haven't slept in three nights, but not complaining...

Okay, after almost nine years of creating Genlux, you'd think I'd have it down by now. Nope, it happens every time. About the last week before we go to press and I spend about 18 to 21 hours a day (unfortunately I'm not exaggerating) writing, retouching, designing, fine tuning and getting the pages ready for our printer. This week from Monday to Friday and I had 12 hours of sleep...total. But, I'm not moaning or complaining—I love every second of building this book. By the way, thanks for your input on the cover. I'm really not big on creating by committee but I appreciate the opinion of those who chimed in. Here is the final that you'll see in Barnes and Noble from coast to coast.

Here's the beautiful cover by photographer Marc Baptiste and stylist Lisa Cera. She's wearing Valentino and Rahaminov earrings. I decided to reverse the copy—looks cleaner. I LOVE typography and Futura has been one of my perennial favorites. 

There are so many great editorials in this issue. Returning photographers Tracey Morris (she shot three stories), Marc Baptiste, Louiza Vick, and then three first-time in Genlux photographers: Masha Matsava, Andreea Radutoiu, and Karolina Amberville. I'll share my favorite images over the next few days and then upload the entire stories soon. First up, one from Louiza Vick...

Stylist Tiffani Chynel did a great job of creating a six-page centered on scarves and jewelry. One of the things I enjoy doing is coming up with headlines for our fashion stories. Our new intern Emily Hassard did a good job of coming up with a few for this issue. 

Louiza Vick is one of my favorite shooters. This was our fourth or fifth story together. She's so kind, relaxed, low key, polite and works well with others. She's also super quiet on the set. 

Funny story: The first time we worked with Louiza, she kind of scared us. She came to the shoot without an assistant, so naturally our first thoughts were that she wasn't a pro. Most pro shooters use at least one assistant, some use two, and some, like Erik Almas, will use three.

So there we were on location and she's moving and struggling with all of this lighting equipment. (And you have to understand, she's a tiny thing). So Camille Clark, the makeup artist, and I looked kept giving each other the side eye—thinking the same thing—Oh, no! This poor girl doesn't know what she's doing. What we were really afraid of was that we wouldn't get good shots. But she showed us!! Her shots were brilliant. I have to add that the entire team that day was genius.

Anyway, back to Louiza Vick, she's an awesome shooter who gets the shots, every time! I believe one of the keys to Louiza's success is working with a great post-production artist—an artist who knows how to work beautifully on skin. Never that overly-retouched look that we hate. 

Love this pose. The tilt of the head. The hand is perfect. The jewelry is beautifully lit. 

Love this pose (above). The tilt of the head. The hand is perfect. The jewelry is beautifully lit. (Sometimes it's hard to shoot for both jewelry and the face—depends on the reflective quality of the pieces) These happened to work perfectly. Look at the quality of the light on the silver surfaces—beautiful. Awesome makeup. The model is Iti Armpalu. She's only about 5' 7" so not ideal for high fashion but her face size and structure is great for beauty.

Great styling by Tiffani Chynel! I get so excited when I see a great image like this. The model has a perfect expression of being in the moment-between-the-moments. Sometimes it's great to shoot a model when she's unaware that you're shooting her. Like you say, 'Okay, relax, I have to change my lens.' Those are the moments that make great shots. 

no, please, not another cover dilemma

One of the toughest decisions I have to make every issue is which photo to put on the cover. In our last issue of Genlux, it came down to two great images of Ciara photographed by Marc Baptiste. I went back and forth and back again. I loved the energy of image A with her tasseled hair whipping around—creating beautiful movement; but I also loved the cool attitude of B, with her "I am Ciara—so don't mess with me" look. So I decided to post the two on our Facebook page and see if a little crowd-sourcing would help us decide. the decision was split there too, though it skewed toward B. I usually make the final decisions on our covers, but with this one, I was fine going with either one. 

genlux ciara cover - version A

genlux ciara cover - version b

Which brings us to the new cover with Katheryn Winnick of Vikings, again photographed by Marc Baptiste, and again, I'm faced with two great choices. And here they are. Here are my thoughts. I love the energy of A with its touch of attitude and ever-so-slight amount of sexiness; but I also love B and the quiet, elegant beauty of this image. A is more active, and, from a sheer photographic standpoint, it's lit a little better. The angle on her face is flattering and the shadows add a lot of depth and drama to the photo. B is definitely "flatter" in terms of lighting but the face is prettier, more Genlux. Katheryn looks younger in B—maybe too young. (Our magazine's demographic skews toward a mature woman—35 to 55+—something we always need to take into consideration when selecting photographs). In fact, if I were to give you the book we most closely attempt to mimic, it would be British Harpers. I know that many of the photographers we work with would love to shoot more edgy like Italian Vogue—but that's just not the reader we are trying to build an affinity with. Hmmm. Which do you pick?  

genlux spring katheryn winnick cover - test A

genlux spring katheryn winnick cover - test B

please don't laugh. i've never shot at joshua tree.

I know, I know. All the photographers out there are laughing that I've never shot out here before. What an amazing location. These gigantic beautiful rock formations and big, big sky. And so so quiet. You can actually hear the sound of the air rushing from beneath the wings of the birds flying overhead. I'm not kidding, it's that quiet. And lucky for us, perfect weather—especially for a winter's day. About 78 degrees and an ever so slight breeze. Just enough to require sandbagging those scrim stands. 

Joshua Tree, California. These stones stand about 35 feet tall. That's me on top of the tallest stone. See me?

