Test Shoot with HK Photographer PAUL S.

This was shot in seconds. The sun was setting fast and this was the first layout. We were panicking, but thankfully it doesn’t show here.

Most times I feel like my modeling days are far behind me. I usually work behind the camera now, styling beauty editorials and writing for the newspaper or magazine. But once in awhile I get calls that are too hard to resist. Like from Aniko, who is my good friend from Hong Kong. She wanted to recommend me to her photographer friend who has worked a lot in HK and wanted to try it out here in Manila. (He is Filipino, too, but grew up in Canada.) He needed a model to shoot that week and Aniko wanted to give my number. I, of course, agreed. I haven’t done a test shoot in years!

This was going to be fun. I miss modeling! Paul S. immediately called me up, sent me his pegs and we booked the shoot in an instant.

At the day of the shoot, things didn’t go as smoothly but we rolled with the punches. First of all, my hair took forever to style and later we found out it could only last for literally five minutes because of the humidity. And because of heavy traffic our poor stylist arrived late.

I think because we were a positive bunch we took this as an opportunity to chat, relax and get to know each other. It was my first time to work with makeup artist Ines Lobregat, who I’ve known for years. She did an amazing job. Her makeup on me was flawless. That day I also found out that Paul was related to Nancy Castiglione, who I met in hosting workshops in ABS-CBN years ago. Nancy was at the shoot with her twin boys who are just the cutest and most adorable twins I ever met.

When stylist Vanessa Johnson arrived we had a few minutes of sun left so we ran from one place to another. We were shooting guerilla style, which meant we shot anywhere. I love that we really got creative where to shoot, as guards were shooing us away from close establishments. In the end we were sweating bullets and panting from running all over the place. But we had a blast!

The photos that Paul took were amazing. I love his direction and point of view. I always like it when a photographer is able to make me look different, and for this set of photos he did a great job. Here are photos from our test shoot. Hope you like them!