From Naughty Socialite to Travelodge Trash

I decided to go from Riches to Rags overnight. Following the Naughty Socialite shoot with Jon Mayle (see previous blog entry) on the Saturday, I met up with Bryan Morris (aka Thunder UK) at the Travelodge hotel in neighbouring Billingshurst, West Sussex on Sunday 10 October 2010. We had a chat beforethe shoot on Fetlife and concluded that we do a sleazy motel shoot as I looked at his portfolio and noticed he has done a few and really liked them. I always wanted to do something like that as I seen some awesome B&W images of motel shoots in the U.S. by some art photographers, as portrayed on coffee table books.

Bryan was quite an easy going guy, polite and considerate. Though I myself was a tad quiet at first arriving in a hotel room with a tog I've never met face to face before, he made me feel at ease immediately. What made us both giggle was that he arrived at the room first, and there I was marching through the hotel lobby clad in a gaudy leopard skin coat (part of the shoot outfit) with tons of makeup on with both of us wondering what was on the mind of the poor young receptionist!

The lights were set up and all I had to do was change into lingerie and look pretty. Well pretty? Well, I was to be in black underwear with suspenders & stockings being sexy. However, with the sleazy motel setting in mind, the intention was for me

to be the bored wine swigging, chain-smoking slapper with attitude. What fun that was! There were empty bottles of wine on the dressing table, cigarette stubs piled up high on the glass ashtray (which Bryan smoked all, collected the stubs and brought to the shoot!) and me pretending to smoke! And I don't even drink or smoke... and how cool was that, when I was sitting on the toilet in my bra & knickers having a smoke!

One of the other themes to this shoot was focussed on exhibitionism. Well I won't go into it in detail but I am an exhibitionist. Not only that. I get my kicks doing crazy things like sneaking a flash in public and seeing how far I could go without getting caught. Okay most places have CCTVs but

hey, I'm sure I'm making someone's day! Hehe. So Bryan and I went out in the hallway with me initially wearing that mentioned gaudy leopard skin coat. At one point, an elderly-ish typically Southern-England type couple passed by so I hid in the corner. One they were gone, it was flash time! In another scene, Bryan was to pose as room service and I was answering the door with nothing on. I thought about using the Do Not Disturb sign someowhere but the letters were too small to read...

Another aspect we explored was voyeurism. Bryan was to pose as a voyeur while I was doing my everyday stuff in the hotel room. Drinking, smoking, watching telly, showering, sleeping, looking out the window and even using the toilet! For this shoot, he brought with him a remote-control shutter and disguised himself in a black hood and long leather coat. One of them was of me sleeping on the bed naked while he creeps towards me. Another was of him opening the door whilst am sitting on the toilet seat, knickers down...How rude!

Our final set was a shower scene, related to voyeurism aspect. In the past I never liked doing that because my hair and make up would get ruined. Of course, if we leave it to the last set who cares! And what sleazy motel shoot is complete without a shower scene? So there I went, splashing around and lathering myself with Bryan's shower gel which kinda made me smell suspiciously masculine. I was to act unaware the pics were being taken. Thus, I loved the results when days later, Bryan created a collage of the various shower scenes, as if I was being stalked... the image of this is among the right hand side of this blog...

So concluded our shoot. It was fun and exciting, although at one point we ran a bit out of ideas given the limited space we had in the hotel room. Nevertheless, I think we nailed quite a number of great concepts. I would definitely work with Bryan again, and we plan to shoot soon once our schedules are cleared up. Thanks so much,Bryan, I look forward to it!

...Oh, and now imagine the reaction of the receptionist when I

passed by the lobby with my makeup smudged and hair wet and still wearing my gaudy leopard skin coat!

For more trashy images of this shoot, click onto http://www.flickr.com/photos/minimiu/sets/72157625116446429/