Is it just me or is that a banana in your pocket/it getting hot in here? That's probably because it's June, but also because we have our next Autostraddle Calendar Girl ready for your hungry eyeballs! Guess who it is? Can you guess? I will give you a hint: if you were watching the Season 2 premiere of The Real L Word last night, you saw her in a scene doing this very photoshoot with Robin Roemer and the Auto-crew. We're excited for this one, y'all.
Here's something you need to know before you get to the good stuff:
You can buy our 2011 calendar for $5.
That's totally a super cheap sale price AND when you buy stuff from us it helps us keep going.
Also, if you missed any previous amazing Calendar videos made by the one and only Kelli Griggs:
Kelli & Ashley are January/February, Luna & Michelle are March and Julie/Brandy and Stacee are April and May.
Some background:
This is Round Three of Autostraddle's Lesbian Calendar Girls: talented, smart, charismatic, geeky and really-really-good-looking lesbianisty ladies. We make this calendar for you because you all really need to cut it out with your crushes on straight girls, this shit is out of hand, the last thing you need is 12 months of whatever Maxim & FHM come up with. REAL LIVE LESBIANS!
This year we're going to give you a video every month and just a few teases of what the actual photos will look like, so the Calendar will be chock-full of surprises. Are you excited? WE'RE EXCITED.
Our June lady is Francine Beppu:
Robin Roemer, on working with her good friend Francine Beppu:
I've had the pleasure of knowing Franny, Co-Founder/Director of Business Development at NamiWave, since we worked together at Logo years ago. She's a sweet girl, a great friend, a savvy business woman, and a really, really good time. After I asked her to be part of our calendar this year, I found out she was going to be a new cast member on The Real L Word. When the show's production company asked if they could film our shoot, we took every measure to make sure we found a location where they could work with us, made sure the girls involved during that part of the day were ok with possibly being in the background of the show, and did everything we could to accommodate their schedule so they could use our shoot as content.
Sadly, the Network removed from the final edit the one thing we asked in return: exposure for Autostraddle and a credit for using me or my images on air. I'm still happy to have asked the beautiful Francine Beppu to be part of this calendar, because with or without a reality show, she is a fabulous and unique addition to this year's calendar. I always knew she would make great TV and I'm excited to watch her on this season of The Real L Word.
Photographer Robin Roemer & Stylist Sara Medd
Here's Robin & Sara to explain a bit more about this year's theme:
The 2012 Autostraddle Calendar is our interpretation of the idea of a “lesbian image” without the traditional presentational definers of gender and sexual identity – when we (literally) strip away clothing, what do our naked selves communicate about who we are?
The 2011 calendar was about solo portraits of women who are brilliant, beautiful and courageous on and off camera; 2012 is about the amazing and vibrant community of queer women.
We sought to do something different this year by creating dramatic scenes and having the models interact with each other. We loved the idea of playing with identity in the form of masks, and the power that comes from choosing what to reveal and what to keep hidden.
Be prepared to see lots of skin this year in the 2012 calendar – but remember that it’s what we choose not to show that sometimes gives the most away.
We photographed a group of beautiful and diverse queer women both poolside and on various studio sets in Los Angeles. We’re excited for the monthly Behind the Scenes videos, where Autostraddlers can meet our sexy and inspiring calendar girls. (This being possible thanks to Videographer/Video Editor Kelli Griggs and Music Supervisor Stacee Coleman).
We hope you enjoy meeting the girls as much as we did!
Thanks to all of the amazing stylists, the production team members, and of course our brave and beautiful models.
We hope you love the results and look forward to purchasing your own 2012 calendar later this year in support of the project and of Autostraddle.com.
xoxo
Your devoted producers,
Robin & Sara
(Photographer & Stylist)
So here it is!
We present the Autostraddle Calendar Girl Behind-the-Scenes video for June:
To find out what happened on Sunday night's premiere episode, check out Riese's recap:
Episode 201 - Fresh Start Body Parts!
NSFW! Possibly not safe for a lot of things, really.
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Special Note: As of December 2010, the comments on Calendar GIrls posts exist to celebrate women, so any shit-talking will get deleted. Direct concerns about the project or website as a whole can be directed to robin at autostraddle dot com or riese at autostraddle dot com!
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