Here is a photo from my latest photo shoot. I haven't posted it to Flickr yet, you you're seeing it first right here. I'll talk about the photo itself in the flickr comments, but I wanted to say a few words about what went on in the days prior to this shoot to make it all happen.

The first thing you may notice about my photos is that it's an entirely new location. If you look at the geotagging on the photos you'll see that I moved a few miles. But that's not what I wanted to talk about either.

You may have noticed that the lighting is better. Well that's because about a year ago now I went out and invested in a good set of studio lights. As you can see, they make all the difference in the world. Kalina Isato had good lighting in her studio for my Awesome Makeover session and that's when it really hit home that I needed to get serious about lighting if I was at all serious about photography. Unfortunately, they sat unused for all that time while I was waiting for a photo shoot to try them out. Actually, that's not true. I actually used them as painter's lights when I was repainting the house. It killed me to use them in this way, but it did two things for me. It allowed me to play with them, and it provided me with a cover story for purchasing them. This way I wouldn't have to hide them. They were simply tools.

I've already mentioned my new wig in my Flickr photos. I hope you like it. Several friends suggested that I try something new and I'm glad they did. I really love it. But, it's not what I set out to purchase. My favorite long straight auburn wig that I've had for about two years now turned up missing once again. I'd already replaced it once when it mysteriously disappeared, and here I had to replace it yet again. I certainly didn't want to have to resort to my ratty old blond wigs, so it was time for a trip to the local wig shop once again. I had every intention of purchasing an exact duplicate for the one I lost. In fact I did just that. I also went ahead and purchased a second wig, the one you see pictured above, at the same time. It wasn't until I started laying out the clothes for this photo session when I found the missing wig. Apparently I really wanted to protect the wig so I carefully wrapped it up in one of my favorite skirts that I'd packed away for the move. With God as my witness, I searched high, low and everywhere in between looking for that wig but apparently I didn't unfold that skirt far enough to find it. So now I have two identical wigs plus a new one. My new replacement is still in the original box. I figured I'd keep it as a spare in case it every gets lost again. But now that I think about it, I might just take it back and see if I can't get one in a lighter shade.

Now the really big thing I wanted to mention was my new waist cincher. You can see it just below my bra. I've really wanted to get a good waist cincher and/or corset for a long time now. I've read enough to know that a good fitting is very important. A lot of the better retailers want detailed measurements to custom fit/make the garment just for me. Even if I could take the proper measurements, ordering it online and having it shipped to the house would be problematic. So I decided to make one myself. I had three nights to do it.

I've had this dream of making one for a long time now. A few years back I whipped up something simple out of some good strong denim from an old pair of jeans. It allowed me to practice with the sewing machine and demonstrate beyond a doubt the necessity of getting the measurements just right. This stuff doesn't stretch, so it has to fit right.

I read online a few articles on making your own corset. One site suggested wearing a tight t-shirt and wrapping one's self in layer after layer of duct tape to get the right shape. It felt absolutely wonderful as I was wrapping myself one wrap at a time. I'd never experienced the wonderful feeling of being laced tightly and it was simply marvelous. I felt my posture improving and an ever increasing feeling of support. It was quite intoxicating. I wrapped myself tighter than I ever thought possible and I loved every second. Now I was also trying to be very careful to take it slow and conserve my energy. The last thing I wanted to do was black out from a lack of oxygen. More than that, I was afraid that if I couldn't get enough air that I'd start to panic and there was simply now way I could cut this think off of me quickly, especially if my chest was heaving with gasping breaths.

Once fully wrapped, I did indulge myself for a moment and walked around a bit taking in the wonderful feeling. The next step was to make a cut down the front and peel the duct tape template off my body. I could clearly see that I'd captured the curves that I so desperately wanted. In order to transfer those curves to flat sheets of fabric I needed to make a few more vertical cuts into my template. I cut the template into eight equal strips a few inches wide. It was a trade-off between how accurately I wanted to capture the shape and how many seams I wanted to sew. Before cutting, I did one thing that really simplified things later on. I marked and numbered every cut line. I'd mark cut #4 with 4L and 4R just on either side of the line. I also marked each template with a number. Between the two numbering schemes I wasn't going to have to worry about getting them mixed up once everything was cut apart. With the templates fully marked and cut, I called it quits for the night.

