Sam Sanchez

I never throw away any photos. It’s a habit I’ve kept from shooting film. When I was reviewing the work, I found I liked Carina’s expression in this frame although it was underexposed because my stupid Yongnuo flash couldn’t recycle fast enough. It was partially my fault. I should’ve used fresh batteries but I thought the slight extra wait with the old batteries would be acceptable… until it wasn’t. We were working on a smeared lipstick concept and discovered you need to smear a lot of lipstick for the effect to show up. I worked only with brightness, contrast, and saturation adjustments and a wee bit of white balance. I added a little more grain to push the noisy look because I thought it looked cool. I like the subtlety of the smear and the skin textures. I think it’s a very sensuous image. Good thing I didn’t delete the original file. @samsanchezphoto

What can you do with a scarf? If you’re Darya, the answer is a helluva lot. She was able to create several distinct looks with that single prop. Now, that’s talent. @samsanchezphoto

I saw a picture of a model with blood on her hand making the shhh gesture. I thought it would be fun to make a similar photo. I contacted my favorite model and muse and pitched her on the idea. Carina was in. I did research on making fake blood and found a procedure with a minimum number of ingredients. I even tasted it to make sure she wouldn’t upchuck on set. That would take the shoot in a different direction. We agreed this should be the last concept we executed that day because of the mess and clean up. Carina dipped her hands in the blood and took it from there. She really brought the concept to life with her interpretation. I gave her little direction. What you see is her performance art. I just set up the lights and pressed the button. What she made is savage, disturbing, and erotic. I’m very impressed by her creative abilities and her can-do attitude. I’m very fortunate to work with an artist of her caliber. I decided to enter this photo in the PDN Faces photo contest. I saw the other entries and wanted to shake up the party (just a wee bit). @samsanchezphoto