"NANGWAYA The Warrior"

Here's another project dealing with a specific concept and featuring a fellow actor who was looking to beef up her portfolio with varied characters, looks & personalities for the benefit of future casting opportunities.

I had the idea of a character who lived in a post-apocalyptic world. One who, after global chaos & a war broke down society as we knew it, fled to the countryside & other remote areas of the nation in order to survive. 
She had no choice but to be strong & almost ruthless in order to make it in this new, hostile world.

After some creative thinking, I came up with a look, a backstory to her character & an African name which means "don't trifle with me". I named her "Nangwaya".
Location for a shoot like this had to be important as it needed to be credible. I chose a location which is about 1.5 hours west of Chicago by the name of Starved Rock State Park. 

It was a bit of a hike on rugged terrain and on what turned out to be a pretty warm day but we soldiered on and were able to bring the concept of Nangwaya to a very cool reality. Working with either professional models or actors helps tremendously in making that concept-to-reality transition happen as they typically are accustomed to taking direction and are able to pull emotions that are more challenging to an ordinary, untrained individual.

I was very happy with the results, as was my actor, and I'm thinking I may develop this into a longer story at some point as I do want to know what happens with her. Stay plugged into my website and/or blog for news on any new "episodes" of the Nangwaya story. ;)

Thank you for reading. Enjoy these images.
See you next time!
-Mario
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