If you are going to drive 100 miles to do a shoot, through endless road works and their obligatory speed restriction, Midlands Motorway Maniacs and torential rain, the model at the end of the rainbow had better be worth it.
Dee Dee welcomed me with a cup of coffee, which is always a good start, into her small but pleasant home, which she had reorganised according to her idea of what would work, based on the brief I had given her regarding the outfits I was bringing. With limited resources she was spot on.
The first set was as you might expect, Leopard. She pounced on it and preened as my choice of costume fit perfectly. Let's not beat about the bush, Dee Dee is a Big Beautiful Woman, the abreviation BBW could have been invented for her, so she needs special attention to those huge boobs and long legs. And she has a larger than life personality to match. She is an experienced model and takes direction easily. She understood my needs and funny little ways and she noticed things, little things, subtle things, that many people miss. For example, she noticed I wear two wedding rings and knew that I had been married twice, which means she had read my profile. Clever girl. She had also checked out my portfolio and mentioned certain outfits she had seen some of my other models wearing, expressing her interest is styles and colours that would suit her, which is good, positive input at the pre-shoot comms stage.
The shoot itself was supposed to be a gentle ice-breaker. We didn't break it, we smashed it. 1000 images in the bag inside 4 hours. Lot's of communication on set to get the best poses and Dee Dee knew how to make my outfits look sexy.
The drive home seemed to fly by. Fewer roadwork or was that just my imagination, no rain, well not too much (I had actually had a few scary moments on the trip north, aqua-planing has never been one of my favourite sports and it brought back memories of the Master Driver briefing us young Sappers of the dangers of driving in heavy rain on exercise in Germany in the 70's) and that feeling of a job well done.
Thank you Dee Dee for giving me 100% effort, 100% enthusiasm and 100% concentration, with a great sense of humour and a second cup of coffee at the end of the shoot to wind down.
Now I know you are expecting me to say she's a great model, you should book her and that I am probably going to book her again.
Wrong. Go find your own model, this ones mine and I have booked the next two shoots, in August and September.