Photographer Spotlight - Robert 'Nix' Nickson and Myla Strange

 Nix and Myla are definitely an experience to work with. Their shoots typically have an edge to the sexiness, involving blood, heads not attached to bodies, or heavy machinery. I love photo sets that have a narrative, maybe because of my writer background. Every time they contact me with an idea, I'm super excited to jump on it.

Our first shoot tougher involved nuns, school girls, and heavy blood-covered chainsaws. While the photos didn't turn out due to some bad luck, the experience was hilarious and the story behind the shoot and their attitudes really encouraged me to continue working with them and I'm so glad I did.


Here are some photos we've worked on together with Rodrigo from Rue Morgue Magazine!

The redhead always wins! Photos by Nix, makeup by 3BArtistry

 Nix and Myla float between Detroit and Toronto (and possibly some other places) and have recently opened up their studio in Detroit, where one of our shoots was used as a major unveiling! This one:

Christmas Corpse! Photo by Nix

As a bonus, I never leave a shoot with them empty handed. Whether it's a gorgeous fascinator, a really lush Santa Hat, or even framed prints of our previous work, they really appreciate and support the girls who work with them.

Check them out, and give them love!

~ Red

Mardi Gras - Bacon Pancakes and Beads!

What did YOU do for Mardi Gras?

I didn't get a chance to chow down during the day, since I work some bar night shifts now. This generally means I get up at 2pm, get pretty and scoot into work by 5pm, and get home somewhere around 2:30am.

Starving.

The entire night I was handing out beads to lucky bar goers, even though it's not quite as crazy a party time here in Canada. I was also mad craving some pancakes, of course. It's not called 'Fat Tuesday' for nothin'!

Upon my arrival back at chez Red the boy creature had done himself well. I present you with Bacon Chocolate Chip Pancakes!

See also the bacon on the side? There was more, but it didn't make it to photo time. You can clearly see the evidence where I partially mangled a pancake pre-photo as well.

Pancakes are pretty awesome.


So what did YOU do for Mardi Gras?

Previous 2am pancakes made by the boy

~Red

Website Makeover!

Hello all!

If you've been near me in the past year (within hearing distance of my rantings), you may have heard me fretting, nagging, bitching, grumbling, hypothesizing, and plotting about how to make my website better.

Instead of bothering with hiring someone (I did attempt), I decided that, like all things that you truly want done, it's best to just do it your own damn self.

So I did.

Go see!

~Red

2011 in Review!

2011 was a whirlwind year for me, and now that it's at a close I finally have a chance to look back over what I've accomplished and what still needs to be done in the coming year.

This year I made the decision to roll with the punches and layoffs and try to manage a self-employed career involving burlesque and some of my other talents. I'm hoping I can keep that up in 2012!

Image from weheartit.com

Productions:

I produced two shows this year, and helped out with a few others. Ladies in Red was the first show of the year, at Cherry Cola's Rock 'N Rolla. The show went spectacularly, and I am so happy to have had a chance to work with the girls who have become a staple in my cast for producing. Also on this show was the debut of Izzy Ridged, aka Joey Arrigo who you may know from So You Think You Can Dance Canada. The drama following this show was disappointing and I found myself losing faith in the community due to the behaviour of some jealous people but it's best to ignore it and move forward, and that's what I did and will continue to do!

Babes in Space was another resounding success! My Star Trek vs Star Wars burlesque show sold out both nights of its show and received several positive reviews, as well as TV spots with Naked News and Cosmo TV. I'm so thankful to the audience and my performers for pulling out all the stops to make this show amazing, and to my friends who worked their pert asses off at FanExpo to help with the booth.

I've come to expect drama surrounding productions. Babes in Space was dogged by a very similar pair of productions by a group that had originally stated that they were aiming to promote and contribute to their community. Originally. I've removed myself from their association and the success of my event speaks for itself.

