Underwater Shoots LOOK Easy. My Story Says Otherwise...

I'm getting a lot of questions on how my first underwater photoshoot went, so it'd just be easier to tell the experience on here, then link anyone who asks.

I arrived at a residential area in Woodside, CA (near Redwood City) just before 11am, the meeting time. At this one particular house is a special pool with no chlorine, just big filters. I get into shorts and a bra (didn't have a bathing suit), and quickly learned the basics of scuba diving. I sink under the water with the photographer, Paige, and her special spider-looking waterproof case with lights. It was pretty awkward breathing underwater through a regulator and only with the mouth. I adjusted quickly though, and we took piece by piece off to capture the feeling of posing underneath (obviously I'm not going to be wearing an oxygen tank and goggles). We paused and ate some lunch, decided on various looks for the shoot, and finally applied makeup. The set was complete, so I put the first dress on, and stepped into the water. Already from the surface it looked neat wearing something unusual in the pool.

I've never been much of a swimmer - I had lessons as a kid, so I know the fundamentals but I always wore dorky goggles and stopped for air during freestyle. I had an assistant go under the water so I could be fed air underneath, but the first couple of times I went down to pose, my body's reaction was to surface and get air, not motion for him to swim to me and have me exhale sharply in a regulator before inhaling air. I'm telling you it was awkward! There was a moment I felt that I couldn't do it. It was tough and complicated, but not impossible. I had to mentally pep talk myself into succeeding because I always challenge myself and I'm establishing a name, so if I do well, I'd be kept on the "future underwater models" list! I thought of celebrities and models who had to do this very thing, so I tried it again, and this time, before I ran out of air, I tapped my mouth, exhaled and breathed oxygen into my lungs. It felt good but it was still an odd feeling. I needed this round of being under for longer than 10 seconds to power me through the rest of the shoot. Finally I had hope again. I can do this! They added a weight belt to help sink me quicker and we ended up clearing the tanks of oxygen. Break time!

After about 3 hours of shooting, we decided to check out the images, clear the memory card, refill the oxygen tanks. For being a "trooper," we decided to continue shooting, but a different look the next round.

Makeup was redone. I put on my formal dress from 5 years ago - a coral colored, princess-type dress with a corset top and layers and layers of tulle/fabric for the skirt half. I had to force it under water, and I knew it was going to be really heavy once I was submerged. We shot this one in the deeper end of the pool for the black background. The black was very complimentary to the colors of the dress - I think it looked prettier underwater than above! I was use to how the shoot would be by now, but it's still a really uncomfortable feeling not being able to breathe how you want.

I had a few scary moments, and had to be rescued from the assistant scuba below. The dress would wrap around my foot, making it impossible for me to wade to the surface or do anything but sink. We placed a ladder in the pool so I could get to an "island" to relax and breathe in between takes during shooting through those couple of hours. The dress would expose me a few times but I just wanted air, and I didn't care. As one of the photographers on set stated, now I can say that I've done the hardest kind of photoshoot a model can do! That put a smile on my face. I definitely would rank this as something a model should do with a developed portfolio so their focus isn't on how to pose, but rather to think of all the elements an underwater shoot involves (you can easily look like a monkey!) - especially since you only get maybe 30 decent images out of 400; way different than modeling on land!

I had tons of fun and would advise any model to try it out, but do so when you're experienced. I'm waiting for images being done in post-production and I can't wait! I was able to peek and had several favorites. Fathom Films would like to shoot with me again and even said I have potential to be an underwater model.