Welcome to my official website! I am so excited about my co-starring role in Capturing the Elements: Forks, a new photography DVD now available on Amazon!

We have received a tremendous response about The Ultimate Beauty Pageant Notebook, my first published book series written exclusively for beauty pageant contestants. Thank you everyone for all your positive comments and support.

Scroll down to see the latest entry in my private photo diary, where you can read all about my most memorable modeling adventures, and view favorite photos from my career in commercial and fashion modeling. Enjoy, and thank you for visiting!
-Cherie

Photo Diary: Maxim Magazine

There are moments in every model's career that create lasting memories. From the casting to the booking to the photo shoot, everything about working with Maxim Magazine was memorable. I was called to meet with the art director by my parts modeling agent, who told me I was one of only a couple models that were being considered for the shoot. At the time Maxim was a fairly new publication, and it was rapidly growing in popularity. The magazine was already becoming recognized for its smart and sexy covers that featured well-known celebrity personalities, and the walls of their Manhattan offices were adorned with bigger than life versions of these covers. It was pretty amazing to see, and admittedly it made me a little nervous, but more excited than anything - I really wanted to book the job and become a part of the history of this publication. Luckily, the art director did choose me for the shoot and I was all set to be photographed by New York photographer Frank Veronsky.

Now, we've all heard of black and white and read all over. Well, for a while there it seemed every time I did a photo shoot in New York people wanted to make me red! I was starting to think there was a big sign that said "paint me red" written on my forehead. And while this polaroid from the Maxim shoot is reminiscent of my previous photo shoot with Finch Paper, the red body effect was actually created through lighting and not full body makeup. What you can also tell from the polaroid is that the front hand and the camera prop are well in focus, while the bottom half of the body is blurry. That's partially because I was instructed to wiggle my bottom half like a go-go dancer while keeping my upper torso (along with the extended arm and hand holding the camera) completely still - not an easy feat.

Perhaps the most memorable part of this shoot was what you can't see in the polaroid - and something on a more personal level. If you look really closely at the lower right hand corner of the tear sheet you can see a tiny bit of my at-the-time brand new bikini line tattoo making its professional debut - kind of a no-no for parts models. I guess the rebellious side of me had briefly shown itself, and I had acquired this lovely piece of body art just days before the Maxim booking came along. Talk about bad timing! Fortunately the photographer didn't mind. In fact, he thought it would be so minimal in the outcome of the shot that they didn't even try to cover it with makeup. What a huge relief!

The final result was a great piece of product advertising, a nice addition to my parts modeling portfolio, and a wonderful memory of this New York photo shoot. What fun it was to work with Maxim!