I've learned to guard my productions a little bit more seriously heading forward, and to consider those who I am making partnerships with more carefully. There are a lot of unscrupulous people that I simply do not need to waste time on. I will continue to surround myself with inspiring and talented people who don't feel the need to bully others to get ahead. Lead by example and all! Both shows were great success and moving forward with that will be my main goal!

Babes in Space group finale, photo by Chris Suppa

Shows:

I've had a chance to perform and play with a load of amazing people this year! The highlight was the recent show with my teacher Coco Framboise. Performing with Armitage Shanks and the whole cast was stellar.

The Toronto Burlesque Festival seemed to whip by this year and I really wish I had more of a chance to throw myself into the crowd! My performance on Sunday was both less and MORE stressful than performing at the beginning of the 2010 festival. Last year I was the Thursday opening act, and able to enjoy the rest of the weekend with the pressure off (though the pre-performance pressure was insane!). This year I had a load of other performances in my head and nervous anticipation leading up to the show! But the environment was great and I was in the first set so I got to see the rest of the performances. I was also able to write up the first few days of the festival for 21st Century Burlesque, and you can check out my diary over there!

Impromptease is probably my favourite regular show, both for the reason that its producers are brilliant, and the show is a ball of hilarity. I was also able to perform at Comedy Bar again, which was a bit nostalgic as that's the bar where I did my first burlesque performance!

Learning:

I was able to take quite a few classes this year, and I hope I can continue that into the new year. Coco's classes are a regular thing for me, and I was excited to take lessons from Burgundy Brixx and Jett Adore (whom I got to interview later). Through her I was also able to learn from Minnie Tonka and Armitage Shanks (who was brilliant, as usual).

Other classes I was able to take included a series of circus classes with my trainer through Centre of Gravity. I hope to focus more on my aerial skills in 2012, since quite a few things got in my way this year! I managed to make some progress on vocal classes with my sexy teacher, but due to time and cash I also had to let those slide. Again, something I want to pursue more responsibly in 2012! I also took some dace classes with Carla Catharwood, and though her idea of burlesque is at odds with mine (PussyCat Dolls style vs Strip Tease, which is a whole other blog post) she's an amazing dancer and a great teacher. I'd like to take more classes from her in the future.

A major class I took with the Hourglass Workout with Lyzabeth Lopez. This is a really hardcore women-only bootcamp focused on creating and enhancing an hourglass figure. I lost 15lb and about 15 inches over the course of the her classes, and made huge increases in strength. I'm continuing these classes in 2012, and you should too.

People:

I met some great people this year and furthered some previously existing relationships.

Toni Wallachy of Pink Panther Studios was a great connection and we've done amazing work together (and I hope to continue to do so).

Brook Alviano has continued to make some amazing costumes for me and others, and was indispensable with Kinky Biscuit (an upcoming star) during Babes in Space and the insanity there.

Tatiana of Spanish Fly Films has been incredible at filming and editing some amazing trailers, and I've got a load of work for her in the new year!

Coco Framboise stepped in near the end of the year and has been amazing, despite her busy schedule.

Kinky Biscuit, Toni Wallachy, and Tatiana in Windsor

I've learned a lot about how to keep positive influences close and disregard the negative ones that come out, and I'm going to try to get better at this in 2012.

The Future!

2012 already has a ton of things underway. I've been running in circles throughout December trying to get moving on projects that don't have dates yet. Of course, without dates, I have nowhere to go!

I'm really excited for the productions I have lined up for the new year! You can expect another Babes in Space from me some time around FanExpo. I will also be coproducing with the amazing Toni Wallachy of Pink Panther Studios , and have another show in the works with another infamous (and dapper) colleague that I'm incredibly excited about.

My monthly show is an experiment that will be launching February1st (stay tuned for more news!) and I have plans being made to attend Miss Exotic World in Las Vegas during the summer, and BurlyCon (finally!) in the fall.

With my passport renewal underway I'm excited to explore performance opportunities across the border and maybe even overseas!

