About eight months ago, I moved to South Beach, never having been to South Florida before, and immediately I was taken by the beauty of this place. It is so marvelously exotic and so uniquely beautiful that I wanted to capture every moment I could. With a point-and-shoot camera, I started photographing everything in site: buildings, sunrises, sunsets, guys juggling on the street, the homeless. Everywhere I looked was beauty.

A large part of the beauty of this place is its people. I was capturing some of it in street photography, but not much. Around December of last year, I made the decision that I wanted to move into shooting female models. I was getting some positive feedback on my street photography and wanted to turn some of that attention onto women as the subject. Could I capture the beauty there the way I was seeing it in everything else around me? It didn't seem like it would be difficult since the female form is naturally beautiful. Realizing that I had reached the limits with my point-and-shoot and knowing I needed to step things up to be taken seriously, I bought my first DSLR over the holidays and within a couple of weeks, ran an ad on Craigslist and subsequently scheduled my first shoot.

Going into it, I knew the first shoot was going to be a learning experience. What settings did I need to use? Where was the light going to work? What about the background? A lot of questions would be answered that I hadn't even conceived of previously. The shoot went great, although I've never posted photos from it. Not because the girl wasn't beautiful, but because from technical and photographic standpoints, there was a lot I hadn't considered.

Briana
Briana contacted me via ModelMayhem, having looked through my portfolio, and from the beginning, we had just amazing working chemistry. Briana has definite ideas about what she'd like to shoot and I'm very open to whatever suggestions models may have.

Of course, all of her ideas work so well so it's been easy, too. Our first shoot together, Briana came over in the early evening and it was after midnight by the time we had reviewed photos and parted ways. But we didn't part ways without scheduling our second shoot which would take place three days later. Briana, was a makeup artist as well, but I'd venture to say she's a stylist.

Three shoots I've done with her now, and each shoot comes with a vastly different and yet equally beautiful version of Briana. The first shoot, we went retro 70s, with her sporting a fro and vintage clothing. The second shoot was more sensual, with Briana in lingerie, with straightened hair, and more subdued makeup. Our last session, Briana came in blue with brilliant eyes to match. Love working with her to get the shots. Just a beautiful model from any angle.

Madison Scott
My second "real" shoot was with Madison Scott. Madison contacted me from a second ad placed on Craigslist, sending me an email with sample photos.

From the beginning, before even meeting, I was immediately impressed with her professionalism, approaching scheduling and wardrobe with precision.

The day of the shoot, Madison showed up with a bag full of clothes, her friend/manager (another teen porn star) and her husband. At 19, Madison had been in teen porn for just about as long as she legally could. Fun, vibrant, and full of energy. There was a great vibe, and right from the start it went superbly. The lessons learned from the first shoot now behind me, shooting Madison was cake. What was nice about this shoot, too, was having other people present to take behind-the-scenes shots with my point-and-shoot, in addition to just having the extra company around. Madison and her husband actually lived in Arizona at the time and were here visiting friends. She had seen my ad so decided to schedule a shoot.

I went into this session much more prepared with the knowledge gained from the first shoot. The thing that caught my eye about Madison, too, was that she worked in the adult entertainment industry, specializing in teen porn. Very cute girl with a very sweet look about her.

After the session was over, as we were parting ways, we talked about shooting again, possibly her and a friend together, maybe on the streets of South Beach. That would be a perfect challenge that I would love to take on; I hoped we could coordinate it.

Britney Brooks
A few days after the shoot with Madison, I sent her an email and asked if she had anyone that she could refer to me. She gave me Britney's number and immediately, I was sold.

Britney, too, was in the adult industry, doing more fetish-type work at the time. She was in going to be in town (down from Tampa) doing some other shoots so she and I scheduled a session. Very easygoing and fun on the phone. While talking about what type of clothes/lingerie to bring, Britney mentioned she had some Spongebob underwear; I told her right then that she absolutely had to bring them. To this date, without a doubt, some of my favorite photos are the shots of Britney in her Spongebob underwear and white tanktop. The shots have this very soft, sort of early-morning, sensual feel to them that I haven't recreated with another model.

