next two shoots in my head clear as a bell, but this one...

Anyway that's your short update post about where we are on the next project. Shipe out!

Reconstructing... Hamlet?

2011-08-24T22:15:00.000-07:00

This last week we did something new for us at Reconstructing Grimm. We put together a series of photos for this weeks upcoming production of In My Minds Eye by Fools For Tragedy. The photos serve a few purposes really; first off it's good way to generate some buzz on the show before opening, secondly it's a nice visual guide for the audience. Sometimes with Shakespeare it becomes a little difficult to remember who is who, so having an idea before hand is a nice touch and it really cuts down on hearing, "Who is that?" "Why are they talking?" "I don't remember what they're doing?" bubbling up from the audience. And thirdly I am in the show and it's project I thought would be fun to do.

Here comes the shameless plug part of the blog.

In My Minds Eye opens Thursday August 25 and runs August 26 and 27th at 7:30pm. There is a $10 cash donation suggested, but you can give more or less (all proceeds go to Soulstice Theatre) for more information you can check out the Fools for Tragedy webpage; here.

While Hamlet is not fairy tale it does have many supernatural elements that make it easy to fit into the current Reconstructing Grimm set. This particular production of Hamlet has six different actors playing Hamlet.

Hamlet: The Body
(Jordan Gwiazdowski)
The physical form of Hamlet or "The Real Hamlet" of the set. He is the anchor of the group to the world.

The Fool

(Jennifer Gaul)

The Fool is the spirit in search of experience. He represents the mystical cleverness bereft of reason within us, the childlike ability to tune into the inner workings of the world.

The Mask
(Andrew Parchman)
The one without a face. Shrouded – Hidden. Assumes whatever visage needed.

The King Maker
(Liz Whitford)
The strategist, the schemer. No nonsense.

The Blade
(Amber Smith)
Cold killer. Bloodthirsty. Revenge lives in these eyes.

The Son
(Kelly Doherty)
The problematic symptoms of youth; undying love of mother, reverence of father, temper, confusion, young love, fear.

Then there's Hamlet's Family:
Gertrude; Hamlet's Mother (Laura Holterman)
Claudius; Hamlet's Uncle (Brian Bzdawka)
The Late King of Denmark (Michael Keiley)
and Hamlet

And the friends of the Royal Family of Denmark
Ophelia (Liz Shipe)
Polonius (Robby McGhee)
Laertes (Adam Zastrow)

and here are a few shots to wet your appetites:

It just so happened that night James Clark was free, so we got the opportunity to to a video as well!

Enjoy, and come see the show.

Are Fairy Tales the "New Vampires"?

2011-08-13T18:47:00.000-07:00

So I'm taking a little detour on my personal project to talk a little bit about what's going on in pop culture. Now I'm not conceded enough to think that any of this was my idea first, or that I have more claim to this whole Grimm Fairy Tale thing than anyone else, but I do find this recent turn in programming to reinvent fairy tales a little interesting. For example; this year alone there are two different versions of Snow White coming to the big screen, (again not to toot my own horn, but I did my spread over a year ago... ) ABC and NBC are also competing with two versions of grizzly bedtime story programming.

NBC's Grimm:

The Wikipedia page gives this description:
Set in present-day Portland, Oregon, the series puts a new twist on the stories of the Brothers Grimm in which a homicide detective learns that he is a descendent of a group of hunters known as "Grimms", who fight to keep the balance of humanity safe from the supernatural creatures of the world. Upon learning of his destiny and that he is the last of his kind, he has to protect every living soul from the sinister storybook characters that have infiltrated the real world

And ABC's Once Upon a Time

Wiki def:
The series is loosely inspired by the classic fairy tale stories except set in the present day, hence the series name. The stories hold a key to the mystery that will draw a bail bonds collector and the son that she gave up for adoption 10 years earlier to a New England town called Storybrooke, Maine. This town is actually a parallel world in which fairy tale characters look like normal people and don't remember their true identities or anything about their true lives.
When I saw all of the marketing campaigns coming up I was equally excited, and a little agitated to watch all of these projects coming out that I had no way to be any part of. Also I was a little floored at how similar both projects seem to be, at least in definition. I'm sure the shows themselves will find their own rhythm overtime if they last past the first season, but at the moment I think the networks should be a little worried due to the obvious comparisons that will arise.

Anyway, I started thinking that all of this was coming up just as all the major networks and studios have exhausted their vampire resources.

True Blood is well into 4th season, The Vampire Diaries... okay well I don't know anything about that show, it never interested me, but it seems to be on it's merry way. And the Twilight Saga whether you like it or hate it is coming to a close. It feels like with the studios on the brink of loosing their pale anemic multibillion dollar cash cow has been scrambling to find it's new outlet. And that outlet has been to return to the terrifying, undisneyfied versions of classic tales.

The trend really started I would say about a year ago with the release of Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland.

This movie was huge in case you missed it, but if you are reading my blog I'm betting you didn't. The problem was, the movie didn't even follow the premise of Alice in Wonderland. This charming children's story about a girl who wants nothing more than to be a grown up was twisted and turned into a story about a young woman who wants nothing more than to stay childlike. And more over, with the addition of things like the fudderwacken ( in my opinion the Jar Jar Binks of this film) and Alice's slaying of the Jabberwock I have to say over all, while the movie was visually stunning and had good points I was not a fan.

Then there was the critically and publicly panned Red Riding Hood.

This was followed by another flop in the form of the film Beastly.

All in all I guess I've noticed the main trend with updating fairy tales is that the movie ends up being striking to look at, but in terms of the story it's either boring, not entertaining, or just plain bad. So Have the studios got this whole trend wrong? Should they have just stuck with beating the already long dead vampire bat? If all anyone seems to be doing is creating a pretty picture that moves across the screen, devoid of a story that people like is my project even worth continuing if other people can produce just as pretty a picture for a thousand times the budget?

Beauty and the Beast: Part 5: The End

2011-08-07T19:51:00.000-07:00

Adam was surprised how quickly he'd made up his mind. How easy the decision came to end his life. In fact he was now almost happy. There was this feeling of freedom that washed over him.

He picked pills. It seemed the simplest way. His mother had been addicted to every imaginable form of prescription medication known to eastern medicine. In the end he didn't even know what he took, just that it was large and round and sort of a yellowy green.

After taking the entire bottle Adam walked into the foyer and looked at the city while he waited for the effects to take hold. He could hear the horns honking in the street and people moving about their business passing him by. The sounds became fuzzy, then the lights started to grow brighter. Soon all he could see was a light glow as he fell to the ground. His breathing was starting to slow, he could feel each heart beat getting further and further apart.

"This wasn't supposed to be the end of the story." The Enchantress was lying next to Adam on the floor looking him right in the eye.

"...it's the only way she'd be happy..." Adam said through jagged breaths.
"So you want me to believe you're doing this for her?"
"I am."
"It's a noble gesture, if it weren't so misguided and stupid I would almost find it sweet."
"Just... go... away. I'm finished with all of this."
"I only came because I never thought that a man should be alone in his last few moments. I thought you'd like the company."
"I don't want to see you."
"I see, well maybe that is something I can help with."

Adam watched as the Enchantress faded away into the lights. He was finally alone, but no sooner had he thought that than the door opened. And he saw Bethany walk through the door. It struck him that it was just like the first day she'd walked into his house. Her eyes were still bright and wide, but now they were filled with concern.

"Adam!" She called.
"Beth..." He managed to croak out from the floor,.
"Adam! What happened?" She ran to the floor to help him. "Adam what did you do?"
"I'm letting you go. You can go back to your life now"

"I don't want you to let me go, you idiot. Did you take something? We'll fix this, let me just get some help." She was starting to cry. The tears were falling down her face. Adam would give anything to make her stop. He never wanted to see her hurting like this.
"No don't go. I don't have much time left."
"Stop that. You'll be fine."
"You go and be amazing."
"You can't die." Bethany was sobbing now. Torn between running for help and comforting Adam, " You can't die, because you're my best friend. I need you here with me. I love you so much. Please. Please. Just let me help you."

There it was. What Adam needed to hear, several hours too late. What a sad picture sat on the floor of Adam Brunswick's penthouse. A beast, a monster, lying dead in the arms of the woman who loved him. The scene had run it's course and now the only sounds heard in the massive halls where that of Bethany's sobs echoing back to her.

As it so happened, this tragedy had an audience. The Enchantress had stayed and done what she did best. She had been watching. And she had seen all she needed to see.

Bethany felt Adam's body start to move. She looked down at him with as little hope as she could allow herself to have. Adam's body was radiating light. It was terrifying and strange and beautiful. She reached out a hand to touch him as the body lifted gently off the ground. The light became brighter and brighter until she could only make out the vaguest of shapes. Then there was a flash and outside the skies began to thunder.

Adam slowly go off the ground. He couldn't believe he was alive. He couldn't believe how much his head hurt. He reached up to touch his forehead and it felt smooth, like skin. He felt his hair and it felt normal as well. His teeth were no longer fangs. Adam ran to a mirror and looked at himself, and it was really him. The creature was gone, he was himself again.

"Adam?" Beth said quietly.
"I'm me again." Adam walked over and crouched to join Bethany on the floor. " Beth it's alright, I'm fine. I don't know how but I'm fine." Bethany stared at him in shock. Adam brushed away her tears and she grabbed his hand.
"You're real., you're really real? I'm not dreaming.You're here?"
"No you're not dreaming, I'm here and I'm not going anywhere ever again."

Adam was true to his word. While they did fight and have other numerous disagreements over the course of their lives together as all couple do, they never forgot what brought them together and how lucky they were to have found one another.

As for the Enchantress. She's still watching, still waiting. So be very, very careful how you lead your life. Or else...

Beauty and the Beast: Part 4

2011-08-05T08:39:00.000-07:00

The night of the banquet came quickly. Adam was more nervous than he'd ever been in his entire life. It was going to be his first date with Bethany. Date. Well, not really a date. It was more of a hanging out, party crashing thing. Either way it was a big deal to Adam. He'd spend all day planning what he was going to say and how he was going to say it.

He was just fixing his outfit in the mirror. The sun had just lowered beneath the skyline. There was a light breeze, and then he heard an all too familiar voice.

"Don't you look nice. Going out?" The Enchantress stood by the window, poised an elegant, "Give me details." She moved into the room to face Adam.

"No. Now get out." Adam brushed past the Enchantress toward the door.
"Still a bit prickly are we? You might want to rethink that, you remember what happened the first time you upset me."
"You're right, I'm sorry. Get out, please."
"You don't think that she'll ever really love you, do you?"
"What? How do you know about her?"
"Please, you didn't think that I'd stop keeping tabs on you. Just because you couldn't see me doesn't mean I wasn't there. This, Bethany, she's sweet but you're nothing more than a charity case to her. And once she's been paid you know she'll leave you. Just like your friends, just like your parents."
"That's not true. She doesn't care... I mean stuff like that..."
"Doesn't matter to her?" The Enchantress tutted softly, "That's sweet. It's amazing that for so long you couldn't care less about the good in people and the second it might benefit your life, your needs your counting on it. Let me ask you something. If the situation was reversed would you be able to look past it."

Adam could say anything thing. He finally turned to face The Enchantress and she'd gone.

Several hours later Adam was watching the party from his parents grounds. He couldn't bring himself to call Bethany or meet her when they had designated. He saw the people laughing and having fun. Adam hated them, all of them. He couldn't stay, he just felt angry. He wanted his old life back. He wanted to not care, not feel. Before when he could just gloss over life, things were so much easier.

Adam had just turned to go when he hear the small feet moving in his direction. He immediately thought the Enchantress had come back to torment him one last time.
"What do you want from me?" Adam yelled
"I was trying to figure our why you stood me up." Adam turned around to see Bethany running over the grounds in a stunning gold dress.
"Beth, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to."
"You could've called, I was worried something happened to you. Come on, I bribed a waiter to bring some dinner upstairs."
"Wait you're not mad anymore? Just like that?"
"I get that this must be hard for you. Seeing your house, your parents. That's going to bring up some stuff. So what do you want to do? We can stay, we can go, we can order food to the townhouse and forget this whole idea. "
"Why do you treat me so well?"
"What?"
"I am not a good person, I'm not a person at all. I'm just this thing, this big horrible thing."
"Stop that, right now. Come here." Bethany said moving close to Adam.

