Ahh, Pinterest. If you are a photographer, or just a girl in general, you know that once you get on Pinterest, it's game over for the next 2 hours, at least. For me, I justify this by finding a lot of cool ideas to try for photo shoots! This week's shoot with Maggie was all Pinterest centered, right down to the DIY flower crown.

This shot, done by the amazing Emily Soto, was my inspiration. I always see this one pop up when browsing Pinterest for photo ideas (in fact, I just see a lot of her work because she creates the most beautiful fashion imagery) and I couldn't ignore it any longer! I've been eager to do some simple, fashion inspired headshots lately, so this seemed like the perfect opportunity.

I started by planning out my location, which actually happened to be my living room! We have a big sliding glass door that leads to our porch, which happens to provide some really amazing, soft window light. I was able to nail a white sheet up to the ceiling right behind the window to create a simple white/gray background that would fall out of focus and act as a clean, non distracting background. Then, I went out and bought the materials to create my own flower crown.

Side note: if you want to create one yourself, this tutorial was simple to follow and the supplies were inexpensive. I bought one bunch of fake flowers at Walmart which easily were enough to make a whole crown, for $5! http://www.thewonderforest.com/2014/05/diy-flower-crown-tutorial.html

Making the flower crown took around an hour, and surprisingly turned out well for it being the first one I've made. I even had a bunch of scraps left over to make another one, which may be happening for a future photo shoot!

The next day, Maggie came over bare faced with freshly washed hair, and I worked my magic. Yes, if you're wondering, I've thought about getting my cosmetology license and becoming the person who does your hair and makeup, AND takes your photos, because at this point, I pretty much do that anyways! I curled her hair with a curling wand and brushed out the curls to create some super pretty waves, and did a gold and lilac super soft eyeshadow with minimal makeup everywhere else.

Maggie is a natural in front of a camera (mostly because I've had her model for me so many times at this point that I could create an entire portfolio of just shots of her) so we nailed out exactly what I'd wanted within 30 minutes, tops! Shooting with her is always so easy and stress free because I know I'm going to get something I love out of it.

The post production on this was super simple: light retouching and some highlight and shadow toning to create those warmer, pastel, desaturated tones you see in the final shot. I was more than happy to do something this week that was simple, but still held it's own against some of the more complex images I've been creating in this project! It's been super fun so far, getting to check all the random photo ideas I've collected over time off my list. Emily Soto is one of my favorite photographers and a huge inspiration to the type of fashion imagery I've been working on this year!