some time ago, i received a call from the said company. apparently i had won a free makeover and facial, the customer service lady said and apparently she was called nadia too. hmmm. so, the lady was quite convincing, telling me that there were no need to pay for anything and i had 2 free shots. i didnt even need to bring my wallet down at all! she told me i could bring my mum down to do a shoot together but since my mum wasn’t free, i asked if i could bring tiger along. the lady said no immediately.
weird aint it?
so i did a bit of checking, googled, found some interesting stuff on blogs, forums etc and at that time i was thinking to myself, i better cancel the shoot after reading all the unsavourable news. but i decided to just go for it, afterall it would make a good blogging experience. lol.
so i found the company at circular road. infact it was really near to pitstop cafe. i have to admit, the place looks not bad. immediately a cute guy came over to chit chat with me and basically flirt and try to find out what i was doing. i was also made to fill up a form with my details and interestingly there was this column asking if i was working. in order to save myself from “hard sell”, i indicated that i was a student which was the truth. it seems that after finding out i was a student, they didnt seem as interested as before.
so i was introduced to my “nanny”. this person who will accompany me thruout it all. interestingly, we share the same name again. and yes, she wasnt the customer service person who called me. imagine! 3 nadias in the same building. zzz.
i was then brought to the makeup place. basically the first look would be casual and consist of the clothes off my back and the second look would be more elaborate. i can choose a dinner gown or one of the traditional gowns. i was a bit cheesed off at first because apparently nadia no. 1 had lied to me. there was no facial and i didnt know i was supposed to wear the clothes i was wearing. she told me the clothes would be supplied by them.
imagine if i had worn shorts and tee?! brrr. so simple light makeup was done and off i was to the “white room”.
there were quite a lot of people waiting for their turn so i spent say 20 mins waiting. thankfully i had brought my book and so i spent my time reading. basically the photographers were really nice. i was made to shoot in various diff angles and within 10 minutes i was done!
back to makeup. elaborate makeup and i had my hair done up. i looked damn old man. i was trying to find a kimono but apparently the one and only kimono they had was missing so i settled for the korean costumewhich i had to use a lot of pins to secure it to my body. (what is it called again?)
bad choice. they gave me super red lipstick and i couldnt recognise myself. yours truly usually just uses a touch of nude lipgloss. i felt super “ching chong”. i was asked to pose with an umbrella (!!!) and it felt very awkward for this look.
when everything was over, they kindly helped me tone down my makeup and removed the horrid bun.
then came the “difficult” part. they assigned another smooth talker to me. firstly we went thru the photos that i took, and he showed some photoshop magic. brrr. he then tried to sell to me the albums and when i heard the price, i immediately laughed. imagine, an album could pay for at least 2 of my university modules!!!! i think he got the idea and apparently he told me i was the first to laugh at him. lol! it was pretty obvious that i was quite firm and wouldnt budge and thus he let me off easily.
i myself was quite surprised too. lol. i expected more from them after reading all the horrid stories online. so i was given a choice of 2 digital images and rest were deleted right infront of me. tsk tsk so cruel.
it wasnt a bad experience overall but i would advise all ladies to be firm and not cave in to their hardselling.
here are the pics, no photoshop, just resizing and a border by yours truly. doesnt seem like anything special to me. (maybe thats why i was so firm). i didnt choose the traditional look for i looked horrid.
1st pic.
2nd pic.
i wanna take more pictures! (preferable foc/tfcd etc) hurhur. any lobangs? barf barf took some very nice pictures for me previously. heh i want more! 😛
nadnut’s overall rating:
not worth paying that amount of money. don’t be silly.
i went for something like this too! can’t remember if it was by this company though. they gave me 2 free shots too..
when they showed me their “photoshop magic”, i yawned and said “i can do all of these too…”
so i was let off! haha
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In fact, many makeover studios use the “get two free pictures” technique to try to bait customers. Then they put the pictures up in a computer and deletes it in front of you so that they can psychologically influence you in buying their insanely expensive picture.
Nadia, if you want free photography, you might want to look around clubsnap. These people are photography enthusiasts who are always looking for models for their photography practises. I dont think you will be paid, but you’ll get nice (and free) pics in exchange 🙂
This is one thread from the forum : http://forums.clubsnap.org/showthread.php?t=108488
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Haha the first picture is real cute!
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hello nadnut! been following your blog for a bit but never commented! =)
im glad you managed to get out of the “scheme” unscathed. (plus you got yourself 2 gorgeous shots!) seems like they’ve been pulling the same stunt everywhere tho. even got the call myself. but i didnt go down. haha.
cheerios!
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love the pics! but glad you didn’t get suckered into anything.
they actually called me as well but i wasnt free to ‘entertain’ them over the phone and they never called again. hur hur. but darn, i’d like to have ppl take nice shots of me foc too.. haha 😛
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You look really pretty in the pictures!! 🙂 This studio you went to called the Goonfather before. He scared off the telemarketer by insisting that he wanted to take “naughty” pictures since the name of the company is “Naughty by Nature”. Hehe!
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I’ve heard of this company before. Apparently they will force you to buy stuff and all. But at least you look nicey in the pics 😛
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they actually called me before. I also asked them if I could ask Monkey along, they said cannot. Ah well.
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Not bad leh the pics!
If I got that other lens I will also take picture for you again!
But no costume leh. 😛
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I to went for this so call makeover sometime in jun or jul….
The price is damn ridiculas…and something i won’t go again….
btw the pixz i got is on friendster…
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I think you ask Barffie to help you take pics better..
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I’ve received calls like this before.. and also
1) those calls that claims you have won something like travel / hotel stay/ etc. but need to go down and listen to a talk to collect it,
2) calls that offers you free spa / yoga/ facial session
3) calls that ask you to go down for audition etc.
There’s no free lunch in the world. Take it and expect to lose some time while they try to sweet talk you into buying their package. Or you could just tell them you are not free and not interested. I usually reject them straghtaway. =)
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