"You are a good guy Adam Brunswick. Maybe you weren't always, but why the hell should that matter? You are funny, do you know that? You're a guy that can tell a joke. You're sweet, you make sure that I don't work too hard and forget to eat dinner. You are easy to talk to, there are not many people that would listen to me complain for twenty minutes straight about my mother. I don't know what happened to you, and I don't care. This face that you hate so much, it's changed you for the better."
For the first time since the curse Adam let himself hope that someone really wouldn't care. That it really wouldn't matter.
"Beth..."
"Yes?"
Adam's words were bubbling up inside him. He had to tell her how he felt.
"I..." Then his words were interrupted by a a soft ringing.
"Hold that thought." Bethany said while searching through a small clutch bag.

Why does she have her phone? Adam thought. No one takes their phone to a dinner event. Do they.
"Okay, alright. I'll be there in just a second." Bethany hung up the phone, " I'm sorry that was your father, he needs me to meet some people inside. I'm sorry. I'll be like five minutes. Wait here." Bethany gave Adam a quick hug and ran toward the house.

Adam followed her to watch from a window. She was standing in the middle of this beautiful party, with beautiful people. A place he could never go again. Even if she did care about him, he was sure it couldn't be love. The he started to realize, all the time she'd spent with him over the last year, all that wasted time. She could've been doing so much more with her life. Adam was holding her back.

Then all at once in a brief second Adam had an idea. I crazy insane idea that would let Bethany be free of him. He turned and started back towards his penthouse. That was the moment that Adam Brunswick decided to end his life.

Reconstructing Grimm: T-Shirt Contest!!!!!

2011-08-02T06:57:00.000-07:00

So we're taking a small break in the telling of Beauty and the Beast to throw out an idea Alan and I had yesterday.

I'm calling on all Reconstructing Grimm fans to come up with a slogan for Reconstructing Grimm. And example that I love but can't use is :

Reconstructing Grimm
None of the Bibbity Bobbity Bulls@$!

I love this it was submitted by Pete Johnson, however the mouse would crucify us. So here's the deal, come up with a slogan; Alan, Perry and I will vote on the best one. Then we'll put it on a t-shirt that will be available for sale for a limited time.

So bring them on! I wanna hear from you!

Oh and I do like to include a photo per post so here's another shot from the most recent shoot that's great, but I can't find a place for in the story. Enjoy.

Beauty and the Beast: Part 3

2011-07-30T15:50:00.000-07:00

The next day was a blur for Adam. His parents cried, many discrete doctors were called, in the end there was nothing to be done. That was his face now. Adam locked himself in his penthouse alone. Convinced he would stay that way forever.

Soon there was a media frenzy. Where was Adam Brunswick? What happened to the city's poster playboy? Adam watched all of it unfolding. He called the people he thought were friends, but it seemed that he was out of sight out of mind. Several days passed with no change, until a summer evening with a moon hanging low in the sky. Adam was watching the city, missing the bustle of it all when he heard a voice.

"Beautiful isn't it?"

Adam turned sharply to face The Enchantress who had slipped in silently with the moon beams.

"You. What did you do to me?" Adam was retraining himself as best he could.
"A favor, whether or not you see it that way."
"A favor? You made me a monster."
"Oh no, you were a monster before, I just made it more apparent." She said slipping gracefully onto the ledge to look at the lights of the city. "You my dear boy, you were bought everything except, it seems decency."
"Fix me. Please. I'll pay you whatever you want."
"For once it's not about the money. It's about the lesson. Once you've learned it you'll change back."
"What lesson?"
"Love. You need to learn to love."
"I know how to love, I've loved tons of women!"
"There are so very many things wrong with that sentence. Let's deconstruct, shall we? First of all you have slept with tons of women that is not love, it's trashy and tacky. Secondly love is a reciprocal agreement you must love her she must love you. Do you see how that works?"
"Fine what do I need to do?"
"You have one year to find someone to love you for who you are."
"That's going to be impossible! There has to be another way."
"Sorry, that's the way's it's always been."
"And what if I can't find someone in a year?"
"Then you'd better get used to that reflection." And with that the Enchantress faded away into soft breeze and away into the night.

Adam walked to the hallway mirror and stared at his face. He stared so long that all he could see was shapes and lines. Then for the first time in Adam's adult life he felt like nothing.

The media attention wasn't dying down and it had been almost three weeks since Adam went into hiding. The day after his encounter with The Enchantress Adam told his parents how he could break his curse. They set about setting up all kinds of online dating, matchmaking services, even a reward. However, Adam wanted no part of it. He just wanted to be left along to wallow in self pity.

The other big change in Adam's life was the addition of a new staff member. A P.R. rep to handle Adam's sudden disappearance hired at his father's insistence. His name was George Cayhill and he was arriving in ten minutes. Adam had spent the morning pacing nervously awaiting his arrival. Finally the door opened and Adam heard the sound of high heels on the tile foyer. That was odd. He decided to take a peak at the intruder.

"Hello?" Called out a woman with wide eyes, "Is anyone here?"
"You're not George Cayhill." Adam called back into the cavernous front room and it echoed back to him.
The woman jumped, "Very astute, no no George Cayhill is a bit higher up than me so they passed your account on to me. But I assure you I'm very capable and I'll do an excellent job with your account."
Adam couldn't quite see her, but her voice sounded familiar "What's your name?"
"Oh... right I'm sorry. I'm Bethany Charles. And you are... hiding? Why are you hiding? Come out here."
Adam walked out just barely into the light, "It's you! So this is what happened to Adam Brunswick" Bethany said smiling, "I was wondering if you were okay, but I didn't have a name and I..."
"Get out."
"Excuse me?"
"I said get out. I won't work with you."
"Well that's just too bad, because guess what? No one else will. Adam Brunswick is not a desirable boss, your reputation precedes you."
"What?"
"Yep that's right. So it's either me or no one. And believe me at the moment you could use someone to handle this mess. And another thing, you are severely ungrateful for a guy who I helped out. But if you'd rather handle this yourself, fine. Stay in your tower and rot." Bethany turned to leave and Adam quickly thought it over.
"Wait."
Bethany stopped in the doorway and turned. She let out a big sigh, "What?"
"What's your plan?"
"I'm sorry?"
"How are you going to fix this? Explain my disappearance."
"You've got to be kidding."
"No, if you're going to stay I have to be sure your going to do the job well. So... explain."
"Okay. First off you're headed to rehab. Not actually you, the media version of you that I am going to create."
"That explains three months tops."
"Will you let me finish. First rehab for drinking, then for gambling. After that you're headed to a Buddhist retreat far, far away. That should get us at least a year and a half then we'll discuss further plans. I've got all the paper work filled out for both rehab centers and have a look-alike prepped to be sent to the first, with a signed confidentiality agreement. If he talks we can almost legally kill him . He's been instructed to keep to his room and keep appearances to a minimal. The staff would be told the he, or you, is to be left alone. He'll be you for the next year. We'll leaked the story to at least three entertainment new corporations and every tabloid you can think of. Trust me, the question of where Adam Brunswick has gone will not only be answered it will become a reality. I can have all of this ready to go by six am tomorrow. Why? Because I am very, very good. Still want me to go?

Bethany set up and office in the penthouse and soon was sending out all kinds of press releases and publicity photos that were released at precise intervals. The world soon believed every word she fed them, and Adam was safe once more from the prying eyes of the media machine.

The longer Bethany stayed, the more Adam found he liked her. She was straight forward, always said what she meant, that was so different from the women he usually dated. He also noticed little things they had in common, the music she listened to while working and the magazines she'd bring with her to read on brake. The way she'd take off her high heels by noon because they pinched her feet, the fact that at lunch she'd always offer to pick him something up made him want to know more about her. Yes, Adam liked everything about Bethany. He started to change just a little here and there. Attempting to tell bad jokes just to see her smile or getting her coffee or just cleaning up after himself in general. Bethany even started to stay after hours just to have dinner with him or watch a movie. Soon they even started talking to each other on the phone at all hours.

As bad as the curse was before, it was unbearable now. To have finally found a person he could really talk to, a girl he really liked and wanted to be around for more than an evening and have no way to be with her. Bethany was sweet, but the only reason she could be there was because she was nice and it was her job. And as the months passed Adam became more and more depressed.

"What's wrong?" Bethany asked Adam
"Nothing."
"Well that's just not true. I know when you're in a pissy mood. Spill."
"I'm fine. Really."
"Is it about the banquet thing?"
"No that's.. wait... what banquet thing?"
"You're parents didn't tell you?"
"My response to you're question should've filled you in that they didn't."
"Your parents are throwing this big banquet for charity next week. I thought you were bummed about the fact that you weren't going."
"Well, that wasn't it, but it is now."
"Why can't you go? Come on, I'll rent you a tux. I'll get a dress we'll crash. It'll be fun."
"Aren't you forgetting something?"
"What?" Adam hid his head in his hands, "Oh you mean your hideous face." Adam looked up sharply, "Oh come on, I was kidding. I don't know you care, it's not about what other people think. If you like you who cares about everyone else."
"That's east for you to say, your hot."
"Thanks, but I still think you're being really stupid about this. It's at your parents house. We'll go and just hide and watch from upstairs. Is that a possibility? "
" I guess so. Do I still have to wear the tux?"
"You bet your ass you do."

Reconstructing Grimm: Beauty and the Beast: Episode 3

2011-07-27T00:53:00.000-07:00

The fourth installment of the reconstructing grimm webseries, I'm a big fan! Enjoy! James Clark is my hero.

Beauty and the Beast: Part 2

2011-07-26T07:30:00.000-07:00

It was nightfall before Adam woke up. He was still in the park. That was one of two things he knew that the moment, he was in the park and he had a splitting headache. Adam stood-up and went for his cellphone... which was missing. Then he moved for his wallet... which was also gone.

"... I've been mugged." He thought, "great, just great. looks like I'm walking."

Adam started the long trudge to his penthouse. The night was pleasant enough. Despite the inconvenience of losing two of his most prized possessions all in all it wasn't a bad walk. Besides he figured he'd just go long enough to find someone to help him and offer a massive reward.

Before long Adam saw a jogger.

"Hey! Hey buddy!," Adam called out. "I could use a little help." The jogger started at Adam and stumbled off the path a ways. The jogger then turned and ran as fast as he could in the opposite direction.

"Come on, I was mugged... What is your problem. Show a little compassion!"

Adam walked out of the park into downtown. He was looking for someone, anyone to help him. But it seemed not one person would make eye contact with him. And if he tried to talk to them they start walking faster and faster away. Adam became frantic, and the more frantic he became the crazier he sounded. He couldn't understand. Then he walked past a darkened store window and turned to look at himself, but the reflection wasn't someone he recognized. It wasn't a someone at all. He'd become a thing of fur and feathers. It was as though his face had grown out of the earth. Adam started to panic. But he caught himself, he must've hit his head. He was hallucinating, that had to be it. He closed his eyes and counted to three, when he opened his eyes he'd be his same handsome self again and he could go home and everything would be fine. He took a look, but the creature was still staring back at him.

"Help!" Adam screamed into the streets. "Someone please, I don't know what's happening to me!" The sounds of the city began to overtake him. Adam couldn't breathe, his heart kept speeding up. He collapsed right in front of of Perrault's P.R. firm at the feet of a very shocked Bethany Charles.

"Oh my god! Are you okay?" Bethany crouched to Adam's level.
"Don't look at me. Get away from me." Adam said quietly shielding his face.
"Don't be so dramatic, come on let me see. If you're hurt, let me help you."
"No, don't!" Adam yelled as she pulled his hands away.