For the cincher itself, I bought a few yards of heavy black satin material. I used two layers to double the strength and to make sure I had a nice smooth finish inside and out. I simply folded the satin with the back sides together and laid out each template on top. I would have cut out the material the first night, but I quickly discovered that my old scissors were too dull to do a decent job of it. I'd have to run out to buy a new pair the next day. It was a good stopping point anyway.

Any seamstress will tell you that the next part is critical. I laid out the template with a 3/8" seam allowance all around the template. Originally I tried to skip this part and simply trace the outine of the template itself leaving plenty of spare all around for the allowance. That would have been fine, but when it came time to sew the pieces together it was much easier to line up precisely cut fabric edges, than it was to estimate where the sew lines were and match everything up. Don't forget I was sewing four layers (two per template) at a time. I made one seam the hard way then I went back and cut the pieces properly.

I nearly forgot to mention, there was one place that I needed to extend the template. I knew that I wanted to add extra material in the back to allow me to open up the garment about 6" from the fully-closed position. I also knew that I'd need to have some extra material where I could attach the metal grommets on both sides. I decided to add an extra 10" just to be safe. This would give me my 6" opening and 2" per side to make folds for the grommets. I really wanted to be generous here. Better to have too much fabric than not enough.

The way I laid out the fabric, I never cut the back two pieces apart. I simply added the 10" of extra material between them and cut them out as one large piece that I sewed to the other ones. For each seam, I ran a single stitch down the seam line, and then with both seam allowances pressed to one side I ran a second stitch right along the edge to give me greater strength. Actually the front seam was different. I knew that I wanted to insert a zipper here so I simply basted a quick stitch down the front to hold the two parts together until I put the zipper in. This is when I discovered that the zipper I purchased wouldn't work at all. It was meant for pants or a skirt where the bottom of the zipper always stayed closed. I needed one meant for a jacket or something where the two halves completely separated. Oh well, it was a good place to stop for the night anyway.

On the third day I bought a good heavy zipper, it was a bit bulkier than I'd have liked but with that much force against it I didn't want to skimp. While at the fabric store I noticed a pack of 2" wide black satin trim probably meant as the border on a childs pillow. The border would be perfect for finishing the top and bottom of the cincher. With the materials in hand I had everything I needed to finish the cincher. With a closed seam I placed the zipper behind the seam and carefully stitched the zipper in place. Again I made sure to run two full passes on each side for strength. With the zipper in place, I ripped out the basting seam and watched the cincher open and close for the first time.

As added protection for the zipper I recycled something from an old long-line bra. The bra had a front closure with a series of hooks and eyes running up and down the front and this is what I recycled. It wasn't quite as long as I'd have liked but at least it would take some of the stress off of the zipper. To attach it, I simply closed the zipper, closed the hooks and eyes, and ran a pair of seams down both sides to sew it firmly in place.

A few quick passes on the top and bottom of the cincher and the satin border was in place. It really gave a nice finished appearance too. Once again it only added to the strength--always a plus. The last thing was to attach the all important grommets for the lacing. Here is where a previous project came to my aid.

Way back before I'd made the original denim cincher, I tried using a long-line bra as a cincher. I took some nice sturdy belt cording and ran a row of grommets down the length about 1" appart. All I had to do was to sew two strips of this stuff to the back of the long-line bra and ta-da I had a make-shift corset. Unfortunately the bra had too much stretch in the material and it just didn't work very well. But fortunately I was able to reuse the grommetized cording for my new cincher. I simply cut it out of the old bra/corset contraption and sewed it into the cincher. It worked perfectly. At long last I was able to lace the cincher and check it out.

Now completed, I was thrilled to see that it fit perfectly. It was a struggle to cinch it up tight enough to fully close it, but that's just what I wanted. I couldn't be happier with how it turned out.