Airbnb

"...and this would be your housemate, Scarlett. So, will you be staying?"

I bought a pair of red, heart-shaped sunglasses recently (one more to add to my collection -_-;), and I thought it would be cute to pair it with a bright red bikini for a photoshoot. I went shopping but didn't find anything I liked well enough. But then I realized I already had a bikini with a cherry motif that would be perfect, and it dawned on me that I could totally recreate Sue Lyons' pose from Lolita! Although I prefer Adrian Lyne's adaptation, as it better captures the emotional intensity that forms the heart and soul of the story, I cannot deny that Stanley Kubrick's version is the more iconic of the two.

In any case, I posed in my black cherry bikini, but I didn't really like the results I was getting. And the bikini itself wasn't fitting me right - the tube top has a tendency to curl downward (I think it had straps once, but they were lost before I ever inherited it). So, even though I'd painted my nails red just for the photoshoot, and had already repainted them teal for the weekend (mermaid theme at the pool!), I decided to give the pose another try. I figured I could just do the image in black and white so the colors wouldn't matter, and this other bikini not only fit me better, but was a better match to the original shot I was mimicking, besides. When I realized that it matched my teal nail polish, it was serendipity! And I'm much happier with the second day's results. The sun was out (it actually drizzled a bit while I was posing on the first day - good thing I was wearing a swimsuit!), and I had to shoot with my phone to better handle the dynamic range, but I think I pretty much nailed the pose, and the results look spectacular. So now I'm happy!