Bethany took a sharp breath in. Here it comes Adam thought, she's going to run, "What's your name, come on let's get you home."
"I can't tell you my name."
"That's going to make getting an address decidedly more difficult."
"Why aren't you running away from me? I'm hideous."
"Why are you complaining, you need help. I'm trying to help you. Get up."
Bethany hailed a cab, and Adam gave he driver his address. The she dropped him off and checked to make sure he was alright one last time. Then she left Adam alone in his huge house.

Beauty and the Beast: Part 1

2011-07-22T19:31:00.000-07:00

Adam Brunswick wasn't a bad man deep down. This part is integral to the story, that is why you're being told first and it is important that you understand that for all of Adam Bruswick's faults he wasn't a bad man underneath his predisposed nature. That being said at the beginning of this story, Adam was selfish, flippant, on occasion cruel, and above all spoiled.

The Brunswick Family was one of those incredibly lucky families to have been rich forever. So long everyone seemed to forget how they made their initial fortune. It wasn't really important. All that was important is that they had money now, and plenty of it.

Adam took more than a little advantage of his family's fortune. He lived in excess, too much liquor, too many women, too much gambling. He was a typical spoiled rotten brat. Adam treated his father's employees like servants, and he treated his servants worse than that. He too self absorbed to see that he was hated everyone and everything around him, not that anyone who felt that way would say anything.

There is a very famous quote, I couldn't tell you who said it, but the quote says, "Character is what you are when no one is looking." But see the thing is, there is never a time when no one is looking. There are eyes everywhere, all around, waiting watching and making all kinds of decisions for us. Some people call it bad luck, others karma, or even magic. Adam didn't believe in any of these things, but he was about to.

The Enchantress had no name. She was part of the earth itself, made of wind and spring rain. She was one of many, she had thousands and thousands of sisters and brothers. All of them silently making sure that the world maintains a balance of right and wrong. These ancient and noble beings don't see all of the injustices of the world. There is no way they could, there is simply too much to see. Some people slip through the cracks. So it was simply Adam Brunswick's poor fortune that he should have fallen into The Enchantress's line of sight.

Adam was walking home in through the park. He'd had another long night of drinking and gambling and woken to find himself in yet another of many apartments owned by a woman he did not know. Adam for some reason decided to enjoy the morning and get a cup of coffee while he strolled. Later, he'd curse this decision. If only he'd have called his driver, if only he'd hailed a cab. It was too late now though, Adam was headed toward something much larger than he could've imagined.

As Adam walked he approached a homeless woman. The old woman's face was wise yet sad. She asked for one thing. The untouched cup of coffee in Adam's hand. Adam scoffed at this request. He brushed the woman off and kept walking. Again the beggar woman asked Adam, this time with a simple, "Please."

"Hey, why don't you get a job?" Adam yelled over his shoulder.

For a third time the woman called after Adam, "Please, just something to get me through the morning." Adam stopped. He turned around and dumped the coffee at her feet. The second he'd done that he knew he made a mistake, the beggar woman started to change right in front of him. And the last thing Adam remembered before he passed out was a pair of beautiful intense and angry eyes.

The Beast Within the Man

2011-07-11T11:41:00.000-07:00

BEAUTY AND THE BEAST ACCOMPLISHED!!!!!!

You all have no idea how excited I am. First of all, to have this shoot under our belt secondly because the shoot went so incredibly well. We got off to a bit of a rocky start. First of all the casting of the Beast.

The role had gone to a tremendous actor that had been booked in May. Then three weeks ago, he backed out. So I went to my back up choice, who was now going to be on vacation. I moved to choice number three, he was only available in the evening, and everyone else had been booked for the morning. Man number four was a model friend of mine who had expressed interest in Beauty and the Beast, but in the end had to go out of town with his wife. Beast Five agreed! I was thrilled, we had a guy in place. I started looking for wardrobe and finalizing plans, until Tuesday of this last week. When all of a sudden, and without warning, my phone started to explode with text messages during a nap. Messages were from Beast Five, his apartment had been sublet and he had to move with in the weekend... soooooo he canceled.

Having gone so far into production mode I was not going to give up now. I sent out four more emails. Two actors, a model, and a friend from high school made the list. I made a deal with myself, if didn't hear from one of them by Wednesday evening, the shoot would be canceled.

On Wednesday night at 11:54 I caught a fish... a big sexy fish. And then on Thursday I caught another, and Friday at 3:30am I caught another. That's right after weeks of losing male models, I now had three. So I gave the part to the first person that responded and promised the other two slots in the next few shoots.

The model had to crash at my place on Saturday night. And Saturday morning Murphy's Law punched me in the face a few times for good measure. First off I called Perry, he and I had a slight miscommunication... he didn't know we were shooting that day... at all. So god bless him he piled in his car and rushed to the shoot location. Angela Iannone, (who was amazing as the Enchantress) she and I had a slight miscommunication over the meeting place. But it all worked out. In a side note, can I just say how utterly beautiful and wonderful to work with Angela is. Here's a sneak peek.

Look at those eyes! I'm a little in love.

So for about a half hour while my heart nearly gave out I thought the worst. But finally everything was in place, The Beast and I followed our amazing videographer, and Reconstructing Grimm's new Production Manager Alan Piotrowicz to the location and then the shoot took off. And the day was lovely. great photos, great friends. So who is the amazing Beast we got for the shoot? Here's your first taste...

... Oh I guess you can't see his face here... well I suppose you could just go to the Reconstructing Grimm Facebook page and see the tag. How would you do that? I know! I'll give you a link.

http://www.facebook.com/ReconstructGrimm?ref=ts

So if you want to find the man behind the beast take a little cyber trip.
More pictures to follow. Please let me know what you think. As always love to hear your thoughts.
And now the process begins on... Arabian Nights!

Through the mist in the woods....

2011-07-03T19:45:00.000-07:00

Two years ago I had the good fortune to travel into the heart of a dangerous forest. There I found a hideous Beast in a shining castle surrounded by enchanted objects.

I spent two months there. I made all new friends, my beast transformed into a handsome prince, and I had the best time of my life.

In case you haven't picked up on it, I was in Beauty and the Beast. It's quite simply my favorite fairy tale. It means more to me that I think any other story I've visited so far. Just something about the fact the the feisty heroine wasn't a damsel in distress, she wasn't afraid of this apparent monster and looked past what everyone else saw to find her happy ending.

I'm sharing this because I want you the reader to understand my delay in this photo shoot. There are things that you find so dear to you that you don't rush the outcome, or disappoint the fan base that has been so supportive to this point.

The shoot is scheduled for this weekend. All systems are go as of now. I hope I haven't put too much build-up out there for myself to compete with.

Also, just to give you a little bit of eye candy for now here are some pictures from that trip I took into my fairy tale world two years ago. Also you may notice a few familiar faces, while Nick Zaijdel will not be gracing this weekend's shoot he will make an appearance as the beast in these pics. Another Reconstructing Grimm friends, Bobby Schemeling (Cinderella's Fairy Godmother) was our Cogsworth and Ryan Cappleman (The Scarecrow) was Lumiere. Enjoy... p.s. these are kind of the Reconstructing Grimm equivalent of high school photos so be kind.


Bobby ( My personal Fairy Godmother)


In the Library


Ryan Cappleman stealing the show

I did not make this dress...

Tick Tock The Time Goes....

2011-06-11T07:13:00.000-07:00

Hello!

I know, I know, it has been forever since my last post. I am so sorry. Beauty and the Beast is coming I swear, we're shooting for the end of the month of June.

Here's the issue at the moment. I have started a new job, that complied with my current job and the show I'm in at the moment leaves me exactly an hour to myself a day. So time has been in a bit of crunch at the moment. I have been working on the dress it's getting there. The whole cast is place, we actually have an amazing man who builds puppets who is going to build me a Sort of Beast Mask for our main man. So yeah, that's were we're at.

Stay with me Reconstructing Grimm fans, I heart all of you and I haven't forgotten. Beauty and the Beast will happen. I SWEAR IT!

In the mean time, if you live in and around the Fond du Lac area check this out:

http://www.windhovercenter.org/windhover_gallery.php

Thanks for reading, be back soon.

Peter and the Beast

2011-04-26T22:02:00.000-07:00

A couple of updates for you all you lovely people.
I think I finally have my cast in place for Beauty and the Beast and like I said I really do hate to announce things online because then it doesn't work out and I feel like I've let you down. However in this instance I think I've come up with a rather elegant solution to that problem. Part of that solution is to let you in on my little secret. The truth is, that for any "main" role in a shoot multiple offers go out for a part. Then whoever answers first tends to be locked in, when or if an actor falls through then I have a back up. And if the actor doesn't fall out I tend not to tell the other guys about each other. It's all very shady, and I do feel bad about it on some level, but not bad enough to stop. So here are the top three candidates. And trust me I've lined up some sexy beasts.

NUMBER 1:
First off we have Reconstructing Grimm favorite Nick Zajdel:

This is one of my all time favorite shots of Nick. I know that most of you don't know him out there, but this look is super against type for him. Nick is sort of the human equivalent of the Forth of July. He's all American, bright, lots of fun, and usually ends his conversations with you with some kind of sparkly finale.

NUMBER 2:

Ladies I'd like to introduce you to John Glowacki.

John is a clever new talent at UWM currently. I had the good fortune to work with him on one of his first projects when he started college and he blew me away. I have since been wanting to use him in a shoot, but the tricky thing is he's super hard to pin down. So I'm hoping that his schedule will clear up and I'll finally get to use him for Beauty and the Beast.

NUMBER 3:

Here's where I'm going to be a little evil:

That's right it could be neither of the above mentioned choices, and I have yet to send out a few more notices. So we'll see.

I can tell you that every other role in the shoot has been cast. And I've heavily started work on one of the Belle dresses. That's where we're at folks. I'll keep you in the loop the best I can in the next few weeks and we'll get there together.

Also, Perry sent me three shots from Peter Pan that weren't included in the last blog post because I didn't think we had anymore. So as to not deprive you of these pics I'm including them in this post.

Hook was fighting now without hope. That passionate breast no longer asked for life; but for one boon it craved: to see Peter show bad form before it was cold forever.


All children grow up, except for one... Peter Pan

"So, Pan," said Hook at last, "this is all your doing."
"Ay, James Hook," came the stern answer, "it is all my doing."
"Proud and insolent youth," said Hook, "prepare to meet thy doom."
"Dark and sinister man," Peter answered, "have at thee."

There you are. I think this is the last of the Peter Pan pics, but who can really say when we'll see the last of Peter Pan? As I always promise, if I get pictures you'll get to see them.

Lastly, I would like to pose another question to you. I can read where you're all from in the blogs stats section. I am also thrilled to know that Reconstructing Grimm has been international for quite some time now. What I'd like to know is, where specifically you're from. For example, my second largest readership is in Australia, where specifically in Australia are you guys from? Also let me know what brought you here the blog, you guys know so much about me I'd love to get to know some of you readers a little better.

That's all for now. Goodnight Neverland.

Peter Pan: The Last Adventure

2011-04-19T18:46:00.000-07:00

Here are the photos from day two of the Peter Pan photo shoot. I was going to keep them until day two of the webisode was ready, but I'm not sure when that will be and I don't feel like it's fair to keep you guys waiting anymore. Because there are a TON of shots.

I'd also like send a massive shout out to you guys. The followers and fans of Reconstructing Grimm. You're comments seriously are so cool. It makes me feel like this whole project means something to people. And I love the fact that I can share the things I love with all of you lovely folks. So keep your opinions coming! I love to hear what you think, and I love even more that you care enough to share it with me. You all rock my socks.

Then Peter knew that there was not a moment to lose. "Come," he cried imperiously, and soared out at once into the night, followed by John and Michael and Wendy.

Tinkerbell's voice was so low that at first he could not make out what she said. Then he made it out. She was saying that she thought she could get well again if children believed in fairies.

