Confessions of an Inner Goddess | Glamour Boudoir Photography

The truth is we all want it. The truth is all women want to feel beautiful, powerful, brave and divine. We all want to see ourselves as rulers of our worlds...and even rulers of everyone else's world. ;-) And we all want to drive our inner goddess in different ways to achieve different ends. Some want to steer their inner goddess in the direction of fashion and beauty. Some steer her towards family and hearth. Some towards friendship and sisterhood. Others, in the direction if desire and satisfaction. Me? Work. My inner goddess finds herself at her most fulfilled after the purging of some idea that was born in the wee hours of the night when the outer goddess couldn't sleep because she was too busy coming up with ideas that will simply rock the photography world.

And this all kind of came as a revelation to me as I was drooling over a few incredible photo shoots I oogled this last week. As I'm taking in the breathless beauty of Keira Knightly in the latest edition of Vogue (Vogue....my mistress....my muse....how I love thee ;-)) I dreamily thought to myself 'Wow....wonder what it's like to be such a goddess for a day? To have someone do your hair, your makeup...to put you in clothes that make you look like the mostest and bestest version of yourself and do it over and over again for the whole day??' And then I realized that that is what I do for my clients. You don't exactly get to wear couture and we don't take a quick trip to Paris because of the perfect spot for that one dress that just begs for that specific background. But we do have our fun.

That made me think....maybe I should share with you how my inner goddess works her magic in an effort to bring out your inner goddess.

There is a process to how I do what I do and it's just sort of a routine I fell into and has worked for me (and it's more fun than any woman should really get to have in her work day). This is the process I also use for Engagement Sessions. Not so much for weddings, although I do have a process for that, it's much simpler. I find that weddings sort of have their own formula for the day and given the usual time crunch, my usual process is much more mental than physical. But I think that may be changing soon too....

When a client hires me for a shoot I immediately start a Pinterest board for them. About 95% of the time I invite them to the board. The other 5% is just for me, to get my thoughts and ideas together. Once my client starts posting on her board and I can see what she gravitates towards, and once I see photos of the clients themselves, I can begin to formulate what direction I want to take the shoot. Sometimes I meet with clients at my studio so we can go thru my wardrobe (below) so that (a) I can see what grabs them and (b) to assist them in their wardrobe selection for the day. This photo below doesn't include the slew of accessories and shoes/boots I have but it gives you somewhat of an idea.

And then I become a slave to the cyber and print world. I am continually eating up what is going on in the fashion world. Vogue, Vanity Fair, W, V...all my mistresses though Vogue is my go-to. Grace Coddington you will always be my first love. ;-) Since fashion magazines are very fashion forward I kinda feel like it's my job to follow those trends and incorporate them in some way into every shoot.

And then the fun begins. I am a very visual person (not surprising for a photographer, right??) so in addition to Pinterest and Polyvore I also need to be able to grab onto something. I need to be able to rip stuff out of magazines, print things off the internet, scribble on them, sketch out an idea, go crazy with the post-its, and begin to put together an entire shoot for my client(s). Based on my ideas, my inspirations and based on her ideas and her pinnings I begin to put it all together on a huge cork board I keep in my workspace. It changes constantly (and needs to grow about 4x its size for more room...coming soon to a spare room near you) based on my clients and based on what's going on in the world.

Yep. This is my life. Right there above these words. This is what excites me. This is what lights a fire inside that keeps that inner goddess nice and toasty. This is what gets me starry eyed with dreams of grandeur in my work. This is how it all comes together for me and how I wrap my brain around an entire shoot for each and every one of my clients. We do have a spare room and eventually, this winter when things die down, I will devote one entire wall to weddings, one to E-Sessions and one (or 2 really) for Intimates. And as you can see by the little cutie patootie drawings sneaking out below some of my rippings is Ella's creative outlet (our incredible 6 year old daughter). She'll get a wall too. ;-)

And below are the 4 things that my husband put together for me to attempt  to keep me on track. I say "attempt" because he is my designated manager and handler of all my crazy and God bless him...he needs all the blessings he can get.

My grand ideas don't seem to scare him as much as they used to, thank goodness. So now, when I say "Hey what do you think about taking that antique bed I just bought on ebay and putting it in the middle of that creek we found on that hike the other day with some gorgeous gal playing in the water around it?" he doesn't lose his breath or fall to the floor. Or when I casually mention he will need to figure out a way to get a couch from our studio to an outdoor location this week for an E-Session he just shakes his head and figures it out for me (ahem...we own a Prius). Hey...I'm worth it right?? I think he finally figured out that making it happen is much less work than dealing with me if he won't. Ah yes, love that inner goddess. She kicks ass (literally...if he won't do what I ask she comes out in full on boxing gear ready for the first strike). John is the architect and brilliance behind the smooth running of all things business, while I get to be the player. Not bad ladies...not bad. Seriously...I just got up to go look at something and when I got back to my desk I found this:

I am not going to lie to you: life is good.

So ladies. Come play with me...my world is so much fun. I mean So. Much. Fun. You'll like it here: you are beautiful at every moment, we get to play dress up with you, you get to be a goddess model for a day and your every fashion fantasy is played out right in front of you and all for you.

Anyone interested??