Always dreamed of having a gorgeous photo shoot on the beach? What girl doesn’t, right!? Well now you can make your dream come true in the warm water of the Caribbean Ocean in Puerto Rico! If you have any questions or want to nab your boudoir photo shoot spot, then email us at [email protected]
Note we will be asking for a 1/3 deposit to lock in your spot. Air and accommodations are on your own.
It’s coming soon!!!! We’re going to be sending out invites very very soon… if you haven’t already sent us your info, you can do so here. Wanna know one of the main reasons WHY we started Boudoir International? This video shows a real-life example:
Hey everyone. We have a concern and we wanted to clear something up.
Ok, so we are not writing this to stir up anything or bring more attention to this than it’s already been given… we are simply hoping to make sure you all know that the recent negative reviews on a Paris boudoir workshop were not related to our Paris workshop! The other day we opened up a newsletter that read: “Paris and a Drunken Model: A few [members] paid $4,500 each to attend an exciting workshop in Paris with a Boudoir Rockstar. What our members say they got, was a shoot with a drunken model who couldn’t hold focus” — YIKES! We are so bummed that photographers did not have a good experience with this particular workshop. Selfishly, our concern is that because OUR Paris Boudoir Workshop is so well-known, and we (biasly) think it is more well-known than this other workshop 😉 , we got worried when we read that newsletter. We are about to launch our 2013 Paris Boudoir Workshop, and our fear is that people would see that newsletter, but not log in and read the full post – and maybe they would just assume that it was talking about OUR workshop, because it’s a well-known boudoir workshop. So that’s our dilemma. And that’s why we want to be a little blatantly selfish and post here on our blog to clarify that that was not talking about us! We put so much into our Paris Workshop and over the years we have received positive feedback and we wanted to make sure all that hard work, fun and awesome memories weren’t tainted. 😉
In light of the recent forum/newsletter posts we mentioned, we thought it might be the right time to share this email we got a few months back from an unnamed photographer who said this:
“Hi Kimberlee, I wanted to write to thank you again for the fantastic workshop you hosted in Paris in 2010 (the year of the Volcano 🙂 Having just returned from another photographer’s Paris boudoir / fine art nude workshop last night, I can honestly say the workshop and learning environment you and Marissa create is top drawer. The workshop I just attended was so bad I can’t even put it into words and I’m just so thankful to have had your experience to think back on to lift my spirits. I hope you and Marissa know how positively you impacted my boudoir photography and I wanted to thank you again for your spirit. xoxo”
Now, this is not to say that we are perfect, or that we put on a ‘perfect’ Paris workshop. We admit that we have received some negative feedback from 2 attendees in the past. And we take that feedback VERY seriously, due to the fact that we are truly passionate about teaching other photographers our style of boudoir. We are passionate about seeing you walk away from our workshop with more knowledge and skills to take your boudoir business to the next level. When 16 photographers travel from around the world to stay in the amazing city of Paris, and invest money in the experience, and take time away from their families to be a part of the workshop… we see this as a big responsibility, and we don’t take it lightly. Any negative feedback we receive only makes us work harder to fix any issues, and improve – to make the experience more beneficial. We have now led 5 boudoir photography workshops in Paris, France, and in 2013 we are going to lead our 6th. We would love to have you join us. I already have about 20 photographers on the ‘pre-Paris’ list – these are the people who are wanting to receive more information about the workshop as soon as we launch it. They’re going to have ‘first dibs’ on signing up for the workshop, before we notify everyone else. If you want more info or if you’d like to be added to our list, just shoot us an email: [email protected]
And if you didn’t have a chance to read our overview of the 2011 Paris workshop (along with tons of pictures), go check out that Paris blog post now!
“Angelique in Paris!” So hello there, photog friends out in internet world. Happy Monday! If you follow us over on our studio blog (for clients), then you’ve already seen our newest set. For those of you who didn’t get a chance to see it, I thought I’d post it again here, on our blog for photographers. This video shows a little glimpse of the crazy shenanigans that went on behind-the-scenes at our San Diego boudoir studio as we were putting together the new set, and then at the end, you’ll see our first client that we shot on the new set. We are in LOVE with it!
Aaaaaaand… did you know that we share ALL of our favorite things – including lighting equipment, set stuff, and tons of other divalicious goodies – over at our ” target=”_blank”>AMAZON SHOP?! Go check it out!
We have been churning over what we were going to do with some extra space we found in our studio by re-arranging. Really mulling over the decision for months. I mean we have SO many fun ideas, but in the end, this is what we did for one of our new boudoir sets….
boudoir poses and set
In the end we decided we would name this new boudoir set the “Starlet” because it looks like some really cool backstage dressing room for a very hip, very demure star. We’re in love with set design, and can’t WAIT to show you our even NEWER set that we just created last week! Check back with the blog soon… we’ll be posting a video that shows the entire set-up process, as well as our very first shoot on the set with a client!
We had OH-SO-MUCH-FUN at WPPI this year. Along with our platform program, speaking at the Bay Photo booth & Graphistudio booth, working at our booth, and hitting up some awesome vendor parties… we also made sure we had plenty of time to be our goofy selves as we enjoyed Vegas! Warning: there is a lot of randomness in this video. 🙂 Enjoy!
Can’t wait for next year! Oh, and we also need to let you all know that we’re going to be in Vegas in just a couple weeks – for WPPI U!!! We’d love to have you come join us. Visit WPPI’s website for more info & to register.