It was as if Peter's terrible oath had boarded the ship. Hook felt a gloomy desire to make his dying speech, lest presently there should be no time for it. "Better for Hook," he cried, "if he had had less ambition!" It was in his darkest hours only that he referred to himself in the third person.
"No little children to love me!"

Hook was not his true name. To reveal who he really was would even at this date set the country in a blaze; but as those who read between the lines must already have guessed, he had been at a famous public school; and its traditions still clung to him like garments, with which indeed they are largely concerned. Thus it was offensive to him even now to board a ship in the same dress in which he grappled [attacked] her, and he still adhered in his walk to the school's distinguished slouch. But above all he retained the passion for good form.

This had got on Hook's nerves; it made his iron claw twitch, and at night it disturbed him like an insect. While Peter lived, the tortured man felt that he was a lion in a cage into which a sparrow had come.

"So, my beauty," said Hook, as if he spoke in syrup, "you are to see your children walk the plank."

"Are they to die?" asked Wendy, with a look of such frightful contempt that he nearly fainted.
"They are," he snarled. "Silence all," he called gloatingly, "for a mother's last words to her children." At this moment Wendy was grand. "These are my last words, dear boys," she said firmly. "I feel that I have a message to you from your real mothers, and it is this: `We hope our sons will die like English gentlemen.'"

She had not long to wait. In the cabin he had found the thing for which he had gone in search: the key the would free the children of their manacles, and now they all stole forth, armed with such weapons as they could find. First signing them to hide, Peter cut Wendy's bonds, and then nothing could have been easier than for them all to fly off together

...One thing barred the way, an oath, "Hook or me this time." So when he had freed Wendy, he whispered for her to conceal herself with the others, and himself took her place by the mast, her cloak around him so that he should pass for her. Then he took a great breath and crowed.

Seeing Peter slowly advancing upon him through the air with dagger poised, he sprang upon the bulwarks to cast himself into the sea. He did not know that the crocodile was waiting for him; for we purposely stopped the clock that this knowledge might be spared him: a little mark of respect from us at the end.
He had one last triumph, which I think we need not grudge him. As he stood on the bulwark looking over his shoulder at Peter gliding through the air, he invited him with a gesture to use his foot. It made Peter kick instead of stab.
At last Hook had got the boon for which he craved.
"Bad form," he cried jeeringly, and went content to the crocodile.
Thus perished James Hook.


... As for Peter, he saw Wendy once again before he flew away. He did not exactly come to the window, but he brushed against it in passing so that she could open it if she liked and call to him. That is what she did....

..."You won't forget me, Peter, will you, before spring cleaning time comes?"...

..."I am old, Peter. I am ever so much more than twenty. I grew up long ago."
"You promised not to!"
"I couldn't help it. I am a married woman, Peter."
"No, you're not."
"Yes, and the little girl in the bed is my baby."
"No, she's not."
But he supposed she was; and he took a step towards the sleeping child with his dagger upraised. Of course he did not strike. He sat down on the floor instead and sobbed; and Wendy did not know how to comfort him, though she could have done it so easily once. She was only a woman now, and she ran out of the room to try to think.
Peter continued to cry, and soon his sobs woke Jane. She sat up in bed, and was interested at once.
"Boy," she said, "why are you crying?" ...

Hope you all have enjoyed this series. Like I said episode two will most likely be up by the end of the week. Thanks again!

Tale as Old as Time: Part 2

2011-04-16T12:15:00.000-07:00

So far I've been doing a lot of fabric choices and drawing for that the "belle" dress. I'm walking a fine line I think between my own creations and giving a nod to some classic animation. I won't reveal too much, but I am super excited for this gown it's going to be very very different from any thing you've ever seen in one of our shoots so far.

I think one of the other things that deserves a mention is that there there will be two dresses for Belle in this shoot. The gown and the "peasant dress" and the "peasant dress" is interesting due to the fact that is was sewn by my grandmother int he 70's and it is my mother's prom dress. It sounds a little weird, but trust me it's going to be awesome.

I'm also playing with the whether or not I want to do some level of creature make-up on the beast, or have it be more a hairy thing. Don't know yet. You'll have to come back and see what I come up with in the mean time. Here's episode 3 of Reconstructing Grimm, hope you enjoy.

Reconsturcting Grimm: Peter Pan

I'll embed the video as soon as I can. Later.

Tale as Old as Time: part 1

2011-04-13T07:31:00.000-07:00

The final shots from the Peter Pan shoot are coming I swear. I'm just holding off to post them so I can add the Peter Pan webisode of Reconstructing Grimm. I have been told by the end of the week the video will be up.

In the mean time I thought I'd give you some updates on Beauty and the Beast. The nice thing about this particular shoot is the fact that we had already been planning to do it once upon a time. Right before we had to switch gears to Peter Pan I had done a lot of the ground work. For example, the shoot is already almost completely cast. However until I have everything in place I'm not going to say anything. Like I've said before, the second I announce something, I summon the "plans-fall-through" demon who drags my best intentions down into the depths of scheduling issues and the vortex of Murphy's Law. So to save everyone this awful fate, you'll all just have to be patient. Trust me I'm doing this for you...

Anyway back on topic, I will tell you the theme that we're going for. I have been playing with the idea for some months to do sort of Old Hollywood Glamor with it. Making the beast this hotel room destroying rock star, and Beauty more Audrey Hepburn like. I realize this might sound strange weird even. But most of my ideas sound really weird to people. I am constantly reminded of this by Mother Shipe, every time I explain an idea after about fifteen minutes she tells me, "I just have to see it when it's done, I don't understand it Elizabeth." I shrug and hang up and go back to working on my stuff.

That's what I'm shooting for anyway. The next bit I have is a question for all of you! That's right, so here's what I'm wondering. The original story is short on minor characters. In fact The only ones that carry over to the house of mouse version we all know are Belle, her father, the Beast and the Enchantress. Everyone else, GONE! Question: How many characters should I attempt to include from the Disney's arsenal or should I stick to the original story. Up to you guys. Post in the comments what you think.

http://www.scottgustafson.com/WN_BB_painting.html

http://www.alexross.com/bellecoleman.html

Off to Neverland: Part 2

2011-04-03T12:10:00.000-07:00

Today was the second part of the Peter Pan photo shoot. I'm going to be completely honest when I say, it was AWESOME. We all had fun, lots of laughing. Super cool. I won't have any of the pictures from today until a little later this week, but I'll post them as soon as I get them.

The success of today's shoot was due in large part to the incomparable Matt Kemple. Matt was joining us today as Captain James T. Hook and was super fun to have on set. I can't wait to show you a few of the pictures we have of him in all his pirate glory. (Matt is a local performer who heads up the Milwaukee Comedy scene. Check out more on that here: Milwaukee Comedy )

Several people who had known Matt was taking on the role had expressed that they felt he might be too young looking as Hook. However, when I sat down to think about what I wanted in a villain this time around I was looking for someone who was almost as boy-like as Peter. Somehow that seemed to make him more terrifying to me, the idea that he and Peter are so similar. They just happen to have very different issues, Peter is of course afraid of the future and a bit of a thrill seeker. While Hook is more in that murdery pliagey kind of a place.

On a Chris likes to terrify Liz note. Chris was two hours late to the shoot today. This information is not really relevant to the post on the whole, but I feel a public reprimand is in order. I'm telling you people it's a good thing he's so gosh darn adorable.

And last, but certainly not least Jason Waszak was back for the shoot today in two respects. The first being that he was kind enough to lend us his attic for the innards of the Jolly Rodger. He and I spent something like a half and hour to fourty-five minutes set dressing yesterday afternoon so all was good to go today. Jason also was featured in one or two photos as Smee. He was a joy as always.

I also have a few shots from that last shoot that I'll include in this post.I was pleasantly surprised to see that there were some really cool pictures from that last shoot as well. Like...

From the Adventures of Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie
...Certainly Wendy had been dreaming.
But Wendy had not been dreaming, as the very next night showed, the night on which the extraordinary adventures of these children may be said to have begun...

...The window was blown open by the breathing of the little stars, and Peter dropped in...

...Second to the right, and straight on till morning...

...That, Peter had told Wendy, was the way to the Neverland; but even birds, carrying maps and consulting them at windy corners, could not have sighted it with these instructions. Peter, you see, just said anything that came into his head...

..."Pirates!" he cried. The others came closer to him. A strange smile was playing about his face, and Wendy saw it and shuddered...

That's all for now. Come back for the third and final installment of Off to Neverland!

Off to Neverland: Part 1

2011-03-25T14:06:00.000-07:00

Last night we did the first part of a two day shoot. Not going to lie, it was a little rough. Both Perry and I weren't feeling 100% so we're crossing out fingers. We also were shooting in my apartment, it was a bit cramped and so on. Enough with excuses, I think we did get some nice shots. I haven't seen too many yet, but there definitely something to work with there.

Yesterday we concentrated mainly on Peter and Wendy. Peter was played by the dreamy Reconstructing Grimm Alumni Chris MacGregor. He was lovely as ever. And put up with a great deal. When we planned the shoot the temperature was resting in the upper 40's low 50's. For Wisconsin that's pretty much a heat wave. Yesterday when the shoot actually happened the temperature topped out at a balmy 27 degrees. I had planned outdoor shots. I'm an idiot. We got as much as we could outside, but as I was barefoot, and Chris's shirts were less than thermal we had to come in very quickly.

There is a second shoot day scheduled to take care of Peter Wendy and Hook in the Jolly Roger set. Here's hoping that it will work better than the Wendy's bedroom set. Again not announcing who's playing Captain Hook as then something terrible will happen to him to make him not able to do the shoot. There might even be a few other surprises as well.

For right now here's one picture to tide you over.

An excerpt from J. M. Barrie's Adventures of Peter Pan...

"I shall sew it on for you, my little man," she said, though he was tall as herself, and she got out her housewife [sewing bag], and sewed the shadow on to Peter's foot.
"I daresay it will hurt a little," she warned him.
"Oh, I shan't cry," said Peter, who was already of the opinion that he had never cried in his life. And he clenched his teeth and did not cry..."

Come back... there be Pirates here...

Finding Neverland: A Rocky Pirate Ship

2011-03-17T00:04:00.000-07:00

Right; I'm going to stop announcing things on this blog I think. Every time I announce something it falls through. So instead I'm going to leave you with this.

The Peter Pan shoot is being planned.

There will be people in it... as to whom you'll see after the shoot as it's still fluctuating.

Where, you'll see if I say anything about it I'm convinced the structures will blow up at it's own will.

When... God I wish I could say for sure... soon though. I can promise soon.

Keep voting on the shoot that will take place after Peter Pan and Beauty and the Beast. Just to remind you the choices are:

A.) Sleeping Beauty
B) Arabian Nights
C) Hansel and Gretel

I haven't closed off the polls yet so keep your thoughts coming in.

Thanks much! More information on Peter Pan soon!

Finding Neverland: Part 2: Casting Notes and Updates

2011-03-08T22:19:00.000-08:00

This is the fastest update post you will ever get. James Clark just finished a new video for you guys.
As promised here is the link to the second episode of Reconstructing Grimm:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4mEPJU2CbkA

Go take a look. Lots of fun information and I even want you're opinions on some things, so don't disappoint me!

On a casting note I can tell you that Reconstructing Grimm alumni Jason Waszak will be joining us for the Peter Pan shoot. Not telling you what character he's going to be, but he'll look good doing it.

Still working out some of the kinks, but things are coming together nicely. More information soon.

Finding Neverland: Part 1

2011-03-08T05:47:00.000-08:00

Due to some extenuating circumstances the Beauty and the Beast shoot had to be put on hold. The next shoot is actually going to be Peter Pan themed. Casting is still a bit up in the air, and so are locations, but I can tell you that the dress and wings are done and I can't wait for the photo shoot.

I thought in this post I'd discuss the process of making one of the dresses. In the last shoot you guys missed out a bit due to the fact that I didn't actually create the costume. When I talk to people about my photo shoots many of them say things like, "Oh your life must be so glamorous to do shoot like this all the time."

