Click here to see the uncensored image.

Tired and stressed, with a to-do list as long as my arm (well, my forearm), and as many books as I’m allowed borrow from the library, I’ve just spent over an hour reading the MamaMia blog, a blog by former magazine-editor Mia Freedman.

It’s all the things I usually hate- questions about feminism, about raising children…hell, there’s a celebrity section along with a fashion section.

I should hate it, and yet there’s just something about it…

Maybe it’s the down-to-earthness. Maybe it’s the obsession with getting someone who’s actually eaten in the last 21 days on the cover of a magazine. Maybe it’s the fresh honesty.Maybe it’s the fact that she found a muscular women attractive, and made me envious of Jodie Marsh’s form, all in one post.

Maybe it’s the fact that my knee problem is back (again), and on top of that I’m stressed about how much work I have to do, and any distraction at all is a good one.

I shall re-visit in the morning (which will definitely make the stress worse) and decide…in the meantime, I seriously recommend you take a look. I have a funny feeling that Mia Freedman’s blog will stand tomorrow’s test, like when you roll over in bed after a night on the tear, expecting to see someone ugly, and instead you see someone gorgeous.

Any writer who can hold my attention for that long, and in topics I would usually hate, must be fantastic, and I suspect Mia Freedman is.

We are delighted to invite you to our open forum  “Ask Wicca”
Wicca is one of SL premier models – with a great deal of experience to share with you all – Runway, Live and print.
Here is your chance to ask her your burning questions and hear the interesting answers she gives to all others in what should be a fun and informative session.
Please join us at Fashion Institute Crystal Theatre on Sunday 22 November at 3pm

We are delighted to invite you to our open forum  “Ask Wicca”
Wicca is one of SL premier models – with a great deal of experience to share with you all – Runway, Live and print.
Here is your chance to ask her your burning questions and hear the interesting answers she gives to all others in what should be a fun and informative session.
Please join us at Fashion Institute Crystal Theatre on Sunday 22 November at 3pm

Rumour Market
Dean of Modeling

Piture Credits: Taliya Tarber

I saw this figure a while back before it was released and yesterday a friend of mine was in LA and asked if I was looking for anything…and here we are, another $110 out the door.

Seriously, WordPress really kills the quality of my images. Look at this difference between my computer and my blog.

inside Nov. 09 British Vogue

The new Kate Moss is Brazilian.  The first time I spotted her was in Nylon’s October 2007 issue, featured as a rising star.  Alice Dellal’s wild hair cut and foreign features caught my eye.  I also noticed Dellal was not as leggy as the average editorial model.  Still, the camera captured a strong presence and spirit.

I came across Dellal again in this month’s British Vogue. She has graced the pages of other magazines including Dazed & Confused, French Vogue, and L’Officiel. At only 5′5”, the Brazilian rebel has been deemed the new Kate Moss.   This title is fitting as Dellal has been seen out on the town with questionable company partaking in questionable activities not unlike Moss did in her youth.  Last year she replaced Moss as the new face of Agent Provocateur. Dellal’s style is also similar to the 90’s grunge of Kate Moss.  She champions cut off denim, floral minidresses, and chunky shoes.

Dellal is currently London’s it girl.  The boss of Britain’s fashion scene, i-D magazine, has shot 12 different covers, each featuring one of the “Best British Models.”  Dellal will make her official British debut with her cover.  The 12 models also include legends Kate Moss, Naomi Campbell and Twiggy as well as newcomers Agyness Deynand Jourdan Dunn.

Dellal was famous before she was famous.  Her mother is Brazilian model Andrea Dellal and her father is a millionaire and bodyguard to the stars.  Her friends include Pixie Geldof and Daisy Lowe, two of my favorite British models/socialites.  The three recently left Select Model Management to sign with Next.  It’s rumored Select was not a fan of the girls’ hard partying. But girls will be girls.  One of the biggest perks of fashion modeling is the social scene.

What I love most about this girl is her personal style.  The way people dress in their down time speaks mountains about a person.  Dellal pulls off the fierce haircut, combat boots, and leather details on the daily.  “I like my style. If people don’t like my hair, then they don’t have to book me,”  Dellal said on Vogue.com.  But it looks like that hair cut will be landing her a cover sometime soon.

“When I was seven, I caught my reflection in a spoon and though, ’Wow! I‘m ridiculously good-looking.‘”- Dellal in Nylon, Oct. 07

• Alice Dellal Bio [Modelina]

DAUL KIM. http://iliketoforkmyself.blogspot.com/

I can’t seem to conjure up anything besides mumbles and jumbles of my emotions. But one thing that I can say clearly without being emotionally distraught is that you’ve been such an inspiration and that you will always be remembered with fondness. bye love.