AND… we ALSO have an exciting giveaway! Enter below to WIN one free registration to WPPIU in Las Vegas. We’ll be giving away 1 free spot, and we’ll also be giving a discounted, special registration rate of just $125 5 people. So enter below – the contest ends in just ONE WEEK! You can enter every day if you’d like. Thanks everyone; hope to see you in Vegas!
a Rafflecopter giveaway
I have received a lot of questions recently regarding our post-processing, editing, and this big question: do we liquefy our boudoir images? And our short answer is: Nope! We don’t like to liquefy or remove things from our clients’ images, if at all possible. In fact, our post-processing is SO extremely minimal – and for our clients’ orders, after processing in Lightroom, we really only open them in Photoshop to do blemish removal & skin softening/light airbrushing, with some sharpening. And that’s it! If a client requests special or extra retouching (for example, removing a tan line, removing scars, removing braces, etc) – then we will do so, but at an extra charge ($65 per hour). If a client ever asks us to make her more slender, we actually tell her that that’s not something we do. We want to be sure that we are working with our tried-and-true posing & lighting techniques (using the poses from The Posebook, & using the easy lighting recipes that we share on our Lighting & Shooting DVD). So with our Divalicious posing & lighting tips, along with specific outfit choices/recommendations… we make a woman look as beautiful as we can, without needing to ‘slenderize’ her or ‘fix’ anything later in Photoshop. Now, if a client is adamant about having us slenderize her body, we will fight her on it for a while, and we try to use the opportunity to empower her and help her realize just how beautiful she is. Our goal is always to help our client feel comfortable in her own skin, and to recognize her own unique beauty. With all of that said, at the end of the day, we want our client to be happy. So we want to be honest and let you know that if a client is unhappy, and she is still fighting us with this policy, then at some point we might decide to give in and make an exception to use the liquefy tool. However, we don’t use it very much – just slightly, because we don’t want to change her into something she’s not. It’s all about making her look beautiful, and celebrating who she is – JUST as she is.
Now, we also want to add a disclaimer here and say that this is not the only ‘one right way’ to approach this subject. I know there are a lot of photographers out there who may have a different opinion – and that’s just fine! We are simply responding to the many questions we’ve received, and we wanted to share what OUR opinion is, and how we do things at our studio in San Diego. So, there you have it! Feel free to leave a comment and share your thoughts on this topic. xoxo, The Divas
Growing up I was OBSESSED with Disney movies. I know all young girls are, but are they so obsessed that the sound of each epic Disney song can tell them exactly what stage they were at with their own “Walt Disney-inspired dream”? Maybe. I know I sure can! This morning I was feeling very grateful for all that has transpired in the past few years, thinking about how in some ways it truly was Walt Disney that taught me all about “dreaming,” and I think the best way to sum up and celebrate the journey is by sharing our timeline/progress through this series of videos. Hope they make you smile as much they do me.
1. A dream emerges It all starts with that wish your heart makes. And as a child this song gave me permission to dream big. And although we didn’t have little mice friends to help us out along the way, we DID have an amazing team pushing us forward with this dream. We can’t talk about our dreams and our timeline without mentioning the pivotal people who have been a part of the Diva family through the past eight years. We are so thankful for each and every one of you!
2. Getting to work. Although not always whistling, I did often play this song to remind myself that rolling up your sleeves and working very hard can be an enjoyable thing. It’s all about the attitude right? I actually did listen to this song multiple times when I was getting a little pooped.
3. Almost there!
“Getting closer and closer every day and I am almost there, trials and tribulations I have had my share, ain’t nothing gonna stop me now, cuz I am almost there. You gotta make it happen, it all depends on you” – Princess Tiana. When I heard this song the first time, I knew it was just what I needed. We were going through some changes and I could see how things NEEDED to be, but I knew it was going to take a lot more tweaking to get there. So we rolled up our sleeves and made shtuff happen!
4. In awe with gratitude and satisfaction. In so many ways I feel like this is a gratitude hymn or some sweet melody to God. In the past few years this journey has really been a spiritual transformation for myself, and I might be a able to speak for K in saying that is has been for her, too. It wasn’t about getting what we wanted (because I assure you sometimes we didn’t), but more about seeing how God is in control and is always there for you even in the small things, and definitely in the big things. I know K and I are on to new chapters of God’s plan for our lives, and as we discover what this looks like, I know we both really feel as though he has shaped us for new adventures. Yes we are still and always will be photographers and business owners, partners & BFFs, and we will always be working toward our goals and dreams for the Boudoir Divas and bringing boudoir to the masses. But along with all of that, I think we will now ALSO be able to put our focus more on HIS bigger picture. Because we have been able to reach and realize so many of our original dreams for The Boudoir Divas, we are at a place where we have found more freedom – and that freedom is allowing us to dream in new ways. So now, we are thrilled about re-launching “Boudoir Photographers Unite” – and we are also on quite a roll of documenting and helping the marketing aspects of a few different non-profit organizations – which makes our hearts feel alive. We can say we see His plan for us – and we are so grateful. I don’t think I can watch this next video without crying every single time.
We would absolutely LOVE to hear what Disney songs, or just songs in general inspire you. To leave a comment you actually need to click on the blog post header to get you into the post page. It would make my day to hear what songs move you. 🙂 – Marissa
AHHHHHH!!!!!! We are SO stinking excited to announce this. We’ve been dreaming of doing a boudoir photo shoot in the Caribbean for a few years now, and we are FINALLY going to make it happen! If any of you photographers out there have dreamt of having your own boudoir photo shoot, why not go all-out and have it happen in the Caribbean?! 🙂 We are going to have just 4 spots available for shoots this November, so if you’re interested, please email me asap: [email protected] & we can send you some more info & details about the shoot!
*****EDIT: Within moments of launching this, we immediately had TWO spots snatched up! That means we only have TWO more spots available!!!!!!!!! Shoots will be booked on a first-come basis (once we have received your non-refundable retainer fee)… so email ASAP if you want to grab one of the last spots!
