Immediately I loved her story, that she just opened up and told me, like we’d known each other for years…She told me how she was from a small town in North Carolina, she was a school teacher and had always sang in Church.  Someone told her she should come to Nashville for CRS week and get to know the industry…without even hearing her music, I was fascinated by her story and told her “we need to do a photoshoot for you!  You need good images to promote you!”  Then after listening to her self-made video on YouTube, I was determined to help her not only with photos, but also have her get to know some people in Nashville that could jump start her career.  I think if this whole photography thing doesn’t work out, I’m definitely getting into Artist Management!  Love promoting this girl.

Quickly becoming best friends we schemed on how to put together a photoshoot on an limited, zero budget :)  Teachers should get paid more, dang it!!  With the assistance of my country-music-loving, 12-year-old friend, Savannah, myself and Danica’s hair and make up expertise we made an amazing photoshoot happen right in my back yard, sand bar in Jupiter, Florida.

Danica also had this vision of creating a burning heart behind her…with the help of my incredibly creative husband and his father, Dave, we put together the coolest image EVER of a burning heart.  The photos of this set up are comical!  And, so you know how “un-photoshopped” this image actually is, I had my mother-in-law filming on my iPhone (thank you, Kathy Kauss!). You HAVE TO WATCH THIS!!  Ring Of Fire Photoshoot

Cannot wait for my friend to be famous!  Check out her YouTube video here and make sure to follow her on Twitter and Facebook! And check out her radio interview on WKML 95.7  here!

Lastly, a huge, gigantic thank you for my amazing graphic designer friend, Davis, www.visualwavedesign.com, for creating a logo for Danica — it’s just awesome.

Another huge great-filled thank you goes to a dear friend of mine, Mike Varel.  Mike is a film maker that will give you goosebumps with every clip of his footage and make you think!  I dare you to visit his website and not shed some tears after seeing a few trailers…Mike was gracious enough to come and film Sarah’s photoshoot from the photographers perspective!  More on that very soon :)  In the mean time, just check out this image he pulled from his footage…I’m obsessed with it!   

Here’s Mike and Tessie doin’ their thang, the day of the shoot:

Another favorite person to talk about is the wonderful, Michael McCall.  Michael has worked with Sarah Darling from the beginning of her career, making her hair and makeup flawless from one of her first music videos “Jack of Hearts” to her newest Christmas video, “O Holy Night” – Michael McCall is one of the most genuine, fun people, I’ve met!  Loved getting to know him better through our fun group dinners and dancing evenings in LA.  And of course, he made Sarah flawless once again the day of her photoshoot!  Here’s Mr. McCall in action!

& and being my lighting model –

Another pic Mike pulled from the footage he filmed..

Can’t wait to share more photos from this shoot of my gorgeous friend, Sarah!  Album release scheduled for mid to late 2012 — for now…I’ll leave you with a photo that captures the mood of Sarah’s Santa Monica shoot…

…and for a really, really great laugh, click the link below :::

Tea Time by Mike Varel

You know Storme from GAC’s Headline Country and Sirius XM Radio’s, The Highway!  Storme is probably one of the best interviewers’…he always makes everyone feel so comfortable and his knowledge and love of Country Music is astounding.  Ask this guy anything about Willie Neslon to Lady Antebellum, he knows all the facts.

Ever since CMA Fest, we had been talking about updating his head-shot photos.  So, while I was out in California for Grammy Week, I saw on Twitter Mr. Storme would be there too and told him we had to do a photo-shoot!  He needed a new head-shot, badly.  So, off we went, at Sunrise one morning in the pretty California Light, in Huntington Beach.  Here’s a couple of my favorite images from the shoot…

What an amazing experience at Nashville’s Schermerhorn Symphony Center.  I was asked to photograph for Country Weekly magazine, the video shoot of Black River Entertainment’s Sarah Darling’s “O Holy Night” Christmas rendering.  Although I now have the Christmas carol stuck in my head forever, the experience was something I’ll never forget.  My friend Sarah looked like Cinderella, seriously, a real-live, Cinderella at the Ball.   The musicians, Lauren Brettell, Jeff Herrick, Bethany Bordeaux, Tim Denbo, and DJ Hershey were fantastic and beautiful people accompanying Ms. Darling flawlessly!

Excellent job of hair and makeup by the incredibly talented Michael McCall.  And a sincere thank you to, Tyler Lewis for his photography assistance on the shoot!