That being said, obviously production is a major push for me this coming year. I'm hoping to continue my streak of sold-out shows! No pressure.

With my employment situation transforming from corporate salary to self-run business, I'll be looking for multiple opportunities to expand my social media clientele and taking some time to teach myself more tips and tricks in this area. Even though I feel I'm strong in this category, I'm all about staying on top of learning!

This blog will be undergoing a mini-makeover with some expansion into advertising, and I'm hoping to push forward on my Youtube page as well! My website needs an overhaul. This'll be a top priority for me.

As for my performances, I would like to audit my current acts and work on 'upping' their 'wow' factor. Less acts, higher quality! There are two festival style acts that I have buzzing in my head, and I'd like to refine my plane act as well.

Basically, more more more for this coming year!

Here's to 2012!

~ Red

Vanity - Fan art! Cameron Stewart strikes again!

History has been made!

I present to you, and amazing piece of fan art from the brilliant Cameron Stewart!

I received this piece a few months back, via email, and with my moving and shows and general insanity-of-life, I never had a chance to post it!

Cameron Stewart can be found at His Blog! with more art!

A bit of a bio, clipped from his blog (and wiki):

"Cameron Stewart is the Eisner Award-winning and Shuster Award-winning illustrator of Batman & Robin, Seaguy, Catwoman, The Other Side, Seven Soldiers: The Manhattan Guardian, The Apocalipstix and Sin Titulo!" (Winner of the 2009 "Outstanding WebComic Creator/Creative Team" Shuster Award and the 2010 "Best Digital Comic" Eisner Award)

I love art!

~ Red

The Kitten Edition

Like many a burlesque dancer out there, I have fur-babies. Kittens. Kittletts. Often called Boogers. They eat my boas and push sequins off the table, but they are little drag queens in fur coats, and my cuddly buggers, and this post is going to show you them.

Photo by Ken Lam from our Get Your Makeup Did event

Blaise, on the left, is a bit of an evil bastard. He was adopted in August 2005, and he's almost six. I can't say enough good things about the Brampton Animal Shelter where I got him. Pym is the terrified little tabby 'n white on the right. He's generally shy as hell until night time rolls around...when he becomes a squeaking monster demanding pets.

Blaise came fully kitted out with a free vet check, pet insurance, shots and his bits snipped. Interesting extras included a full set (20) of pointy knives on each toe, and obscenely large teeth.

Witness the toothy fiend! Yes, that's my toe on the right. He chompers actually stick out under his cheeks, like a modern sabretooth. He has a great many habits, for example: in the fall/winter one of the most likely places to find him is behind my laptop, kicking the back and clawing at my fingers as I type. The motor's warm, I suppose. I've gotten used to the possibly-unsettling reality of this face:

Mostly, our relationship is like:

Blaise and i tend to get along on a 'fuck that noise' level. We both have the same tolerance levels, but since he's a cat he tends to forgo diplomacy and is able to be a ratbastard whenever he likes. I love him for it. He has his cuddly moments, as I do, and he's pretty insistent about being given attention Right Now, whenever that 'now' may be. Must be nice to be a cat.

Pym, on the other hand, is a sweetheart and hella skittish. He was adopted 'by accident' from a pet store that was not supposed to sell kittens. Unbeknownst to me, they had foster kittens in the store one cold November, 2005. I walked in to get Blaise some treats and this little 5 month furball meow'd at me...but no sound came out. The sales lady told me he'd been found nearly frozen, half dead under a wheelbarrow.*

I took him home.

He still has a broken meow. It comes out as a squeak, or a trill, or a really weird sound. I've hypothesized his possible alien origins. He's a little over five years now, and he's calmed down quite a bit from his initial shyness. Night time is always the time he creeps out and pretends he wants you to pet him. By the time you get into bed he will force you to pet him.

And after force-pets, he will burrow if given the slightest chance.

Action shot!