I'm sure if any of you watched the behind the scenes footage that dispelled some of those theories. Don't get me wrong I love this project, and I have so much fun doing it. I wouldn't do it if I didn't. However it is a great deal of work.

For example here's another timeline for you telling the harrowing tale of the Tinkerbell Dress:
Let us set the stage: Saturday morning (my one day off from work and school)

8:30am: I wake up and get my things together. Write a list of all the things I'm going to need from the store.

10:00am: Head to the first of many many bus stops. The best fabric store "in the area" is ten miles away, which bus wise might as well be Serbia. (*important note* I live in Wisconsin it was 10 degrees outside. And the buses never run on time)

10:23: Waiting at the next bus stop.

11:24: Frustrated and angry that the next bus hasn't come yet.

11:44: Finally boarded next bus.

12:14: Arrived at Southridge; walked the additional four blocks to the store.

12:28: Finally at the fabric store and having regained the feeling in my feet started to look for the perfect fabric.

1:33: Made final choices. Went to get the fabric cut and saw the line. Cried on the inside a bit. Apparently on a Saturday morning every woman in Wisconsin has to get to the fabric store to buy any and all kinds of fleece. All the fleece in the world was being purchased presumably to make blankets for the cold Wisconsin winter.

2:03: Fabric cut finally grabbing materials for the wings. Store didn't have appropriate wire, I was going to have to make another stop.

2:10: Left the fabric store and saw that the mall had a Sears, assumed that they might have wire. They didn't.

2:35: Re-boarded the bus to head home.

3:16: Got on the second bus to head home.

3:42: Stopped at a hardware store for corrugated steel wire and electrical tape.

4:04: Returned home. Now the work started

4:20: Started work on the wings. Set everything out on the floor in front of the t.v. and turned off my phone.

9:00: Finished the wings and had to start the dress. Cleaned up the work space and started over.

12:10 Finished the dress. Walked into my room and collapsed.

That's more or less a typical prep day for a shoot. There's still a great deal of work to do. And I'll give you updates as they come. The best part is though, when a dress is finished the other aspects are much easier to coordinate, so come back soon for more information on the Peter Pan shoot, as well as Episode @ of Reconstructing Grimm: Update.

Reconstructing Grimm: Episode 1: The Steadfast Tin Soldier

2011-02-25T05:37:00.000-08:00

Hello All;
As promised here is the first behind the scenes video of Reconstructing Grimm shot by the wonderfully talented James Clark. It'll give you a nice little look into the process of a photo shoot and you can meet some of the actors.

or if you can't view it on the blog here's a direct link to the youtube page.

Reconsturcting Grimm: Episode 1: The Steadfast Tin Soldier

Hope you enjoy. While I'm at it here's a shot that I wanted to add into the story but couldn't find a place in the text.

Now I know what to us this image for, here's a caption for it: Check out the episode and leave your comments or I'll be sad.

The Steadfast Tin Soldier

2011-02-22T21:48:00.000-08:00

THE STEADFAST TIN SOLDIER

Once there was a toy maker who made the most beautiful, original toys in the world. He made them so tragically beautiful in the way that they had very humanistic flaws. The Porcelain Doll so fragile that one unkind word would shatter her into a million milky white pieces.

The Wind-up Ballerina Doll who danced so beautifully, but always by herself. She longed for a partner to ease her loneliness.

The Jack-in-the-Box who was clever, but made with out kindness so he was selfish and cruel.

The three of them lived together, being watched over by the toy maker. One day the Toy Maker created a group of Tin Soldiers for a little boy. The Toy Maker had made twelve Tin Soldiers, but after the eleventh Soldier the Toy Maker ran out of bravery so he replaced it with loyalty. The twelfth soldier did not go with his brother's he stayed behind out of loyalty to the Toy Maker and became simply known as Steadfast.

As soon as Steadfast saw the Ballerina Doll, he was in love, but couldn't bring himself to talk to her. And while Steadfast was watching the Ballerina, the Jack-in-the-Box was watching the two of them. Waiting and watching. The Jack-in-the-Box was also in love with the Ballerina, but whenever he tried to tell her the words came out wrong he found that what ever he said would bring her to tears.

Without kindness he couldn't express his feelings for her which only made him angrier and more withdrawn . And so he sat in his box thinking terrible thoughts, making terrible plans.

The Ballerina Doll had also noticed Steadfast. She noticed how kind he looked, if not a bit shy. The Ballerina wanted him to talk to her, but he always stayed at his end of the toy box. Feeling dejected the Ballerina spoke to her friend the Porcelain Doll.

"I don't understand why he won't speak to me? Am I that terrible?" The Ballerina asked.
"I don't think that's it," replied the Porcelain Doll, "I think he's just shy. Why don't you go talk to him?"
"Can I do that?"
"You can do what ever you want."
With a new resolve the Ballerina set out to speak to Steadfast. She found him in his usual spot. Her stomach was in knots as she approached. But finally a word came out of her mouth, just one word.
"Hello," she said
Steadfast looked up with a start. He hadn't expected this at all, and very quickly he responded back with a meek, "Hello,"
The Ballerina continued, "I noticed that you don't have many friends here, and I just thought you could use someone to talk to."
"Thank you." Steadfast wanted to say more but the words weren't coming.
"I was also wondering if you dance, I like to dance..."
"I know, I like to watch you,"
"What?"
"That sounded much creepier than I meant it too, I meant you're so graceful. I could never move like that, I just like the way you move."
"Thank you. Would you like to dance with me?"
"I couldn't, it's not that I don't want to, but I wasn't made to dance. I wasn't made for any purpose it seems. I had eleven brothers, we were an entire battalion. But when the boy who bought us came to pick us up I was too scared to go and I hid so I could stay here. Now I'm the only one. It can be very lonely being a soldier without courage."
"It can also be lonely to be a Ballerina without a partner."
"I suppose I could try to dance with you. I'm sure I'll be very bad at it and..."
"You'll be amazing."
And so Steadfast and the Ballerina shared a dance. But it was more than a dance really. There was that feeling that things were going to be different now, all because they had found something they needed desperately. Each other.

"Thank you," The Ballerina Doll said, " I don't suppose you'd like to try this again tomorrow?"
"More than anything." Steadfast replied as he started to leave.
"You were wrong about one thing though," The Ballerina called after him.
"What's that?"
"You were made with a purpose. You make me happy." And both the Ballerina and Steadfast smiled.
The Jack in the Box had seen all of this, and wasn't going to stand for it. Years of loving the Ballerina Doll, years of trying to tell her how he felt and in one afternoon she falls in love with this insignificant tin soldier. He was going to have his revenge.

That night while Steadfast was asleep in his box dreaming lovely dreams of dancing he felt it rattling and shaking. He pushed open the lid to find Jack tearing his way in.
"She was mine!" Jack yelled "She was mine and you took her from me!"
"I didn't take anything, she can make her own choices."
"I have loved her for as long as I can remember, and now you're going to pay and so is she!"
For the first time since he had been made something stirred inside of Steadfast. He wanted to protect the Ballerina. Somewhere deep inside Steadfast found the courage so he took his sword and fought back.

To his surprise Steadfast had won. The Jack in the Box scurried away to lick his wounds. On the way, he realized if he couldn't defeat Steadfast, he'd go after the Ballerina. She was a much easier target. He went immediately to carry her off and complete his evil plan. The Jack in the Box went after the Ballerina, and the Porcelain Doll didn't know what to do. She tried to stop it on her own, but the Jack in the Box turned and said something so cruel it cannot be repeated. Something so unkind it would make the moon weep and flowers loose their color. It hurt the Porcelain Doll so, she could feel her self beginning to break. The pieces of her heart cracking slowly, in one final act she knew she had to get Steadfast.

She crumpled on the stairs of her dollhouse and called out to Steadfast as loudly as she could.
"Steadfast! Come quickly!"
Steadfast heard her cry and came running, "What is it? What's wrong?"
"Jack's taken The Ballerina Doll."
"Where?"
"To the fireplace, you have to stop him."
"What about you?"
"Never mind me, it's too late for me. But you can still save her."
"Thank you."
And with that the Porcelain Doll shattered leaving Steadfast alone to save the Ballerina Doll.
Jack was dragging her off when Steadfast found them. The Ballerina Doll yelled to him and Steadfast grabbed her hand.

He tried to pull her back, but he'd forgotten his sword. Without his sword Steadfast lost his nerve as well. He wanted more than anything to save the Ballerina Doll, but Jack was fierce in his rage and overpowered both of them. Jack took the Ballerina doll and continued to the fireplace.
Steadfast had never felt more alone. He hadn't been brave enough to go with his brothers, nor could he save the Porcelain Doll, and now he couldn't save the Ballerina Doll. Once again, Steadfast's fear turned to anger, and that anger turned to something rather like courage. Steadfast ran to the fireplace to stop the Jack in the Box, but it was too late. The Jack in the Box had started a fire and the flames were to high for the Ballerina to get out. Steadfast jumped in the fire after her.
"No!" The Ballerina yelled, "There's no way out we're both trapped."
"I know," Steadfast said solemnly.
"Then why did you do this, you could've saved yourself."
"I don't want to exist if you're not there."
The Ballerina said nothing else, there were no more words. She and Steadfast just clung to each other as the flames ate them away.

The next morning the Toy Maker looked around his work shop at the destruction. The broken Porcelain Doll, the toy boxes opened and flung around the room. He also couldn't find the Ballerina Doll or the Tin Soldier. Then he noticed a flash of light from as the sun glistened on something in the ashes of the fireplace. He walked over, and there in the debris was The Ballerina Dolls beautiful tiara intertwined with melted tin. From that day on the Toy Maker never made another toy again, and the Jack in the Box due to his treachery lived the rest of his days in lonely solitude slowly going mad.

Tinker Toys: Completion

2011-02-17T10:23:00.000-08:00

Last night was the amazingly successful Steadfast Tin Soldier shoot. We unfortunately lost out on using Tamsyn, due to a rehearsal she was called into. But the shots turned out great anyway. James Clark filmed the entire shoot, it will be edited down into a 10 minute episode of Reconstructing Grimm to be posted within the next few weeks.

Some acknowledgments need to go out to the volunteers:

A massive thanks goes out to Carte Blanche Studios. They booked us their space very last minute and gave us a full four hours on the shoot to get everything we wanted to get done.

Also the models; Jon Porter, Adam Zastrow, and Wendy Rightler did an amazing job for their first time out on one of theses shoots.

And of course Perry Heideman, the photographer. Phenomenal work every time.

I also don't want to post too many pictures until the video is up, but I will give you a little teaser shot of some of the work we did last night.

More are coming!

Tinker Toys: Locations

2011-02-14T07:34:00.000-08:00

I had been hunting for places that I wanted to shoot The Steadfast Tin Soldier and after some searching I found the perfect place. I was really excited, I told everyone... and then we lost the space. It's disappointing but it happens. So that's when you start all over again. I was lucky enough to have Carte Blacnhe Studios donate their time and space to us so that we could finally have the last element to make this shoot work. The shoot is coming up this week so come back for pictures.

Also; the process of this shoot will be filmed by a wonderful videographer by the name of James Clark. So now you also will have to come back to see the first live episode of "Reconstructing Grimm." Hosted by myself, and guest starring, Jon Porter, Wendy Rightler, and Adam Zastrow.

On a casting note as well we've also added one more character to the shoot. A Rag Doll to be Played by Tamsyn Reed. I had planned on using her in the doomed Hansel and Gretel shoot a while ago and finally got to bring her in. So that's all for now. Here's hoping for a successful shoot.

Tinker Toys: Design Elements

2011-02-07T12:46:00.000-08:00

Now that I have casting firmly in place, and most of the location things taken care of (there will be separate blog in the future; I just want to nail everything down first.) I thought that I would discuss a little of the design element that I got through for a shoot.

I try and go in with a direct concept for each shoot or at least a jumping off point. In the past this is what I started with in a nutshell.

