Dare to Bare with Dave Hare

For a change, it's good to have close-up images that enhance your best assets. And this is one of the reasons I was very keen to work with Dave Hare whose beautiful work I came across on Fetlife. We both travel quite a lot and spend weeks at a time abroad so pencilling in a date was a challenge. After a year or so of corresponding with each other we finally nailed Wednesday 8 June 2011 to shoot.

Thankfully Dave is based in London which made it easy for me to travel there from my mother's place. I took the tube to Archway and walked to his place where he greeted me warmly. Despite his decades of experience as photographer and the incredible creativity and talent he has, he is very approachable and unassuming. Also an easy-going guy who made me feel comfortable. So comfortable in fact that we went straight into shooting nudes without the initial "warm up" lingerie shoot I normally have with other photographers! So there we shot together with me wearing nothing but my high heel pumps and the canvas background.

Well am not exactly that well endowed but it's nice to discover that I got other assets to flaunt which I had never noticed before. Dave lent me a pair of skin-coloured lace boy-shorts from his collection of lingerie he lends to models. And away we started taking "bum shots"! I love how the lacy flower texture of the underpants compliment the skintone as well against the curves. A clever creation thought of by Dave!

The next set was wearing my favourite black corset. It was the one I bought from Nikita Sablier, and yup, the one I also wore

in Jonny Blaze's Final Seduction series. We did a few images under the studio lights then went around the house searching for suitable settings from which to shoot such as the staircase, doorway, hallway and lounge. Am actually pleased how it all turned out considering that with one simple outfit, we can create different moods. Sexy, sultry, cheeky (excuse the pun), elegant or serene. Oh and not to forget, we also managed to throw in a bondage image where I'm tied from the back with a rope harness from the ceiling!

For the final set, I wanted to show off my red suspenders and matching red fishnet stockings. No knickers and no bra, just suspenders & stockings! And not black but red! I thought Dave would be the perfect photographer to capture some beautiful images with his immaculate lighting techniques and comfort with close-ups. And yes, it worked! Just look at the first image of this blog and see for yourself!

I think the few hours we shot together went well though quickly as we were able to churn out quite a number of beautiful images. I enjoy working with creative photographers that are not only skillfull but share and are open to ideas and not afraid of trying something different. In addition, Dave was quite quick at getting back to me with the edited images after I had chosen which ones I liked. Now that's another plus!

Thank you Dave, for the opportunity to work with you the other day! You were such a pleasure to work with, and I certainly look forward to working with you again in the near future.

For more images from this shoot, please check out my Flickr Page!!!

Blue and Vintage...

Blue and Vintage, originally uploaded by Mini Miu.

Yep this is one of the excerpts from the Pony Rescue Group Shoot arranged by Jason Wright in Hastings on 11 June 2011.

This Blue & Vintage theme is taken by Martin Blunt and shot alongside a beautiful vintage car. Silly me, I forgot to take down the make of the car but it's from c.a. 1920s if I am correct. I myself am wearing a sheer blue body stockings by Mary Quant... how 60s!

Once I compile the pics, I'll introduce you to the togs that shot me at the Group Shoopt along with the best of their pics!

Coming up soon: Artistic erotic/nude photoshoot in London with Dave Hare...

Pretty in Pink!

Pink Clubwear, originally uploaded by Mini Miu.

One of my crazy pics at the Bodyline groups shoot in Nottingham on 5 June 2011. A lot of the Pink outfit pics didn't turn out that well but I love this one! Thank you, Les Pearson!

BTW, this outfit? It's from Dutch clubwear, Unzipped. (www.unzipped.nl)

Miu's Non-stop Crazy UK Tour

Apologies again for being so slow in updating my blog once again! So many going on!!! I was in the UK early this month and in a space of just over a week, I had SEVEN shoots, two of them group shoots and one studio day. It brought me from London to Gloucester to Nottingham then back to London again then off to Peterborough then Horsham and finally Hastings.

Yep I need to slow down but I enjoyed every moment of it. Knackered? You bet! But it was well worth it, seeing old friends and meeting new faces. Then of course there are the pictures of course, a huge variety of them ranging from fetish, bondage, quirky fashion, swimwear, lingerie, and of course nudes! Heck I can't even remember whom I shot with, I need to keep track but just to be a show off, this is what I been up to:

Fri 3 June: Fetish bondage shoot with Silkgag in Gloucester.

Sat 4 June: Studio Day by Martin Russell in Gloucester with 5-6 photographers

Sun 5 June: Bodyline Studio Group Shoot organised by JD Rose in Nottingham

Mon 6 June: DAY OFF!

Tue 7 June: Fashion-glamour shoot with Adi Dewey in Peterborough

Wed 8 June: Art & nude with Dave Hare in London

Thu 9 June: Fetish bondage with James Delta at Horsham Home

Fri 10 June: DAY OFF!

Sat 11 June: Pony Rescue Group Shoot organised by Jason Wright in Hastings

In the course of the next few days or so, I'll be posting up some edited pictures from these shoots as they come in. And of course do my blog. I also got a huuuge backlog of stuff to write up about from the past shoots!

Keep your eyes peeled guys!!!