He's had a few (costly) issues with his bladder/kindeys lately, and the trips to the vet haven't made him too pleased with me. I had to rush him there for an overnight stay on the eve of Toronto's Strip Search 2010. A hefty bill later, and he's fine. I watch him like a hawk now, and he's fine if caught early.

Besides, look at this face. Could you resist?

This is often why I'm
late for work

Many pets are little performers in their own rights. I'm pulling together a post for the future, detailing the lives of performers and their pets. If you'd like to be included, please email me a picture of you and your pet at sspernicious (at) gmail .com with your stage name and your pets' name. Any critter will do!

Go hug your fluffers!

~Red

*I'm positive they use this backstory for all their foster kittens. It works.

Red Hairring

How many of you have a favourite product? Something you use all the time? Something that you would be incredibly put-out should they discontinue it? And then they do?

Ugh.

Lush does that all the time, the most recent being Sweet Japanese Girl, a face bar I swear by. Gone.

Poof.

Feria did the same thing to my hair dye. But while I've found a replacement for Lush's face bar, I have yet to find a box dye comparable to R76 and it's frustrating. Everything is too dark, or not saturated enough, and I've been hemming hawing over what I'm doing next. The logical decision?

Off to the salon I go!

Yes yes, girly. I know. I'm not at salons very often. Dying your hair red means you're in for regular upkeep, and I can't afford the pro treatments every four-to-six. Even though I am a redhead by nature, it's not exactly fire engine red.

Here's me before:

I'm getting the full treatment, thanks to a few phone calls and meetings. Daddario salon is half-sponsoring me in exchange for appearing on their website. Soon, with my reddened hair and a new set of extensions, I will be posing all over their online domain (one page, realistically).


I've had my hair done at Daddario before with my last extensions, and I keep coming back whenever I get the urge for a 'salon experience' (about twice a year). It's a great little studio on the second level of Yonge St. and features a pretty blonde on the front poster ( Hi Brittnee!), and a headless blonde inside...


And then there's Timothy, my favouritest hairdresser ever. He listens, he makes suggestions appropriate to my look (and not his preferences), and doesn't insist...like some hairdressers I've dealt with in the past. And he's fierce...I mean, come on:


After we're all said and done here I'm going to take a look through my contacts and send over some pictures of girls 'for approval' on their website. In theory they pick the girls, do up their hair for a huge discount, and boom: salon feature.

Now I just have to remember how to deal with a full mane like this!

Tim's a ghost! Ninja-hairdresser! Whoosh~!

This is Why I'm Hot

A bold title; self-centered, and probably a bit presumptuous, but this is an introduction to me, and as such I think ya'll should be informed of a few things before we go any further: bold is the tamest adjective that can be used to describe me.

Needless to say, I build my reputation on keeping my mouth open (and my fingers moving on the keyboard) no matter what may come out. Sometimes I consider it a public service: the ability to say what everyone else is thinking. Sometimes I figure I'm just a bitch.

But this is getting ahead of myself. It's painting a terrible picture of a 'fiesty' (another tame adjective) redhead without any background.

Why am I difficult? What could I possibly know about anything I'm writing about? Where the hell is my nerd-cred?

People have been asking me the first question for as long as I can remember (and with varying tones of annoyance). There’re too many answers for that one. Primarily I think I'm difficult because it's fun. The other two questions have answers more explanatory than my hedonistic (and sometimes sadistic) enjoyment of shenanigans.

I was always a nerdy little thing. Growing up as an only child, whose only friends were books, will do that to you. I moved around a lot, I read way above my level (stole my father's sci-fi before he'd finished it, causing trouble at a young age), and I began that wonderful pilgrimage to the mountain of seclusion so many nerds undertake.

My youth was filled with the high marks stereotypical of someone who has few friends and little to do other than peruse the Discovery Channel, the library, and—when the internet made its debut in the 90's—search engines like HotSpot and Ask Jeeves. I plundered it like words were my rum. I was round, bucktoothed, and isolated...with the happy armor of biting wit and stinging sarcasm to cover up my squishy insides.