Snow White: Hippie-Wood Nymph
Red Riding Hood: Indie it-girl in a gritty reboot
Alice in Wonderland: Classic styling in juxtaposition with Lewis Carroll's outlandish story
Wizard of Oz: Yellow Brick Runway
Cinderella: Vogue Magazine Spread Cindy
Nutcracker: Vintage Christmas with Ballet elements

For The Steadfast Tin Soldier the jumping off point came with this basic idea:
* Harlequin Tim Burton Toy Box

This is the first shoot that I did not make my dress for and I'll tell you why. First time was an issue. Planning the gala while starting up a new semester at school and a new job left very little time for sewing. Second, The Milwaukee Gay Arts Center was kind enough to provide me a dress for the opening of our show at their space so I thought it would be nice to use it in a shoot. And three, with the time I saved making the dress I now had much more time to play with make-up and focus on styling for the other characters in the shoot.

Steadfast Soldier is coming up quicker than I think you might expect, so stay tuned. More on locations and shoot day time line to follow.

Tinker Toys: Casting

2011-02-04T13:40:00.000-08:00

Here's your first update:

Currently I'm working on putting together The Steadfast Tin Soldier. I set about casting almost a month ago. There are three main characters to the story but we've added one more. All talk about that in a bit. First and foremost we needed a Steadfast Tin Soldier. I didn't have to think about this for too long. I quickly booked Jon Porter. Jonny Porter is my White Whale; Ahab style. He has been offered a part in every photo shoot since the very beginning. There were a myriad of reasons he couldn't make it, work... and well work... and... fine there was just one reason he could never do a shoot. But never the less, in the past few months Mr. Porter has become much more available so he is going to be our titular character. Jon is an actor who has worked all over Wisconsin. He's a tremendous presence onstage, one of my favorite people to work with, and a dear friend.


http://www.polyvore.com/art/collection?id=37445

Then I needed a villian; a jack in the box. Since I had used a main character I'd never used before. I settled on Adam Zastrow. Adam had offered to do a shoot with me about a month a go and I thought it was time to put him in the game. Adam has this look about him, like there's something dangerous there. I wanted that for the Jack in the Box. Adam is also an actor. He works a lot with Carte Blanche Studios; this is also the space that is opening the Urban Fairy Tale series after we close at MGAC.


http://www.elfwood.com/art/k/r/krippa/jack.jpg.html

Finally we're adding in our raffle winner from the Gala Night; Wendy Rightler. To add more of toy box feel to the shoot Wendy is going to be playing a Porcelain Doll. This character is not in the original story, but it doesn't really matter to me, I think it will add some levels to the pictures. Wendy is also and actress and performer. I'm really glad to have her involved.

http://www.michaelbrugh.com/porcdoll.html

So those are the featured players for this shoot and that's all for now. More on locations and accessories later.

Nutcracked

2011-02-02T20:45:00.000-08:00

The amazing Alan Piotrowicz had set up the gallery showing at the MGAC just before the Cinderella photo shoot. I however wanted to get one more shoot into the showing. After discussing many, many, many possibilities of fairy tales, I decided to go with the Nutcracker. This was suggested by both my mother, and Roommate. Although roommate had mentioned it right away, I either ignored her or didn't hear her. So when about a week later my mother said, "Hey you should do the Nutcracker," and I responded with, "Why yes! That's a brilliant idea! Everything is already decorated for Christmas, it will save me so much time!" I ran to tell Roommate who responded with a sour face and anger as she had already said it. There were many apologies and soon I moved on.

I did a brief sketch of a dress for Clara. I wanted to do a dress that could be worn around in the day, but have the look or suggestion of a nightgown as that is how the ballet goes. I also picked a very simple fabric, muslin and more ornate trimmings, this results in a super comfy functional outfit. At least in my opinion.

One of the more difficult things about this particular dress was the vine embroidery around the neckline and waist. I had never really done embroidery before, certainly not on such a tightly woven fabric. However after hours and hours of work I finished it. That was most definitely the hardest thing I've tried to tackle so far.

Then it was time for locations! I had wanted to use the atrium of Grand Ave Mall for ages. In fact I had tried to get permission in the past and just couldn't get a hold of anyone. However this time, with lots of persistence and a couple of emails I finally scored a this really lovely backdrop.

The other location that we were going to need was a really nice house. Like mansion nice house. So what better than an actual mansion. The nice thing about Milwaukee is that is has a lovely selection of B&B's that are pretty flexible with schedules and letting us shoot for almost nothing. I put out feelers to three Milwaukee Bed and Breakfasts, then all I had to do was wait. With in hours the Schuster Mansion responded and were willing to work with us on our time frame. Also an really perfect location for us.

We move on to casting. It's no secret by now that one of my favorites is Mr. Chris MacGregor. However, what is a secret is that I'm not the only one that pushes to get him in my photo shoots. I'm about to open a great big can of worms that I will get in trouble for, so I hope you find this amusing. My mother has a great bit old crush of the Dreamy Chris MacGregor and when she suggested the Nutcracker, she also suggested Chris. P.S. Roommate enjoys the look of him too.

So with all this pressure Chris was definitely in, but as who. The logical choice would've been the Nutcracker Prince himself, however I wanted to see if he could be evil. So I decided he would play my version of the Mouse King; which to seem more badass in some way I call the Rat King.

Badass Rat King: Another Triumph
Then it was time to move on to The Nutcracker Prince. I wanted to pull in an actor named Cleary Breunig that I had worked with at school, I had cast him in the aborted Hansel and Gretel shoot as an alternate for Hansel. Granted half of the male Milwaukee actor community was asked at some point for the Hansel and Gretel shoot. But that's another story for another blog. Anyway I wanted to use Cleary because he had this boyish quality that I felt fit the Nutcracker for some reason.

Cleary was more than willing to do the shoot, but had none of the clothes (except for a white button up and jeans) that I wanted to dress him in. So it was time do a little shopping in the mens section of stores. It's a scary place that I only go to when absolutely necessary, and this time it was necessary. I went to my favorite store again, Goodwill and hit pay dirt a Banana Republic sweater that matched the matched the Nutcracker prop I had perfectly. Then I hit up another favorite of mine Closet Classics where I found the hat. On the day of he showed up in this great overcoat that we used in a bunch of the shots.

I had sent out the confirmation emails to Perry, Chris, and Cleary on the Monday before a Sunday shoot. Perry responded Tuesday morning to confirm. Cleary Wednesday afternoon, and Chris... well Chris didn't respond. I sent another email. Still no response. Then I started to panic. Chris is the source of much of my panic, I think he knows this and takes some perverse pleasure in it. So as Friday night rolled around and I still hadn't heard anything from Chris, I decided to take drastic measures. I phoned him (he didn't pick up) so I left message basically saying that if I hadn't gotten confirmation by 9pm I was going to recast. It felt harsh and I wasn't proud of myself, but I did not want to go through a Wizard of Oz fiasco again. Chris called back at 8:48pm to say he was going to be at the shoot, but he was going to have to leave by 10am at the latest on the shoot day. Now to put that in perspective; a shoot starts at 9am, so in actor time that actually starts around 9:30am. We were only going to have Chris for basically a half hour. This now meant we were going to have no pictures of Chris at the Schuster Mansion. I was a little disappointed, but I figured we'd make due.

Shoot day cam quickly after that. Hadn't slept all night again and I really needed to. The boys showed up at around 8:30am and I put them through hair and make-up as quickly as possible. Then Perry met up at my apartment and we moved to Grand Ave. It was on the way in when I saw this great Christmas Tree and I decided that we needed a picture in front of it resulting in my favorite shot of the whole shoot.

Then we moved into the circular stair case section. We picked the shots we wanted for Chris and got them done really fast. The whole time we were shooting, there were security guard pacing watching the pictures. No less than three stopped to ask if we had permission, to which I would respond yes. Then they would ask who gave it to us, I would say Tracy and then they would move on. It wasn't a big inconvenience but I could've done with out it.

Chris left us, and so Perry, Cleary, and myself moved over to the Schuster Mansion. The woman I had talked to on the phone met us with all smiles. She told us a bit about the B&B and then left us to our work. The place was decked out beautifully, and if given the opportunity I could've shot there all afternoon.

Another successful shoot and we were ready for the showing. Well sort of. We had enough shoots for the showing, but the work had just begun. The following weeks were filled with picking shots, framing, menu panning, and such.

And now you're all caught up with the past shoots. All blogging from here on out will chronicle the upcoming shoots and the process as it happens. Hope you keep reading, see you soon.

A Dream is A Wish Your Heart Makes

2011-01-30T18:28:00.000-08:00

Two weeks before my birthday in November I decided what I wanted was to tackle a photo shoot. I also wanted to do it in a week. So Sunday night I picked Cinderella. Monday I contacted Perry and set the day, and Tuesday the heavy lifting started.

This series was going to be different in many ways from other shoots. For one thing we were going to need two dresses. The "Cleaning Dress" and the "Ball Gown." I had the cleaning dress made already. I had designed and sewed it for the Hansel and Gretel photo shoot we had planned, but never made happen. I wasn't really happy with is as a Gretel dress anyway, it fit the Cinderella concept so much better and it was a great jumping off point.

Then I headed off to goodwill again and found another beautiful curtain panel. I wanted the dress to look both classic and trendy, which is not the easiest of things to accomplish. So I figured if I made it mostly structured and added the fishnets later that would do the trick.

The dress took about six hours to make. Or I thought it had. I had installed a zipper that I had on hand, it was white, I thought I could hide it. I was wrong. It looked awful, so Friday morning after my classes I headed to fabric store and found a matching zipper that look leaps and bounds better. I also did the accessory shopping, I found the necklace, shoes, and belt at Wetseal, and I didn't break the bank either. All three items were under thirty bucks.

The it was time for casting. What is Cinderella without her fairy godmother, and handsome prince. Like I said I only set myself a week to find people for a Sunday shoot. I called on a good friend of mine from high school Gary Oak. He had been keeping tabs on the series since the beginning and he and I had been trying to find a project to do together for a while. I thought that this would be perfect. So fortunately he was available and more that willing so we booked him right away. I couldn't be happier with the finished product. He is... I would say dreamy, but that is Chris's word so let's go with... dashing and sexy. Yeah I think Gary deserves two words and those are dashing and sexy.

Mmmmmmm. That's nice. I feel happy looking at that picture.

When it was time to cast a fairy godmother there was really only one option. Bobby Schmeling has been my fairy godmother incarnate almost since the day I met him. Seriously, this man has put aside his own needs to come to my rescue more times than I can count. He's one of my dearest friends and I couldn't think of a more appropriate person to fill this role in the shoot. He was brilliant, but then again, he always is.

It was location scouting time. I knew we needed an awesome staircase. I google Milwaukee architecture and found a website that provided names and pictures. I clicked through about 75 pictures before I found the spot I wanted to use. It was on Jefferson St. I hopped a bus and tried to find someone to ask permission to shoot, however the building was vacant. So I figured that we'd shoot there until someone told us we had to leave.

At one point during the morning of the shoot a cop slowed down in the middle of the pictures. My heart stopped. For a second I thought that I was legitimately going to be arrested. The car slows and the window roles down, the cop looks at us and says, "You had all summer, aren't you cold?" Then he laughed and drove away. That man is my hero, and if given the opportunity I would like to bake cookies for him one day.

We were also going to need a space for the pre-ball fairy god mother shots. I had just closed a show at In Tandem Theatre and I knew they had a fantastic fireplace in their backstage. I called them and they were super gracious to let us shoot while they were working on their new set. I knew we could get everything we needed in an hour and stay out of their way.

Some of my favorite pictures were taken at this space. Gotta love In Tandem.

Finally we needed a "palace" or at least my take on a palace. I knew where I wanted to shoot. However it seemed like the longest of shots. I wanted to do my Cinderella story at the downtown Hilton. I figured the worst they could say was no. So I walked in and right up to the front desk. I introduced myself, and explained the project. I was asked if we should shoot there I hadn't even finished my sentence before the man behind the desk stopped me. He held up his hand and said, " I don't care. Do what you want." I responded confused, "Are you sure you don't need to ask someone else about this?" He went back to working while talking to me, "Are you going to break things?" "No." "Are you going to move things?" "No." "Then I don't care." Hilton accomplished.