Miu Gets Cute and Happy Again!

So for the past many shoots I've been doing quite a bit of art and fetish work. Beautiful and profound. Yet serene and in deep thoughts. Or edgy and even shocking at times. Many are in B&W. Everybody loved that pic of me pointing the gun at the camera! And when was the last time you saw me smiling? When I first started off as a glamour model in 2008 much of my images were perky and quite "girl next door". Then I somewhat got interested in fetish and the creative side to modeling so out went the smile and in came the many other facets of me. The mean bitch with the don't f*** with me attitude. Or the vulnerable victim pleading for her life.

Well now that the warmer months have approached, I figured I would lighten up! I was not looking to do any cheesy glamour stuff. Instead, I wanted something elegant and classy yet fun and simple. In short I wanted to relive the cute and happy side to me. It was through Twitter that Drew Hart and I discovered each other. Drew has done a lot of photography for famous people as well as for theatres so has a knack for capturing models well. This was the perfect opportunity for me to get a few decent headshots which I've recently been lacking. Furthermore, donning some colourful outfits would be another change to my otherwise sombre black or white I typically wear nowadays. The date was set for 14 May 2011.

Drew picked me up from Willesden Junction station and we walked to his house. He was just as friendly and unassuming as I expected and was a jovial person. Apart from his wonderful personality, he's a very talented photographer who clearly knew all about lighting as he was meticulously directing me. The studio was set up in his lounge, and after a cup of coffee, we began. I thought we'd warm up by doing a couple of shots in the outfit I wore.

It didn't take long to warm up as Drew was extremely pleasant to work with. I changed into a banana yellow lingerie set from Agent Provocateur. As the bra was quite see-thru, I initially wore a black sleeveless blouse to cover the areas, so as to make it less "over-18", ie suitable for FB! We also came up with a few sexy shots of me lying down. In between shots, Drew took some headshots of me. One of the most remarkable one was of me in profile which is quite useful to have in my portfolio, quite a change from posing straight in front of the camera.

The next set was swimwear. A change from a skimpy number, I got into a pretty colourful bikini with which I wore some pearls for added elegance. Apart from the usual glamour girl poses, we came up with a lot of unconventional images as Drew would go out of his way to shoot from various angles. One of them was of me shot from above but still being able to see what I'm wearing. That's very unusual especially for a swimwear shot!

The final set was of me in my long black lacy dress from of all places, Ann Summers! I liked it not only because it was sheer but also because it has a slit in the side. Very sexy! We got a lot of wonderful images from this, especially with the headshots. I also liked Drew's ingenious idea of having me shake my head side to side and flicking my hair about as he captured my hair is flowing mid-air.

As we called it a day, we promised each other to shoot again soon when I'm back in the UK. Drew is also London based so it's not a big deal to get to his place, after having discovered that I could take an overground from Shepherd's Bush! After having chosen my images, Drew was very quick to edit them. I was very pleased with the results and look forward to working with him again soon. Thanks, Drew, for the successful shoot!

For more beautiful pictures from this shoot, please have a look at my Flickr page! Further work of Drew's can be seen on his website too.

Emotional Moments: 日本の夢を見ました

It's been over 2 months since the tragic tsunami in Japan. Regretting I had to cancel my trip in the midst of the post-traumatic upheaval, I donated some few hundred pounds to the Tsunami Relief Fund via the British Red Cross. It's not a very large amount, and no amount of money will ever recover the priceless losses and bring back the dead, but it's the only way I can express that my thoughts are with them. It is also wonderful to have friends that share this sort of gesture too. I am proud and wish to share my appreciation of some of my dear friends, Shibari artist/rigger Wykd Dave and his partner model/photographer Clover Fibbs.

Neither Clover nor Dave has ever been to Japan before, but both hold a great fascination for Japan and anything Japanese. Hence Dave's great passion for Shibari and interest in the Japanese language evidenced in practising his hiragana! In view of their grief towards the tsunami victims, they decided to auction one of their prints in which I modelled when I had shot with them a few months ago. It is a limited edition which they named "I dreamed of Japan" or 日本の夢を見ました。(pronounced "Nihon no yume o mimashita")

The auction took place at the Shibaricon in Chicago at the end of May. Apparently well received, the winning bid went to a gentleman known as "The Hammer" and his wife from Baltimore, Maryland for $500. Not only was I chuffed that our print is worth as much as that, but how many went out of their way to bid for a good cause. Proceeds have been donated to the Japanese Embassy in London.

As a sweetener, it was Dave's bright idea that I write a little letter addressing Shibaricon participants in Japanese. Even better gesture was that I handwrite it! It has been a long while since I wrote something as long as that in my own language. However, modern technology has saved me from manually rummaging through my kanji-jiten (a dictionary to help us with the Chinese kanji characters), as I typed it all up on Word and copied it on paper by hand. And thanks to my strict mother for pushing me to calligraphy classes as a kid; I loathed attending it but am so grateful now as it proved useful for the years to come for something as important as this.

I sincerely wish to thank all the bidders for their generousity and compassion. And my hugs and thanks to Clover and Dave for initiating this kind gesture. I am very honoured to have them as my friends.