What’s up, Hive family. I’m coming to you all earlier than my usual scheduled broadcast time. I want to get to some artwork for 
Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, Cervena and I had plans to shoot together in New York City, then Boston, then LA, and then Vegas. Each time, our schedules didn’t line up for one reason or another. Super bummed, obviously. I never could have imagined that our first time shooting would be with 2,000 miles between us. She was in LA, and I was at home in Minneapolis, and we finally made it happen. I’ve been talking a lot about these distance/virtual shoots here on Hive, and this was an epic execution of the whole approach.
I’ve been giving the models on the other end of these calls a heads up, that they are weird. It’s such a bizarre experience and I know coming out of this peculiar time in our lives, I’ll be saying “Oh, yeah! 2020 was the year that I was doing photo shoots over FaceTime and Zoom calls!”. Sometimes that awkwardness can really affect how these virtual shoots turn out, but Cervena was immediately ready. Hair and make-up done, Playful Promises lingerie and enthusiastic about this crazy ass new frontier to shooting without the photographer present.
She set up a few things around her place, including this awesome spider web decoration. Like, $3 at a novelty store, but it was perfect as a backdrop to her. I asked if she had anything near by, like a crucifix, and of course, she did. That was used and really added another point of interest to the portraits. There’s less to work with during a virtual shoot, and I can’t move things around. In my experience so far, interesting concepts, nudity or sexuality, or very deep, convincing emotions carry well and make for captivating images.
I guess we shot for 45 minutes or so. During that time, we tried a few areas around her place, and her little Pomeranian chewed up her make-up egg blender. I definitely had her doing the usual bizarre poses I come up with, crawling on the floor, under a table with the edge or her phone hanging off the edge above her like a Sword of Damocles. She was such a great participating, and so much fo these shoots are experimental. I really have no idea what I’m going to get until I see it. Thanks for reading and staying with me here on Hive!