Foto originale: http://mgpspstock.deviantart.com/art/kassandra02-53987688

THIS CHICK ANNA SCHILLING WHO IS A HOT RUNWAY MODEL HAD A WARDROBE MALFUNCTION AND I DON’T CONSIDER MYSELF TO BE THE SLIGHTEST PERV, BUT HOT CHICKS ARE WORTH MY ATTENTION FOR A FEW SECONDS AND MAYBE ONE OF YOU WILL BE LOOKING FOR THIS INCIDENT AS WELL AND I WILL HAVE MY FIRST FOLLOWER.

Thanks Yuqin. This was a test shot done over the weekend for a new face at Jurong Park. Sunset behind the frangipani tree and an SB-600 on the camera left that the model held. One more good shot form this shoot. I’ll put that up another day.

source: fashion canvas, le français parisien

Rachel

Damsel in Distress. Or, DiD.

I really am trying to figure out the popularity of DiD. WiseGeek suggests the following:

One of the oldest themes in literature and drama is the damsel in distress, in which a young and presumably innocent woman is held captive against her will by an evildoer, or cannot free herself from a curse or some other psychological captivity. The only person capable of rescuing a damsel in distress is an altruistic hero figure, typically a knight in shining armor in Medieval literature. The roots of the archetypal “damsel in distress,” however, can be traced back as far as Greek tragedies involving young female mortals and their harrowing encounters with gods and demigods.

Although the “damsel” in damsel in distress may sound Germanic in origin, it is actually a corruption of the French word demoiselle suggesting a delicate young woman. In a literary context, a damsel would often be interpreted as a naive woman-child with few natural survival instincts or real world experience, perhaps a sheltered member of a royal family or an untraveled country maiden. A damsel in distress such as Rapunzel, however, might use her wiles to assist her eventual rescuer or lull her captor into a false sense of security.

One of the essential parts of a damsel in distress scenario is the heroic effort to rescue her. In many tales of damsels in distress, several would-be rescuers fail because they have ulterior motives of sexual conquest or otherwise lack the moral fortitude of a true knight in shining armor. The moral of many of these “damsel in distress” stories is not strictly about the rescuing process, but the altruistic reasons for the rescue. Evil must be defeated before the damsel can be released from its grip, and only the most heroic and purest of heart would have the power to succeed.

My guess is that in bondage related images the idea is that the “motives of sexual conquest” part of it is more likely to be the inspiration. People looking at these images can fantasize about what deranged thing they might be able to do to or with the damsel once rescued. Perhaps her will is so broken at that point she is willing to do anything. Perhaps she is so grateful for the release and rescue that she will do the same.

So, in a recent bondage shoot with Amy we broke out some wardrobe that was here in the studio and made an attempt to create some of these types of images. I really did not care for the results but then I took another look at them with the idea that if presented in a certain way, they might work out in ways other than what I had been looking at. In other images containing full nudity and rope work it has been my goal, for the most part, to present things in a suggestive manner. Once in a while there is more of a crotch shot than what I want to show in an image, but even with these I kind of try to keep it somewhat subdued. With an image like this:

It is pretty much all suggestive. She is clothed, areas of her body are somewhat revealed, she is apparently bound. From there, all of the people that are into DiD can use their imagination. Will she get out of this? Can she do it on her own? Why is she there like that? What evil plan did the person have in mind? Was it an evil plan or some kind of consensual arrangement and part of some scene?

So, my part here is to present this in a way that evokes those questions or emotions. Can I do it in a more artistic fashion or is it just the same old “some young babe tied up” kind of image.

Whatever it is, I’ll continue to try to figure it out and figure out a way that it could be presented in an artistic and less cheesy manner.

This is the 123rd post in our Celebrity of the Day series.

Nina Dobrev was born in 1989 in Bulgaria. She moved to Canada at the age of 2 and has lived in Ontario since then. From a young age she had a fascination and a talent for all sorts of arts from dancing to gymnastics to theater and visual arts. She attended the Dean Armstrong Acting School and it was here that she was discovered by agents.

She started off modeling and that eventually led to commercials. Then in 2006 she got her big break with roles in movies, made for TV movies and a recurring role on a television series. She has small roles in Away from Her, and Repo! The Genetic Opera.

She also got the role of Mia Jones in Degrassi: The Next Generation she started as a recurring role in season 6 then became a regular in seasons 7-8 and then by 9 she was limited to guest appearances.

She continued to take small roles in movies and lead roles in Made for TV movies but her only television role was on Degrassi. That is until 2009 when she was cast as Elena in The Vampire Diaries.

Though she had yet to be noticed for any of her film roles her television roles are likely to jump start her career if she proves to be a success on The Vampire Diaries.

To learn more about Nina Dobrev visit this fansite or IMDB.

Today will be a bit of some down time for me.  I have real life to tend to today.  I will also be writing a few blog posts and attending a few parties this evening.  So, modeling has the day off!  Huray!

Everyone needs to take a break and refresh, relax and recharge!

By the way, I was notified that I was successful with my casting last night and am invited back to the My Precious modeling group.

Yesterday was a bit unusual day for me in that I actually took a day to just do some photography for pure fun. Now don’t get me wrong, I LOVE what I do. I derive great pleasure from each and every photo session I do. The day I don’t enjoy it, or have fun with my subjects, is the day I need to stop taking pictures. But yesterday’s shoot was just a relaxing walk around Bearskin Neck, in beautiful Rockport, Mass. wandering around all the little shops, and homes, and exploring various nooks and crannies in the town. No pressure, no time constraints, no deadlines. My friend Jenny from Mindstir Photography had asked me if I wanted to do this a few weeks ago. She had no idea where we should go, and knowing she had never been to Rockport before, I thought it would be a great spot. I used to go there a lot a few years back, and it hasn’t changed at all since the last time I was there. Its a very quaint, old New England town, very picturesque, and also very touristy. It has a lot of charm, and the shops are fun to wander thru, I actually got a couple of great deals on some ladies hats for future portrait sessions! We were joined by Dave of Mere Image photography (it was actually his idea to do something like this)and it was a lot of fun meeting another photographer and watching how he did things and talking shop. The place was crawling with photographers yesterday as the weather was unseasonably warm for this time of the year. I didn’t have to wear a coat all day! I am not a very landscape photographer, as people are my favorite subject, but I was challenged to look at some of the every day objects in the town a bit differently and try to come up with some interesting compositions. I was able to grab a few impromptu shots of the very lovely Jenny, but a full blown portrait session was not in the cards for yesterday! I hope you enjoy this little walk around Rockport Mass. you can see a larger gallery on my flickr.

“The Corsa sits in the Vauxhall range like a zeppelin in the middle of central London. It just doesn’t fit in.”

I went to see a football match yesterday. It’s the second time I’d ever been to one, and if I’m honest, I wasn’t particularly looking forward to it. This had nothing to do with having to stand and stare at a field for 90 minutes. No, it was just the simple fact that I have the same interest in sports as I do in cultivating interesting bacteria, i.e. none whatsoever. But having said that, it was all in aid of a friend’s birthday so I dutifully pulled on my “hard-man” jacket and joined the others for an afternoon of watching an apparently beautiful game. Arriving at the ground was like walking into a different world. There were more people than I ever knew existed, all out to support the teams they would gladly die for. And the chanting was fantastic. The lyrics would have made Bono proud, and I swear we even got an around going at one point. Seriously, you’d have been forgiven for thinking you’d stumbled into a mass choir practice. It quickly became very clear that the fans were truly in love with football.

It genuinely amazed me how I could be in the very small minority who didn’t love this game. Billions of people all over the world are in love with it, so how can it be that I don’t find it remotely interesting? Surely I must be in the wrong?

This rather neatly leads me onto the subject of this morning’s column, the Vauxhall Corsa, a car that is loved all over the globe, but that I can’t help but despise. And before you chime in with “Well I don’t own a Corsa, so there,” let’s look at the facts. The Corsa is the second bestselling car in Britain for 2009, coming in just behind the new Ford Fiesta, so there are clearly some people who like it. Everyone I’ve spoken to who owns one has said that it’s reliable, economical and practical. So why then, do I start to retch whenever one rolls past?

Well for a start I don’t get the styling at all. It just seems to have been nailed together using pieces of other cars. The back end is curiously reminiscent of a Chrysler Crossfire, whereas the front seems to be the result of a drunken grope in the dark between an Astra and a Fiat Punto. It just doesn’t make any sense. The other question that immediately springs into my mind is who exactly is this car aimed at? Surely if you were looking for a relatively good Vauxhall you’d just cut out the middle man and go straight for the faster, more economical, better equipped Astra? Buying a Corsa knowing full well that you’re going to trade it in for the next model up is just daft. This is a perfect example of a car that’s been engineered for a specific demographic. Vauxhall has seen that they have a space for a car that looks a bit naff, doesn’t go very fast, and costs very little to make. They’ve then seen that younger drivers would like such a car. So they make it.

But even when they make it they include an options list that’s so bizarre in nature I’m surprised you don’t need a dictionary to understand it. They talk about the “life” option, which as far as I can tell is just another way of saying “standard.” And they go on at length about their huge range of engines. I’m telling you now, there are three options. There’s a 1 litre, a 1.2, and a 1.3. Now we all know that 1 litre is not going to get you anywhere. It barely provides enough power for you to move. And don’t even bother with a 1.2, because speaking as someone who’s owned a car with that particular engine, I can assure you that whilst it will get you where you want to go, it will also ensure that you get there very late. So that leaves you with the 1.3, excellent choice.

I can see why people like the Corsa. It is, on paper at least, a good car. And if the 15,000 of them sold in March alone this year are anything to go by, Vauxhall must be doing something right. I’m not sure, I may come round to the idea of the Corsa. It’s just that at the moment I don’t get why it’s there. There seems to be no reason to have one. If you wanted a small car that’s quite gutsy, go for the Agila. And if you want a bigger car for the family, go for the Astra. The Corsa sits in the Vauxhall range like a zeppelin in the middle of central London.It just doesn’t fit in.

So if you’re looking for a new car, just think twice about buying a Corsa. Yes it may be cheap and it may look alright from certain angles, but it just has no purpose, no presence, no sense of belonging. So think long and hard before you look at the Vauxhall brochure. Or better still, just stick with your old car and go watch the footy instead.

]]> http://agryn.wordpress.com/2009/11/22/philips-riches-covers/ Sun, 22 Nov 2009 08:08:16 +0000 Agryn http://agryn.wordpress.com/2009/11/22/philips-riches-covers/

I’ve seen a review of this collection praising the lavish belts, but there’s a bold phenomenon which I think that missed–these shoulder embellishments. Joel Escober, ladies and gentlemen.

Hari sabtu kemarin, saya dan Mbak Dyah sahabat saya, secara kebetulan menyaksikan sebuah fashion show di Pejaten Village. Itung-itung mengobati kekecewaan saya karena tidak jadi menyaksikan Jakarta Fashion Week. Sesi pertama dibuka dengan fashion show busana muslim dengan merk Ranti. Diperagakan oleh sekitar 8 orang model wanita.

Dari segi fisik, semuanya menarik dan memiliki kharisma masing-masing. Ada beberapa model yang wajahnya ‘familiar’. Sepertinya kami pernah melihat mereka di majalah femina. Ada yang berambut panjang berwajah oriental, berkulit putih. Lalu ada juga yang berkulit coklat (kami menyebutnya kulit eksotis), yang kontras banget dengan rambutnya pirang dan cepak. Sangat menarik. Ada yang berwajah manis, dan “baik-baik”. Dan model-model lain yang juga sama menariknya.

Nah, ada satu orang model yang paling mencuri perhatian kami. Ternyata saya dan mbak Dyah mempunyai penilaian yang sama. Mungkin karena kami sama-sama orang kosmetik. Si model yang satu ini bukanlah model yang cantik sekali, wajahnya biasa saja. Tapi ada yang luar biasa…. yaitu matanya. Ini yang kami tangkap pertama kali dari pesonanya. Bentuk matanya pun unik sekali. Matanya begitu “bicara” . Mimik muka nya juga mengesankan sosok yang “mahal”. Ditambah lagi dengan gerakan tubuhnya mencerminkan sesorang yang pemberani, kuat (jangan membayangkan tukang panggul yah? J), tegar, dan sulit ditaklukkan.

“Wah, bagus banget buat model iklan ya mba, “ kata saya ke Mbak Dyah.

“Iya, muka nya mahal”, jawab Mbak Dyah.

Akhirnya kami memutuskan untuk mencari tahu agency model ini. Dari situ kami bertemu dengan MarCom Manager Pejaten Village dan beliau  mengenalkan kami pada management yang memayungi model-model tersebut, bernama Portrait Management.

Di sela-sela fashion show, Revlon melakukan demo make up dengan produk eye shadow keluaran terbaru dengan warna-warna gelap bernuansa smoky eye. Mereka membawa seorang model sendiri untuk di make up. Usai make up, sang model diminta untuk memamerkannya ke audience, dan catwalk. Dari mata dan gerakan tubuhnya, tak perlu waktu lama untuk menilai bahwa dia  “tidak pede”, daya tariknya pun hilang dalam sekejab. So, saya tidak menangkap karakter produk yang tadi dijelaskan panjang lebar oleh presenter Revlon. Sayang sekali, padahal riasannya bagus.

” Itu model dari mana sih? Apa mereka nyomot BC nya yah (Beauty Consultant)”, kritik Mba Dyah.

“Mungkin”, jawab saya.

Hal ini semakin menegaskan bahwa pesona diri tidak dipancarkan dari cantik rupawan nya kita, dan bukan pula dari pintarnya kita membicarakan hal-hal tentang kita. Hanya dengan sinyal mata dan gestur tubuh, cukup menggambarkan siapa diri kita sebenarnya.