The Art Department is deep into working on the covers for Fall/Winter 2010-2011 and has moved from deciding directions on books and choosing artists right on to the fun part: photoshoots! Today yours truly was at the studio with the crew responsible for the Jaz Parks series by Jennifer Rardin (hey, Bite Marks is out now, don’t forget).

The next book in the series is lucky number 7, tentatively titled Bitten in Two. Jaz and her motley crew of vampire hunting/demon slaying/werewolf shooting misfits are in Morocco this time, hunting for a way to evict the evil spirit locked in the back of Jaz’s skull. If you haven’t read this series, it’s all action, ass-kicking, and one hot vampire. No swooning maidens here.

Anyway, back to the shoot. Cast of characters: Tim Hsu, series designer. Michael Turek, fabulous photographer. Renee Kille, patient and hard-working model. Italo Vasquez-Velasquez, stylist of vampire-hunters, assasins, and other bad-ass ladies. And me, art directing everyone (which pretty much entails sticking your nose into everyone’s business). Scene: Some Studios on 28th street, NYC. Props: army issue military knife, thigh holster, revolver, arm gauntlets, hot red dress, lots of gaffers tape.

What’s fun about a series is everyone knows their roles and the tone, and you just get to play. I don’t have the shots back from Michael yet, but we got some great shots. The last few books have been focused very much on Jaz Parks, ass-kicker, but we wanted to refer back to the earlier installments, which were more on the sexy side. So we did a lot of sexy-but-deadly, which is totally Jaz.

Enjoy some behind the scenes shots taken on the trusty iphone:

Reference material – you don’t want to accidentaly take too similar a pose.

Italo & Michael equipping and arming our model.

Tim demonstrating how to hold the knife and look mean.

Michael working his magic.

Checking the shots on the computer.

Tim playing with the props. As opposed to me, who never plays with the weaponry…

(actually from the Bite Marks shoot)