New work during a busy week before Viva Las Vegas!

Hey, Steemit! I’m doing my best to make a post before calling it a night. It’s not often that I’m plagued with technical issues, but when it happens it shuts me down. I’ve been attempting to encode a movie to have something in the background to watch while I edit. That’s causing Photoshop to run at a crawl, and iTunes keeps crashing on start up so when it is done, I’m not sure if I’ll be able to move it on to my iPad [….AirDrop, maybe? @iamredbar? Bueller?]. We’ll see. It’ll all work itself out.

This has been a demanding week. I’ve had meetings with clients, book responsibilities to address, @jasonrussell’s Portrait Contest to host, Trail by Comics “Writing” ends tonight […I’ve been reading a lot more than usual] and quite a few @dlive streams of editing tutorials, drawing sessions and gaming with @guthrie. This all while @vermillionfox is out of town with @lonniedi and I’m trying to get my shit in order for almost two weeks on the road; LA and Vegas for Viva and the big Dark Pinup book release party Thursday, April 19th at The Artisan Hotel.

I’ve found small windows to edit a photo here and there, so I wanted to share some recent work, starting with a new photo of comic book illustrator, tattoo model and all around lovely human being, Danielle Otrakji. This was from our shoot in New York City right after the New Year. We were given permission to shoot at Beauty Bar, which was an embarrassment of riches for an available light photographer such as myself. All kinds of unique lighting arrangements, both in front of the bar and in the back room. We found one Hellish, red overhead light and of course, I had Danielle get underneath it. She had a cool 70’s “America Hustle” vibe in her wardrobe. One of those moments where everything comes together like it was all planned […it wasn’t].

The second photo I wanted to share was streamed on @dlive while I was editing. Darla Deville, from my last trip to the west coast. I made a trip with my family from LA, to Palm Springs, to Las Vegas. I took a few shoots to offset the cost of the flights and rental car. Darla was an absolute dream to work with. I was familiar with her modeling before she contacted me about shooting. She has a Hollywood starlet face and incredible curves. It was such a pleasure to work with her, especially in the beautiful estate we were shooting in Southern California. More of Darla to come soon, but I wanted to share this new image.

Lastly, this new edit of Delilah Dynamite was from a trip I’d made north while shooting on the east coast. From New York City, to Buffalo, stopping for one night to collaborate with this burlesque beauty, just before crossing the border in to Toronto. It was a much needed break from the road and a delight to shoot with such an incredible model. We made use of a small AirBnB, getting creative with our lighting as the sun went down. We light a few candles seance style, and created some moody, seductive, dark pinup photos. There is a @dlive editing tutorial of this image as well, although Photoshop started slowing down on me at the end.

That’s just a few recent edits I’ve finished. This week, I’m going to try and blast out as many as I can. I hate leaving for a big trip with the last big trip’s work still hanging over my head. Thanks for reading, resteeming and voting. For more photography, art, illustration and the stories behind the work, follow me here @kommienezuspadt!