I was kidding about being on that stone. Here is the actual Joshua Tree, well, not THE, but a Joshua Tree. From what I'm told there is actually one that is considered THE Joshua Tree. 

We came out to shoot for our Genlux Spring/Summer issue with photographer Geoff Ragatz. My friend who I've shot with for about 5 years now. Our first shoot was in Napa at a winery that Geoff's super cool Mom, Charlene, got for us. The model for that shoot was Melissa Haro. Today we are shooting Masha from Photogenics. She recently went blonde from brunet and she's looking to get some great new images for her book. The rest of our team is Camille Clark from Aim Artists on makeup; Paul Desmarre from Rex Agency doing hair; Our stylist is Amy Mach with her assistant Amelia; Geoff's assistant is Matt and our Genlux intern is Emily Hassard. 

Our Genlux photographic team dwarfed by these beautiful gigantic stones. 

The theme of our shoot is TRIBAL. So much of spring fashion is based on this and Amy was able to pull some really gorgeous pieces. And shoes. And jewelry. 

Shoes. 

and more shoes. 

Our call time was 5:00 for hair and makeup at this cute little motel out in the middle of nowhere. We started heading for the location at 6:30 to get our first shot by just past sunrise. One of my unwritten rules on shoots is that there are no rules. If we plan on starting at 6:30 but don't start til 8:00 it's all good. If we are aiming to get 9 looks for a 10 page story but only get 6 looks done, it's fine—we just have more pages for the next story. And if we're going for 6 looks but get 10 great looks, awesome! We'll just make it a longer story. There's no room on Genlux editorial shoots for timelines or must-do's. It needs to be a low or no pressure situation where everyone is participating because they want to be here, not HAVE to be here. Everyone's opinion is valuable. And each is brought in because they're REALLY great at what they do. 

The colors of the rainbow are so pretty in the sky. 

My friend and photographer Geoff Ragatz surfing the desert sand. It was Geoff's idea to come here today. 

This was the last look (below) Masha walking down the path. The giveaway on might be the long shadows. (I'm not showing all of the looks because I can't reveal how amazing Amy's pulls were.) Geoff was about a hundred feet away using a 300mm, or was it a 400mm? Anyway, a super long lens. So in the end, we finished with seven looks total. A few doubles. We always open... no, we usually open with a double-page spread and then drop to singles. Okay, that's it for this week. Time to get ready for our next shoot with Lydia Hearst. 

Masha from Photogenics in this crazy beautiful place called Joshua Tree

The sun stays pretty low in the sky during January, but the light can still get flat—nothing a little Rotolux can't fix.

Paul Demarre our hairstylist had downtime so he carved a little nest out of this stone. He's still there. 

Besides carving rocks, Paul's other hobby is stacking them. Good job, Paul. 

perhaps john mcenroe said it best. you have got to be kidding me

Note: Not mentioning names because I'll have to work with these peeps again soon.  
Yesterday I had a good hair day but a bad model day. Listen up. In the morning our team pored over model submissions from about 10 agencies for our shoot today. The usual mix. Photogenics, Ford, Vision, Next, etc, etc. And when I say pored, we analyzed and scrutinized each girls book and polaroids with a fine-tooth Mason Pearson comb. After much deliberation we settled on that one girl and I gleefully contacted the "winning" agency very early yesterday morning to let them know we wanted THIS girl—to please confirm her. Silence. An hour goes by. No confirmation. Two hours. No confirmation. I call the agency, and I'm told the booker is out to lunch. Another hour rolls by and I FINALLY get an email saying sorry but the model is in New York. Um. WHAT? YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME. Why did you put her on the submission? Why did our Genlux team waste all of our time figuring out she was the one when, in fact, she wasn't even available. (By the way, that's not what I told the agency.) I merely said. Hmmm. Okay. Can you please send another submission—this time I contacted the booker I've worked with for over 8 years. So she sends a submission and we go through the same process and settle on one that we all like. I contact the booker and about an hour later I get an email back in this incredulous tone: "What? The shoot is tomorrow? She's already booked tomorrow." Ummmm, WHAT? YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME. YES, YOU KNEW IT WAS TOMORROW!! But actually what I said was this: Okay, please just let me know who is available tomorrow. So they send over these two lame models who I would never use. So. While all of this is going on, I've contacted two of the other agencies to let them know they each have a girl that would be good for this shoot and are they available? One of the agencies gets back to me with bogus answer that the girl is in school so won't be able to give me an answer til 5:00. Here's the trouble folks. Part of this train is moving out to the location at 7:30 TONIGHT and they are the ones taking the model. Yikes, yes, that's what I was saying! So here we are. Waiting til 5:00 for one model when the other model is set to confirm. It's now 5:10 and I pull the trigger and book Masha from Photogenics and let the other agency know we couldn't wait. Not only that, the other agency was asking a lot of questions about the shoot, kind of like they were going to have to "sell" the model on doing it. So happy we went with Masha. At the end of the day (which this really was ladies and gentlemen) the end of the day. Moral of the story: Things ALWAYS work out for a reason. The lesson. In fashion, never get stressed. If a model you want can't do the job, for whatever reason, it was NOT meant to be, and a better one is about to walk through into hair and makeup. So you NEVER have to yell at the booker, YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME. 

Masha from Photogenics. Marcus, the booker at Photogenics comes through!

Masha recently changed her hair from brunet to blonde. She looks amazing!