The shoot went absolutely perfectly. Three different outfits and most shots in the bedroom where the light flows in best. The funniest thing about shooting Britney was the last third of the shoot; we were so engulfed in conversation, that I was snapping photos left and right, barely paying attention to what I was doing. When I looked back through that last set, I realized I had captured about 100 different facial expressions and it was perfect. The focus was off on some photos, but with Britney, I managed to catch this very engaging personality, and like the models before, had managed to capture these very real, candid, moments.

At this point, I had nearly decided that I simply wanted to shoot girls working in the adult industry. But Britney wasn't from the area, either, living in central Florida, and so references were pretty much at an end. Britney did have one referral for me, but that shoot didn't come to fruition although I'd still absolutely love to shoot her friend.

Kristin
Kristin (opening photo) was the next model I shot and she was the first girl that was strictly in the modeling world. She had worked as a makeup artist and was beginning to expand her modeling portfolio. The interesting thing about scheduling a shoot with Kristin is that we had exchanged emails previously (from the first Craigslist ad I had run) and had somehow lost touch. After shooting Britney, I had joined ModelMayhem, which is a site connecting photographers with models and makeup artists, and ran across Kristin's profile.

I reconnected with her through there and we set up a shoot. Beautiful, beautiful girl and shoots just magnificently. Great shoot, going with more of a retro 80s sort of look, and of course, beautifully done makeup.

Taylor Rae
Taylor worked as an event promoter and did modeling as well back in her home of northern Virginia. She had come to Miami for shoots and for leisure and like Briana, she looked at my portfolio and contacted me to schedule a shoot.

We shot on a Saturday and it went so well that we planned another shoot for a few days later. Taylor was fun, spunky, and eclectic, and just a fantastic, fantastic girl. Our first two sessions were these marathon shoots that stretched for six to seven hours, producing an almost ungodly amount of work. We were outdoors, we were indoors, we were all over the place it seemed. The last "official" shoot we did was at Haulover Beach, lasting only a couple of hours. What made shooting Taylor such a unique experience wasn't just that we had these great shoots together, it's that she also ended up staying here for a bit, and so it provided for a lot of behind-the-scenes photos and just great casual shots that wouldn't have happened otherwise. It was like a summer vacation with Taylor here.

She had shot with one other photographer prior to shooting with me and shot with another photographer during her stay here. Fantastic model that shoots really well, and she became a good friend on top.

Anna
While Taylor was staying here, another young woman contacted me wanting to shoot, Anna. Anna left Russia about a year earlier and was living in South Beach, having lived in Delaware for a short time prior where she had worked as a photographer.

Because she was also a photographer, shooting Anna was a complete joy. While shooting, we would talk about different ways to shoot her or just about photography in general. Her reason for wanting to shoot just captivated me as well; she was taking these amazing black and whites of people, shooting models herself, but wanted to be on the other side of the camera for a change. When I first saw the photos that she took, I was blown away by how artful and how well done her work is. Simply an amazing photographer. So to shoot her, to shoot the photographer, was a great treat. Our first session went really well, with Taylor assisting and offering some modeling advice from time to time. We did about half the shoot outdoors and the last half inside.

One thing I really enjoyed about Anna as well, was that she was very into themed shoots. Our last day together before she moved back to Delaware, we went on a trip to the Everglades, thinking we might get some great shots of her in nature. Rather than get the nature shots, though, we decided to go with sort of a "Girl on Vacation" sort of theme.

There was all these kitschy alligator/airboat places dotting this road through the Everglades and we used those as part of the theme for the shoot. Beautiful, beautiful shots. It was such a pleasure shooting Anna and I hate that she moved to Delaware, but hopefully, we can shoot again.

Today
I still shoot street photography, shoot various events, and have been involved in some other projects. I shoot models with an increased regularity now, and that's good. I run ads sporadically on Craigslist and make the occasional contact through ModelMayhem. I've met other photographers who do similar work; that's been a joy.

One of the things I love about shooting models is that, for this brief moment in time, you get to know this person, to hear what's on their mind, and to learn who they are, to see into them to a degree. You make a new friend.

I have been fortunate in that everyone I have worked with has been beautiful to the core; not just on the outside, but on the inside as well. And it's all of that beauty that I try to convey.

Invariably, somewhere during the shoot, I see that internal beauty come out and makes its way into the camera. When that happens, it all becomes very worthwhile.

Model Contacts: