Q & A With Albert Ortega

Q. Albert, you and I and your lovely wife Marina have been friends for several years, and all the Playmates I know who have worked with you have really enjoyed it, and are thrilled with your work. You recently shot some new pictures of Nicole Wood. What other Playmates are you planning new photo sessions with?

A. Thank you. I've had the privilege of working with quite a few Playboy Playmates, and it's almost always a great experience. Since a lot of them are either friends of mine, or close acquaintances, it can make for a fun day or night. I shot with Nicole in Atlanta and it was a lot of fun. My flight was more than an hour late getting in, so we had to work a lot faster than I normally like to, but we managed to create some great images. I believe you can see them at her website NicoleWood.net. She is a wonderful model to work with, and does incredible hair and makeup. I just finished shoots with Playmates Maria Checa and Angel Boris, and a new model named Iveth Cortez, who is getting a lot of attention from Playboy lately. I met her in a café in downtown Miami and got her started in modeling. She's part of the Latin Ladies pictorial for Playboy's July issue, and was flown to LA to shoot the accompanying video. She has also shot for the Special Editions. Keep an eye out for her.

Q. Tell us a little about your many sessions with "The Girl With the Bow in Her Hair," the ever-popular DeDe Lind.

A. There's so much to love about working with DeDe, and I am always amazed at the shape that she is in, and also how uninhibited she is. I've shot her on a public beach, as well as at a private home with a 120,000-gallon pool with five waterfalls. We shot a "behind the scenes" type of video for her, and she told me that it is her best seller. She even assisted when I shot Miss November 1975 Janet Lupo for one of my clients.

Q. You also work for the magazines Latin Sensations and Latin Supermodels. Do you work differently with the women who pose for these publications as opposed to working with the Playmates? Does their Latin culture make them more shy about showing their bodies?

A. Those are good questions. Latin women are traditionally brought up in very conservative households. While this may cause them to be shy about modeling nude or showing off their bodies, it also tends to make some of the girls want to break out of that protective shell and see what they may have been missing. As for the other part of your question, I really try to treat everybody the same. It sounds corny, but it's true. I'm really not too star-struck anymore. Maybe it's the result of being in the business of meeting and shooting so many women, combined with living in the Miami/South Beach area. Down here, you always run into a model or a celebrity. I've also had the pleasure of working with so many beautiful women -- and not all of them were models -- that you just learn that they are all just people on the inside. In fact, my male friends think it's crazy that I went to a party at the Playboy Mansion where there were so many models and movie stars and Playmates, and all I would talk about the next day was that I met Billy Idol.