The day of the shoot came super quickly. I hadn't slept the night before, like every other shoot to this point. All my boys were on time. Hair and make-up was a breeze and we were off to the first location at Jefferson St. We set up and started up. If you'll remember I did say this was November, and it was chilly. Bless Alan Piotrowicz who came to observe the shoot that day. He ended up serving as more of a PA for everyone, he held coats, carted props, and got coffee. You gotta love him.

Then we headed over to the Hilton. We set up and drew a nice crowd in the lobby. Little girls would stop and point, men in business suits with roller suit cases slowed down. Most of them thought we were doing something for a classy magazine, I didn't have the heart to tell people that we were really just fulfilling my childhood fantasies, so I didn't make eye contact and didn't speak to anyone.

Finally we hit up the In Tandem space, and I dressed down. We finished by around 2pm and parted ways. It was later that night that I got the first Cinderella loosing her shoe photo. I loved it, and for the first time I realized that these projects were bigger than a little whim that I had several months ago. Yeah, this was pretty cool.

Whistle While you Work

2011-01-29T13:19:00.000-08:00

Gala Night was spectacular. To all those who made it, thank you so much for all of your support. To all of those who didn't, it's okay there will another one at the gallery opening at Carte Blache Studios within the next four months or so. Here's kind of a time line of my day, pictures to follow:

11pm-10:29am: Spent awake pacing, making last minute adjustments.Packed up all of the centerpieces, serving trays, candles, table linens, extra photos, and signage. General OCD type behavior.

10:30am- Moved all of the accouterments into the car. The branch centerpiece with hanging LED lights didn't want to get in the car, but with some gentle forcing it was persuaded. Bobby Schmeling in all of his amazingness helped cart everything to MGAC.

10:45am- Started hanging our fo-chandelier from a lighting rig. This consisted of different lengths thread connected to silver Christmas ornaments. Bobby spent most of this time looking at my butt from the base of the ladder. He commented on how nice it was, but ultimately not for him. Then also mentioned how this was wasted on him.

11:45am- Started setting up tables and and linens. Tinkered with plate settings for almost a half hour. Which was pointless because we changed it all later.

12:48pm- Finished setting up the space and moved to LUCI boutique to pick up for the dress forms. Only four dress forms instead of the promised six. It was alright I had a fabulous gay man who made it work. (Bobby not Tim Gunn)

12:58- Arrived back at MGAC, forgot to call Angela Iannone and tell her that I had a ride to pick up the dress forms. Felt like an idot. She was gracious enough to forgive me. Still feel bad though.

1:15pm- After profuse apologies to Angela we dressed the forms and headed off to finish errands for the day.

2:03pm- Bobby still did not have wig for the evening we looked at a beauty supply store, found nothing. Stopped for a brief 20 minutes to eat at Panera, it was super tasty.

2:45- Went to Closet Classics. Found two wigs for Bobby and jewelry for my costume. Bobby still wanted to look for more wigs. Off to Bartz.

3:07- Hit up Bartz got cups for the evening. No additional wigs for Bobby.

3:28- Pick N' Save. Beverages and Napkins. The drinks promised to me for the evening fell through. Had to make other arrangements. Arrangements that included my wallet.

4:15 Arrived at Bobby's house so he could get cleaned up and gather his costume for the evening. Had a few minutes to sit and chill out for the first time all day. Watched youtube clips. Bobby showered... naked... I didn't see anything.

5:00-Left Bobby's house.

5:30- Arrived all the way back to my apartment so I could pick up my costume and all the food. Roommate had promised to do some baking for me. Couldn't find the treats at my apartment. Started to freak out. Went to the freezer, treats were there. I knew roommate wouldn't let me down.

6:00- Back at the Milwaukee Gay Arts Center. Started plating and garnishing food. The whole menu; cucumber sandwiches, feta cranberry spinach roll-ups, Chinese chop salad in won-ton cups, pineapple slices, lemon bars, Hazelnut-caramel-toffee Brownies, and custard tarts (roommate treat). Took much longer than expected. Should've expected that. Couple arrived early to the exhibit and walked around while I worked. Took them three trips around the room before they realized it was me the in the photos.

6:47- Bobby informs me we have no chord to plug in the ipod. Which means the evening will have no music an result in a cone of silence that would kill the merriment of the evening.

6:55- Alan Piotrowicz and Eric Nutting save the merriment and my sanity by dropping of said ipod chord.

7:04- Finally finshed plating food. Run backstage to feverishly apply make-up and costume. Did a really slapdash job.

7:30- Run out to meet and great. The evening begins.

12:03- Evening ends, arrive home. Had a lovely time, but collapse from exhaustion and sleep until...

7:30am- Get up and get ready for work.


Myself and Perry

The beautiful Bobby Schmeling

Bobby Schmeling, Papa Cappleman, and MAMA!

So that's what goes into a gala people. Lots and lots of work. If you came hope you enjoyed it! I also hope to see everyone at the next one in four months!

Follow the Yellow Brick Road

2011-01-25T11:38:00.000-08:00

After Red Riding hood Perry and I had really found our groove in terms of planning and process. I knew that I had wanted to do Wizard of Oz since the photography series started. This was mostly due to a casting choice, I had been wanting to do a shoot with the amazing Ryan Cappleman for months and I knew he'd make a wonderful Scarecrow. However every time I called him, due to high demand he wasn't available. So when a time slot opened up I jumped at the chance. I emailed Perry and we started all over again.

Location scouting was pretty easy this time around. Since I had wanted to do Wizard of Oz for so long, I had sort of been scouting whenever I was out and noticed an interesting spot. We traveled again to the Urban Ecology Center (used before in Alice in Wonderland) for some pictures, a bike trail adjacent to the ecology center, and our yellow brick road was a back ally way with cobblestones that I loved.

Then I had to think about the dress. There were so many different ideas I had for how to update. I had originally thought something in the vain of The Wiz, a skirt and top combination. But the more I thought about it, I liked the idea of a jumper. I feel that jumpers are underrated. After finding a great tan and black gingham, I drafted a pattern and set to work. The dress only took me about an afternoon to complete. There aren't any shots of it, but there is an exposed zipper in the back. It gives this sweet jumper a little more edge than it would normally have. I then paired it with a black leotard I had lying around.

After the dress was done I had to concentrate on casting the other roles of the shoot. Ryan Cappleman of course was The Scarecrow. After Ryan and I had discussed it for a bit, we decided that the straw fedora paired with jeans and boots would give the best idea.

For the Cowardly Lion and the Tin Man I called upon guys that had done such a great job before I had to use them again.
Chris Macgregor (Snow White's Prince) joined us again as the Tin Man. Chris does a great job everytime, and I'm not saying I wouldn't have called him anyway, but the choice was more made due to the fact that I knew he had a gray suit. I kept telling him to think Mad Men for his styling and this is what we ended up with.

Yeah, he's still dreamy.

I asked Jason Wazsak (Mad Hatter) to be the Cowardly Lion, and decided to attempt to give him a more Wolverine like look with the styling. The scarf was added to give the look of a mane. The nice thing about Jason is that we could give him an edgier look, but he has a nice gentle quality that makes it seem not as harsh as it would be with a different model.

The day of the shoot had arrived. I had been up all night... again. This is a pattern with me. I was finished getting all of the things we would need for the day together when Ryan showed up. We put him through hair and make-up and had just finished when Jason arrived. Then we repeated the process. Then we get a call from Perry saying he'll be at my place soon. We were all set... wait... where was Chris. Yes that was the question of the morning. Where was Chris? Then all of a sudden Ryan remembered that Chris was out of the country. I asked him if he was sure. He wasn't, but still not news you want to hear. I started calling him fanatically. Then after about ten minutes of hearing from nothing I started calling everyone in my phone who could fill in for him. I had two back-ups who were getting their things together when Chris arrived. He was sleepy but at least he was there.

The first location we hit was the back ally way. Some of my favorite shots cam from that this location, although one of the trickier shoots for photoshop.

and...

Then as we were heading off to the bike trail, I noticed a small public garden on the way. They had a few beautiful sunflowers and I thought it would be really nice for some Scarecrow shots.

And then some shots from the bike trail.

After these shots we moved a little further down the bike trail. It was another hot and humid day, because it had just rained the day before. The guys were great, I couldn't get to the spot we wanted to shoot in with out ruining the heels I had picked for the shot. So these boys took turns carrying me to the location. There is nothing like it, I highly recommend it ladies definitely the best way to travel.

The shoot was another success. I was touring in Chicago the next week with at show, then school had started up for me again. So the next shoot was months after this one, but it's so worth coming back to read about.

Happy Little Working Song

2011-01-24T09:36:00.000-08:00

Here's the first update for the gala. I have until Friday to get everything together, and if I'm being honest I'm starting to get a little nervous. I have all of the table setting completed, we hung the most of the prints at the gallery yesterday, and we've been getting some great press.

I've mentioned this before, but I don't own a car. It's really hard to pick-up, carry over, or drop off on the bus. Over the past few weeks it has been nonstop trips to the store, making all kinds of decisions, spending hours and most of my sanity putting whatever I can together in my apartment. My dear friends have been really great about driving when they can. Particularly a shout out needs to go to my Bobby. He is my own personal fairy godmother, I feel so strongly about this that I cast him as such in the Cinderella shoot. He's amazing.

Also it became clear that to properly display the costumes I was going to need dress forms. Luci Boutique of Milwaukee has be gracious enough to donate 6 dress forms for the evening which is beyond cool.

I have accomplished a lot, but I still have all the food to complete. The issue with that is that my kitchen is painfully small. I can make it work, but it will be tough. There's that and I could make all of the food today if I really wanted, but it would all be bad by Friday, so I'm just trying to figure out what I can prep early and want absolutely has to wait til the day of. However I can give you some insights into the menu, which I am super excited about.

I'm doing a Craberry Feta Pinwheel

photo from: http://www.sandisrecipecorner.com/recipe2126Q.htm

As well as Brownie Petit Pours:


photo from: http://www.finecooking.com/recipes/caramel-pecan-chocolate-brownies.aspx

There's lots of other treats too, but I can't give away all my surprises. I was going to take pictures of the decor that I have so far, but ironically, I don't own a camera that would support that process. Besides, you'd have to check out the Gala this weekend to see what I've come up with.

Here Comes Little Red Riding Hood

2011-01-23T20:14:00.000-08:00

We had posted the Snow White and Alice in Wonderland shoots on facebook. The reaction was overwhelmingly positive. My mother in particular had soon become my biggest fan. I didn't want to disappoint with my next choice of fairy tale, so I thought about the shoot for a good chunk of time before settling on Little Red Riding Hood. I had thought of creating a series based off of Red Riding Hood a while before the photo shoot. In the series, Red had become a girl who had witness a crime by and underground gang called Wolf Pack, and Huntsmen were kin to police men. I based the pictures off of these basic ideas.

Now it was time to start drafting an outfit. The hood was nonnegotiable, but there was no way I was doing a cape and or poncho. I don't care what InStyle Magazine might say, that is not fashion. It is a sheet with a hole cut in the middle. I love a crop jacket, so I drew a few possible ideas and then started draping the pattern on my body. Not easy. However after about 28-36 hours of labor the coat was done. The dress only took 4 hours to complete. This was mostly because it was based off of a preexisting pattern. I however did not get to go to good will for this series. I had to go to an old fashioned fabric store. I had searched around for what I wanted at the GW, but there wasn't anything jumping out at me.

The belt was a great find from T.J. Maxx that I found on my dinner break at work. I found a nice prop gun at a corporate conglomerate that I won't mention, and the aviator sun glasses from Dollar Tree.

