In February, I wanted to do something fun, Valentine's inspired, and very PINK! I had come up with this initial concept back in October 2020, but didn't have a fully developed vision yet. Luckily, I knew exactly where I wanted to shoot and what I wanted my Barbie girls to look like. Once I knew that, it all came together very quickly.
How did my Barbie World come to life?
I started with the tried & true method of a Pinterest board. I knew I wanted my 3 Barbie girls to be 3 genres of person. One would be sporty, one would be schoolgirl/Clueless inspired, and the other would be the classic embodiment of Barbie. With that in mind, I went pin crazy.
Once I knew what the vibe was, what the outfits would be, and the overall themes, I reached out to my models. This was going to be a collaborative shoot where we split the studio cost, they purchased/put together their own outfits based on my inspiration, and got the photos in return. Because of this, I sent each of my models a huge paragraph outlining my plans, where we would shoot, tentative dates, and the inspiration board so they could decide if they wanted to be a part of it. Luckily for me, everyone was super excited to be a Barbie for the day.
Feel free to check out all of our Barbie models on Instagram:
Sporty Barbie- Mercedes (@mercedesbiscotti)
Schoolgirl Barbie- Lauren (@spicypimentobean)
Classic Barbie- Tati (@radashulya)
My materials
I went hard in the pink for this photoshoot. I knew I wanted HELLA props to make this very pink and fun. Here's a full list of all my props seen in this photoshoot:
The Actual Photoshoot Experience
I booked the Rose Studio at Rose Studios LA. They were so nice and super thorough in their explanation of parking, expectations, and what they were providing. I would absolutely book with them again.
The only critique I have is just that the pink set itself required a lot of touchup in terms of the paint and flooring just to make it look picture perfect. Besides that, absolutely loved everything about them. We had a lot of fun shooting this & I think you can absolutely tell in all the photos. You can also find some behind the scenes clips on my BTS highlight on Instagram.
I shot this with a mixture of natural light from the studio windows & two strobes provided by the studio. It is super easy to recreate this lighting simply with two light sources to make sure your model is lit evenly from both sides. I didn't really want them all together in many shots as I wanted them all to stand alone as their own version of Barbie.
More BTS content can be found in my Reel. Click here to see the whole process.
Editing
I know social media is heavily focused on natural editing, but these girls were meant to be Barbie girls in a Barbie world, meaning they needed to looks as perfectly plastic as possible. I focused heavily on making them look as social media ready as possible with skin touchups, as well as background touchups to make sure everything felt like the Barbie dreamhouse.
The Final Photo
I really enjoyed creating a lot of meaning and symbolism of how incredibly diverse women can be during this photoshoot. The response on Instagram was so positive & I will definitely be using these in my portfolio for a long time!
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