In this time I wrote fanfic, cosplayed, traded pokemon cards, obsessed over fandoms, attended conventions, played MMORPGs, and ran a webcomic that made its way into the Toronto Star.

There came a time during my last year of university where I got sick of my exterior not matching the heat my tongue could spew at a moments notice. I dropped forty pounds, had my teeth fixed, and suddenly became a model.

The transformation took a little longer than that, but you get the gist.

So what does that mean for me now? Well, as one of those girls who was picked on or ignored as tormentors saw fit, who eventually found solace in nerdy things like books, comics, anime, and video games, I have my nerd-cred. It's hard won and well defended.

My life as a model, while making a good chick-lit title, is full of the amusement that comes from having the 'outside' perspective for so long. So I'm kind of pretty now? Great. I still get self-conscious around girls that have been pretty their whole life. You know the ones. I still spout vitriol at a moment's notice, often to the surprise of those who peg me as a ditzy 'pretty' type. It’s amazing the 180 that people do when suddenly you're aesthetically pleasing. I still read, I still write, and I can and will still kick your ass at half the nerdery you toss me.

Being suddenly pretty isn't all it's cracked up to be. There I was, undergoing an identity shift, and I was alone. I made full use of all the dating opportunities known to me, after a break from a few long relationships that were more stifling and needy than actually fulfilling in any sense. I got into the morally murky entertainment scene. I got out of the morally murky entertainment scene, only that much more bitter for the endeavor (but with a lot of hilarious stories, in retrospect). Now I'm back in the less murky waters of modeling, with the occasional music video or public event under my stylish belt, and regular burlesque shows around Toronto to balance it out.

So what do I do now? I work like anyone else does, I have the occasional photo shoots, I do PR events for nightclubs, I dance whenever I can (no matter who's watching), i twirl some tassels, and I coddle my cats more than is likely healthy.

Along with my nerd background and my modeling photos, I come from a life where I've tried everything. I grew up on a farm (with the boys) and I've taken every opportunity that I've come across to learn something new, mostly in the hope that I'd find my niche. I don't know if I have yet, or if anyone really has a niche. So far I'm just having fun. I've become less and less concerned with fitting in, and more and more content with who I am.

Mind you, I still think my thighs are fat.

So, enough about me...let me give you an overview of what sort of opinionated ramblings you can expect here. For now I think I'll be limiting this blog to three broad topics, as follows:

Burlesque: As a new performer on the Toronto circuit I'm certainly not a big fish, a fat cat, or the top dog...but if you get me enough rhinestones I'll happily dress up as any of them.

Food Reviews: I've only been in Toronto a little over a year, and in that time I've found quite a few places that I drag friends to. Now I have a larger audience, and I'm going to make sure everyone here knows about the places contributing to my gym time. You can buy me a drink if you see me there.

Strange Stuff: Everyone knows there're ghosts in Toronto. No one knows where. Or maybe you do. If you do, email me and I'll write an article about it. This section will be for local haunting, odd occurrences, psychics, occult stuff, and generally weird news. Of course, this'll be written by a skeptic and a writer with the educational background to know the difference between a good story and possibly legitimate freaky business.

My final topic will be a controversial approach to dating advice...

How Not to Suck: Having gone through all modes of dating, on both sides of the sexual fence, I feel that I'm equipped with a vast knowledge of why people suck. This series will be directed at men, guys, boys, and dudes. Women may find it interesting or amusing. Things covered may include 'Why You Cannot Touch Her Breasts', and 'How Webcamming Your Penis Can Come Back to Haunt You.'

So there you have it. I'm going to be difficult and loud, and you're just going to have to deal with it. I've been told I'm a sweetheart, really deep down, and I suppose in my search for love and my quest for good food, I am. I'm not quite sure where the ghosties come in (haunted bakery due to unrequited love?) but we'll get that figured out as we go along.