Then it was time for casting. I had originally wanted another actor for the Huntsman, however he had to back out at the last minute. So I called in Nick Zajdel again who you'll all remember as the White Rabbit. No offense to Nick, but I did have my reservations about using him. He seemed so young and innocent in the Alice pictures, and I needed a manly man. I figured the best way to do that was to ask him to grow some stubble for the day of... more on that later.

I had always wanted Neil Vanides as the wolf. He's swarthy, he's dangerous, he's hot. Neil was on board immediately which was a dream come true.

The day of the shoot rolls around. I was up all night stressing about this and that. I hadn't had confirmation texts from either boys, so I was starting to get nervous about them showing up. Then at about 6:45am, while I spackled and plastered my face I got a phone call from Neil. "Have you looked outside?" he asks. I hadn't. I walked over to the window and peeked between the blinds. It was pouring. "Are we still shooting today?" the second question. These shoots take to long to put together to cancel, I told him to head over and we'd try to wait out the rain or figure something out. I started to calm down then Neil speaks again, "We have a slight problem though, I don't have a ride." Great. I told him to hang on and I'd call him back momentarily. Then I called Nick, asked if he could swing by and get Neil on the way to my place. He said that was fine, then I called Neil back and set that up.

Perry called shortly after asking if we were shooting. I told him everything I said above and Perry set out to meet us. Then as soon as I got off the phone for the millionth time before 8am the boys buzzed to get in. They were wearing what I had instructed them and they looked great. But then I looked at Nick's stubble... or lack there of. He had been growing it out for a week and a half to no avail. This was a fight he lost. I thought quickly and decided that we'd use some stage make-up and paint it on. An idea Nick wasn't thrilled about, but I'm pushy and usually get my way. The finished product didn't look too bad.

Yep. Not too bad at all.

Finally Perry showed up and it was still raining. Instead of sitting around my apartment and wasting the day I had an idea. The basement of my apartment complex is super creepy, but visually interesting so I thought we'd get a few shots down there. We carted the equipment down stairs began to work.

After a couple of nice shots down there, the rain had cleared up and we could move to a nice location that I had picked in the Downer Woods. The area was super humid, so I was glad to have my hair pulled back for this shoot. As we were walking into the wood I saw this great hollowed out tree, I knew we need a shot in there.

This picture is one of my favorite from this series. However what you can't see is that the inside of that tree is crawling with bugs, all kinds, like some hideous form of fear factor. Then we spent the rest of the day hopping around faking fight scenes.

Again after about two hours we wrapped for the day and we all set out on our merry way. Another fun successful day.

I gave it a full five hours after the shoot before I stated thinking about my next project... The Wizard of Oz.

Taking a Trip down the Rabbit Hole

2011-01-17T16:22:00.000-08:00

After the success of Snow White and with the pending release of Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland, I decided to do my own version. I emailed Perry with the idea and he was over the moon We wanted to do an approach that was closer to the Arthur Rackham illustrations as opposed to the Disney version. Then I started about the process all over again having learned a thing or two from the first story.

First off, I wanted to use three subjects as opposed to two. But choosing the characters proved difficult. There are so many amazing characters in Lewis Carroll's classic tale I was a little lost. Alice was a given, and it really didn't matter to me that I wasn't blonde, it's my shoot I'll do what I want. Besides I more wanted to capture the idea of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland without actually doing the story shot for shot. There was also no way I could get the number of actors/model to do that.

After thought and consideration I decided to go with the Mad Hatter and the White Rabbit. I also knew exactly who I wanted in each role. For the Mad Hatter I wanted to use an actor named Jason Waszak, super talented nice guy who I knew had always wanted to play the Mad Hatter at some point. For the White Rabbit I picked another actor friend named Nick Zajdel. He had this sort of childlike, woodland creature energy that was perfect.

Then it was time for clothes. The Alice dress, which is a particular favorite of mine, I had made months prior for a show that I had been in. I hadn't gotten a ton of use out of it, so this was the perfect time.

Since I had the main fashion I decided that for this shoot I would try two new things for me. 1.) Men's wear 2.) Millinery . I made both the Mad Hatter Hat and Vest for this shoot. It started pretty much the same way, with a trip to my favorite place ever... that's right Goodwill. I found some old black pillow cases and I knew I had some lining, that was for the vest. The a trip to the craft store for buttons and hat fixings.

The vest proved to be way more difficult that I could've ever imagined. See the thing about dresses, it that if I make a mistake I can hide it some how or I can tweak it on my body as I go... I'm always there. For Jason's vest I only had a sheet of measurements and my old singer sewing machine circa 1947 which make button holes a nightmare. However I was pleased with the finished product and I only had to have one extra fitting with Jason.

Now the Mad Hatter Hat, it wasn't difficult really, just new territory. Lots of trial and error.

Yep, and Jason's pretty dreamy too. I do know some good looking boys.

You might notice that the hat is comically small. My story that I've been telling people is that it was a choice, however that's not entirely true. I just messed up my first attempt and only had enough materials to make the hat pictured above.

I started by by making a hat form out of the poster board and duct tape. Then I used a really strong kind of craft glue and covered the form in pieces of an old velvet blazer that I cut up. I put the brim through my sewing machine making my own bias tape from the scrapes of the Snow White dress, as well as the band. Finally the 10/6 was cut out of a manilla folder with the edges burned.

Then it was onto prop shopping. I hit up the stores Tuesday morning and Dollar Tree. I spent about nine bucks recreating the place settings for the Tea Party scene.

The white table cloth is my own bed sheet, and the over table cloth is a piece of fabric I bought years ago. The white plates are also my actual dining wear as is the tea pot and pitcher. The wall clock that Nick (White Rabbit) holds is also mine. I basically ransacked my apartment for this shoot., but the out come was great.

The day of the shoot was warm, and I made the boys get up early again. With this shoot I started doing hair and make-up call. Meaning that they guys would have to be at my apartment a full half hour before the shoot would begin. I'd look over clothes and do their make-up, then we'd all trek to the Urban Ecology Center to meet up with Perry.

I had scouted out the location a week before the shoot. I was another tough location to get to, this time we had three strapping men to cart stuff around. There is a method to my madness. When we reached the spot we set about paying with all kinds of different poses.

I liked the look of this one, and Nick was a fantastic sport about lifting me like that for at least twenty minutes. Oh yeah I did grab his butt while I was like that, but there are no pictures of that.

This tree served as the entrance to Wonderland. There's Nick being handsome. Oh here's another.

The best thing about this shot was that Nick wasn't posed, Jason and I were shooting and Nick was waiting behind us like this. I saw him and looked at Perry and told him to turn around and take a picture. There is no lighting shift or photoshop, just a great shot.

However my favorite shot was inspired by this Rackham drawing.

And here is our version...

So after about three hours and lots of giggling we finished the shoot, carried all of our stuff back out of the woods, and headed home. It was a good day, and we had a great finished product.

Snow White

2011-01-15T04:16:00.000-08:00

I thought I'd go back and include what I remember from the process of each shoot starting from the beginning. The first shoot as I mentioned was Snow White.

Last July I found a craigslist ad from Perry Heideman. A Milwaukee photographer who wanted to start doing a photos that told a narrative as opposed to the landscapes he'd been doing prior. I responded saying that he should do existing stories, like fairy tales and make it easy on himself. Then I included my number, and within days I received a phone call. After less than an hour we had picked our first story, Snow White and a day. The shoot was set two weeks from out first conversation. That's when the work began.

I set about finding a location. The issues where that we have no budget... none. All of these shoots are funded by myself or Perry. I personally will not spend more than fifty dollars a shoot. So I had to search for a public location that still looked lush and had that fairy tale quality that the story required.

I ended up choosing this ravine trail by the lake front in Milwaukee. I often go running there in summer and spring, and it was so perfect in those months for what we were trying to do. However a little tricky to get to, but more on that later.

Then I started on the dress. I had one day off from work in the two weeks leading up to the shoot, and that was the day I needed to get the bulk of the work done. I had an idea of what I wanted. A flowing white cotton peasant dress... If you'll take a look at the above photo that is not what I ended up with. I mentioned that we had no budget so when I went out to buy fabric I realized that my said little pay check did not go far. So I headed off to my favorite place in the whole wide world. Goodwill. I found this amazing wine colored fabric in the form of a curtain panel. It may have been very Maria VonTrapp, but I didn't care.

This being the first dress I made in a while, I didn't quite trust my pattern drafting skills. So I did use a pattern. It's a Mcalls quick sew that I modified. I also don't have a dress form so I do a lot of fitting to my body. The day I started that dress I worked for 14 hours straight and finished it that day. I have a very one track mind when it comes to that kind of thing. The "belt" with that dress was made from a spool of ribbon that I cut and doctored together in a way that worked with the dress.

Now I had to "cast" a Prince. This proved a little more difficult than I thought. After this shoot finding models wasn't too hard, but being the first in the series no one knew what the finished product would look like and they were super hesitant. I called four or five of my actor friends who either declined or couldn't make it. I was at the end of my rope when I remembered Chris MacGregor.

Dreamy right? Right. He hadn't crossed my mind at first because he's a few years younger than me, but I had just worked with him in another show. Once the idea popped into my head I realized he was perfect. Then I called and thank god he accepted. I told him to bring a bunch of clothes and we'd pick on the day of.

The other thing about these shoots is that the best time to get a good photo outside is 9am or 5pm. Now I am a demon hell spawn and I like to do early morning, so I made both of these poor men get out of their beds by 7am on a Sunday morning. I myself couldn't sleep. I was up at 5 doing hair and make-up. Then at the location Chris pops open his trunk which double as our make shift wardrobe and make-up trailer. We met up with Perry at the entrance to this ravine trail. Remember when I said that it was tricky to get to the location. Yeah. This is a ravine trail, it's scenic and beautiful, but also hidden away and steep. The three of us carried MASSIVE amounts of equipment down stairs, through brush, and over bridges and such. To make matters worse it was I believe 90% humidity that day, which I believe is somewhat of an excuse for my hair or at least that's what I'm claiming.

Perry provided the apple, I brought along the blanket and the basket of flowers. I knew the shots I wanted so we set about the better part of two hours trying this and that.

However, this being a public area meant that there was no privacy, so in most of these shots there were people stopping to watch us shoot. Yep, people with their dogs, runners, bikers, you name it they'd buzz through and we'd politely say hello then they'd move on. We finished the shoot, packed up the equipment and headed right back out of the woods. No sooner had we left than the skies opened and it started to pour rain. This was not the last time we lucked out like that, but that's a story for another day. And the shoot turned out happily ever after.

Once Upon A Time... part 2

2011-01-13T14:08:00.000-08:00

So after all of these shoots, and posting the shots on facebook, people took interest. So much interest, that I felt the need to start deconstructing what goes into making one of these shoots work. From conception, to planning, and the finished product you'll be privy to my journey as I put these together.

The next project that you can follow along with me is the planning of the opening night of the showing for these photos. The Milwaukee Gay Arts center has decided to give myself and Perry a full on show, so in honor of that I am planning a Costume Gala. I'll post pictures of the centerpieces I've constructed, as well as the hors d'oeuvres, and just track my over all stress level.

And after that stay tuned, because the next shoot is in the works is... The Steadfast Tin Soldier.

Once Upon A Time...

2011-01-13T13:57:00.000-08:00

... there was a girl who lived in a small one bedroom apartment who got very bored. So about six months ago she did what she always did when she got bored. Created a new project.

Hello;
So like I said, about six months ago I got bored... really bored. It was this middle of summer, I was working a terribly monotonous job as a telemarketer when I couldn't take it anymore. I decided I was going to find something to occupy my time. For reasons I still don't know I thought that I would try my hand at photography art direction, modeling, and clothing design. All things that interested me, but up until then I had no formal training in actually doing. So I found a photographer, the brilliant Perry Heideman, and planned my first shoot. Snow White.

That went so well we moved on to a full series of Alice in Wonderland...

as well as Little Red Riding Hood


and Alice in Wonderland


The Wizard of Oz

and the Nutcracker.


...Cinderella