My work was my life, and my life was my work, and there was a kind of blur between reality and what was being created.

...you don't need to be technically great, because if you have a strong philosophy people will be moved by your pictures regardless.

Now I love the act of creating a new image. When everything comes together, it feels like ecstasy. It's like a climax.

I always like to meet the people I'm going to photograph. I need to have a conversation. I need to feel a vibe. I need to see what's going on in the person. I'm not just interested in physical beauty. I really need a personality.

I was never afraid of getting old. I remember being young and thinking, Wow, I can't wait until I'm older because I feel like everything is going to happen then. I don't want to sound pretentious or anything, but I'm always one of the first ones to say, "Let's try that."

I guess my work is described a lot of the time as very sensual and sexy. When I take a picture, I'm very focused on trying to discover something about a person. Or about an idea. I try to be quite successful at it.

I want to let [my photographs] be something that comes from the model in her own way. I don't want to take the models too much out of their own skin. I realized that I wanted to create a marriage between who the person was, the nature, the beauty in the figure, and how the models sat or posed themselves.